Look, it’s Obama’s approval ratings over time! Right right right, whatever, who cares, etc. We just wanted to share Marc Ambinder’s full analysis of this: “This: well — it’s been a month of sausage making, and as we learned in July, when the sausage is in the oven, Obama can’t escape the taint of partisanship that Americans seem to be rebelling against.” That’s disgusting, Marc, whatever you wrote. [Marc Ambinder]

A new poll from Zogby (grain of salt!) shows Arkansas Democratic Sen. Blanche Lincoln slightly ahead of her possible 2010 opponents for the moment, but when people are asked how they would vote if Blanche Lincoln voted for health care reform, she is losing by double digits. Televised pundits and such will see this and scream about how Blanche Lincoln simply CANNOT afford to support health care reform now, IT WOULD BE POLITICAL SUICIDE! MORE »

Oh do make sure to help out Dr. Ron Paul by voting in his who should be my Vice President when I am President poll! Look at all the completely random former novelty politicians and immediate family members there are to choose from. [RonPaul via Hit & Run]

It has been some time since we used to liveblog election results every single Tuesday for months at a time, so let’s do it tonight, on “Election Day 2009,” which has brought about as much excitement and suspense as the May 3, 2008 Democratic primary in Guam. The powers-that-be, like dicks, have constructed a system in which Virginia polls close at 7:00, New Jersey polls close at 8:00, and New York polls close at 9:00. We will start here at 6:45ish and just cold motherfuckin’ type all night long. CNN has definitely issued a release promising NINE MILLION ANALYSTS for its panel tonight, and you cannot miss any of them! Now go stock up on alcohol & guns and return for ridiculous insanity-typing that, we promise, will only be tangentially related to politics.

Here’s a wacky poll from the Facebook over the weekend. The Secret Service were informed and are now looking to kill the shit out of someone, perhaps the person who created this poll. MORE »

• LIKELY VOTERS IN NORTH CAROLINA, A BLUE STATE: “Public Policy Polling also asked those surveyed whether they consider Hawaii to be part of the U.S. Five percent said no, and 3 percent said they were not sure.” What is this “consider” business? [News & Observer]

Oh ho ho, read this and you might think our political system has been GRIDLOCKED or something for the last 20 years! “Most Americans continue to want the federal government to focus on reducing the budget deficit rather than spending money to stimulate the national economy, a new New York Times/CBS News poll finds. Yet at the same time, most oppose some proposed solution for decreasing it… MORE »

Hey, a new survey about things people don’t know: Gallup asked some random selection of Americans who haven’t had their phones shut off to rate nine major federal agencies they may or may not have heard about, on the AM radio. The results are … bad news for, let’s see, Ben Bernanke? Sure! MORE »

Birth control? The spork? Caucuses? The labradoodle? The Volkswagen Thing? Democracy? Drip irrigation? Unmanned drones? [CNN]

Gee, usually when married people publicly confess to having a hot dirty sex affair with some person they’re not married to, folks stand up and cheer! But for poor Senator John Ensign, it has only made him less popular. How exactly are he and fellow Republican adulterer Governor Jim Gibbons supposed to defeat the Mormon saint Harry Reid when they can’t get voters to like them? MORE »

Hmm… we’re not going to offer our opinion on the matter until we hear what Bill Kristol has to say about this. [CNN]