"we need to throw everything we have into these elections, and then some"

Agreed.  Forget 10 million.  Take 20 million.  Take 30.  Take until the bank stops giving.  We need to capatilize on this, pronto.

I agree with taking 10 million...BTW is this the last batch of the MW polls...we have to wait like another 2 weeks or never for the next 2006 polls?

Push them hard! Do it NOW and we can break them!

  Bean is up by only three, but is an incumbent.  Hall, Maffei, Massa, and Gillibrand are up big, but are challengers.  Message to Bean: you should have run left, not right.  You might have at least run against Bush.

Note: these came out right after Chris swept through upstate, so this may just be a bump due to his influence in the area.

Rochester Turning - turning the tide upstate

I'm literally dancing at my laptop over the idea that Kelly (NY-19) may soon be a-gone! There's a core group of us who have been working on this race since Feb. 2005 and it's nice to see some of that work start to pay off.

Not really. It's a whole new ballgame now. Schumer and Emanuel wanted to dump lots more money into targeted races, while Dean wanted to grow the party geographically. Now, though, it seems everyone's on the same page: throw tons of money all over the country and expand the playing field.

It's not so much that folks are coming around to Schumer/Emanuel's plan; it's more like events are speeding up Dean's plan.

Those are really, really stunning numbers in NY, btw, but it sort of bears out what I'm seeing on the ground. The NYGOP is in total meltdown. There are no signs, no volunteers, nothing. It's stunning, breathtaking to see.

I've been watching all the polls in NY.  While these seem a bit too positive they do show a continued trend in NY.  I don't think i've seen one poll in 3 months that hasn't supported a strong trend for the democratic candidates.  Not one has shown a gain anywhere for a republican.  

its encouraging to say the least. .  Now, let's hope we don't have any freak snow storms on the 7th.

LOL at the GOP spin machine.  Contrast these independent polls with the GOP internal polls that were released today:

NC-08: Hayes 49 - Kissel 33 (GOP +16 vs -7 in last independent - Public Op Str)
CO-05: Lanborn 49 - Fawcett 32 (GOP +17 vs tie in last independent - Basswood Res.)
NJ-07: Ferguson 48 - Stender 33 (GOP +15 vs +2 in latest independent - Tarrance Gp.)

I don't doubt that the GOP leads in at least some or possibly all of these districts (these are all districts where GOP incumbents were heavily favored at the start), but these polls are just stupid.  Are these the results of their push polls?

actually I do remember his list, and I remember what he said in interviews back during the summer and yes, he did want to narrowly focus on a small number of races. This was as I remember from an article in the NY Times, and around the time he was promoting his book early on.

Great news!  I've been waiting for some news on NY-29.

I suspect we'll all be singing Elvis' "Blue Chrismas" soon!

but either way, aren't ALL these races targeted?

They are now!

Seriously, though, Rahm did want to go the traditional route of deciding on the target races and states, pour resources into those areas, and make the marginal improvement that way, taking a narrow Congressional majority through winning swing districts.

Dean, otoh, thought that that strategy was responsible for the decline of the Democrats in many areas around the country, and wanted to spend money all over the place in a long-term party-building effort. He thought that spreading the DNC money around the country hiring organizers would benefit the party long-term and create a permanent majority some time down the road.

In all fairness, what's happening now is neither of their plans. It's just that events have conspired to make the entire country a battleground, so that Rahm can spend in battleground races and Howard can spend all over the country, and they both mean the same thing.

"This chocolate tastes great in my peanut butter!" "This peanut butter tastes great on my chocolate!"

I wonder about these polls.  Yesterday another poll had Sweeney slightly ahead of Gillibrand in NY 20, and today she is stomping his ass 54-41?

I'd like to believe it, but I'm more inclined to wait for the actual results on the morning of Nov. 8.

Actually yes, Rahm was arguing loudly six months ago that this was a "historic opportunity" to permanently change the balance of power in the house. Dean blew him off.

Imagine if Dean had had the foresight to take Rahm's advice and invest in a solid ground operation six months or a year ago. Instead of a hail-mary last ditch borrowing for TV ads we could have made serious progress at cementing a Democratic majority on the ground.

Now even Chris Bowers supports Rahm's strategy, spend what you have to for a win now in 2006 and that will win the long term. To bad he doesn't have the grace to admit it, or the faith in the American People and the Democratic message to have taken the risk.