What happens when you have a Republican Governor running for reelection whose approval spread is 40 percent positive/58 percent negative and a favorable spread of 43 percent positive/53 percent negative? In the case of Matt Blunt in Missouri, you've got an incumbent in a lot of trouble. Take a look at the results from the latest Research 2000 poll out of the Show Me State commissioned by The St. Louis Post-Dispatch and KMOV-TV:

Blunt (R)Nixon (D)Research 2000
11/12-15/074251Rasmussen Reports
10/10/074443Rasmussen Reports
8/23/074346SurveyUSA
7/24-25/0738575-Mo. Ave
7/24-11/15/0741.849.3

The numbers we're seeing out of this race seem to generally gibe jibe with voters sentiments around the country. Looking at the breakdown of the race between Blunt and longtime Democratic state Attorney General Jay Nixon, the latter leads by a remarkable 59 percent to 32 percent margin among Independent voters. While the margin of error for this subgroup is higher than the overall 3.5 percent margin of error for the entire poll (as it is for other subgroups), this massive Democratic lead among Independent voters is nonetheless noteworthy. Nixon's lead here is not too dissimilar to the Democrats' 57 percent share of the nationwide Independent vote in House elections in 2006, and it is quite a bit better than Democrat Claire McCaskill's 51 percent to 43 percent win over Republican Jim Talent among Missouri's Independents during her win in the state's 2006 Senate election.

If Democrats nationally can do as well among Independents as Nixon is doing in Missouri -- and a recent Pew poll suggests Independents are indeed more likely to lean towards the Democrats than towards the Republicans nationally -- then 2008 is going to be a very good cycle for the party.