Couldn't this difference be due to the push by the netroots for absentee registration due to concerns about votes being counted properly?  

Since it is mainly a Democratic/Progressive concern (unfortunately), I would imagine a great deal of this departure from the norm could be due to this.  

Not that I don't want to believe it is a sign, but I'm not holding my breath.

hey Chris, typo in your headline: you have "SinGs" instead of "SiGns" -- feel free to delete this comment. Nice Post.

.....continuing a trend by Democrats in Iowa of emphasizing early voting.

Here in AZ I just got an absentee ballot request form from a group promoting a ballot measure. I'm sure the GOP is sending them out to their voters (at least they used to).

So far nothing from the Democrats but the sound of silence.

"No Green has gotten 8% in a federal race with two major party candidates in years"

Six years, I do believe.  Isn't that how much Nadir pulled from New Hampshire in 2000?

Hi,

My only concern here is that I thought many of the absentee ballots in Iowa and Florida showed an overwhelming lead for Kerry in 2004, so can we point to early leads in absentees now with confidence?

I definitely hope there is a real rout!

Did this not also happen in '04, where there were lots more Democrats voting early in the day, and all the blogs were crowing about the impending Kerry landslide victory?

I think the large numbers of absentee voters might reflect some anger/impatience on the part of Democrats, but I don't think you can take anything more from it.

That independent poll in NY-26 showing Davis within two points of NRCC chair Tom Reynolds shows you a couple of things:

1. We are currently winning in NY-24, NY-29 and possibly even NY-25.  Aside from NY-23, which we haven't heard anything about because it's very Republican, Sweeney's seat (the 20th) is the only upstate battle where the Republicans currently have an edge (and that's because Essex and Warren Counties are super-Republican).

2. There will be a coattail effect for Democratic challengers in upstate New York.  You could see this in the primary, as only 200,000 voters in the state even bothered to pull a lever on the Republican side.  The extent of it is unknown at this point.  It could range from just pulling Arcuri through in 24 to seeing Maffei, Massa, and even Gillibrand, Hall and Davis being sworn in on January 3, 2007.

Republicans were just getting lambasted in the national news early this week, so I'd expect the Fox poll, conducted on 9/26 and 9/27, to be a bit optimistic compared to polls conducted on more balanced reporting weeks.  The news cycle is sure to run pro-GOP at some point between now and election day.

Then again, if the news keeps going against BushCo every day to the election, I think we'll have a rout on our hands.  I sure can't think of anything that has been going right for them that could be highlighted in the news.  "GOP successfully strips Habeaus Corpus"?  Now there's a winner (/snark).

The Washington Post blog by Andrew Cohen reads:
"Of all the stupid, lazy, short-sighted, hasty, ill-conceived, partisan-inspired, damage-inflicting, dangerous and offensive things this Congress has done (or not done) in its past few recent miserable terms, the looming passage of the terror detainee bill takes the cake".  

... and that's the conservative media.  Crossing fingers for this to hold another 6 weeks.

I just drove across this district from Southern Tier NY up to Buffalo, via Batavia. I saw Jack Davis signs EVERYWHERE and no Reynolds signs. Most of these signs were on the public right-of-way so they don't indicate anything. But I did see a few on front lawns. Again, I saw NO Reynolds signs.

Two comments on this post:  One:  I'm not ready to do the happy dance yet, because Democrats, especially Culver, have been making intense efforts on the absetee ballots.  I've gotten enough request forms in the mail to line a truck bed.  Well, almost.  While we may be winning the absentee ballot contest, it doesn't mean that the votes cast at the polls will elect Democrats.  We still have work to do.

Second, it is exasperating that the DCCC poohbahs are pouring money into the Braley and Boswell races, and providing nothing--not one cent, not one radio ad, not one mailing, not one poll, nothing--to Selden Spencer in IA-4.  Polling shows that the incumbent, Latham, has a "re-elect" of only 35% who say they will vote for him.  His job ratings are 40% positive, 42% negative. He is clearly vulnerable, but may survive by dumping money from the RCCC into radio and TV.  WTF?

That's great news about Davis in NY-26.  He's successfully making the election a referendum on trade, and if the election is a referendum on trade then Davis wins.

Plus, thanks to New York's fusion voting, he'll get a boost from voters who vote for him on the Working Families Party ballot line that doesn't show up in the polls (because the polls don't ask).

Does this make you want to reconsider dropping Carter off your Senate Race Forecast radar?  A rising Democratic tide lifts all boats and M-D stands alone vs. Rasmussen and Zogby.  Nevada has at least as much chance of going D as AZ.

There's a new Keystone Poll out on the 6th. It's
here:

http://www.fandm.edu/x13022.xml

Gerlach leads Murphy 44-41 among likely voters.
When asked, the voters favored "time for a change" over "reelect".  The poll used a methodology called "RBS" (registration based survery). Although this district has a very close partisan divide, the poll surveyed 55% R, 38% D and bal other. The methodology also used historical voting patterns, which, IMHO, would give Republicans an automatic edge because of their higher rates of participation in the past. I personally suspect this is going to be a year where past is not prologue, though.

Aside from the Gerlach-Murphy numbers, there is
lots of good news in this poll, especially given its partisan tilt. Casey leads Santorum; Rendell is crushing Swann and Bush's approval (excellent + good) is 34%.