A couple of late breaking House polls from SurveyUSA. First, Republican Heather Wilson is up 5 points on Democrat Patricia Madrid in NM-01and, perhaps more importantly, this is the first independent poll showing her topping the 50% mark. Also, in CO-04, SurveyUSA has incumbent Republican Marilyn Musgrave running 4 points ahead of Democratic challenger Angie Paccione.

These are very interesting results, and they only add to the intriguing point Jay raised yesterday. Here we have two Republican incumbents running for reelection. Yet Wilson is running stronger than one might expect this year in a marginally Dem-leaning district with a Cook partisan voting index (PVI) of D+2 that voted 51-48 in favor of John Kerry in 2004. Meanwhile, Marilyn Musgrave is in a tight race despite the fact she's in a heavily Republican district with a Cook PVI of R+11 that gave Bush a 19-point victory over Kerry in 2004.

So what gives? To rephrase Jay's point in the form of a question, is Democratic strength overstated or understated this year?