The netroots' increasing influence on the national political scene has just taken another step forward. On Monday, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee hired Arjun Jaikumar to serve as the blog and netroots outreach manager.

Jaikumar is better known in the netroots community as Brownsox, a frontpage blogger for Daily Kos.

"We are thrilled to have Arjun join our team," DSCC spokesman Eric Schultz wrote in an e-mail to RCP. "He's talented, smart, and will help strengthen our relationships with the ever-expanding netroots community."

RCP spotted Jaikumar in Arlington, Va., on Monday at a fundraiser for gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe. He said he was there unofficially and noted that he had just been hired by the DSCC.

Earlier in the day, Jaikumar wrote in his final blog post on Daily Kos that this was "a great moment for the netroots - three and a half years ago, I was an anonymous, underemployed college graduate who stumbled across Daily Kos while looking for news on Senate races. Now, I'm going to be employed by one of the party committees."

The DSCC is not alone in its strategy for netroots outreach. Hotline's Blogometer noted yesterday that Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand's (D-N.Y.) campaign has also hired a netroots blogger -- MyDD's Todd Beeton.

(Cross-posted on RCP's Politics Nation)

For a fleeting moment it looked as if Pennsylvania would be Ground Zero for the high profile proxy fight between the moderate and conservative factions of the Republican Party.

But just like that the focus has has shifted a thousand miles to the south, where Charlie Crist's entry into the Senate race has ignited the same debate as he squares off against a far more conservative opponent in Marco Rubio.

Members of GOP establishment were quick to publicly back Crist, who they rightly believe has the best chance of keeping the seat in Republican hands. But the speed with which the NRSC and the Minority Leader stepped in on behalf of the big-footing current Governor left a bad taste in some folks' mouths and helped solidify the story line of a David vs. Goliath ideological struggle.

Myriam Marquez captures the sentiment in this morning's Miami Herald:

But wait. The fix is already in, and Rubio's worst enemy is his own party.

There's no debate apparently within the National Republican Senatorial Committee. On Tuesday, the committee endorsed the popular Crist just minutes after he announced he'd take a leap toward Washington.

Why the rush to endorse in a primary? Doesn't that break Ronald Reagan's golden rule?

Marquez laments the speed of the "Crist coronation" and wonders why it was necessary for Crist to come off as "a bully with the senatorial dudes ganging up on the little guy who walks the conservative talk?" (The obvious answer, of course, is that the last thing the withered GOP minority wants is a blood-letting primary that might help give away a seat they have solid chance of holding.)

Other highlights from the fireworks accompanying yesterday's announcement:

- Rubio released an ad attacking Crist by linking him to Obama, saying "let the debate begin."

- Crist strategist George LeMieux immediately shot back, knocking Rubio for breaking his pledge not to go negative, saying, "It appears that the first debate Marco Rubio needs to have is between Marco Rubio and himself."

- Republicans in North Central Florida offered a "muted" reaction to yesterday's announcement, according to this report.

-Rubio made his case on Fox News, saying that Florida GOP voters must have an opportunity to "choose what we want 'Republican' to mean."

- On said Fox News, Glenn Beck had this to say about Crist's annoucement, "Just what we need, a 'soft, friendly' moderate GOP member. . . BARF."

It's hard to imagine things looking any worse for New York Governor David Paterson. According to a new survey from Quinnipiac University, Paterson has a record-low 28% approval rating with only two in ten voters say he deserves to be re-elected.

As a result, Paterson trails fellow Democratic Andrew Cuomo by whopping 45 percent in a potential primary match-up and runs 22-points behind Rudy Giuliani in a hypothetical general election match up.

Primary
Cuomo (D) 62
Paterson (D) 17

General Election
Giuliani (R) 54
Paterson (D) 32
Undecided 8

Cuomo (D) 47
Giuliani (R) 41
Undecided 9

Favorable/Unfavorable Ratings
Cuomo +38 (51/13)
Giuliani +24 (56/32)
Paterson -31 (24/55)

Rubio fires the first shot (via Ben Smith):

Though not endorsing in the Florida Senate race yet, the conservative Club For Growth fires this warning shot to Gov. Charlie Crist (R):

"We're deeply concerned about Crist's liberal record on fiscal issues so we're doing our due diligence and currently weighing a possible involvement in the race," spokesperson Andy Roth tells RCP. "Crist could easily become the new Specter."

(Cross posted at Politics Nation)

Great line from Adam Himmelsbach in a New York Times story about the Preakness trying to rein in infield drinking this year.

In other news, it is time to check in on the beta version of the Barack Obama Presidential campaign.  In 2006, Plouffe and Axelrod guided Deval Patrick to an upset primary win, and a landslide election to the Massachusetts Governor's mansion.  The race gave Plouffe and Axelrod an opportunity to test some of the themes and, in some cases, words that Obama would later use to win the White House.

Of course, it has not gone so smoothly for Patrick.  Although he began his tenure with lofty +38 approval ratings, within a year his approval ratings were upside-down.  Last time we checked, his approval was -41 and was upside-down among every major demographic and regional group.  Massachusetts voters preferred the job that Mitt Romney had done as Governor.  And the bad news keeps on coming:  Today the Boston Globe found that Patrick had 60 days in his first two years where he had no appointments on his calendar.  While the charge may be unfair, it is exactly the type of press that keeps a politician's numbers in the gutter.

Point is, Democrats have had a lot to celebrate of late.  But things happen quickly in politics, even to golden children, even in states where the opposition party is completely discredited and anathema.

Of course, the challenge for the GOP is to find a halfway credible challenger.

Those planning the permanent Democratic majority may want to tune in to what is occurring in their flagship state. Democrats crashed through the Republican gates in Colorado during the 2000s, giving the state's electoral votes to a Democrat and taking over both houses of the state legislature, both senate seats, and a majority of the state's congressional delegation by decade's' end.  They were aided, to be sure, by some clever gamesmanship over the state's legislative maps, but there certainly seemed to be a strong Democratic trend in the Centennial State.

But, as it turns out, governing is hard.  As we've noted before, Democrats are not faring all that well in Colorado polling.    Part of the reason it seems is that the Democrats are having great difficulty keeping their troops in line:

Camelot magic is gone from the Dem ascendancy that began in 2004, when Ken Salazar was elected senator and Andrew Romanoff stormed the statehouse. We're now slogging through a recession that Ritter recklessly failed to prepare for, his legislative allies are split and ineffectual, while Post columnist Susan Greene commiserates on "what a bummer it can be to be a Democrat in Colorado."

Despite commanding majorities of 37-28 in the House and 21-14 in the Senate, Democrats this session failed on a number of cherished goals, including a tuition break for illegal immigrants, easing sentences and ending the death penalty, quitting the Electoral College, and nanny-state rules for cellphones and seatbelts.

Setting aside the obvious pro-GOP rhetoric here, there are real lessons for Democrats.  Winning a majority does not mean that the ideological makeup of the state has changed.  In fact, it often means that you elect a large number of legislators from districts that will be inhospitable to your state's agenda, making it difficult to drive the changes you want through Congress.  And if bad things happen while you are in charge -- like, say, a recession -- you tend to shoulder the blame, and your poll numbers suffer accordingly.

Well that was fast.

Florida Gov. Charlie Crist, who formally announced a bid for Senate this morning, has already been endorsed by Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and John Cornyn, chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

The GOP leaders announced their support for Crist despite the fact that another respected Republican is running -- State Rep. Marco Rubio, the former Florida House speaker. Already facing an uphill battle against Crist in the Aug. 24, 2010 primary, the NRSC's endorsement -- which implies financial and organizational help for Crist -- makes the climb that much steeper for Rubio. Not to mention, the state party is touting their endorsements on its website.

"While I believe Marco Rubio has a very bright future within the Republican Party, Charlie Crist is the best candidate in 2010 to ensure that we maintain the checks and balances that Floridians deserve in the United States Senate," Cornyn said, acknowledging the snub. "Governor Crist is a dedicated public servant and a dynamic leader, and the National Republican Senatorial Committee will provide our full support to ensure that he is elected the next United States Senator from Florida."

With Florida Gov. Charlie Crist (R) announcing his bid for the Senate this morning, the Democratic Governors Association has labeled the 2010 gubernatorial election a "top-tier pick-up opportunity."

Democrats held the Tallahassee governor's mansion for much of the 20th Century, but the 21st has so far been dominated by Republicans -- beginning with Jeb Bush's first election in 1998, re-election in 2002 and Crist's 7-point win in 2006. President Obama, though, won Florida by 3 points.

In a press release, the DGA says it's "well-positioned for the 2009 and 2010 election years, having already announced record-breaking fundraising of $5.3 million in the first quarter alone." It also touted a Mason Dixon poll released last month showing Democrat Alex Sink and Republican Bill McCollum in a dead heat -- with 35% for Florida CFO Sink and 36% for Attorney General McCollum, with 29% undecided.

"Democrats have been winning in Florida, and we are committed to seeing a Democrat put the state back on the path to recovery," said DGA Chairman Brian Schweitzer, the governor of Montana. "Strong leaders in the state like Chief Financial Officer Alex Sink give us an excellent opportunity to return this governorship to the Democratic column."