Former Houston Mayor Bill White (D) continues to run a competitive race against Gov. Rick Perry (R), Rasmussen's latest numbers in Texas show (500 LVs, 4/14, MoE +/- 4.5%).

General Election Matchup
Perry 48 (-1 vs. last poll, 3/3)
White 44 (+1)
Und 6 (unch)

White has to still be considered an underdog, however, given that Perry has a robust 59 percent job approval rating. But White boasts strong statewide visibility this early, with 54 percent of Texans viewing him favorably, compared to 36 percent who view him unfavorably.

A whopping two-thirds of Texans say they would favor a repeal effort of the health care law. But President Obama's job rating has improved six points since last month's survey, as 42 percent now approve compared to 58 percent who disapprove.

A new Quinnipiac poll of the Florida governor's race (1,250 RVs, 4/8-13, MoE +/- 2.8%) shows that Democrat Alex Sink may have begun to reverse a downward trend in her numbers.

General Election Matchup
McCollum (R) 40 (-1 vs last poll, 1/20-24)
Sink (D) 36 (+5)
Und 21 (-4)

The survey does not test Rick Scott (R), the anti health care activist who entered the race last week.

On the subject of health care, 44 percent of Floridians say they mostly approve of the changes made to the health care system by Congress while 48 percent disapprove. And 26 percent of respondents said they were more likely to vote for a member of Congress who supported the plan, while 36 percent said they were less likely to support him or her.

But McCollum's high profile role in leading state attorneys general in a lawsuit against the federal government may not be a political winner. Forty percent of respondents said his suit is a good idea, while 54 percent say it's a bad idea. And 28 percent say it's more likely they would vote for him because of the suit, compared to 38 percent who are less likely to support him because of it. His job rating as attorney general is also down 5 points from January.

President Obama's job rating, meanwhile, has improved -- 50 percent approve while 45 percent disapprove, compared to a 45-49 split in January. Quinnipiac attributes that to an uptick in support among independent voters.

Will he run or won't he? That's even what people close to Dino Rossi would like to know, The Seattle Times reports. Polls show the former GOP gubernatorial nominee would be competitive against Washington Sen. Patty Murray, a member of the Democratic leadership, but Rossi continues to say he'll make his decision by the June 11 candidate filing deadline.

State Sen. Don Benton and motivational speaker Chris Widener both consider themselves friends of Rossi, and both are running for the Senate. They're among 11 Republicans running in the Aug. 17 primary. But neither knows which way Rossi is leaning.

Widener admitted Rossi "would be our best chance at defeating Patty Murray," and said he would immediately drop out if Rossi decided to run.

National Republicans would love to see him jump in the race, while Democrats are hoping a third well-known Republican opts not to challenge a potentially vulnerable Democratic incumbent. Last week, former Wisconsin Gov. Tommy Thompson decided against challenging Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisc.), and former New York Gov. George Pataki confirmed many people's feeling that he would not take on Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.).

April 26: That's the day TV advertising costs drop in Nevada, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reports, meaning campaign ads will be on the rise. It comes about one month before early primary voting begins (May 22) and more than a month before the primary (June 8).

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's three potential GOP challengers will likely all hit the airwaves by next week, with the hopes of eventually taking down the most powerful and perhaps most vulnerable member of the Senate.

[Former Nevada GOP chair Sue Lowden] already has spent more than $500,000 in TV and radio ads, which gave her an early boost to the top. She'll likely hit the air again. You'll see a lot more TV ad action from the other leading GOP contenders from now on, too, including from Las Vegas businessman and former University of Nevada, Las Vegas basketball star Danny Tarkanian, who's hoping for an end game burst after slipping behind Lowden.

Former Reno Assemblywoman Sharron Angle, who just won the Tea Party Express endorsement, will get much-needed help from the national group, which plans to start airing ads on her behalf April 26-27.

A surprisingly quiet couple of days in the polling . . .

President

Gallup has the President at 49/44, while Rasmussen has his approval at 47/52.  This represents a slight strengthening in Gallup, and a slight weakening in Rasmussen.  But again, the daily fluctuations aren't what's really important.  The day of the health care vote, he was tied at 47/47 in the RCP average.  Since then, he's generally been at about +1 or +2, which is consistent with what the tracking polls have been saying.  It's good for the President that his approvals are no longer declining, but I would imagine that they were hoping for a bit more of a bounce.

Senate

Wisconsin:  Obviously, a major disappointment for Republicans is that former Governor Tommy Thompson won't run for Senate.  If Thompson had gotten in, he probably would have been the favorite against Senator Russ Feingold.  With Thompson out of the picture, Feingold is favored, but he still polls weakly against the other Republicans in the race.  This is now a longshot for the GOP, but it is still an opportunity.

Arkansas:  DailyKos and Research 2000 polled the Arkansas race.  There's a ton of potential matchups, but the bottom line is that the Republicans are all near 50%, and hold leads of 2%-7% over their opponents.  This is closer than anyone else is finding, and, as is par for the course for these polls, it is at least partially attributable to the fact that their turnout model shows turnout at 2008 levels.  In 2008, the turnout was 36%D, 32%R and 31%I, with 12% African American.  R2K finds an electorate that is 38%D, 33%R, and 29%I (and 11% black).  Decide for yourself if that is likely.

Arkansas Primary:  R2K also polled the Arkansas primary race, and found Senator Blanche Lincoln leading Lieutenant Governor Bill Halter 45%-33%.  It's a good lead for the Senator, but not as large of one as she would like.  Arkansas has a surprisingly early primary for the South, on May 18.

Two other Democratic pollsters weighed in on the primary.  Benenson, polling for the Lincoln campaign, found that the Senator leads the Lieutenant Governor 53%-35.  Talk Business/Zata3, which I've never heard of before in my life, finds a narrower Lincoln lead, at 38%-31%, with 10% for a third Democrat.

Florida:  Quinnipiac found that Marco Rubio only narrowly leads Congressman Kendrick Meek 42%-38%, while Governor Charlie Crist fared better (48%-34%). Both sets of numbers are consistent with Q's previous polling, suggesting stability in the general election race.

But in a three-way race, with Crist as an Independent, Crist becomes Florida's next Senator.  He leads with32% of the vote to Rubio's 30%, to Meek's 24%.  Of course, Crist would have to declare which party he would caucus with, which could change those numbers significantly.

Florida Primary:  Q also found that Rubio now leads Crist by 23 points in the primary, 56%-33%.  Speculation abounds that there won't be a primary, and that Crist will simply declare as an Independent.  The deadline for that decision isn't until June 18, so Crist has some time to make up his mind.

Nevada:  Mason-Dixon polling found Sue Lowden leading Harry Reid 47%-37%, with 5% going to third party candidates.  This is bad news for the Senator, who had hoped that a Tea Party candidate and an American Independent would siphon off the anti-Reid vote.  So far as I know, Mason-Dixon is one of the first to test this theory.

Utah Primary:  RedState.com and Club for Growth foil Bob Bennett could be in trouble in Utah.  Bennett leads his various challengers with 37% of the vote, while the others are in the teens or single digits, according to Rasmussen.  But if Bennett doesn't get to 60% in the convention on May 8, he faces a one-on-one primary on June 22 with the second-place finisher.  If he's only drawing 37% of the vote right now, that's a pretty ugly scenario for the Senator.

Governor

Colorado:  The lone gubernatorial polling shows Scott McInnis leading Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper 48%-42%.  The polling is all over the place here, showing anything from a 6 point Republican lead to an 11 point Democratic lead.  We should have a better idea in the next couple of months where this race is heading.

House

PPP continues the string of bad polling results for the Democrats.  They find the Republicans leading Democrats 47%-42% in generic ballot.  In 1994, the Republicans won nationally by 5 points, so PPP is seeing a 1994-style result right now.  Mind you, this is a poll of registered voters, so the increased enthusiasm among Republicans could lead to an even worse result for Democrats.  Republicans lead by 3.2 points in the RCP average.

HI-01: DailyKos/R2K polled the special election for May 22 in Hawaii.  That race has a bizarre 3-way race dynamic, where two Democrats and one Republican will be on the ballot for a winner-take-all election.  In other words, Djou could take advantage of the split among the Democrats and win the seat with 34% of the vote or so.

Kos suggests that's happening.  Djou receives 32% of the vote, while the two Democrats receive 29% and 28%, respectively.

Kos labels this a "temporary takeover" of the seat, assuring his readers that Djou will be undone in November.  Probably, but I'm not certain of that.  Abercrombie faced a pair of very close calls in the mid-1990s, while the seat elected a Republican in 1986 and 1988.  It's unlikely Djou would hang on in the Fall, but he's not really in Anh Cao territory, either.

Maybe President Obama should stop doing fundraisers. Or maybe he should at least keep them closed to the media. Because it seems when President Obama is in front of a group of friendly Democrats, he just can't help himself from playing the Comic-in-Chief and ridiculing his opponents. It's good for a laugh from the partisan crowd, sure, but it often comes across to average folks (and, of course, to the opposition) as petty and/or unpresidential. That's not necessarily a smart politically strategy for a President who's bobbing along at 46-48% approval rating and barely above water. Nor is it what the public might expect from a President who promised to rise above petty partisan politics.

So, outside of a quick laugh, I'm not sure what President Obama hoped to accomplish by taking a shot at the Tea Party activists who turned out to protest on Tax Day:

So I've been a little amused over the last couple of days where people have been having these rallies about taxes. (Laughter.) You would think they would be saying thank you. (Laughter.) That's what you'd think. (Applause.)

The transcript actually doesn't do the remark justice. You can see the video here.

Obama may have fun mocking the Tea Party activists today,but if the political winds keep blowing the way they have recently (Virginia, New Jersey, Massachusetts) he probably won't be nearly as 'amused' in November when they go from turning out at Tax Day protests to turning out at the polls.

Arizona Sen. John McCain leads former Rep. J.D. Hayworth by 5 points in the GOP primary, a new Rasmussen poll finds.

McCain 47 (-1 vs. last poll, March 16)
Hayworth 42 (+1)
Und 8

Rasmussen's monthly look at the Colorado gubernatorial race (500 LVs, 4/14, MoE +/- 4.5%) finds things in April about where they stood in March.

General Election Matchup
McInnis (R) 48 (unch vs. last poll, 3/4)
Hickenlooper (D) 42 (unch)
Und 6 (unch)

Down nearly 23 points in the Republican Senate primary against Marco Rubio, Florida Gov. Charlie Crist could be weighing running instead as an independent.

NBC News reports staying in the primary is the least likely option:

First Read has learned that Crist is getting much of his political advice nowadays from GOP strategist Mitch Bainwol, and they are considering two options right now: 1) making an independent bid, which would turn the general election into a toss-up; and 2) dropping out of the race altogether and turning his sights to a 2012 Senate challenge against Bill Nelson (D). But right now, no one is seriously talking about Crist staying in a GOP primary he's trailing by double digits. The filing deadline is at the end of this month.

Proclamations and comments by Republican Govs. Bob McDonnell and Haley Barbour have brought back one of America's oldest debates. To what extent is the Confederacy linked to slavery? As the chief cause of Southern secession and therefore, the Civil War, I wrote that one issue cannot be separated from the other. My column on the subject, "On McDonnell's Confederate Mistake," explains the back story and debate.

John Tures, a political scientist at LaGrange College,  offers a more empirical look over at Southern Political Report. He read over the declarations of secession for four Confederate states: South Carolina, Georgia, Mississippi and Texas. His conclusion:

I located the declarations of secession for four different states that were available: South Carolina, Georgia, Mississippi, and Texas.

The word “slave” appears 82 times in these four state declarations. The states even refer to themselves as “Slave-Holding States.” I always thought that was a Northern term. On the other hand, the words “State's rights,” “states' rights” or “states rights” do not appear in any of these four secession declarations. The word “rights” appears 14 times and “right” appears 32 times, but many of these references involve “the right to own slaves.”

Was it about economics? Cotton and rice don't appear. Plantation is noted once, but it refers to a place in Rhode Island. Tariffs are never discussed. Tax is mentioned once. Nullification is not included either, though “null” appears three times, mostly to do with leaving the Union. “Econ” (as in economics, economy or any other term) is mentioned twice. And if you read the declarations, they are chock full of excuses for the necessity of slavery that would make the most political incorrect person today cringe.