Latest 2010 Senate News - Bunning to Retire?

Roll Call

Kentucky Secretary of State Trey Grayson (R) has formed an exploratory committee to run for Senate, a move that would appear to indicate that a retirement announcement from Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) is imminent.

This is extremely good news for the Republican Senate Committee. Bunning has been acting rather, er, erratic lately and has attracted a strong competitor. He squeaked through last time, and 2010 would likely be the year where he pushed it too far. But Kentucky likes Republicans, returned Mitch McConnell to the senate easily and voted against Barack Obama.

In other senate news, TIME.com has some polling that indicates that IL might just be a pickup opportunity for the GOP. The Democratic party is still hurting from the Blagojevich scandals.

According to the survey (April 24-26, 991 RV, MoE +/- 3.1%), Kirk, who's still not well-known statewide, runs even with Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias and leads both Rep. Jan Schakowsky and Sen. Roland Burris. He trails Atty. Gen. Lisa Madigan, though many expect her to run for governor.

And also on the Specter/PA beat, the Democratic party is not exactly laying out the welcome mat.

RedState

Well, that didn't take long. Less than 24 hours after Arlen Specter dropped his dirty bomb of a party switch, the asses have already begun their loud braying. Sen. Specter's return to his long-abandoned Democrat Party is probably not proving to be the homecoming he had hoped for.

Last night we reported that Specter may have to face two challengers. Now it has been revealed that some senior party members are less than thrilled with the deal that the Majority Leader apparently promised Snarlin' Arlen to entice him to jump ship:

And Specter won't be doing himself any favors with votes like this. Not that I'm complaining! He may have saved himself a certain loss in a primary, but he still has to win over state Democrats.