The Secretary of State has come out with her revised registration numbers, broken down by county, Congressional district, Senate district and Assembly district.  I’m sure our resident numerologists will break down the numbers more closely, but here are some quick thoughts:

• There are 16,123,787 registered voters in the state, about 70% of those eligible.  Democrats have a 1.8 million-vote advantage, and by percentages that translates into 43.75%-32.53%, with 19.4% decline to state.  Those are significant increases in Democrats and more significant losses in Republicans from 2004.

• The room to run for Democrats is in Riverside and San Bernardino Counties.  They have among the lowest registration rates in the state (only Tulare and Yuba counties have lower percentages than Riverside), and they are among the fastest-growing populations.  We’re actually within 5,000 votes of having a plurality of Democrats in San Bernardino County.

• CA-03 is now less than 4% difference between Republicans and Democrats.  Republicans have a mere 15,000-vote lead.  This is a huge opportunity.  Republicans still hold an 8,000-vote advantage in CA-11, but that’s dropping.  We’re within 19,000 votes in CA-45 and with a big voter registration drive I think that’s reachable.  

• SD-12 is Democratic by a 47%-35% count, and SD-15 is Democratic by a 40.5%-36% number.  SD-19, the district Hannah-Beth Jackson is trying to flip, is within 10,000 votes.

• AD-80 looks to be in real good shape (46.5%-35.6%), though the participation there could be better.  AD-78 is a 10-point advantage for Democrats, and AD-15 is now plurality Democratic by 3,000 votes.  AD-10 is within less than 5,000 votes.

The blogosphere has been talking a lot today, due to the release of Scott McClellan’s book, about the media whitewashes and their failures to properly inform the country in the run-up to war, due to corporate dictates or budget constraints or sheer laziness.  That has a residual effect everywhere.  The same problems we see with the media at the national level are magnified at the local level, where money is even tighter and cluelessness abounds.  I had to do a double-take when I read the LA Times’ paean “GOP maverick” Sen. Abel Maldonado, supposedly in the context of his re-election “campaign” for State Senate.

SANTA MARIA– — Sen. Abel Maldonado crouched to desk level and, with a mischievous smile, enlisted the help of sixth-grader Michelle Grahame to sweat the governor over the state’s looming budget cuts.

The 12-year-old was immersed in her computer animation project, an Earth-like blue sphere hovering behind a curiously grown-up message: “Please don’t cut Education.”

Maldonado, on a tour of Ralph Dunlap Elementary, persuaded her to tweak it to read: “Please don’t cut Education Arnold.” He left with a printout he promised to deliver to Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who is hashing over ways to close the state’s estimated $2-billion budget gap.

“We’re in some challenging times, but I’ve made a commitment not to cut education,” Maldonado, a Republican, told school officials and PTA members after the tour. “We’re going to have to get creative.”

It was a gentle jab at Schwarzenegger, but Maldonado has crossed the governor and his party leadership before, earning the scorn of conservatives and Republican loyalists. One party official writing on a conservative blog declared that the senator, one of the few Latino Republicans in Sacramento, “is not one of us.”

Those same maverick traits, however, have intrigued party moderates who are struggling to make the GOP more appealing to the fastest-growing segments of the California electorate: Latinos and independents.

I’m flummoxed at why you would publish this glowing profile, which reads like it came right out of Maldonado’s press office, without revealing some information that people might find helpful.  To wit:

• There is a fleeting reference to a “write-in campaign organized by Democrats,” but absolutely no mention of Dennis Morris and his quest to offer the voters in the district an actual choice to the as-of-now unopposed Senator.  Mark Buchman of the SLO County Dems is quoted blaming Don Perata for the lack of an opponent to begin with, but even though Buchman is Morris’ acting campaign chair, the story never allows him the opportunity to mention the write-in hopeful.

• There is NO MENTION AT ALL of the fact that Maldonado has crossfiled to run as a write-in candidate on the Democratic ballot in an effort to short-circuit that campaign organized by those scheming Democrats, no mention of the effort to run on both sides of the ballot.

• There is no mention of Maldonado’s actual record on anything but the 2007 budget, like his vote against the Global Warming Solutions Act, for example.

• There is a mention of Maldonado’s signing on to a plan even more far-reaching than the Governor’s, to SELL the California Lottery, a shortsighted and ridiculously stupid idea that amounts to borrowing against the future yet again, but there is no independent analysis of that proposal; it’s just stuck in there as the midpoint between two supposed extremes and therefore teh awesome.

This is just an abandonment of actual reporting in exchange for a gauzy personal profile.  And considering there’s an election coming up in less than a week, it’s an abdication of responsibility.

Now, the LA Times doesn’t have much of a presence in the 15th Senate District, they don’t have many full-time reporters covering California politics, so they stumble into these half-hearted attempts to inform before election time, and this is what they come up with – a hagiography of a guy who’s running as a Democrat and a Republican to shut down any efforts to challenge him.

This is the media we have in 2008.

With a week out until the June 3rd primary, I thought I’d do a series of posts on the Congressional, legislative, local lawmaker, and ballot races we’ll see up for grabs.  This is a little more of a forward-thinking post, but it’ll provide a good baseline for what to watch on Tuesday.

Nick Beaudrot at Cogitamus Blog did a fascinating set of calculations looking at Republican-held seats and, through demographic numbers, coming up with a reasonable baseline expectation of Barack Obama’s general election support.  There is a set for open seats and a set for seats held by incumbents.  And the numbers are really fascinating.  Nick explains his methodology and what the chart means:

I’ve attempted to build a very crude estimate of Barack Obama’s performance on a district-by-district basis. I’ve given him 95% of the black vote, 60% of the Hispanic vote, 55% of the college white vote, and 35% of the non-college white vote. This gives him 43% of the overall white-plus-Asian/other vote, and just over 50% nationwide. I’ve then assumed that Black voters and Latino voters exhibit uniform voting patterns, and then computed the Partisan Voting Index among white voters to arrive at a number for Obama in the district. This has obvious problems in districts that have a large number of illegal immigrants from Latin America, or in the three Cuban districts, but we can use some common sense to throw out these outliers.

Anywhere that Obama gets 45% of the vote or more, a strong local challenger has a shot at winning the district, especially if it’s an open seat.

We have SEVERAL challengers in that range in California.  Numbers on the flip:

First the bad news.  In the two open-seat races in California the numbers are pretty grim.  CA-52 (Hunter) is sitting at 43.3%, and CA-04 (Doolittle) is at 39.9%.  Of course, we have an exceptional candidate in CA-04 with Charlie Brown, and a brutal primary on the other side (Pete Wilson just savaged Tom McClintock on behalf of Doug Ose – it’s a bloodbath).  So I still believe Brown can outperform Obama’s expected numbers.

The good news comes in the incumbent races.  Here’s the breakdown:

#  District   PVI  Incumbent  %AA   %Hisp  NHW BA  WhitePVI  Obama%

28 CA-50 -5 Bilbray        1.6% 18.7% 54.6% 40.6% 49.0%

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29 CA-26 -4 Dreier        4.3% 24.7% 48.6% 38.4% 48.9%

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40 CA-48 -8 Campbell 1.8% 14.5% 62.9% 37.9% 47.6%

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43 CA-46 -6 Rohrbacher 1.7% 16.1% 49.9% 39.9% 47.3%

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44 CA-45 -3 Bono        6.0% 35.3% 30.0% 34.8% 47.3%

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45 CA-24 -5 Gallegly        1.8% 23.4% 43.8% 39.2% 47.2%

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57 CA-44 -6 Calvert        5.0% 37.4% 40.6% 29.6% 45.5%

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61 CA-40 -8 Royce        2.2% 27.9% 46.2% 33.3% 44.4%

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62 CA-3 -7 Lungren        5.4% 11.8% 36.6% 37.5% 44.4%

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66 CA-25 -7 McKeon        8.8% 31.3% 33.0% 27.3% 43.8%

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74 CA-42 -10 Miller        3.7% 23.8% 50.6% 30.9% 43.2%

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84 CA-41 -9 Lewis        5.4% 28.6% 28.0% 28.8% 41.0%

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90 CA-49 -10 Issa                4.6% 30.0% 32.8% 27.3% 40.6%

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93 CA-19 -10 Radanovich 3.2% 29.7% 31.5% 28.8% 40.4% (no 2008 challenger)

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122 CA-21 -13 Nunes        2.4% 42.4% 31.4% 17.0% 37.3%

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127 CA-2 -13 Herger        0.0% 14.2% 28.7% 33.2% 36.8%

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142 CA-22 -16 McCarthy 5.6% 23.2% 30.8% 21.1% 34.4% (no 2008 challenger)

So that’s seven districts over the “Obama number” of 45%, where a strong local challenger can win the district, and two others just under it.  And in the case of CA-50 and CA-26, that number is extremely close to 50%.  Remember, these are Republican districts that would be expected to vote heavily Republican in a general election.

Obviously, Nick’s caveat about undocumented immigrants applies in a number of these districts.  Still, you have seats like CA-48 (amazing!) and CA-44, and even Ed Royce’s seat in CA-40, where a strong challenger with a good message and some ready cash can actually do wonders.  In the case of CA-48, CA-26 and CA-50, it looks like the education level of whites is driving those seats closer to the Obama camp.

What to look for on election night is how these top 9 districts are behaving.  The analysis is crude and doesn’t take into account new voters that might change the PVI numbers.  If more Democrats are voting than Republicans in the June election in some of these seats, it’s a pretty powerful signal that they’re in play (allowing of course for the fact that there are primaries on only one side).

People are probably going to fixate on the hard numbers in this latest poll on marriage equality from the LA Times, showing the constitutional amendment passing by 54-35.  However, there are a few additional items to consider.

• We all know that initiatives need to be well ahead to start before the advertising ramps up and the No side chips away at the lead.  This poll would traditionally signal an initiative in the danger zone.  However, the initial polls for Prop. 22 in 2000 were at 58%, and it rose to 61% by election day.  Opinions may be fairly hardened on this one.

• In the internals, however, there is much good news for marriage equality advocates.  

More than half of Californians said gay relationships were not morally wrong, that they would not degrade heterosexual marriages and that all that mattered was that a relationship be loving and committed, regardless of gender.

That’s really, really good news.  54% say same-sex relationships are not morally wrong, and 59% say that “as long as the two love each other, it doesn’t matter” what gender the two people are.  It suggests that the only hurdle is the terminology of “gay marriage,” based on lingering tradition.  I think that can be cleared to a degree.

• There’s more confirmation that this is generational.

Overall, the proportion of Californians who back either gay marriage or civil unions for same-sex couples has remained fairly constant over the years. But the generational schism is pronounced. Those under 45 were less likely to favor a constitutional amendment than their elders and were more supportive of the court’s decision to overturn the state’s current ban on gay marriage. They also disagreed more strongly than their elders with the notion that gay relationships threatened traditional marriage.

Considering that the likely Presidential nominee is poised to bring Americans under 45 to the polls in record numbers, it’s certainly better to be on the side that appeals to them.

• If Arnold’s opposition to the measure is publicized, which is likely, that does seem to change minds:

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who has vetoed two bills sanctioning gay marriage, has said that he respects the court’s decision and that he will not support a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage. Californians were split on his stance, with 45% agreeing and 46% disagreeing.

I think this is a pretty good place to be considering the circumstances.  The marriage equality movement has powerful advocates and the weight of justice and fairness on their side.  It’s whether enough people have gotten used to the concept by November.  I think the poll shows that’s very possible.

• Do read Robert in Monterey’s report about Abel Maldonado, Don Perata’s best buddy, running as a write-in candidate in the Democratic primary to stall an attempt to get an opponent on the November ballot.  First of all, this is an example of why crossfiling should be banned once and for all.  Second, Abel Maldonado is a snake and I can now see why Don Perata would knock on doors for him.  Apparently, neither of them have much interest in the democratic process.

• Arnold thinks the legalization of gender-neutral marriage will be a boost to the sluggish economy, but I hope he’s not basing his entire budget on a sharp uptick in gay weddings.  I mean, there are only so many Mr. Sulus rich enough to have that surge register more than a blip.  By the way, good for Mr. Sulu.  And good for Ellen DeGeneres for telling Straight Talk Express where to shove it.

• Speaking of John W. McCain, he’s in California today.  Nobody show him the PPIC numbers!

• Lucas mentioned this, but Darrell Issa got in the middle of a heated exchange between Henry Waxman and EPA Adminstrator Stephen Johnson over the EPA’s breaking the Clean Air Act.  Emptywheel has video:

• Why Fabian Nuñez is claiming racial bias at this late date over questions about his travel practices is completely beyond me.  And he’s taken to Spanish-language television for these accusations to stoke divisiveness in the Latino community, too.  It’s so counterproductive, as well as misleading.

• Speaking of Spanish-speaking media, this is an older story, but it’s fascinating to me that the Spanish-language channels in LA are so much more substantive than the English-language ones, featuring longer, “more deeply reported” pieces.

• We could see a settlement very shortly on prison overcrowding in the state which would not require early release.  There are some decent components to this deal, but it basically gives everyone three more years to clean up their act, and I wouldn’t be surprised if it just puts us in the same siutation come 2011.  The policies needed are well-known; the political will remains elusive.

• The Bay Area AQMD passed a carbon tax for businesses that emit greenhouse gases.  It’s “not enough to change behavior,” one expert said, but it does presage what may be coming down the pike for polluters.  Whether you get there through selling carbon permits at auction or with a tax, the bottom line is that pollution is going to cost enough money to alter business’ approach to engaging in it.  This is a good step.

• Interesting that we denied the endorsement to Rep. Laura Richardson (CA-37) on the same day that she is forced to defend herself against allegations that she walked away from her foreclosed home in Sacramento.  It sounds like the Congresswoman renegotiated the loan, but the conservative fever swamps are all over this one (check the comments in that LAT blog post).  She did buy the half-million-dollar home with no money down, and then left Sacramento almost immediately after winning election to fill the open seat in Congress.

The latest PPIC poll, a pretty decent one in California, has Barack Obama leading John McCain by 17 points, 54-37.  It’s a large sample size including 2003 Californians and 1086 likely voters, so it’s a fairly robust poll amongst age groups and ethnicities.  And if this data point is correct, Barack Obama looks VERY strong for November.

According to the poll, Obama leads McCain among Hispanics 69-20.

That’s a “game over” type of number if it holds.

Cast your memory back to the February primaries, and you may remember that Obama’s problem area was not white working-class voters, as they have been so eloquently called, but Hispanics.  Much ink was spilled over how Obama couldn’t connect with them, how there was all this antipathy between the black and brown communities, and it did manifest itself in the voting, at least in California.  Hillary Clinton cleaned up in the heavily Hispanic areas in Southern California.  In fact, it made up very nearly all of her delegate and popular vote win in the state.  She had the backing of the Latino establishment and worked them extremely hard to get out the vote, which they did in big numbers.

I don’t think anybody expected Obama to rebound among these voters this strongly, this soon.  But his favorables among Hispanics are right in line with his share of the vote over McCain, at 69%.

It’s one poll and it’s one data point.  But extrapolate it out.  The legendary figure is that Hispanics voted 44% for Bush in 2004.  That’s probably not true – it was probably around 39%.  However, that’s substantially larger than 20% – and remember that Bush only won by 3 points, and Hispanic voters may be a slightly higher share of the electorate this year.

Again, it’s one point in one poll, but if California’s Hispanics voted at similar rates to the rest of the country’s, then Colorado would be done, New Mexico would be done, Nevada would be close to done, Arizona would be in play, Texas would be in play, North Carolina and Georgia (with growing Hispanic regions) would be in play… you get the picture.  Rove’s “permanent Republican majority” relied on chipping away at a chunk of Hispanic voters while maintaining the white vote and building the coalition.  The fearmongering and demagoguery over immigration reform, even though McCain nominally supported it (until the primary), has tarnished the Republican brand significantly among this subgroup.  There’s no other explanation for these numbers.

If John McCain gets 20-25% of the Hispanic vote he can’t win the election.  The highest that Kerry ever polled among Hispanics was 59-31.  This is ten points below what Obama’s polling in California.  This is a bigger lead than Democrats had in 2006 among Hispanics.

I think it’s kind of a big deal.