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By Dana Bash, CNN Chief Congressional Correspondent

updated 6:29 PM EDT, Thu September 4, 2014

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

Washington (CNN) -- Republicans in Washington say they are breathing a sigh of relief now that the Kansas secretary of state has ruled that the Democratic Senate candidate will stay on the ballot in November even though he dropped out.

It's a case of political whiplash for national Republicans, who just hours earlier scrambled to send strategists to Kansas when it suddenly became a head-to-head race between incumbent Republican Pat Roberts and an independent candidate with libertarian views, who would likely pull GOP votes from Roberts.

The matchup appeared to make it harder for the GOP to seize the Senate majority.

Now a GOP strategist tells CNN that Republicans believe keeping Democrat Chad Taylor on the ballot is "enormous" because he was only getting 30% of the vote when he was actively campaigning. Republicans predict the Democrat will still get about 10-25% of the vote on Election Day, making it easier for Roberts to beat independent candidate Greg Orman.

The National Republican Senatorial Committee, which works to get Republicans elected to the Senate, was already dispatching veteran GOP strategist Chris LaCivita to Kansas, a GOP source tells CNN.

The source called it just the first move to try to help bolster Roberts' campaign, which national Republicans worry is lackluster and ill-equipped to run an unexpectedly competitive campaign.

Republicans had also enlisted help from former Sen. Bob Dole, the longtime senator from Kansas and a former Senate majority leader, who was already scheduled in the state this week. A source close to Dole tells CNN he is playing the role as "super consultant" to Roberts, an old friend.

Continued here:
Republicans have 'whiplash' over ruling in Kansas Senate race

By James Q. Lynch, The Gazette

CEDAR RAPIDS Its still the economy, stupid.

Koch brothers, climate change, accusations of a scandal-a-week gubernatorial administration and the need for renewable fuels standards in a perfect world may be making headlines. But voters say the economy is their top issue going into the Nov. 4 midterm election.

That doesnt portend a Republican wave election, but Bill McInturff, a leading Republican pollster who, together with Democrat Peter Hart, conducts the NBC News-Wall Street Journal poll, said it is good news for Republicans who believe economic data and the publics sour perception of the economy are moving voters their direction.

Its going to be a very good year for Republicans with a 50-50 shot of taking the U.S. Senate, McInturff said.

Not so fast, counters Celinda Lake of the Democratic Lake Research Partners, which, with the Republican Tarrance Group, conducted the George Washington University Battleground Poll of 1,000 likely voters that was released this week.

It found that Democrats get better marks (43 to 35 percent) than the Republicans for solving problems, standing up for the middle class (54 to 36 percent) and representing middle-class values (52 to 39 percent).

Most attention has focused on the U.S. Senate, where Republicans need a net gain of six seats to gain control. The GOP is expected to pick up a handful of seats in the House it outnumbers Democrats 234 to 201.

Overall, Republicans see their chances of controlling both chambers of Congress improving because polls show voters disapprove of President Barack Obamas handling of the economy. Also, by a 36 to 29 percent margin voters told the Battleground Poll the economy is worse than it was four years ago.

If Republicans can tie Iowa Democratic Senate hopeful U.S. Rep. Bruce Braley to the presidents unpopular policies, that may hurt more than actual economic conditions, according to Chris Larimer, an associate professor of political science at University of Northern Iowa.

Read more:
Republicans heartened polls show economy still top issue for voters

A new Senate report on alleged targeting of conservative groups largely continues an argument that Democrats and Republicans have been having since the controversy erupted in May of 2013.

Not surprisingly, the two sides couldnt agree on what the report should say, so theres a majority version and a minority version.

In their majority report, Democrats on the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations argue again that the controversy has been unfairly depicted, because the Internal Revenue Service also targeted liberal groups such as ACORN, the community organizing group, and the Occupy movement, as well as conservative tea-party groups.

A 2013 IRS inspector generals report should have taken that into account, but instead focused on how the IRS handled applications from conservative groups and excluded any comparative data on applications filed by liberal groups, producing distorted audit results that continue to be misinterpreted, the majority report said.

After reviewing nearly 800,000 pages of documents and conducting nearly two dozen IRS and [inspector general] employee interviews, the investigation found that the IRS used inappropriate selection criteria, burdensome questions, and lengthy delays in processing applications fortax-exempt status from both conservative and liberal groups, said the subcommittees chairman, Sen. Carl Levin (D., Mich.).

The IRS inspector general, J. Russell George, said Friday that he stands behind the audit report and that his offices review of IRS treatment of groups that applied for tax-exempt status is ongoing.

Republicans say in essence that Democrats are comparing apples and boulders, and that conservative groups were far more frequently and heavily burdened by the treatment they got at the hands of the IRS.

The majoritys interpretation of the evidence fails to capture the extent of the IRSs bias against conservative groups and flagrant abuse of power, said Sen. John McCain of Arizona, the top Republican on the subcommittee. The minority report adds: The inclusion of a scant few liberal groups by the IRS does not bear comparison to the targeting of conservative groups.

Each side, however, downplays some facts that might be inconvenient to their case.

The majority report, for example, tends to minimize the extensive evidence that the IRS really did start collecting tea-party applications for what turned out to be lengthy and intrusive review, starting in early 2010. IRS officials in Washington referred to the matter in emails as tea party cases for months, until they decided theyd better broaden its scope.

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Republicans, Democrats on Senate Panel Issue Duelling Reports on IRS Controversy

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The All Progressives Congress governors seem to be reversing policies in major areas such as education, job creation and workers welfare in a move considered to be a ploy to appease voters ahead of the 2015 general elections, DAYO OKETOLA writes

Notwithstanding its victory in the August 9 Osun State governorship election that saw Alhaji Rauf Aregbesola returned for a second term in office, the All Progressives Congress has yet to forget the loss it suffered in the June 21 Ekiti State election. Dr. Kayode Fayemis defeat sent shockwaves through the opposition party considering the fact that he was rooted to win the poll because of his performance. But he lost and analysts see his defeat as a reflection of the popularity of the APC across all the states where it is in control.

Also, a former Minister of External Affairs, Chief Tom Ikimi, who recently defected to the Peoples Democratic Party, reinforced this thought, saying, It is common knowledge that the vote against the very popular candidate Senator Chris Ngige in the Anambra governorship election and recently against one of the most successful governors, Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti State was indeed a vote against Tinubu.

Ikimi described the APC as a Tinubu party and predicted mass protest votes against the party in the 2015 elections.

The party has collapsed in very many states such as Adamawa, it is in distress in Edo, Ogun, Oyo, Lagos and Nasarawa, he had said.

Coincidentally, a Peoples Democratic Party governorship aspirant in Lagos State, Mr. Jimi Agbaje, in a recent television programme monitored by our correspondent, had explained that any government in power requires a mix in balance proportion of politics, propaganda, polity and programmes to win the election in 2015. He is of the opinion that the APC had failed in satisfactorily mixing these elements in Lagos State, adding that this may affect the outcome of the 2015 elections.

In view of this, the APC is not leaving anything to chance in its bid to retain all the states it currently controls with the hope to capture more states from the PDP.

As such, the APC governors have embarked on mild review of policies deemed too harsh on the people and they are currently wooing diverse groups such as teachers, civil servants, students and National Union of Road Transport Workers, among others, ahead of the 2015 elections.

This has become imperative since it is widely believed that many people are not happy with the party across all its states. For instance, members of NURTW, who spoke with our correspondent, described APC administration in Lagos as a government of one day one law and vowed to vote for another party in the 2015 governorship election.

The Lagos State Government, in quick response to the threats posed by this development, is perhaps relaxing some of its policies perceived to be anti-people.

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2015: APC states embark on policy u-turn