Down to the wire

So how easy should voting get? That's the Journal-World's question this morning, looking at advance balloting. The Dennis Moore campaign is delivering ballots for voters, and Jim Ryun's camp is contemplating the same thing. And why you're at it, why not ...

The L J-W also has its dual Boyda-Ryun profile.

Two outside groups -- Americans for Prosperity and Club for Growth -- are active in Kansas campaigns this year, according to the Winfield Daily Courier. Both of them are low-tax, low-regulation groups. AFP is a direct outgrowth of Koch support, and the Kansas Club chapter is headed by a former Sam Brownback chief of staff, David Kensinger.

The Christian Science Monitor has a piece on why the Upper Midwest may be where this election is decided:

Despite intense focus on the three biggest swing states - Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Florida - there's another Florida-size prize that the campaigns can't ignore: three states in the upper Midwest that have gone Democratic since the presidency of Ronald Reagan. Wisconsin, Minnesota, and Iowa together match the Sunshine State's 27 electoral votes. With the race coming down to just a handful of swing states, this region has the potential to be pivotal this year. ...

While all three states are willing to elect Republicans to state government, many pollsters expected the national party to have a tougher time. The more conservative politics of the Bush administration can be a tough sell among moderate Midwesterners.

But a few trends have helped: a population boom in the far-out suburbs, or "exurbs," which tend to be more conservative, and a gradual dying-off of the older, New Deal generation, replaced by voters raised with Watergate and Vietnam and receptive to an anti-government message.

Watch with interest.