Given that the NV-Sen thread (along with poll threads of that race) has become ground zero of the Take Wars (and also just that this is a competitive race in a swing state governorship), I'm kind of surprised it doesn't have a dedicated thread yet. Am guessing the takes are going to be somewhat more muted here, but still, might as well have this here.
Was spurred to make this thread by this post in the Senate thread on Jon Ralston's opinion of the races:
Jon Ralston was on David Plouffe's podcast today.
Based on focus groups he held, he seems to think that swing voters are more willing to give Lombardo a chance than they are to give Laxalt a chance.
He also said that CCM is running a flawless campaign.
While you should take it with a grain of salt, Ralston is usually has a pretty good pulse on NV.
While most of the attention will go to his bullishness on CCM, it is worth noting that if he's right on the comparison between Laxalt and Lombardo
and NV polling is broadly correct on the lean of the state this cycle, then Sisolak is probably the most vulnerable Democratic governor in the country. Even if a 2018-type NV polling miss is in play here, he may still be in serious trouble.
Of course, fundamentally this is just the opinion of Ralston (who I do consider to be somewhat credible) based on some focus groups (a method I generally find rather suspect at drawing major conclusions). Polling has generally shown the two races about even (and even a few with Laxalt outperforming Lombardo), so he probably shouldn't just be taken at his word.
Personally, the "Laxalt outperforms Lombardo" polls feel...off to me in the same way that the "Barnes outperforms Evers" polls last month did. But I also might be stuck too much in the convensional wisdom from 2018 (when the governor's race was seen as a contests between two...not particularly likable candidates).
