Ken Buck 46%, Michael Bennet 41%; Jane Norton 46%, Bennet 40%

Jane Norton has a slightly bigger lead over Obama Democrat Sen. Michael Bennet, 46% to 40%, than Ken Buck’s 46% to 41%, but Rasmussen Reports says Buck is looking stronger against Bennet and his Democrat primary challenger, Andrew Romanoff, than Norton is.

Romanoff looks 

stronger against the Republicans than Bennet does.

Norton leads Romanoff 43% to 42%, and Buck leads him 45% to 39%. Norton and Buck are in a tight race for the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate, and Bennet and Romanoff are running for the Democrats’ nomination.

But more important than the headline numbers, according to Rasmussen, is how strongly voters feel about the candidates. This shown in the poll results when voters are asked whether they have very favorable or unfavorable feelings about the candidates.

Their very favorable and very unfavorable ratings are:

Buck, 13% to 16%

Norton, 15% to 24%

Bennet, 18% to 32%

Romanoff, 20% to 21%.

Buck has the lowest very unfavorable ratings of the four candidates at 16%, and Bennet, the pro-ObamaCare, pro-stimulus, pro-union, pro-tax increase and anti-energy independence candidate, has the highest unfavorably ratings of 32%. But Buck also has the lowest “very favorable” ratings of 13% vs. Romanoff’s 20%.

ObamaCare is unpopular in Colorado where 56% of the likely voters surveyed favor its repeal, and 39% oppose; 51% strongly favor repeal and 29% strongly oppose repeal, according to Rasmussen. The unpopular bill never will be fully repealed but court actions may kill its hated mandates that everyone buy insurance or be fined, and Congress will change the bill over time, especially if Republicans regain control of Congress, which seems unlikely at this point.

Romanoff and the White House have disclosed that Obama tried to get Romanoff to drop out of the Senate race and clear the field for Bennet. Rasmussen’s poll found that 72% of the likely voters in Colorado have been following the story. Half of them said that it is “at least somewhat important to how they vote this year.”

Speculators at Intrade are giving Republicans a 47.7% (bid price) chance of retaking the House in November. Traders are giving Democrats a 72.1% chance of holding the Senate and Republicans a 12.6% chance of taking control of the Senate. They are giving Democrat Sen. Majority Leader, Harry Reid (D-NV), a 49.9% chance of holding his seat. And they are giving Barbara Boxer (D-CA) 69.9% chance of holding her seat. The political futures markets are considered better indicators of the current political situation than public opinion polls, but that is true only when the markets are fairly active and liquid.

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