KyKurmudgeon

Today’s column:

In addition to being announced candidates in the 2010 Senate race, incumbent Sen. Jim Bunning and Lt. Gov. Daniel Mongiardo share at least one other common bond. Neither man’s candidacy generates widespread excitement among his party’s leaders.

Bunning’s fall from grace with Republican leaders has been parsed, dissected and analyzed numerous times by state and national media and in the blogosphere. He seems to have embraced his outcast role and frequently makes pointed references to his rift with party poohbahs, including his fellow Kentuckian, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

Mongiardo deserves some credit for putting Bunning’s political career on the endangered species list. Then a relatively unknown state senator, he swam against a strong Republican tide and came within a hair of beating the incumbent in 2004. More than anything else, that near upset explains Bunning’s status as the Senate’s most vulnerable incumbent in 2010.

Under those circumstances, you might expect Democratic leaders to unite in embracing the idea of a Mongiardo-Bunning rematch. The fact that they haven’t suggests that some of them view the 2004 results as a fluke, attributable more to Bunning’s frequent gaffes than to Mongiardo’s allure as a candidate.

As a result, it has been a given from the outset that the lieutenant governor would not get a free pass in the primary. Another prominent Democrat would be there to challenge him.

It has also been a given that one of three political allies — U.S. Rep. Ben Chandler, state Auditor Crit Luallen and Attorney General Jack Conway — would be that challenger. It turned out to be Conway, who announced his candidacy via Internet video on Thursday.

He will make it official at a Monday afternoon press conference in Louisville. Look for Chandler, Luallen and other prominent Democrats to be at Conway’s side, providing their seal of approval that he is the party’s “chosen one” for 2010.

By contrast, no press conference accompanied the start of Mongiardo’s campaign. No bells and whistles. No retinue of supportive party notables saying, “You go, Dr. Dan.” Just a brief e-mail announcement, and he wasn’t immediately available for comment after that.

This lack of fanfare left the impression that the announcement was rushed to make sure Mongiardo was the first “name” Democrat in the race. (The relatively unknown Darlene Fitzgerald Price, a retired customs officer, was the first D to declare her candidacy.)

Gov. Steve Beshear’s recent endorsement of Mongiardo was also notable for its lack of fanfare. Another brief e-mail announcement issued late in a Friday news cycle that was totally dominated by the firing of former University of Kentucky basketball coach Billy Gillispie. As Conway advisor Mark Riddle noted at the time, Beshear’s statement seemed rather “tepid” and appeared to reflect a political obligation more than a fervent display of support.

Despite not being embraced by all of his party’s leaders, the $420,000 Mongiardo said his campaign would report raising in the first quarter of the year is a respectable figure, assuming it is not artificially inflated by an infusion of his own money.

But the results of a poll released last week were a mixed bag for the lieutenant governor.

The good news: In a head-to-head race with Bunning, Mongiardo currently leads by 7 percentage points. The bad news: If Republican bigwigs succeed in getting Bunning out of the race and Secretary of State Trey Grayson becomes the party’s candidate, Grayson leads Mongiardo by 4 points.

In the poll conducted by Public Policy Polling of North Carolina, Conway leads both Bunning (9 points) and Grayson (4 points).

The two big losers in the poll, which surveyed 610 Kentucky voters April 2-3, were Bunning and state Senate President David Williams, who has not ruled out running for Bunning’s seat whether or not the incumbent remains in the race.

Both men had a 28 percent approval rating. Bunning’s disapproval rating was 54 percent, while 41 percent of respondents disapproved of Williams. And in head-to-head matchups, Williams trailed Conway by 14 points and Mongiardo by 11 points.

Such numbers help explain why national Republican leaders have been trying to ease Bunning out of the race and give Grayson — who will not challenge his Northern Kentucky friend and mentor in a primary — a chance to keep Democrats from capturing a vulnerable seat that could give them a filibuster-proof 60-vote majority.