President Obama and Elizabeth Warren, winning Massachusetts.

President Obama and Elizabeth Warren, winning Massachusetts.

Brown leads Warren 46 percent to 45 percent in a poll by GOP-aligned Kimball Political Consulting. The survey of 756 likely voters was conducted Sep. 7-9, and has a 3.5 percent margin of error. In the previous Kimball poll from three weeks ago, Brown led 49 percent to 43 percent.

new poll of the Massachusetts Senate race from Republican-aligned Kimball Political Consulting is good news for Elizabeth Warren.She's closed the gap, a 5-point gain for Warren since the last poll on Aug. 12. But there's even more good news when you delve into the internals of the poll, as pointed out by Daily Kos diarist schobel94. First of all, the age distribution of the poll's sample is hugely skewed older, with just 12 percent of respondents 18-39, 40 percent 40-59, and a whopping 48 percent over age 60, which doesn't correspond with the 2008 exit polling for Massachusetts.

Even more encouraging is President Obama's 16-point lead in the state, where his coattails can make a difference. The problem for Warren here is that 12 percent of Obama voters say they'd split their ticket and vote for Brown, whereas only three percent of Romney voters would consider voting for Warren. Warren needs to appeal to those Obama/Brown ticket splitters. The last PPP poll showed the way: tie Brown to the unpopular Republican Party.

There's some evidence that Brown's supposed party independence is getting a closer look by Massachusetts voters. For example, this surprising column in the Brown-boosting, that scrutinizes his voting record and finds him not really all that bipartisan when it comes to the War on Women and on big money in politics.

Warren can most definitely take this race. She can take her convention bump and run with it, overcoming the stealth Republican Brown. Help her do it.

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