I DON'T BELIEVE THAT RASMUSSEN POLL

You know this one. Or at least I don't believe it without confirming polls from survey companies that aren't primarily engaged in partisan political hackwork:

What a difference one TV interview can make. Embattled Democratic incumbent Claire McCaskill has now jumped to a 10-point lead over her Republican challenger, Congressman Todd Akin, in Missouri’s U.S. Senate race. Most Missouri Republicans want Akin to quit the race while most Missouri Democrats want him to stay.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Likely Voters in the Show Me State finds McCaskill earning 48% support to Akin’s 38%. Nine percent (9%) like some other candidate in the race, and five percent (5%) are undecided....

Rasmussen is doing what Rasmussen always does: generating results that skew in favor of what the Republican establishment wants the public to believe. The fact that in this case the Republican establishment wants the public to believe that the Republican candidate is a bad man may make this an odd man-bites-dog story, but the pattern is consistent: if Reince Priebus and Rupert Murdoch and Karl Rove want a number out there, Rasmussen will supply it. So get back to me when a few real polling outfits survey this race.

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UPDATE: Here's another skeptic:

Rasmussen poll made me laugh out loud. If anyone believes that, I just turned 29. Sneaky stuff. bit.ly/SscVZf

— Claire McCaskill (@clairecmc) August 23, 2012