I've Got Sources, Baby

For months, National Review Online editor Kathryn Jean Lopez has been the Bodicea of the Rick Santorum campaign—the warrior-woman, charging face-first into the enemy, laughing in the face of doom. While tracking polls show Santorum stalling out 10 points or more behind Democrat Bob Casey, Lopez is countering that with two pieces of evidence no one else would possibly take seriously. First some anecdotal evidence:

One Santorum volunteer I know reports knocking on 300 doors in south central Penn. today, hearing most often: "These polls are absurd! I'm ready to show those media people how wrong they are!"

In "south central" Pennsylvania. If you're unfamiliar with the Keystone state, know that James Carville (while losing a race to Rick Santorum) described it as "Philadelphia on one side, Pittsburgh on the other side, and Alabama in the middle."  In one of the final polls from the race, Santorum was leading Casey in central Penn by 15 points… while losing the entire state by 10.
But to supplement that, Lopez has hard polling data. Well…

I'm told by a good, albeit Republican, source that Gov. Rendell's latest internals have Santorum only 5 behind.

I'm told he had Santorum at 9 on Friday and 17 three weeks ago.

Possibly the least convincing "scoop" ever. Or is it? As it happens, I have sources in the Texas Democratic party who tell me Bob Smither is in a dead heat in the race to win Tom DeLay's seat. Write-in votes for Ron Paul are sweeping Democrats, Republicans and Kinky Friedman out of the way in the governor's race. Bouyed by his Reason endorsements, Jim Webb is tracking 30 points ahead of Sen. George Allen—or so I'm told by sources in the Mike McMenamin for school board campaign.