Florida races ending ugly

Our partners at the Orlando Sentinel try to capture the voter mood on the eve of the Florida primary election, featuring some of the most competitive and contentious races of the summer.

It's supposed to be the year of the "outsider" -- the election where fed-up voters embrace newcomers and kick incumbents to the curb.

But in Florida, the electorate seems to view most everyone in the political arena with a healthy dose of disdain.

In the two most high-profile races -- the Democratic primary for U.S. Senate and Republican primary for governor -- more voters appear to dislike the newbies than like them. Indeed, the latest polls show that the veteran politicians -- U.S. Rep. Kendrick Meek and Attorney General Bill McCollum -- are ahead in those races.

But when pressed to make a selection, many Floridians sound like they're choosing between a cold sore and a sinus infection.

The story is worth a full read here.

Tuesday also features some intriguing, albeit anticlimactic races in Arizona, Alaska and Vermont. In Arizona, Sen. John McCain (R) is poised to fend off primary challenger J.D. Hayworth after mounting an early, aggressive and expensive campaign effort.

Jan Brewer (R) will win her party's nomination as she seeks a full term there as governor, a victory owed in part to the national status she attained by signing into law the state's aggressive anti-illegal immigrant law.

Alaska voters will be deciding whether to renominate their incumbent U.S. senator, Lisa Murkowski, or back a primary challenger counting on support from the tea party movement and the state's former governor, Sarah Palin, for an upset win.

You can read more on the races in a weekend piece for the Tribune papers I wrote here.