Election '16 Bellwethers Ohio and Pennsylvania

From Salena Zito, at the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, "Keep Your Eyes on Bellwethers Ohio & Pennsylvania":

Perception and reality are two different things in politics.

On paper, Republicans Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania and Rob Portman of Ohio should be losing in the polls in their U.S. Senate re-election races.

Both men have been hammered for a month over whether they will support their party's presumptive nominee, their opposition to voting on President Obama's Supreme Court nominee and their refusal to enact new gun legislation after the massacre in Orlando. Yet both are defying conventional political wisdom.

Toomey increased his lead over Democrat Katie McGinty by 8 percentage points in the latest Quinnipiac survey.

Portman's numbers improved by 9 points, placing him in a tie with Democrat Ted Strickland, a former governor who lost his re-election bid to John Kasich in 2010.

The two Republicans are competing in critical states that offer insight into whether Democrats can regain House and Senate majorities in November.

In short, if you want to know who will hold or retake the Senate majority, watch Toomey's battle with McGinty and Portman's with Strickland...

More.