From Sean Cockerham in Anchorage ---

The Sean Parnell campaign is touting its new poll suggesting that the governor would wipe the floor with his Republican primary challengers if the election were held today.

“At present, the race between Parnell, Ralph Samuels, and Bill Walker for the Republican nomination is, for all practical purposes, no contest, with Parnell holding a massive 60-point lead,” said Basswood Research, which did the poll for Parnell.

The primary isn’t until Aug. 24 and there hasn’t been much campaigning yet. But these numbers, if accurate, obviously represent a big challenge for Samuels and Walker. If there are any polls out there contradicting the numbers in this Parnell-funded survey, send them over and I’ll post them to the blog.

Maryland-based Basswood Research is often associated with the Club For Growth, the Washington D.C. anti-government spending outfit that funded Parnell’s unsuccessful primary effort two years ago to unseat Don Young from Congress.

Basswood said it did a telephone poll of 500 likely Republican primary voters in Alaska on Feb. 27-28. It posed the question:

“If the Republican primary election for Governor was held today, and the candidates were Sean Parnell, Ralph Samuels, and Bill Walker, for whom would you vote?"

Basswood reports 69.2 percent said Parnell, 9 percent Samuels and 4 percent Walker.

The polling firm said 17.8 percent were undecided. It gave the margin of error at 4.38 percent.