The latest on the statewide horseraces, also as per today’s Siena NY poll:

- AG Andrew Cuomo continues to blow away the competition, although Carl Paladino has made some modest headway against the Democratic frontrunner, while his GOP primary opponent, Rick Lazio, has not.

Cuomo leads Paladino 60-27 percent, down from 64-23 percent last month. He defeats Lazio 60-26 percent – not much change from 60-28 percent in July.

In a three-way race, Cuomo gets 56 percent to 19 for Lazio (identified as a Republican) and 12 for Paladino (identified as an independent). In a three-way race identifying Paladino as the Republican and Lazio as the Conservative, Cuomo leads 56 percent to 16 for Lazio, and 14 for Paladino.

- Lazio continues to lose ground to Paladino. His primary lead over the self-funding Buffalo businessman among enrolled Republicans is down to 13 points to 43-30 percent. The former Long Island congressman had a 20-point lead (40-20 percent) just last month.

- For the first time, more voters – 38 percent – would rather elect Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand to the US Senate seat she inherited from Hillary Clinton (compliments of Gov. David Paterson), rather than the 36 percent who support the generic ‘someone else.’

Additionally, Gillibrand’s favorability rating improved to 40-29 percent, up from 34-29 percent in July. She continues to lead all three of her would-be GOP challengers, and has even widened her margin of hypothetical victory against them: Joe DioGuardi (54-29) , Bruce Blakeman (55-28) and David Malpass (55-27).

- Among Republicans, DioGuardi continues to lead, 19 percent to 8 percent for Blakeman and 5 percent for Malpass (it was 24-7-5 percent last month), with 68 percent of enrolled Republicans undecided.

- More bad news for state lawmakers. A majority of voters – 51 percent – still say they support ‘someone else,’ rather than re-electing their incumbent Senator, while 31 percent say they’re inclined to return their current representative to office.

Republicans and independent voters are much more negative toward their incumbent senators than are Democrats, and upstaters and downstate suburban voters are much more negative than are voters in New York City.

- As for the Assembly members efforts to cast themselves as members of the functioning house in Albany. Well, that’s not working so well.

When grading their individual senator and Assembly member, voters see very little difference between the two. Thirty-four percent gave their Assembly member an ‘A’ or ‘B,’ compared to 24 percent who grade them ‘D’ or ‘F.’ The corresponding grades for their senator are 36 percent and 26 percent.

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