How many other Sestaks and Romanoffs are there?

After POLITICO reported Thursday that a spokeswoman for Halter responded to a question about whether the White House made overtures with a terse “no” and declined to elaborate, the National Republican Senatorial Committee quickly responded with a press release questioning whether the administration had written off Lincoln months ago.

That was one of more than a half-dozen press releases and clips forwarded by both the NRSC and the Republican National Committee Thursday in an effort to keep the focus on White House incumbent protection efforts.

In Ohio, GOP Senate nominee Rob Portman’s campaign also sought to leverage the Sestak-Romanoff episode by firing off a query about whether Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, who lost to Democratic establishment favorite Lt. Gov. Lee Fisher in a May 4 primary…

“It reinforces the perception that Washington is irreparably broken, corrupt and that Obama’s promised era of a clean, transparent new way of governing was as cynical as any promise made in modern political history,” said GOP strategist Rick Wilson. “This plays precisely into the intense and growing anti-government anger and this kind of petty little political game of which voters are sick to death.”