Beverly Perdue may have endorsed Barack Obama, but she's got a Hillary Clinton pollster working for her.

After Clinton demoted chief strategist Mark Penn, she replaced him with veteran Democratic pollster Geoff Garin, who is more of easy-going, according to CNBC:

An ardent fan of the Washington Nationals baseball team, Mr. Garin cast his campaign role as that of "the seventh inning guy instead of the starter." But his genial relationships throughout the party may offer some reassurance that the endgame of the nomination fight won't prove as damaging to Democratic hopes this fall as some have feared.

His firm, Garin-Hart-Yang Research Group, is currently working as pollster for Perdue, but the polling is being done by Garin's partner Fred Yang.

As with the national race, Democrats are hoping the gubernatorial nomination fight won't be too bruising.

On second thought, national Democrats do have a Dole poll.

After speaking with Dome this afternoon, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee found an old press release from February showing Sen. Elizabeth Dole's approval rating at 49 percent.

That should answer some Democratic and Republican griping about Dole's polls, but it probably won't. 

The DSCC poll showed that 11 percent of North Carolinians said Dole was doing an "excellent job," 38 percent said "a good job," 33 percent said "only a fair job," and 13 percent said a "poor job." Five percent were not sure.

It also showed 35 percent planned to vote for Dole again, 26 percent would "consider someone else," 23 percent said they would vote against her, and nine percent said it depends. Seven percent were not sure. 

The survey of 606 likely voters on Feb. 7 and 8, 2007, was done by Garin-Hart-Yang Research Group.

No margin of error was included in the memo.