Republicans are comfortably ahead in races for three U.S. Senate seats now held by Democrats -- in Arizona, Maine and Ohio.  Nine other Senate races are hotly contested. If the GOP wins five of them, it will control the Senate. What the polls show, as collected by the American Political Network's Hotline: 

STATE/POLL                                       DEMOCRAT                 REPUBLICAN

California	                                           Dianne Feinstein         Michael Huffington
L.A. TIMES                                          49 pct.                        42 pct. 
Feinstein's negative ads slow millionaire challenger

Massachusetts                                    Ted Kennedy              Mitt Romney
BOSTON HERALD                                50 pct.                        40 pct.                
Kennedy attacks on  business practices draw blood

Michigan                                             Bob Carr                     Spencer Abraham       
MARTILLA/KILEY	                                36 pct.                        37 pct.               
GOP tide in Midwest lifts former Quayle aide

Minnesota                                           Ann Wynia                    Rod Grams             
MINNEAPOLIS  STAR TRIBUNE           35 pct.                         42 pct.              
Tax issue is a problem for liberal Democrat

Oklahoma                                           Dave McCurdy              James Inhofe          
KSWO-TV                                            37 pct.                         43 pct.              
Democrat assailed as too close to Clinton

Pennsylvania                                       Harris Wofford            Rick Santorum          
KDKA-TV                                             43 pct.                         44 pct.              
Health care issue now a hindrance to Wofford

Tennessee                                           Jim Sasser                   Bill Frist
THE TENNESSEAN                               43 pct.                         40 pct.
Heart surgeon cuts into Democrat's majority

Tennessee                                           Jim Cooper	                 Fred Thompson
THE TENNESSEAN                               40 pct.	                         46 pct.
Rustic actor-lawyer upstages cerebral Democrat

Virginia*                                              Charles Robb               Oliver North
FAIRFAX JOURNAL                               33 pct.	                         37 pct.
Positive ads are starting to soften North's hard edge

*VIRGINIA INDEPENDENT MARSHALL COLEMAN HAS 16 pct.