A new AP/Ipsos poll seems to support David’s point about the fluidity of the GOP race so far:

White men, conservatives, evangelicals and other pivotal building blocs of the Republican Party are divided among its leading contenders for president, leaving the race for the 2008 GOP nomination highly fluid, according to an Associated Press-Ipsos poll.

Rudy Giuliani and Fred Thompson are each attracting significant support from core GOP groups, based on the poll conducted this week. Even Sen. John McCain of Arizona, whose campaign has been staggered by money problems and staff shake-ups, is backed by solid shares of suburban, college-educated and Midwestern Republican voters.

The roughly one-third of Republicans in the poll who said they disapprove of the job President Bush is doing were gravitating around all three of those hopefuls. Overall, the survey underscores that no contender has yet to convincingly make the case that he is the candidate for change that so many voters want as the party searches for its identity and a successor to Bush.

The horserace:

Giuliani 24%
Thompson 19%
McCain 15%
Romney 7%

Results like this, and the general feeling that the race remains unsettled, suggest that McCain remains very much in the mix, despite his disastrous few months. Meanwhile, while Giuliani leads the field, he has nothing like the clear command of the race that Hillary Clinton does on the Democratic side.

Oh, and I couldn’t resist noting this anecdote from the article:

Lisa Baudoin, 40, a student and homemaker in Sugarland, Texas, said she is a conservative and supporting Thompson because of his views on abortion and immigration. She said she does not like Giuliani’s more moderate immigration stance or his three marriages, and doesn’t like McCain’s opposition to the U.S. torturing terrorism suspects.

“How are you going to get information? They don’t play nice. Why do we have to if no one else is,” she said.

Awesome. Your 2008 GOP: Party of Torture.

Fred Thompson, John McCain, Mitt Romney, Polling, Rudy Giuliani | 3 Comments »

A few days after the latest Republican debate and the official Hollywood entry of Fred Thompson into the race, the actor/lobbyist is gaining strength in the polls. USA Today/Gallup has Thompson up 3 points since August, while Rudy Giuliani continues to lead and John McCain seems to have stopped the bleeding:

Giuliani 33%
Thompson: 22%
McCain: 15%
Romney: 10%
Huckabee: 5%
Brownback: 2%
Paul: 1%
Tancredo: 1%
Hunter: * (ouch)

I could use this as an opportunity to once again go into my Huckabee Is Not a Frontrunner routine, but you get the point. He’s still looking good for a VP slot, though.

Meanwhile, Rasmussen’s daily tracking poll shows a much bigger bounce for Thompson, landing him at the top of the pile:

Thompson 26%
Giuliani 22%
Romney 13%
McCain 12%
Huckabee 6%

Rasmussen comments:

Thompson’s gains since announcing have come primarily among conservatives likely to vote in a Republican Primary. In polling completed since his announcement, Thompson leads Giuliani by 12-points among conservative primary voters. That’s up from a five-point edge before the announcement. Conservatives account for more than 60% of GOP primary voters. Two-thirds of Republican voters view Giuliani as politically moderate or liberal.

In addition to Thompson’s announcement, Giuliani may have lost some ground by proclaiming on CNN that illegal immigration is not a crime.

This is significant, and in terms of the race for the nomination, good news for Thompson. His previous bounce had come thanks almost entirely to moderates, who had been drifting away from the hyper-partisan Giuliani. Now Hollywood Fred is getting conservatives, too. As the Glenn Beck immigration flap illustrates, Giuliani may be having an increasingly difficult time threading the needle between his conflicting images (is he a liberal or a hardliner?) – if so, Thompson stands to benefit.

Duncan Hunter, Fred Thompson, John McCain, Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, Polling, Ron Paul, Rudy Giuliani, Sam Brownback, Tom Tancredo | 3 Comments »

Cross-posted at Alien & Sedition.

It isn’t just wishful thinking, it’s real data showing the decline of the Republican party. Today’s Wall Street Journal has the latest, reporting on a study by prominent Republican pollster Tony Fabrizio:

For Republicans hoping the 2008 campaign will bring a fresh start after the troubled tenure of President Bush, there are sobering signs: Evidence indicates that the party’s problems with the American electorate are much bigger than the president and won’t go away when he leaves office. Recent voter surveys, including private polling done by a leading Republican strategist, suggest a broader erosion of Republicans’ appeal. In particular, three groups crucial to Mr. Bush’s goal of a “permanent Republican majority” are drifting away: younger voters, Hispanics and independents.

The reasons include the Iraq war, conservatives’ emphasis on social issues such as gay marriage, abortion and stem-cell research, and a party-led backlash against illegal immigrants that has left many Hispanic and Asian-American citizens feeling unwelcome. The upshot is that Republicans face structural problems that stem from generational, demographic and societal changes and aren’t easily overcome without changing fundamental party positions. [...]

“The state of the Republican Party is worse than any time since Watergate, and arguably this is worse than Watergate,” says party strategist Vin Weber, a former congressman, “because that was about an event, whereas this may reflect a trend.”

Fabrizio found — consistent with his findings in a comprehensive study of Republicans earlier this year (discussed here) — that the GOP is growing both older and more conservative. This isn’t surprising, given that the present Republican party coalition is dominated by a sharply ideological conservative movement whose ideas and leadership have their origins in the Goldwater era.

(more…)

Polling | No Comments »

I’ve been away for a few days, but I couldn’t let the fact go by that the surge is working. The Duncan Hunter surge, that is.

California congressman Duncan Hunter won Texas’ first Republican Party Straw Poll on Saturday in a low-turnout event that lacked the top-tier presidential candidates.

Hunter got 534 votes, or 41 percent of the vote. Former Tennessee senator and actor Fred Thompson, who is expected to announce his candidacy next week but was not at the event, came in second with 266 votes, or nearly 21 percent. Texas congressman Ron Paul came in third with 217 votes, or 17 percent.

534 people in Texas are buying what Dunc’s selling. You tell me this man can’t walk into the White House now.

This was actually my favorite part.

Crowd support seemed split between Hunter and Paul, whose supporters waved signs and chanted his name throughout the day. Other candidates attending were Chicago businessman John Cox, who got 10 votes; counterterrorism expert Hugh Cort of Birmingham, Ala., who got three votes; and tool-and-die maker Ray McKinney of Savannah, Ga., with 28 votes.

Ray McKinney is the Tin Cup of this race. He slayed the mighty John Cox dragon. (Seriously, 10? 10 votes?)

Duncan Hunter, Polling, Texas | 5 Comments »

Via Real Clear Politics — here are the results for the latest Zogby poll of Iowa Republicans, a week and a half after the Ames straw poll:

Romney 33 (+14 versus May 15 poll)
Giuliani 14 (-4)
F. Thompson 12 (+3)
Huckabee 8 (+6)
McCain 6 (-12)
Brownback 4 (+2)
Tancredo 3 (nc)
Paul 3 (+3)
Undecided 14 (-8)

This is why Huckabee is not a frontrunner. Despite all the glowing press he’s received since the straw poll, despite a 6 point bounce, he’s still in single digits in the very state where he pulled off his dramatic “victory.” Where he goes from here will depend on whether he’s able to outlast the other lower-tier candidates, and what kind of strategy he has to pick up their supporters as well as a good chunk of the undecideds. But he’ll need money to do all that.

Romney’s position in Iowa looks strong, as Giuliani fades, Thompson drifts, and McCain circles the drain. These numbers will move as the candidates begin to spend more money, but Romney has to be pleased with where he stands.

Fred Thompson, Iowa, John McCain, Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, Polling, Ron Paul, Rudy Giuliani, Sam Brownback, Tom Tancredo | 2 Comments »

Much has been said here and elsewhere about the new University of Iowa GOP poll today, and most people agree it’s bad news for most of the Republican field. Out in Iowa, we were able to catch up with David Redlawsk, the pollster himself, and find out what he really thinks the numbers mean for the Iowa Caucuses and the race in general:

“For Giuliani I don’t think the game’s over [in Iowa], though he has dropped a lot and is well behind Romney,” Redlawsk told Iowa Independent. “For McCain it is a different story — I am fairly confident he’s done in Iowa. Iowa Republicans never really liked him very much, and now they have more reason to go elsewhere. But for any Republican who isn’t Romney, it is currently an uphill road.”

[...]

Several candidates are on the bubble of survival and Saturday’s straw poll may eliminate some. Redlawsk says the most likely victim is former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee. “I think Huckabee is out” after the straw poll, he said. “While we see some support for (Kansas Senator Sam) Brownback and for (Colorado Congressman Tom) Tancredo among caucus goers, we get close to no mentions of Huckabee at all.”

[...]

While Texas Rep. Ron Paul runs away with most self-selected, unscientific polls, Redlawsk’s research shows Paul with 2.4 percent support. Redlawsk called Paul’s support very small and very intense. “Paul is the Republican’s Kucinich,” he said.

Fred Thompson, Iowa, John McCain, Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, Polling, Ron Paul, Rudy Giuliani, Sam Brownback, Tom Tancredo, Tommy Thompson | 3 Comments »

What does it mean that Barack Obama is currently the third choice of Iowa Republican voters in the general election — after Romney and Giuliani but before Thompson and McCain? What does it mean that, as the campaign goes on, abortion apostate Rudy Giuliani is losing strength not among conservative voters, but among Republican-leading independents?

Of course it’s far too little data to draw any real conclusions. But for the sake of positing a theory, let’s go back to the Fabrizio poll released about a month ago. As I discussed at the time, the poll described, among other things, the emergence of two very interesting constituencies within the GOP coalition: “Heartland Republicans” and “Government Knows Best Republicans.” My capsule description:

The former, constituting 8% of the GOP electorate, are “more pragmatic and less ideological,” worried about gas prices but supportive of government action on economic issues and climate change, and somewhat Midwestern. The latter group are 13% of the party, the “strongest supporters of government intervention to solve social and environmental problems,” as well as being “skeptical of the Patriot Act” and of military spending generally, heavily female, and “more likely to be found on the coasts.”

So here you have a good 21% of 2000 Republican voters with distinctly moderate — we might even say progressive — politics. And who, in the current crop of GOP presidential candidates, represents them? McCain has glued himself to Bush on the war. And Giuliani’s standing with R-leaning independents has sunk precisely during the time in which he has run away from his previous reputation as a moderate and made a name for himself as one of the most belligerent, partisan candidates in the race.

There’s at least a fifth of the Republican party up for grabs if the GOP’s own candidates continue to amp up the partisanship and crowd each other on the right side of the spectrum. One data point — that Iowa poll — suggests that Barack Obama, with his “post-partisan” rhetoric, might be the Democrat best positioned to peel their support away from the GOP. But all the Democratic candidates might be well advised to take note of them. I’m not saying they should flee the Democratic base — far from it. Rather the point is that candidates should be confident that in making the case for progressive values, they’re actually taking the fight to the Republicans.

Cross-posted at Alien & Sedition.

Polling | 3 Comments »

Okay, that last part is a slight misrepresentation. But, via Ryan Sager, the new University of Iowa poll shows some striking data about Republican opinions in the Hawkeye State. Just a few days before the Ames straw poll, Mitt Romney is sitting on a dramatically-widened lead, while Rudy Giuliani and John McCain plummet into the basement with the rest of the field:

Romney: 27% (+10)
Giuliani: 11% (-9)
Thompson: 7%
Brownback: 4%
Tancredo: 4%
McCain: 3% (-18)

Then there’s this:

One odd factoid: Barack Obama is the third choice of registered Republicans in the general election, after Mitt Romney and Mr. Giuliani, but ahead of Fred Thompson and Mr. McCain.

Fascinating.

John McCain, Mitt Romney, Polling, Rudy Giuliani | 1 Comment »

From Iowa Independent’s John Deeth, we get a pretty thorough preview of how this Saturday’s Straw Poll in Ames will affect the Republican campaign with interviews of Republicans on the ground, and it doesn’t look good for them:

U.S. Sen. Sam Brownback from Kansas is bringing in the band Kansas, and hoping he won’t be dust in the wind by day’s end. Congressman Duncan Hunter of California has hired an Elvis impersonator. And unlikely Led Zeppelin fan Mike Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas, will be playing bass with his own band.

“Take a political convention and mix it with a tailgate party,” said Johnson County GOP activist Todd Versteegh of Saturday’s Iowa Republican straw poll at Iowa State’s Hilton Coliseum in Ames. “If you’re a political junkie, this is a prime event.”

It may also be the last chance to see some of the Republican presidential candidates. Since its inception in 1979, the straw poll has grown from a low-key fund-raiser to the de facto first round of Iowa’s first-in-the-nation caucuses.

The day will see more losers than winners. What’s officially at stake for the candidates is no more than bragging rights. But the lack of something to brag about may be fatal. Lamar Alexander, Elizabeth Dole and Dan Quayle all dropped out after poor showings in 1999, while Pat Buchanan left the Republican Party to take over the remnants of Ross Perot’s Reform Party.

In contrast, only one candidate — Orrin Hatch — dropped out after the actual caucuses.

“After next Saturday, between three to four of the candidates are going to drop out,” said Versteegh. “If you don’t want to see somebody potentially drop out, go support them.”

Read more here.

Duncan Hunter, Fred Thompson, Iowa, John McCain, Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, Polling, Ron Paul, Rudy Giuliani, Sam Brownback, Tom Tancredo, Tommy Thompson | No Comments »

Right-Wing News periodically polls its list of about 230 conservative bloggers to ask who they rate as the “most desired” and “least desired” candidates in the GOP presidential field. The latest survey puts Fred Thompson at the front of the pack, replacing Newt Gingrich, who has faded all the way to 8th place. The “least desired” was, probably not surprisingly, Ron Paul.

Thompson wasn’t an option in the previous poll, conducted in January. Meanwhile, in both surveys, Rudy Giuliani placed second among the desirables. Seems to be an interesting dynamic, with bloggers holding out hope for some kind of platonic ideal — but unanounced — conservative candidate, but ready to back Giuliani if the dream doesn’t come true.

Here’s the full list of “most desired” (respondents were asked to rank their top five) — note that, confusingly, it’s listed in reverse order. Total points in parentheses:

11) Tommy Thompson (5)
10) Sam Brownback (5)
9) Ron Paul (9.5)
8 Newt Gingrich (15.0)
7) John McCain (17.0)
6) Tom Tancredo (27.5)
5) Mike Huckabee (31.25)
4) Mitt Romney (56.25)
3) Duncan Hunter (60.0)
2) Rudy Giuliani (70.0)
1) Fred Thompson (86.5)

Check out the site for the full list of “least desired”.

Polling | No Comments »