tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-71586728645760527872024-03-05T12:46:59.454-05:00Fun With Party I.D. brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.comBlogger153125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-86518130920140898762018-09-24T19:16:00.003-04:002018-09-25T18:33:55.230-04:00Why State-Level Presidential Job Approval Matters In Midterm Elections<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSBfTHxB6UX5zyaRjh3r1ENVjrZ8cEkDMwp2wnMtspI_QzMyrYHRjZNOhVLOfkdcwvHGN7LRTAoKk7AhU9R-yvpgL9I14xNpFJL2HMFoPxIcnv-DrTFOWhvgTq44uUY8WcWZUif1DZEnM/s1600/Trump+image.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="333" data-original-width="500" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSBfTHxB6UX5zyaRjh3r1ENVjrZ8cEkDMwp2wnMtspI_QzMyrYHRjZNOhVLOfkdcwvHGN7LRTAoKk7AhU9R-yvpgL9I14xNpFJL2HMFoPxIcnv-DrTFOWhvgTq44uUY8WcWZUif1DZEnM/s1600/Trump+image.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">History has shown midterm results can be unkind to the president's party when the president's job approval rating is under 45%.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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Given that midterm elections have long been thought of as
referendums on the president’s party, it seems like a worthwhile venture to
take a look at Donald Trump’s job approval rating in the states holding senate
and gubernatorial contests this November. By examining the results of past contests,
and comparing them to state-level presidential job approval, patterns emerge that offer insight into what to expect after the dust settles on November 6. <o:p></o:p></div>
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For the purposes of this article, exit polling from the last
four midterm elections was used to determine the president’s job approval
rating in any given state (<a href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/exit-polls" target="_blank">2014</a>, <a href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls.main/" target="_blank">2010</a>, <a href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2006/pages/results/states/US/H/00/epolls.0.html" target="_blank">2006</a>, <a href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/1998/states/AL/S/exit.poll.html" target="_blank">1998</a>). Because of <a href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2002/data/epolls/states/US/H/00/epolls.html" target="_blank">issues with the data</a> at the time it was
taken, exit polling from the 2002 midterm election is excluded.<o:p></o:p></div>
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To begin, three important rules emerge from looking at
presidential job approval ratings as compared to midterm senate and
gubernatorial results:</div>
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<ol>
<li>When the president’s job approval rating is
under 45% in a particular state, there’s a strong chance (85%) that the
non-presidential party will either flip that seat to their side, or at least hold the seat for their party.</li>
<li>When the president’s job approval rating is
between 45-49% in a particular state, the odds of the non-presidential party flipping or holding the seat are
about even (56% of the time). </li>
<li>When the president’s job approval rating is at 50%
or greater, the odds of the non-presidential party flipping or holding the seat are
only a little better than one in three (38% of the time)</li>
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To see how I arrived at these conclusions, consider the tables below, which document the number of senate and gubernatorial contests that fell into one of these three ranges of presidential job approval in the last four midterm elections. </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoWLm9auvrMyoMdizGRMivFF5UmuYYkWdGgC1o_R0oG1jJMy1qjikPxKVCd6UYjNpxLnq1Ws6GCgrWB_ND0zk_xkVNhXvQ_8Mg1Y0E9ZI_kB4UnjM8MqlgH4bsMRn4bIxBW3pvVSJ5r7k/s1600/Chart+1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="460" data-original-width="547" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjoWLm9auvrMyoMdizGRMivFF5UmuYYkWdGgC1o_R0oG1jJMy1qjikPxKVCd6UYjNpxLnq1Ws6GCgrWB_ND0zk_xkVNhXvQ_8Mg1Y0E9ZI_kB4UnjM8MqlgH4bsMRn4bIxBW3pvVSJ5r7k/s1600/Chart+1.png" /></a></div>
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The fifth table combines the data from the previous four midterm cycles into one, making for larger sample sizes. The overall trend holds across a total of 210 exit-polled senate and gubernatorial contests.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSwet0Ek_duangNjrI3QwulZu_m6ELdVax51r71WAG7_mi1KSqOYnjAyeQMSRTpSaQqlwglnKL5_ytDptX9CO2yt9IQMDsLr9SfDsIxvrq-YpXz1fchJUyjwUUk33TRFjy1IY3dG-mocQ/s1600/Chart+2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="232" data-original-width="277" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSwet0Ek_duangNjrI3QwulZu_m6ELdVax51r71WAG7_mi1KSqOYnjAyeQMSRTpSaQqlwglnKL5_ytDptX9CO2yt9IQMDsLr9SfDsIxvrq-YpXz1fchJUyjwUUk33TRFjy1IY3dG-mocQ/s1600/Chart+2.png" /></a></div>
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As you can see, over the last four midterm cycles, there were 89 exit-polled senate and gubernatorial contests in which the president's approval rating was under 45%, and the party out of presidential power won 76 of them. There were 43 exit-polled contests in which the president's approval rating fell between 45-49%, and the party out of presidential power won 24 of them. There were 78 exit-polled contests in which the president's approval rating was at 50% or higher, and the opposing party only won 30 of them.<br />
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What are the implications for Republican prospects in senate and gubernatorial contests this November,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>given the opposing party's performance within a range of presidential
job approval over the past four midterm cycles? That depends on Donald Trump’s state level job approval rating.<br />
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The table below documents just that - the president's average approval rating in every state holding a senate or gubernatorial contest this November.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3URTjFTi-og8nxwaB0cV5m8SkVsfruXVmMYn-I6t-YuI7tymbc1Lfy5_sG8Ndt9D3OtUvIG49m5-yXlNJIgV3wjRqZlCnvqqu-j2kz2zkkKryXRtKnwo-21sGpyR9y3l7dphA3cZsYBo/s1600/Try+1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="706" data-original-width="552" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi3URTjFTi-og8nxwaB0cV5m8SkVsfruXVmMYn-I6t-YuI7tymbc1Lfy5_sG8Ndt9D3OtUvIG49m5-yXlNJIgV3wjRqZlCnvqqu-j2kz2zkkKryXRtKnwo-21sGpyR9y3l7dphA3cZsYBo/s1600/Try+1.png" /></a></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsd5i0frZu_TS4zrdhGvPSsNaD3fxbknDPvkZ8ZZW0X1nWXcSqJeHQD37gaGf_Xd-Uj5sVt3sb_zia8hpQvgl781C7E2C7goJhellu5PKFF6cE3nvmOW8O5MzjBHlO_FQgQMlzaqTZJ00/s1600/Try+2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="702" data-original-width="550" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgsd5i0frZu_TS4zrdhGvPSsNaD3fxbknDPvkZ8ZZW0X1nWXcSqJeHQD37gaGf_Xd-Uj5sVt3sb_zia8hpQvgl781C7E2C7goJhellu5PKFF6cE3nvmOW8O5MzjBHlO_FQgQMlzaqTZJ00/s1600/Try+2.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Please ask if you would like access to the data used in compiling Donald Trump's state-level job approval ratings.</td></tr>
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There's some obvious bad news here for President Trump. His approval rating is
currently under 45% in more than half (56%) of the senate and gubernatorial
contests to be held in November. Why is that bad for the president? Because the
party out of presidential power wins senate and/or gubernatorial midterm
contests 85% of the time when the president’s approval rating is under 45%. <o:p></o:p></div>
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The good news for President Trump? It could be worse. Take the 2014 midterm election, for example. Barack Obama's job approval rating was under 45% in 70% of the exit-polled
senate and gubernatorial contests. Republicans ended up gaining 9 senate seats and 2 governor's mansions. Likewise, George W. Bush saw his approval rating
under 45% in 65% of exit-polled senate and gubernatorial contests in 2006,
earning Democrats <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Senate_elections,_2006" target="_blank">6 senate seats </a>and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_gubernatorial_elections,_2006" target="_blank">6 governorships.</a></div>
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The table below illustrates presidential job approval in exit-polled senate and gubernatorial contests from the 2014, 2010, 2006, and 1998 midterms, and compares that to President Trump's job approval rating in states holding contests this November. As you can see, Barack Obama in 2014 and George W. Bush in 2006 were very unpopular in the majority of exit-polled contests. Bill Clinton in 1998 was quite the opposite. President Trump's job approval rating, as of today, falls in between them.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAA4ZWNKDrcoioGsH2IgwXWF3v_kF1w82DFDGvTU5IYbeIX9tH-O-Ncc8q3_wy0Te6VJ9SGQfEC-zZCTeHcXt8ynnBxXQsy6j7UIL2bReEFIrhXZZDm2SYQk0B5IZNU6Qy5Ua0yoPFvNA/s1600/try+again.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="558" data-original-width="408" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiAA4ZWNKDrcoioGsH2IgwXWF3v_kF1w82DFDGvTU5IYbeIX9tH-O-Ncc8q3_wy0Te6VJ9SGQfEC-zZCTeHcXt8ynnBxXQsy6j7UIL2bReEFIrhXZZDm2SYQk0B5IZNU6Qy5Ua0yoPFvNA/s1600/try+again.png" /></a></div>
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Based on what we know from past midterm exit polling, what
does Trump’s state-level job approval ratings tell us about what to expect on
election night? In a nutshell, it confirms what we already knew. If presidential approval polling was our only metric to go
by in predicting the results of upcoming senate and gubernatorial contests, it suggests that Democrats will pick-up a whole bunch of governorships, and will lose three senate seats (making the composition of the Senate 54 Republicans, 46 Democrats/Independents). This is roughly in line with most forecasts, as well as current state polling averages of senate and gubernatorial contests.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEia9nAIemBAyAaGMUm_Sm-2f-U-nk97kz23JPMLJlbu6jU1h8Xl2x39dtHF3lNZf_XlOVLCadybbwCzRTnadyqBEeQJlvYYa0Vln7ljpN_ILXI3S97bqMjiQZSXEC-77CrewLrOmWTNv3s/s1600/Try+3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="564" data-original-width="544" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEia9nAIemBAyAaGMUm_Sm-2f-U-nk97kz23JPMLJlbu6jU1h8Xl2x39dtHF3lNZf_XlOVLCadybbwCzRTnadyqBEeQJlvYYa0Vln7ljpN_ILXI3S97bqMjiQZSXEC-77CrewLrOmWTNv3s/s1600/Try+3.png" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA2co1jB8KUkUxj9BAwU7DdFi2g7w4WrwJhyphenhyphenHEha8TJxaA3Ur_bhnx8QJaIR7ZhWvWQh6GIO64syBA2pEWryZ_Oqjv2e2wwq1t_OAKtw2QZEzROBOfQ4Yj6pdTQYyC73TP75bHPvTl_xk/s1600/Try+4.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="564" data-original-width="544" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgA2co1jB8KUkUxj9BAwU7DdFi2g7w4WrwJhyphenhyphenHEha8TJxaA3Ur_bhnx8QJaIR7ZhWvWQh6GIO64syBA2pEWryZ_Oqjv2e2wwq1t_OAKtw2QZEzROBOfQ4Yj6pdTQYyC73TP75bHPvTl_xk/s1600/Try+4.png" /></a></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCXbWl_B1XrSzlWHrpigEaPSo5-xsCSs0kpFBoEjri12YsTyZ1dpcY-hSBExA9j55gDvlD7oYhfBXlDKWxVRwFp_kl5lKaV0YqoXWKVK1BvuS2TDaeh7itfOk3XMpFz4wwwC0uqHiaVpg/s1600/Try+5.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="229" data-original-width="544" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgCXbWl_B1XrSzlWHrpigEaPSo5-xsCSs0kpFBoEjri12YsTyZ1dpcY-hSBExA9j55gDvlD7oYhfBXlDKWxVRwFp_kl5lKaV0YqoXWKVK1BvuS2TDaeh7itfOk3XMpFz4wwwC0uqHiaVpg/s1600/Try+5.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Ask if you would like access to the data used to compile state averages. Data mostly comes from public sites such as <a href="https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/latest_polls/" target="_blank">Real Clear Politics</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_gubernatorial_elections,_2018" target="_blank">Wikipedia</a>, and <a href="https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?board=102.0" target="_blank">Dave Leip's US Election Atlas</a>. </td></tr>
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As you can see from the table above, current senate polling averages suggest that if the election were held today, Republicans would end up with 49 senate seats, Democrats would end up with 50 seats, and 1 seat would be a toss-up. The polling suggests that Democrats would flip Arizona, Nevada, and Tennessee. Republicans would flip North Dakota. Missouri would flip from blue to toss-up.<br />
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Regarding gubernatorial contests, the table above suggests that the Republican's 33 seat majority would drop to just 24 governorships if the election were held today. The number of Democrats in governor's mansions would increase from 16 to 25. There would be one toss-up. Current polling suggests Democrats would flip 9 state governorships - Nevada, New Mexico, Kansas, Iowa, Wisconsin, Illinois, Michigan, Georgia, and Florida. The Republicans would pick-up one seat in Alaska. Maine is presently a toss-up given the <a href="https://www.suffolk.edu/documents/SUPRC/8_8_2018_marginals.pdf" target="_blank">only poll</a> we've had of the race.</div>
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The bottom line is that with President Trump currently under
the critical 45% approval mark in over half of the contests taking place this
November, Republicans have a lot of exposure. While the current composition of the Senate doesn't look as though it will change all that much, even a minor shift could give Democrats control of the chamber. And the partisan composition of state governor's mansions is likely to look very different on Wednesday, November 7. The Trump Admin has two things on their side - time, and the fact that they are not currently in as bad of shape, from a job approval perspective, as Barack Obama and George W. Bush were at this point in 2014 and 2006, respectively. But time can be a double-edged sword. Things could get better for Republicans, or worse.</div>
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brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-47131981435109984252016-03-18T12:15:00.000-04:002017-04-14T02:29:07.665-04:00Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, and the Impending Gender-Gap Explosion<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGs1x9yiEA61oeMUZLrQsucFmtkgIqq9umxDcEGCcWuYrTJ9_ruaMGkyzEdDaNO9HUxRdHh2y43PTlF4tZcux0dymuAVGA2HVw0SXa5XDRN1HTXZsQeiM-OmyXSBxigS2J-4_0DlYVaRU/s1600/disparages.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGs1x9yiEA61oeMUZLrQsucFmtkgIqq9umxDcEGCcWuYrTJ9_ruaMGkyzEdDaNO9HUxRdHh2y43PTlF4tZcux0dymuAVGA2HVw0SXa5XDRN1HTXZsQeiM-OmyXSBxigS2J-4_0DlYVaRU/s1600/disparages.jpg" /></a></div>
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In every presidential election since exit polling began over forty years ago, Democrats have performed stronger among women than men, while Republicans performed stronger among men than women. Of the eleven elections since 1972, Democrats have lost the female vote in four (1972, 1980, 1984, & 1988), all of which resulted in electoral landslide defeats for their party. The same is true for the three of eleven elections (1976, 1992, and 2008) where Republicans lost the male vote.<br />
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While the difference in voting patterns between the sexes is clear, the extent of that difference has varied widely throughout the years. In the most recent presidential election, the Democratic incumbent carried women <a href="http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/results/president/exit-polls">by eleven points</a>, while the Republican challenger carried men by seven, creating a gender-gap of eighteen points. But in 1976, when Democratic challenger Jimmy Carter <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1976">defeated</a> President Ford, the gap was less than ONE point. In 1972, when Nixon <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1972">won reelection</a> in a landslide, the gender gap was only three points.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_vpNBfHAIF1iXiPS4-piuJqqBrYVVmOdeKvbXJ4n1w-3B4_VvZuS9CwoBNIfc6rC89otNho-vtwz0Tssyri89CV7ve5W_o5MZVxdedfhE72ZDWIiRAWMJsbDntqL99RsyHxnNPuDQ4J0/s1600/More+Gender+Gap.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj_vpNBfHAIF1iXiPS4-piuJqqBrYVVmOdeKvbXJ4n1w-3B4_VvZuS9CwoBNIfc6rC89otNho-vtwz0Tssyri89CV7ve5W_o5MZVxdedfhE72ZDWIiRAWMJsbDntqL99RsyHxnNPuDQ4J0/s1600/More+Gender+Gap.png" /></a>The largest gender gap recorded by exit polling came in the 2000 election, where Gore carried women by ten points, while Bush carried men by eleven.<br />
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Yet in an election year where the most likely Republican nominee happens to have a <a href="http://fortune.com/2015/08/09/trump-insult-women-history/">knack for disparaging women</a>, and where the probable Democratic nominee elicits an almost instinctual <a href="https://www.nationaljournal.com/s/81040/hillary-clintons-demographics-problem?mref=home">disdain from her male detractors</a>, you have the recipe for a gender-gap explosion that could make the 2012 election, or even the 2000 contest, seem tame.<br />
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In fact, if current polling is any indication, that's exactly where we are headed.<br />
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Using national general election surveys released this year and compiled by Real Clear Politics, the average gender-gap across eight surveys is twenty-seven points. That's nearly ten points higher than the gender-gap seen in 2012, five points higher than the largest gender-gap ever recorded in a presidential election, and fourteen points higher than the average gender-gap in presidential elections since 1972. See below:<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhbB5RkesNSmk700giNnEEHzQ-eHUpZ1EbldxUwlgL2b6RdWeAgiRViA7dlGC8eJJqUi7-6CPPMvNZzdPTlO-WjRhfv7OxcSnx3UWyrDZjdCZibhGHhuPevzwcsJjad1rZSk-cJxzjflI/s1600/Gender+Gap.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhhbB5RkesNSmk700giNnEEHzQ-eHUpZ1EbldxUwlgL2b6RdWeAgiRViA7dlGC8eJJqUi7-6CPPMvNZzdPTlO-WjRhfv7OxcSnx3UWyrDZjdCZibhGHhuPevzwcsJjad1rZSk-cJxzjflI/s1600/Gender+Gap.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Only surveys with publicly available crosstabs are used in the averages.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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Hillary Clinton averages an impressive 53-35% lead over Donald Trump among women. You have to travel back to 1972 to find a presidential candidate with a larger advantage than she among the female vote - and that, ironically enough, belonged to Republican Richard Nixon. Clinton's lead among women ranges from as high as twenty-eight points in <a href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2016/images/02/29/rel4b.-.2016.general.pdf">one recent poll</a>, to as little as <a href="http://www.suffolk.edu/documents/SUPRC/2_17_2016_tables.pdf">eight points</a> in another.<br />
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And while Trump's 49-40% advantage among men is less impressive than Hillary's performance among women, it's still more impressive than Mitt Romney's 52-45% win in 2012. Trump ranges from as high as an <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/26/politics/poll-republicans-results-cnn-orc/index.html">eighteen point</a> lead among men, to as little as <a href="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections/election_2016/clinton_edges_ahead_of_trump_in_presidential_matchup">three points</a>.<br />
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The largest gender-gap found by a single pollster this year is forty-one points! It stems from a <a href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2016/images/02/29/rel4b.-.2016.general.pdf">February CNN</a> survey finding Clinton leading 62-34% among women, with Trump winning men 54-41%.<br />
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To better illustrate the potential for a gender-gap "explosion" this November, consider the graph below:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuj6vIKZ4WNHsLss-vKBFHzsfemgHjOJEfnCUbJYAUEoonjhy57EqbuO9zfg3Qaav2l-i8juxCE_KJW2kDo-blPHS63Oq9-onAIKS3T1qC0h-QWSwtciw8R6p9jxvK9EQVaHSL54Y2yBo/s1600/Line+Graph.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuj6vIKZ4WNHsLss-vKBFHzsfemgHjOJEfnCUbJYAUEoonjhy57EqbuO9zfg3Qaav2l-i8juxCE_KJW2kDo-blPHS63Oq9-onAIKS3T1qC0h-QWSwtciw8R6p9jxvK9EQVaHSL54Y2yBo/s1600/Line+Graph.png" /></a></div>
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If the pattern above holds, 2016 looks likely to join 2012, 2008, 1996, 1992, and 1976 as presidential election years in which the Democrat performs better among women than the Republican does among men. The opposite was true in 2004, 2000, 1988, 1984, 1980, and 1972, where male support for the GOP ticket was stronger than female support for the Democrat.<br />
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And if the general election horse race numbers fail to convince you of the potential for a widening gulf between the presidential preferences of men and women, consider the favorability ratings of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. Not surprisingly, you'll see there's a significant gender-gap here as well.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtGSXgx4bwwJizIkjjETif2EV7-p0hzCDvmzOdkr12CMpnJj2FFSeajuDuLAOS8npfYD0HSTNj0au2_-7GJL51ynUUyPGpIuixkz6jwweTlfmXHy5_5W8YgsGvJzR46bLg6zxk1eUjE4Q/s1600/Will+this+work.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhtGSXgx4bwwJizIkjjETif2EV7-p0hzCDvmzOdkr12CMpnJj2FFSeajuDuLAOS8npfYD0HSTNj0au2_-7GJL51ynUUyPGpIuixkz6jwweTlfmXHy5_5W8YgsGvJzR46bLg6zxk1eUjE4Q/s1600/Will+this+work.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">*Economist/YouGov is a bi-weekly tracking survey. The numbers reported in the table above are a monthly average.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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On average, there is a twenty point gender-gap between Hillary Clinton's net favorability rating among women (-3 points) and men (-23 points). For Donald Trump, there is an average seventeen point gender gap between his net favorability rating among men (-15 points) and women (-32 points). The gender-gap in Barack Obama's and Mitt Romney's favorability rating at a similar point in 2012 did exist, but wasn't nearly as pronounced.<br />
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The gender-gap is even more stark if you take out the one internet pollster, YouGov, which compared to the non-internet surveys used in the average, seem a bit outlier-ish.<br />
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In the era of Trump, you can expect to hear lots about the many ways we're divided as Americans. Though if current polling holds, the battle of the sexes could give racial, class, and religious divisions a run for their money.brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-59659949429864907952016-03-04T12:23:00.000-05:002016-03-24T15:54:13.093-04:00No, Trump Is Not Unusually Strong Among Democrats - But He IS Unusually Weak Among Republicans<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-lIjbXk6whM06fQFfcv4Nq6Sy9bwzy01Yc99DDza7FlAPVz-Yi7biB04FzZyFioexz06IxjQfxSQrUHsAybvDXnayXMY77fN9n5KgIP2dkRAdlrs7c2wFU4KtBgZXfRWyt1NzxSnQlWo/s1600/Dems+for+trump.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-lIjbXk6whM06fQFfcv4Nq6Sy9bwzy01Yc99DDza7FlAPVz-Yi7biB04FzZyFioexz06IxjQfxSQrUHsAybvDXnayXMY77fN9n5KgIP2dkRAdlrs7c2wFU4KtBgZXfRWyt1NzxSnQlWo/s1600/Dems+for+trump.jpg" /></a></div>
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From Mitt Romney's past dalliance with government healthcare and abortion, to John McCain's involvement with campaign finance and immigration reform, strict purity to conservative orthodoxy has never been a Republican prerequisite for the presidential nomination. But if Romney and McCain flirted with expanding the bounds of acceptable disobedience to GOP principles, Donald Trump has blown the lid off those bounds.<br />
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It started before he even officially entered the race last June, when Trump implored attendees at a Republican summit in April to resist reforming <a href="http://www.mediaite.com/tv/donald-trump-rails-against-cutting-social-security-medicare-during-gop-summit/">Social Security and Medicare</a>. During the first GOP primary debate on August 6, 2015, Trump expressed admiration for Canada and Scotland's <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zFRjExsfTk&feature=youtu.be">single-payer healthcare system</a>. A few days later, Trump <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/250936-trump-defends-planned-parenthood">defended Planned Parenthood</a> during an interview with Sean Hannity. Two weeks later, Trump suggested during a CNN interview that he would <a href="http://money.cnn.com/2015/08/27/news/economy/donald-trump-economy-tax-plan/">raise taxes on wealthy Americans</a>, cleverly labeling it a hedge-fund tax. The following month, Trump signaled his disdain for free trade during a '60 Minutes' interview, telling Scott Pelley <a href="http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/donald-trump-60-minutes-nafta-827389">NAFTA has been a "disaster."</a> Believe it or not, the list goes on, but I digress.<br />
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Naturally, the historical nature of a Republican's brazen appeals to populist economic programs often identified with progressives led many political commentators to entertain an interesting theory: might Mr. Trump's overtures to the left pay dividends this November? Articles from Breitbart's <a href="http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/01/03/trump-boosted-midwest-democratic-party-switchers-racism-sneers-ny-times/">Mike Flynn</a> and The Washington Post's <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2016/03/02/could-donald-trump-win-in-november-thanks-to-democrats/">Philip Bump</a> highlight Trump's support from a specific kind of Democrat - namely, ex-Democrats. The <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/31/upshot/donald-trumps-strongest-supporters-a-certain-kind-of-democrat.html">NY Times' hypothesis</a> was a bit different, though not far off - a big chunk of Trump's support stems from self-identifying Republicans who, for whatever reason, are registered Democrats.<br />
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Regardless of the theory, beware of misleading headlines suggesting Trump could coast to victory in November on the backs of Democrats; because from the standpoint of general election polling, nothing appears nearly so out-of-the-ordinary. In fact, considering the <a href="https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=700FD6570D12A4C1!404&authkey=!AKXhCP513uHk3Nk&ithint=file%2cxlsx">eight national general election polls</a> (with readily available crosstabs) conducted since the Iowa Caucus on February 1, Trump earns an average of just 9% from self-identified Democrats - essentially the same amount won by his GOP opponents Marco Rubio (9%) and Ted Cruz (8%). In fact, Mitt Romney, John McCain, and George W. Bush all polled better among Demo.crats than Trump during a similar period in their respective 2012, 2008, and 2004 (uncontested) primaries.<br />
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Not only that, but it's Marco Rubio - not Donald Trump - who holds Clinton to her lowest share of the Democratic vote. She wins, on average, 84% of Democrats in post-Iowa general election polling, while winning 85% and 86% against Donald Trump and Ted Cruz, respectively. See the table below:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQ6ESkjLiR-p0a2SGdgdinQ9MhBt9pQO6WwpNQECf1kLhnf-IRxHeW49RD1N1TAmpVvMcaDuTrueKY4SuYZoSwt1bqqUlVb-WfK8O7q3iGlMEAzIzRZ6hCxMW4KxHwiVh4aY7-K8YSx5E/s1600/Blog+Pic.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhQ6ESkjLiR-p0a2SGdgdinQ9MhBt9pQO6WwpNQECf1kLhnf-IRxHeW49RD1N1TAmpVvMcaDuTrueKY4SuYZoSwt1bqqUlVb-WfK8O7q3iGlMEAzIzRZ6hCxMW4KxHwiVh4aY7-K8YSx5E/s1600/Blog+Pic.png" /></a></div>
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As Donald Trump's so-called attractiveness to Democrats saturates the news media, one verifiable fact does not: Trump is performing <i>worse</i> among Republicans in the general election than current and past Republican candidates at this point in the campaign.<br />
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In national surveys conducted since the Iowa caucus, the GOP front-runner is <a href="https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=700FD6570D12A4C1!406&authkey=!AH7ty3o-nPFt2mg&ithint=file%2cxlsx">averaging just 78% among Republicans</a>, bottoming out at 65% in a post-Super Tuesday poll conducted by <a href="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections/election_2016/clinton_edges_ahead_of_trump_in_presidential_matchup">Rasmussen Reports</a>. Meanwhile, Rubio and Cruz average 86% and 85% among Republicans respectively. Looking back at history, Romney, McCain, and Bush averaged 86%, 83%, and 87% respectively at similar periods during their primary - in other words, better than Trump.<br />
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Trump also cedes slightly more Republican voters to Hillary Clinton than Cruz or Rubio.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggBy389FOG7ZqQosGg6CB1Io8XRB1kVjm1NrINd4ucgTujmcygkXm7JuaBVcCnouQ8fGKD_7THM7zrRBWd-xk17tcrtW4_-GIpKR8RuOnbHhn-j4_2oVsWMP93GSx-9wKj1T2Zz2gyh7k/s1600/Blog+pic+2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggBy389FOG7ZqQosGg6CB1Io8XRB1kVjm1NrINd4ucgTujmcygkXm7JuaBVcCnouQ8fGKD_7THM7zrRBWd-xk17tcrtW4_-GIpKR8RuOnbHhn-j4_2oVsWMP93GSx-9wKj1T2Zz2gyh7k/s1600/Blog+pic+2.png" /></a></div>
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As you can see, there is nothing exceptional, or even remotely indicative of a Democratic avalanche towards Donald Trump.<br />
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Not only is Trump unimpressive against Democrats, but whatever gains he <i>may</i> eventually make are more than offset by Hillary Clinton's gains among Republicans. In fact, in all eight national primary surveys conducted since the Iowa caucus, Clinton performs better with her base than Trump performs with his. She averaged a 76-point lead over Trump among Democrats, while Trump averages just a 68-pt lead over Clinton among Republicans.<br />
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The same cannot be said for Marco Rubio, Mitt Romney, John McCain, or George W. Bush, all of whom's advantage among Republicans was/is greater than their Democratic opponent's advantage among Democrats.<br />
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So the next time you hear a story about the potential for Trump to cut into Clinton's Democratic base, remember these facts - 1. the numbers don't support such a theory, and 2. Trump's weakness with his own base could cancel out any strength among Democrats, were it to materialize.brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-3293220512485875782016-02-25T19:58:00.001-05:002016-03-24T15:55:23.741-04:00Trump vs. Rubio vs. Cruz In The Electoral College - Who Beats Clinton?<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCOpZR8yxn8dKaLfJmWpXZdswSKd3pgWembKZ70G_lLgzFZDDjT_-aNs1TT0RI73W1m768E-XInwxXp_nGEHraWUX7NUB7X075WUuS5qRf1PKQnWr-oRyTOj_dC1mIoDGYu4R4ffyEbh8/s1600/Voting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhCOpZR8yxn8dKaLfJmWpXZdswSKd3pgWembKZ70G_lLgzFZDDjT_-aNs1TT0RI73W1m768E-XInwxXp_nGEHraWUX7NUB7X075WUuS5qRf1PKQnWr-oRyTOj_dC1mIoDGYu4R4ffyEbh8/s1600/Voting.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Getty image</td></tr>
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As the 2016 presidential race progresses, I've given in and decided to try my hand at a bit of electoral projection. True, I'm playing in a crowded field with bigger and better players, but this is mostly for me. Plus, everyone needs a hobby.<br />
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For starters, this projection will be purely electoral college based, relying entirely on polling and nothing else, as opposed to say <a href="http://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/election-2016/primary-forecast/virginia-republican/">FiveThirtyEight</a>, which employs a nifty "polling plus" forecast. Why not just rely on <a href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster">Pollster</a>, or <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/latest_polls/">Real Clear Politics</a>, you might ask? While both sites are exemplary, RCP excludes some surveys, and Pollster has yet to start projections for individual states in the general election - not to mention both sites aren't quite as up-to-date with the latest polling information as I would like them to be.<br />
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At least for now, each state's electoral college projection will be based on every state poll released in the last two months. For example, today's update would be based on polling dating back to December 25, 2015. Obviously, as the pace of general election polling picks up through the rest of the year, the projection will be based on a smaller time frame.<br />
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Since we're still nine months from the presidential race, very little general election polling has been done in most states, while other states have seen no polling at all. Regarding states that have not had any polls conducted over the last two months, the electoral college projection will be based on an average of the most recent survey conducted <i>after</i> Trump's June 2015 presidential announcement, and any survey conducted within one month of that most recent poll. If there has been NO polling post Trump-announcement, the electoral college projection will be based on an average of that state's 2004 and 2012 presidential election results. I've chosen 2004 and 2012 as a baseline in the absence of any polling because these two elections featured a relatively moderate-to-small win for the two political parties - the Republicans won by <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=2004">2.5 nationally</a> in 2004, while the Democrats won by <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php">3.9 points in 2012</a>.<br />
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Electoral college projections will be made for the three most likely GOP nominees (Trump, Rubio, and Cruz) using various shades of blue (for Democrats) and red (for Republicans), based on the Republican candidate's lead or deficit against the Democratic candidate. For example, the darker the shade of red, the stronger the Republican's lead against Hillary Clinton. The lighter the shade of blue, the smaller Hillary Clinton's advantage against the Republican candidate. For an illustration, see the map below:<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx644bhoBv3B-ug85qnvs76KS1HK7KyMLDws8rfE9ZiXW0EFiGJrK4vI-WEymHisaw4RVpXweIlRhQcDHptVxf8mdkywAltrHRjFkBSz2avaHQtg3o_Ve9odvxJGxay_XwWwlQijdYgVw/s1600/US+Map+Colors.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx644bhoBv3B-ug85qnvs76KS1HK7KyMLDws8rfE9ZiXW0EFiGJrK4vI-WEymHisaw4RVpXweIlRhQcDHptVxf8mdkywAltrHRjFkBSz2avaHQtg3o_Ve9odvxJGxay_XwWwlQijdYgVw/s1600/US+Map+Colors.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pink = GOP lead of less than five points. Light red = GOP lead of five to just-under ten points. Red = GOP lead of ten to just-under twenty points. Dark red = GOP lead of twenty points or more.<br />
Very light blue = Democratic lead of less than five points. Light blue = Democratic lead of five to just-under ten points. Blue = Democratic lead of ten to just-under twenty points. Dark blue = Democratic lead of twenty points or more.</td></tr>
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Now, on to the projections...starting with the strongest Republican candidate, based on current polling:<br />
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From an electoral college perspective, Florida Senator Marco Rubio is the best positioned Republican candidate remaining to win the White House. Current polling coupled with historical analysis gives Rubio the largest number of electoral college votes for a Republican since <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1988">George Bush, Sr. in 1988</a>. Rubio flips the previously blue states of Colorado, Minnesota, Iowa, Michigan, Ohio, Florida, Pennsylvania, and New Hampshire red. Those eight states alone represent 112 electoral college votes. State projections based off historical analysis due to a lack of post June 2015 polling are: AL, AR, CT, DE, HA, ID, IN, KS, LA, ME, MD, MA, MS, NE, NV, NJ, NM, ND, OK, OR, RI, SD, TN, TX, VT, and WA.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWPJmPBZNDc30KW6ZfGFNI4dheEDhFYGsR2feGig0ii3msGX8tV1TjThdcmJi-VRlFafmftWUTVeT2n1_YySrHLi1g9r6YIs4w0QDxt7sbxZSB9G_HTYzafMRQ9eGBQsCMBY-tc5WAjCg/s1600/Cruz+EV+as+of+Feb+24+2016.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiWPJmPBZNDc30KW6ZfGFNI4dheEDhFYGsR2feGig0ii3msGX8tV1TjThdcmJi-VRlFafmftWUTVeT2n1_YySrHLi1g9r6YIs4w0QDxt7sbxZSB9G_HTYzafMRQ9eGBQsCMBY-tc5WAjCg/s1600/Cruz+EV+as+of+Feb+24+2016.png" /></a></div>
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Unlike Rubio, the latest state polling puts Texas Senator Ted Cruz in danger of a 2004-style electoral rut, only this time, with the Republican losing. While Cruz is able to flip a handful of Obama 2012 states (Colorado, Minnesota, Iowa, and Ohio), it isn't enough to hit the magic mark of 270. So though it appears Ted Cruz would improve on Romney's margin from four years ago if the election were held today, he would still fall short of capturing the White House. State projections based off historical analysis due to a lack of post June 2015 polling are: AL, AR, CT, DE, HA, ID, IN, KS, LA, ME, MD, MA, MI, MS, NE, NV, NJ, NM, ND, OK, OR, RI, SD, TN, TX, UT, VT, and WA.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVgkXqDEbobRAPRzUNbBfrPecru9MGojhXzIB2JG3VdFSj4Vl3iDlTFVYi_kIZL0SSeChXDXm_HPQFA5gmn4ogxt7CsYhqJyEDUCuW1rfXSbAVXwcebRl1qogikOZ_y8TwehuC0t85Czw/s1600/Trump+EV+as+of+Feb+24+2016.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhVgkXqDEbobRAPRzUNbBfrPecru9MGojhXzIB2JG3VdFSj4Vl3iDlTFVYi_kIZL0SSeChXDXm_HPQFA5gmn4ogxt7CsYhqJyEDUCuW1rfXSbAVXwcebRl1qogikOZ_y8TwehuC0t85Czw/s1600/Trump+EV+as+of+Feb+24+2016.png" /></a></div>
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Of course, this brings us to the proverbial elephant in the room - Donald Trump. Contrary to <a href="http://blog.seattlepi.com/seattlepolitics/2015/12/15/nearly-half-of-republicans-believe-trump-is-most-electable-gop-candidate-poll/">poll after poll</a> indicating Republicans believe the billionaire businessman to be the <a href="http://ap-gfkpoll.com/featured/ap-gfk-poll-republicans-view-donald-trump-as-most-electable">most electable</a> candidate of the field, he's actually the least electable from an electoral college perspective, at least for now. Not only does Trump flip fewer states to the GOP column than Rubio or Cruz (only winning over Nevada, Colorado, and Ohio), he loses a couple of Romney states to Clinton (Kentucky and North Carolina). State projections based off historical analysis due to a lack of post June 2015 polling are: AL, AR, DE, HA, ID, IN, KS, ME, MD, MS, NE, NJ, NM, ND, OK, OR, RI, SD, TN, TX, VT, and WA.<br />
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Electability does not operate in a vacuum. It's fluid. So naturally, campaign developments such as a primary victory or a major debate stumble could alter these maps remarkably quick. But as it stands today, the Republican Party's third place candidate, in terms of primary popular vote and delegate count, is 1st place in terms of ability to win in November.brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-55039919644607651242016-02-19T05:06:00.002-05:002016-03-24T15:55:51.431-04:00Post-New Hampshire Primary Polling Suggests Trump's Historically Well Positioned To Capture GOP Nomination<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglsnsSQIeCvjOAcpk5ocFn47qtWEJcmaxAK5UBUjuDxvp51pD8svg6v_BJkxI2DJ1XKGfwz_HaK2SOPWKm8oTiTixSuzrxK5jGuhN2D7mzI3D2wWWRCllws-06-lFXTZcFlSiCntqMz_4/s1600/TITLE+PHOTO.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglsnsSQIeCvjOAcpk5ocFn47qtWEJcmaxAK5UBUjuDxvp51pD8svg6v_BJkxI2DJ1XKGfwz_HaK2SOPWKm8oTiTixSuzrxK5jGuhN2D7mzI3D2wWWRCllws-06-lFXTZcFlSiCntqMz_4/s1600/TITLE+PHOTO.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photos, from left to right, courtesy of Getty Images, Carlos Osorio/AP, and Mike Segar/Reuters</td></tr>
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To the chagrin of the sixty-to-seventy-odd percent of Republicans who do not support Donald Trump as their nominee for president, the billionaire firebrand is looking mighty dominant in post-New Hampshire primary polling. But how is he standing up compared to past polling front-runners at this point in the campaign? For Trump critics, the news is pretty bleak, yet not without at least a faint glint of hope.<br />
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In my experience, it's always best to start with the bad news, so here goes: in nearly every presidential primary since 1976, the national polling leader between the New Hampshire and South Carolina primaries has gone on to become their party's nominee. Specifically, of the fifteen post-New Hampshire national primary polling leaders examined over the last forty years, twelve eventually earned their party's nomination (or 80% of the time).<br />
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Having said that, Donald Trump is currently the Republican's <a href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2016-national-gop-primary">national polling leader</a>, and by a wide margin. With one day remaining until South Carolinians head to the polls, Trump's averaging 36% support from Republicans across seven primary surveys conducted after the New Hampshire primary, reaching as <a href="http://morningconsult.com/2016/02/trump-drops-slightly-clinton-holds-steady-in-new-poll/">high as 41%</a> and as <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-press/surprise-trump-falls-behind-cruz-national-nbc-wsj-poll-n520296">low as 26%</a>. He maintains an average seventeen point advantage over his next closest competitor, Ted Cruz.<br />
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Faced with the numbers, and what we know of history, what else is there to conclude other than the fact that Trump appears headed for the Republican nomination?<br />
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<a name='more'></a><br />
Well, as foreboding as all this sounds, it isn't necessarily as cut and dry as Trump supporters would hope. First of all, consider the table below, which documents past national polling leaders following the New Hampshire primary, their polling average in surveys conducted between the New Hampshire and South Carolina contests, their highest and lowest poll result during that time period, and whether or not they won the Iowa, NH, and SC contests:<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">* indicates the South Carolina primary occurred after larger, more significant contests. As a result, the date-range for the data is restricted to polling following the New Hampshire primary, and preceding the next significant primary contest.<br />
**<a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/us/2008_republican_presidential_nomination-2741.html">2008</a> - <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/us/2016_republican_presidential_nomination-3823.html">2016</a> polling data is courtesy of RCP. <a href="http://www.pollingreport.com/wh2rep.htm">2000</a>-<a href="http://www.pollingreport.com/wh04dem.htm">2004</a> polling data is courtesy of Polling Report. 1976-1996 polling data is courtesy of the Roper Center <a href="http://ropercenter.cornell.edu/ipoll-database/">iPoll Database</a>.</td></tr>
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Plainly, Donald Trump is sitting in good company with past post-NH polling leaders who went on to become their party's nominee, e.g., Mitt Romney, John McCain, George W. Bush, etc. But note that there are at least three instances since 1976 in which the post-NH national poll leader did not go on to become his or her party's nominee - Gary Hart in 1984, Hillary Clinton in 2008, and Hubert Humphrey in 1976.<br />
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Former Colorado Senator Gary Hart and eventual 1984 Democratic nominee Walter Mondale both had primary victories in their column following the New Hampshire contest on <a href="http://frontloading.blogspot.com/2009/02/1984-presidential-primary-calendar.html">February 28</a>. So it was no surprise to see the two of them exchange national polling leads during the fourteen days before the next series of contests. In the end, the "outsider" Gary Hart just barely edged establishment figure Walter Mondale in an average of the five polls conducted, 33.2% to 33.0%. Of course, the two men would go on to engage in a back-and-forth delegate battle that would last four more months, with the man who was not the clear, decisive national polling leader following New Hampshire going on to capture his party's nomination.<br />
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A more recent example of a post-New Hampshire national polling leader who did not capture their party's nomination is Hillary Clinton in 2008. Not only was she the <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/us/democratic_presidential_nomination-191.html#polls">national polling front-runner</a> following her <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=33&year=2008&f=0&off=0&elect=1">victory in New Hampshire</a>, but like Trump, she dominated the primary race for months before the first contests took place. Clinton's primary loss is historically known, having fallen irreversibly behind thanks to a prolonged series of caucus losses throughout the month of February. But her 2008 path is one that many Republicans hope to see Trump take soon.<br />
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There is one other occurrence in which the post-New Hampshire primary national polling leader did not go on to become his party's nominee - the 1976 Democratic primary. A little known southern Governor by the name of Jimmy Carter was gathering steam by finishing second in Iowa, and first in New Hampshire. Yet for all his newfound name recognition following New Hampshire, he still trailed former Vice President and Presidential nominee Hubert Humphrey nationally - this, despite the fact that Humphrey had yet to enter the presidential race, and ultimately never would.<br />
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But let's face it folks - the 2008, 1984 and 1976 scenarios don't look all that similar to what we're seeing today. Unlike in '76, there is no unannounced Republican lurking over the heads of the current crop of candidates. Unlike in 1984, Trump's national polling situation is much more dominant than Gary Hart's. And unlike in 2008, Trump's closest competitors aren't quite nipping at his heels the way Obama was to Hillary at this point.<br />
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So for some semblance of hope, it might be better for Trump opponents to look elsewhere. For example, in 2012, though Romney took a <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/us/republican_presidential_nomination-1452.html#polls">commanding national polling lead</a> following his New Hampshire victory, he would go on to lose that advantage to both Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum for extended periods of time in a contest that did not wrap up until three months later. Though Romney ultimately succeeded in securing the nomination, at least he stands as an example that a solid national polling advantage following the New Hampshire primary is not guaranteed to stick around.<br />
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Also consider the 1980 Democratic and 1976 Republican primaries, where candidates who were *not* leading nationally following the New Hampshire primary, nonetheless, managed to rack up impressive late primary contest victories, while closing their national polling gap. While Reagan in '76 and Kennedy in '80 were also ultimately unsuccessful at securing their party's nomination, they provide a roadmap for how Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio might overtake Donald Trump.<br />
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Without sugarcoating, the bottom line is that the picture isn't pretty for those passionate about keeping Donald Trump away from the GOP nomination. History stands in our way. But the few exceptions I've noted, as well as the admittedly small sample size of data we're dealing with, should at the least provide justification for non-Trump candidates to carry on, and perhaps even provide a little encouragement.brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-25308613003272978412016-02-04T15:16:00.002-05:002016-03-24T15:56:00.036-04:00Iowa Entrance Poll Finding: Democratic Caucus-Goers Lurch Sharply Leftward in 2016, Republicans Less Conservative<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgL8Ub01xV0dsn18-OG3yH3Cnb4GEq3zl-DcxRDc9cxujnCg2m7jiJ36ZkI7RX7cr7HheqEbq8lNbnUzyjWnpEtcB_ArD7SeAhFw1wIFl0VTnBG0Cf9n3zry94cnmw-6VCuNTKR6WgdN9I/s1600/Bern+and+Hill.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgL8Ub01xV0dsn18-OG3yH3Cnb4GEq3zl-DcxRDc9cxujnCg2m7jiJ36ZkI7RX7cr7HheqEbq8lNbnUzyjWnpEtcB_ArD7SeAhFw1wIFl0VTnBG0Cf9n3zry94cnmw-6VCuNTKR6WgdN9I/s1600/Bern+and+Hill.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #281b21; font-family: , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: 10px; line-height: 11px; text-align: right;"><a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=bernie+sanders+hillary+clinton+picture&safe=off&espv=2&biw=1511&bih=714&tbm=isch&imgil=Ux9aa6Jofu_U8M%253A%253B36BxDT0eJ8i1eM%253Bhttp%25253A%25252F%25252Fwww.cnn.com%25252Fvideos%25252Fpolitics%25252F2015%25252F10%25252F13%25252Fbernie-sanders-democratic-debate-sick-of-hearing-about-hillary-clinton-emails-19.cnn&source=iu&pf=m&fir=Ux9aa6Jofu_U8M%253A%252C36BxDT0eJ8i1eM%252C_&dpr=0.9&ved=0ahUKEwjLmdqH6N3KAhUS1iYKHQ7YDeIQyjcILw&ei=MRyzVou9L5KsmwGOsLeQDg#imgrc=zXg8bXEfHiqfIM%3A">Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images</a></span></td></tr>
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An unquestionable, and entirely predictable ideological shift in the Democratic Party was confirmed by the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/02/01/us/elections/iowa-democrat-poll.html">Iowa entrance poll</a> on Monday night. The first such poll to be conducted in eight years revealed that Democrats, or at least those willing to turn out for a night time caucus in Iowa, have become decidedly more liberal since their last meeting in 2008.<br />
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The fact was captured not only in the <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=19&year=2016&f=0&off=0&elect=1">final vote count</a>, which found a self-professed socialist virtually tied with a former <a href="https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/107-2002/s237">Iraq War supporter</a>, but turned up in black and white in the poll taken of Iowa Democrats as they entered their caucus site.<br />
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To be sure, there was an abundance of evidence that the Democratic Party was shifting ideologically leftward prior to the Iowa entrance poll. Since Bernie's campaign announcement <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/04/29/politics/bernie-sanders-announces-presidential-run/">last April</a>, multiple surveys found a plurality of Democrats viewing <a href="http://hotair.com/archives/2010/02/05/gallup-majority-of-democrats-have-positive-image-of-socialism/">socialism favorably</a> - even more favorably then their <a href="https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/467z1ta5ys/tabs_OP_Socialism_20160127.pdf">views of capitalism</a>. Routine political polling from the <a href="http://www.gallup.com/poll/183686/democrats-shift-left.aspx">likes of Gallup</a> and <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2014/06/12/political-polarization-in-the-american-public/">Pew Research</a> also picked up on the increasingly liberal bent of the party. But caucus-goers confirmed the movement, and to an unmistakable degree.<br />
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<a name='more'></a><br />
According to the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/02/01/us/elections/iowa-democrat-poll.html">entrance poll</a> provided by a consortium of major media outlets, nearly 30% of Democratic caucus participants identified themselves as "very liberal." That's an increase of ten percentage points since their last <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/images/PollingUnit/IADEMHorizontal.pdf">caucus in 2008</a>.<br />
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At the same time, the percentage of Iowa Democrats identifying as ideologically moderate or conservative declined from nearly HALF of the 2008 caucus electorate, to just 32% in 2016. Self-identified "very liberal" and "somewhat liberal" Democratic caucus-goers combined for a total of 68% of the electorate in 2016; an increase from just 54% in 2008.<br />
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As obvious as the ideological trend already appears, it becomes more pronounced when looking further back at past Iowa entrance polling. For a quick reference, consider the table below:<br />
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<span style="font-size: 9.5pt; line-height: 107%;">Percentages
are courtesy of<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/02/01/us/elections/iowa-democrat-poll.html"><span style="font-size: 9.5pt; line-height: 107%;">2016</span></a><span style="font-size: 9.5pt; line-height: 107%;">,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><a href="http://abcnews.go.com/images/PollingUnit/IADEMHorizontal.pdf"><span style="font-size: 9.5pt; line-height: 107%;">2008</span></a><span style="font-size: 9.5pt; line-height: 107%;">,<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><a href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2004/primaries/pages/epolls/IA/"><span style="font-size: 9.5pt; line-height: 107%;">2004</span></a><span style="font-size: 9.5pt; line-height: 107%;">, and<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span><a href="http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x3697133"><span style="font-size: 9.5pt; line-height: 107%;">2000<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></a><span style="font-size: 9.5pt; line-height: 107%;">entrance polls.</span></div>
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In just sixteen years, the number of Iowa caucus-goers identifying as "very liberal" has nearly tripled. Over the same time period, moderate and conservative Democrats have seen their numbers decrease by nearly twenty points. The percentage of "somewhat liberal" caucus-goers has remained static.<br />
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In 2000, 2004, and 2008, liberals and moderate/conservatives represented roughly half of the Iowa Democratic caucus electorate apiece. Now, liberals outnumber moderates and conservatives by more than two to one.<br />
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Equally as noteworthy as the Democratic Party's liberal lurch in Iowa is the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2016/02/01/us/elections/iowa-republican-poll.html">Republican Party's relative moderation</a>. While the percentage of "very liberal" Democrats increased ten points over the course of eight years, the percentage of "very conservative" Republican caucus-goers <a href="http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/primaries/states/iowa/exit-polls">dropped seven points</a> in just four years. However, unlike the case on the Democratic side, moderate and liberal Republican caucus-goers did not see a corresponding increase in their numbers. But self identified "somewhat conservative" voters did.<br />
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<br />
To be as fair as possible, lets reiterate the typical caveats and criticisms of exit/entrance polls:<br />
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<ul>
<li>they're essentially an over-glorified, run-of-the-mill survey</li>
<li>they're subject to the same errors as any other poll</li>
<li>they're more prone to random sampling issues</li>
</ul>
<br />
<br />
Regardless, the next time the media focuses on a so-called <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2011/09/12/more-now-see-gop-as-very-conservative/">increasingly right-wing</a> Republican Party, as <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2012/11/gop-soul-searching-too-old-too-white-too-male-083472">they're apt to do</a>, conservatives can at least point to Iowa in rebuttal. And thanks to Bernie vs. Hillary, they might just be able to flip the usual narrative altogether.<br />
<br />brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-906366103278428202015-07-14T11:01:00.000-04:002016-03-24T15:53:38.924-04:00Newsflash: Donald Trump's Poll Numbers Are Brutal, But That's Nothing New<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbrmQaUvQz3eWpGE1UcFJhHg_ezV6C11zltw_kDB4U6rG9giAabRtK-rtjCus76MioIyZJ7_mIclgq6EZcoTAXGAFA_0M1C0XfgOQ4S0Y5r7XoDKibUqyZWFFvEZi6gMysNSe9AdrQrQA/s1600/Trump+in+Phoenix.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjbrmQaUvQz3eWpGE1UcFJhHg_ezV6C11zltw_kDB4U6rG9giAabRtK-rtjCus76MioIyZJ7_mIclgq6EZcoTAXGAFA_0M1C0XfgOQ4S0Y5r7XoDKibUqyZWFFvEZi6gMysNSe9AdrQrQA/s1600/Trump+in+Phoenix.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Donald Trump peaked in 2011 national GOP primary polling <a href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/PPP_Release_US_0414925.pdf" target="_blank">at 26%</a>. His best performance this year is <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/07/11/us-usa-election-idUSKCN0PL0DA20150711" target="_blank">16%</a>. Photo courtesy of Charlie Leight/2015 Getty Images.<cite> </cite></td></tr>
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Much to the chagrin of a large number of <a href="http://www.mediaite.com/tv/trump-steamrolls-nbc-reporter-takes-shots-at-krauthammer-and-jonah-goldberg/" target="_blank">right-leaning</a> political <a href="https://www.commentarymagazine.com/2015/07/10/is-donald-trump-republican/" target="_blank">pundits</a>, business mogul Donald Trump is polling well enough nationally among Republican primary voters to land himself in the top tier of candidates, whether the so-called "Establishment" likes it or not.<br />
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Yes. With one of the <a href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/the-2016-gop-field-is-shaping-up-as-historically-crowded-and-unpredictable/" target="_blank">most crowded</a> primary fields in history, as well as one of the <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2015/07/06/krauthammer_on_trump_we_have_the_best_republican_field_in_35_years_and_were_talking_about_this_rodeo_clown.html" target="_blank">most hyped</a>, it's the notoriously bombastic and combative Donald Trump who is <a href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2016-national-gop-primary" target="_blank">surging</a> among the GOP. And as surprising as it may seem, it shouldn't be. After all, <a href="http://www.nickdavies.net/1987/12/01/ducking-and-diving-with-donald-trump/" target="_blank">we've been down</a> this <a href="http://nypost.com/1999/10/08/trump-pumped-to-hit-stump-wants-to-run-with-oprah-on-his-ticket/" target="_blank">road before</a>.<br />
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Very little has changed in the last 30 years since The Donald first gave serious consideration to a presidential run. Everything is there: the <a href="http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/stories/1999/10/08/trump.transcript/" target="_blank">ego</a>, the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/1987/10/23/nyregion/new-hampshire-speech-earns-praise-for-trump.html" target="_blank">far-fetched</a> policy <a href="http://www.mediaite.com/tv/bill-oreilly-disses-donald-trumps-iraq-oil-plan-on-fox-friends/" target="_blank">prescriptions</a>, the <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/donald-trump-embraces-birther/story?id=13240431" target="_blank">exceedingly</a> wild <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zKRnO51HYRg" target="_blank">accusations</a> and <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/donald-trump-deletes-tweet-jeb-bushs-wife/story?id=32256986" target="_blank">insults</a> hurled against his <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/donald-trump-calls-jeb-bush-unhappy-119153.html#ixzz3dcI3elR3" target="_blank">opponents</a>, the <a href="http://www.thewrap.com/tv/article/trump-goes-f-ing-tirade-26917/" target="_blank">erratic behavior</a>, but most relevant to this piece, his <a href="http://www.gallup.com/poll/3535/buchanan-leads-trump-among-likely-reform-party-voters.aspx" target="_blank">poor standing</a> in American public opinion <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/011807_foxnewspoll.pdf#page=4&zoom=auto,-97,639" target="_blank">throughout the years.</a><br />
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Polling data from Trump's presidential flirtations before 2011 is hard to come by. Though the limited amount I could retrieve indicated America's <a href="http://www.gallup.com/poll/3535/buchanan-leads-trump-among-likely-reform-party-voters.aspx" target="_blank">patience with Trump</a> was only <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/011807_foxnewspoll.pdf#page=4&zoom=auto,-97,639" target="_blank">slightly higher</a> than it is today.<br />
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As a result, the focus of this piece will be the comparison between Trump's polling performance in the first half of 2011, versus his performance so far this year. <u>Spoiler alert</u>: from a GOP horse-race perspective, Trump is looking very similar to how he did four years ago. His standing has worsened, however, from three different perspectives: 1) he's <i>less</i> popular with the general public, 2) he's less popular with primary voters, and 3) his general election standing looks worse. <br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><b>No Love For Trump From The American Public</b></span> <br />
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Since the start of this year, Trump has averaged a 27% favorability rating across nine state and national polls, with 62% saying they view him unfavorably. In national polling alone, he fairs even worse, averaging a 25/65% rating. An ABC/Washington Post survey taken shortly after Trump revealed he <a href="http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2015/05/28/donald_trump_s_major_announcement_set_for_june_16_don_t_be_fooled.html" target="_blank">would be making</a> a major campaign announcement on June 16 found an astounding <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/page/2010-2019/WashingtonPost/2015/06/02/National-Politics/Polling/question_15688.xml?uuid=dcljngkVEeWVHo4VCQ1krg" target="_blank">76% of registered voters</a> saying they viewed Trump unfavorably. The same poll found that only 13% of voters could bring themselves to say they view Trump favorably, <i>despite</i> his near universal name recognition. His unfavorable rating exceeds his favorable rating in every poll of adults taken this year, by anywhere from 19-63 percentage points.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH_6N_4RbpVZZIqKy0ASDCCGzAYJQIRsVSDD2LDONQrxGWSx8KzSOdj3soQzFmJROuEn2-LjiJGUyvdo5EOyxJ5M4RzvCEMXpX2htLXJW_hmh-TXJ3hyJH2_2Fsq8F3Q3jIyt3sFaWaAU/s1600/Trump+1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgH_6N_4RbpVZZIqKy0ASDCCGzAYJQIRsVSDD2LDONQrxGWSx8KzSOdj3soQzFmJROuEn2-LjiJGUyvdo5EOyxJ5M4RzvCEMXpX2htLXJW_hmh-TXJ3hyJH2_2Fsq8F3Q3jIyt3sFaWaAU/s1600/Trump+1.png" /></a></div>
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<a name='more'></a>Four years ago, Donald Trump averaged a 30/56% favorability rating across twenty state and national polls taken from the start of 2011 until he officially <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/post/donald-trump-wont-run-for-president-in-2012/2011/05/16/AF14G14G_blog.html" target="_blank">withdrew his name</a> from consideration on May 16. That's a net nine points higher than his average favorability rating thus far this year. Among national polls alone, Trump averaged a 32/53% favorability score in 2011, a net 19 points higher than his current year-to-date average. And like we're seeing this cycle, Trump's favorability rating was underwater in every state and national poll taken in 2011.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzBaLJqVQjdml-l35GaBXjlhO_yQxVkyoMVVwHge_s0tkc8nGSFiO_hpuIC4EnAP7xalkWVRiV5E5VzD_ALMD45Uoz-vHge3OxO1GxXacr9GZLKFAs_4i_61PgbG43hFIWKOgFYH-Mrg8/s1600/trump+2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzBaLJqVQjdml-l35GaBXjlhO_yQxVkyoMVVwHge_s0tkc8nGSFiO_hpuIC4EnAP7xalkWVRiV5E5VzD_ALMD45Uoz-vHge3OxO1GxXacr9GZLKFAs_4i_61PgbG43hFIWKOgFYH-Mrg8/s1600/trump+2.png" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><b>Little Love For Trump From The GOP</b></span><br />
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It isn't just the overall American electorate that views Mr. Trump in a negative light - members of his own party aren't terribly accepting either. Of the nine state and national polls conducted since his official <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2015/06/16/donald-trump-to-announce-his-presidential-plans-today/" target="_blank">campaign launch</a>, The Donald only breaks even among Republican primary voters, with 43% viewing him favorably, and 43% viewing him unfavorably. That number drops to 35/51% when considering all twenty-three state and national surveys conducted this year, of which Trump is above water in only three! Besides perhaps Chris Christie, those are the worst ratings of any GOP candidate with widespread name recognition.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfqmiH6IA0PSLrV0Vv7kG8cOOdGjNKqoXJ4mkbptNcLL0FxL6XlQxXen8brLCdEVy5TvmOVNSe5c0g0H2KUxh8NkyTfxb7UHKwZvZoQY0NokPJvIlKYGc8uy2P1FRJf2sGmRFYEGN_X1o/s1600/Trump+3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjfqmiH6IA0PSLrV0Vv7kG8cOOdGjNKqoXJ4mkbptNcLL0FxL6XlQxXen8brLCdEVy5TvmOVNSe5c0g0H2KUxh8NkyTfxb7UHKwZvZoQY0NokPJvIlKYGc8uy2P1FRJf2sGmRFYEGN_X1o/s1600/Trump+3.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">* indicates the survey population is of Registered Republicans and Republican-leaning Independents.<br />
^ indicates the survey population is of Republican adults.</td></tr>
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It was a similar story four years ago. Against an array of big-names like Mitt Romney, Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin, and Newt Gingrich, Trump was by far the most disliked among the Republican base. Just 40% said they viewed Donald Trump favorably across twenty-one state and national polls taken in 2011, while 45% said they did not (a net eleven points higher than the 35/51% he has averaged in 2015). Of those twenty-one polls, Trump's favorability rating was in the net positive range in less than half. Again, this is among voters in his <i>own</i> party.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhC74XXOuvcdNss9odf-Oo9sQHUCyE8ltEpXfjX6r9PybDv_uK4ei1b___D0dKTpHxGZ_M57Wws_GkP4A7GeiLif4GaMytfsDk_SY96fn24ZQXr2waBXTZAC3Wqk1CzYbPTnk2iRA-6Ut0/s1600/Trump+4.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhC74XXOuvcdNss9odf-Oo9sQHUCyE8ltEpXfjX6r9PybDv_uK4ei1b___D0dKTpHxGZ_M57Wws_GkP4A7GeiLif4GaMytfsDk_SY96fn24ZQXr2waBXTZAC3Wqk1CzYbPTnk2iRA-6Ut0/s1600/Trump+4.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">* indicates survey population is of registered Republicans.<br />
** indicates survey population is of Republican adults.<br />
^ indicates survey sample is of Republican likely voters.</td></tr>
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<b>Trump Is Weaker Against Hillary Than He Was Obama</b><br />
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One final aspect in which Donald Trump looks weaker in polling than in 2011 is his standing in the general election against Hillary Clinton. Across seven state and national polls this year, Clinton attracts an average of 50% to Trump's 37%. When looking exclusively at the four national surveys taken this year, his deficit grows to 52-34%. In the same four polls, the largely unknown Marco Rubio averages eleven net points more against Clinton than the universally known Trump, trailing just 48-41%.<br />
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Mr. Trump's support is also surprisingly subpar, once again, among Republicans. In the <a href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2015/images/06/30/trumpbushclinton.pdf#page=72&zoom=auto,-97,780" target="_blank">four national polls</a> to test a hypothetical <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2015/06/24/0624152016iranweb/" target="_blank">Clinton vs. Trump</a> race this year, Trump averages a <a href="https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/iay0mr88pc/econTabReport.pdf#page=123&zoom=100,-108,608" target="_blank">68-14% lead</a> among members of <a href="http://www.quinnipiac.edu/images/polling/us/us05282015_U32trdf.pdf#page=11&zoom=auto,-97,382" target="_blank">his own party</a>. Sound impressive? Not compared to Jeb Bush, Scott Walker, or Marco Rubio, all three of which earn over 80% support from Republicans in the same four national surveys. Trump is also especially toxic in the eyes of Independent voters, who give Hillary an average 49-32% lead in national polling. Marco Rubio, by comparison, trails Clinton just 41-39% with this group. <br />
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Trump's general election prospects looked only slightly better in the Spring of 2011, though not by much. At a time when Obama was barely treading water in terms of his job approval rating, Trump averaged just 36% to Obama's 51% across twenty-three state and national polls taken from January-May, 2011. In national polling alone, Trump fared nearly as bad as he is today against Clinton, trailing the President 52-35%. Compare that to eventual nominee Mitt Romney's poll performance against Barack Obama in national polling during the same time period, in which Romney trailed by an average of just five points. And like today, Trump could barely get out of the 60s among Republican voters against the President they so loathed, and failed to resonate with Independents.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZRx5vp38knHwB_FIwQJhZvUf5fL84V6IQGFxLLuM10muELzylPAfDqM11XDQD6eeyx4nOBPYt0Q5XOiYGQuR-KO0B1ChFeuK1jHePLP54ePSIttCUziVF_rT2JkLlU229RkaT_H2JMQo/s1600/Trump+6.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZRx5vp38knHwB_FIwQJhZvUf5fL84V6IQGFxLLuM10muELzylPAfDqM11XDQD6eeyx4nOBPYt0Q5XOiYGQuR-KO0B1ChFeuK1jHePLP54ePSIttCUziVF_rT2JkLlU229RkaT_H2JMQo/s1600/Trump+6.png" /></a></div>
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<b>Evidence of Donald Trump's Low Ceiling Among Primary Voters</b><br />
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In spite of the brutal polling reality faced by Trump discussed above, his dedicated group of supporters can at least look to one thing for hope - the GOP primary horse race, where Trump has raced to the top of a pack of <a href="http://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/us/scott-walker-becomes-15th-republican-in-white-house-race-1.2283708" target="_blank">fifteen candidates</a>, with at least one more <a href="http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/elections/presidential/caucus/2015/06/23/john-kasich-coming-iowa-want-show-respect/29191257/" target="_blank">likely to join</a>. He averages 12%, second to only Jeb's Bush's 14%, across eight national surveys conducted among primary voters since Trump's official entry in the race.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggf63H_2KcHbVeBWTFw9UUL0T7dHEiJ_6pM0xHP24skTCcKB6NiKnuaz3VautCjMaA0hGtxrKuTJ8yH-q6wO7yG-QSMZ1pMKK0ovsnjmko9WCMz3_7jxC0fYq0ZMsJw9BrmP8aS3XwOOs/s1600/Trump+6.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEggf63H_2KcHbVeBWTFw9UUL0T7dHEiJ_6pM0xHP24skTCcKB6NiKnuaz3VautCjMaA0hGtxrKuTJ8yH-q6wO7yG-QSMZ1pMKK0ovsnjmko9WCMz3_7jxC0fYq0ZMsJw9BrmP8aS3XwOOs/s1600/Trump+6.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">* Indicates survey population is of Republicans and Republican-leaning Independents.<br />
** Indicates survey population is of registered Republicans.<br />
^ Indicates survey population is of Republican adults.<br />
^^ Indicates survey population is of registered Republicans and registered Republican-leaning Independents.</td></tr>
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That's very reminiscent of Republican public opinion during Donald Trump's prior polling surge in 2011. See the table below: <br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-e1G6B1yMkPqXmssCdUR-RJFjMKLjMowMPgMaz6k20KqCnojvlavpAcwHE_8zHxjJK1wkrOINsPSLZ5pFZdYsikc3n3p8bXNTBZHuYdftw4NW8BdrSSwe4JyCNKdaJuD2BV9NTN5o3Yc/s1600/Trump+7.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj-e1G6B1yMkPqXmssCdUR-RJFjMKLjMowMPgMaz6k20KqCnojvlavpAcwHE_8zHxjJK1wkrOINsPSLZ5pFZdYsikc3n3p8bXNTBZHuYdftw4NW8BdrSSwe4JyCNKdaJuD2BV9NTN5o3Yc/s1600/Trump+7.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">* Indicates survey population is of Republicans and Republican-leaning Independents.<br />
** Indicates survey population is of registered Republicans.<br />
^ Indicates survey population is of Republican adults.<br />
^^ Indicates survey population is of Republican and Independent adults.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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But a little perspective is required before assuming Trump's present surge will last. As noted in the tables above, the former host of <i>The Apprentice</i> rocketed to the top of primary polling four years ago, only to fizzle fast. Openly questioning the President's American citizenship, a blustery, profanity-laced speech in Las Vegas, and the sudden <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/02/world/asia/osama-bin-laden-is-killed.html?_r=0" target="_blank">killing of Osama Bin Laden</a> all led to a quick collapse among Republican primary voters. Consider that in the month of April 2011, Trump averaged 13% of the Republican primary vote in state and national polling. In May 2011, before ruling against a bid in the middle of the month, he averaged only 7%.<br />
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Further limiting Trump's appeal are abnormally unfavorable views from his own party, as well as near universal name recognition - a combination that allows very little room for growth. In <a href="http://www.quinnipiac.edu/images/polling/ia/ia07012015_Is38vbd.pdf#page=5&zoom=auto,-97,421" target="_blank">every survey</a> to <a href="http://publicmind.fdu.edu/2015/150629/" target="_blank">ask Republicans</a> which presidential candidate they would <a href="http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/MSNBC/Sections/A_Politics/6_22_PollPDF.pdf#page=12&zoom=auto,-97,761" target="_blank">not consider</a> supporting <a href="http://loras.edu/About-Loras/News-Events/News/2015/Walker,-Rubio-and-Bush-Top-Three,-Loras-College-Po.aspx" target="_blank">in 2016</a>, or some variation of the question, <a href="http://www.quinnipiac.edu/images/polling/us/us05282015_U32trdf.pdf" target="_blank">Trump ranks</a> at the top of the list. A <a href="https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/11y8hr071z/tabs_HP_Donald_Trump_20150713.pdf#page=1&zoom=100,-108,620" target="_blank">recent poll</a> found 43% of Republicans would be dissatisfied if Trump were to become the GOP nominee. Another <a href="http://www.monmouth.edu/assets/0/32212254770/32212254991/32212254992/32212254994/32212254995/30064771087/d56c8128-f211-4a0e-a413-f4716c83cf65.pdf#page=5&zoom=auto,-97,502" target="_blank">new poll</a> found 39% of primary voters believe his presidential bid is more of a publicity stunt than a serious run for office, by far more than any other candidate. <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2015/06/24/0624152016iranweb/" target="_blank">Fox News found</a> that by a 64-29% margin, registered Republicans view Trump as a "side show" rather than a "serious presidential candidate." That sentiment was shared by 77% of <i>all</i> registered voters! <br />
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Trump is certainly allowed to exaggerate his stature among Republicans and the American electorate in general all he wants. But the fact of the matter is that Trump's perpetually low favorability ratings, as well as his anemic general election standing, make it likely that we're fast approaching "peak Trump" in Republican primary polling - that is, if we haven't already reached it. brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-43337455462256714132015-07-08T11:46:00.000-04:002015-09-01T00:53:32.541-04:00The Rise of Non-White Voters: Why The Racial Composition Of National 2016 Election Polls May Be Missing The Mark<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiY3izwoWTWglB-LK66C3PJi_QsZPn5Z14h4MIPPL0MB-7wjB4QNNQg_794CiCiiXptFfgDRX7VfG4HX4fsv0RUQa-RFfW6MtadE00PsfODZSJrsiWvPdl13sOlG8nVSh518nJGwVbVXKo/s1600/Title+Image.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiY3izwoWTWglB-LK66C3PJi_QsZPn5Z14h4MIPPL0MB-7wjB4QNNQg_794CiCiiXptFfgDRX7VfG4HX4fsv0RUQa-RFfW6MtadE00PsfODZSJrsiWvPdl13sOlG8nVSh518nJGwVbVXKo/s1600/Title+Image.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Exit polling indicates that the non-white share of the electorate has increased by <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhI_rZR7fTbz7RfI58wC4cbBDmpW_7QCtE0Qs1n7FMaKXtPoqpekxgLg57w3Iq_STjYnJC-Xiq10w9ncJBTzZDRgqaafUzXsvShuQIJZDDfZhwdNOtH6IYt6VZUYQUpCLnK2M9x_dFyQQc/s1600/Partisan+ID+blog+chart+pic.png" target="_blank">2-4%</a> in every presidential election since 1992. Picture courtesy of Jacquelyn Martin/A.P.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
The Cook Political Report's Political Analyst <a href="http://cookpolitical.com/about/staff/david-wasserman" target="_blank">David Wasserman</a> recently tweeted the message below, regarding the likely racial make-up of the 2016 presidential election: <br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en">
<div dir="ltr" lang="en">
New <a href="https://twitter.com/CookPolitical">@CookPolitical</a>: White % of electorate may fall from 72% to 70%, Latinos & Asians/Others each up 1%, AA % stable: <a href="http://t.co/lMsalsgl5L">http://t.co/lMsalsgl5L</a></div>
— Dave Wasserman (@Redistrict) <a href="https://twitter.com/Redistrict/status/611932980680855553">June 19, 2015</a></blockquote>
</div>
<br />
Wasserman's tweet revives a point made <a href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2012/11/2016-not-looking-any-better-for.html" target="_blank">very shortly following the 2012 election</a>, when I posited that based on demographic shifts since 1992, white voters could expect to make up anywhere between 68-70% of the 2016 electorate. Why? Because the white share of the presidential vote has dropped between two and four points every cycle since 1992.<br />
<br />
Well, the prognosticators at The Cook Political Report <a href="http://cookpolitical.com/story/8608" target="_blank">have spoken</a>. And given their level of expertise in these matters, I'll happily give them the benefit of the doubt and go with their estimate - the 2016 electorate should be roughly 70% white, and 30% non-white.<br />
<br />
Based on Wasserman's analysis, it might be a bit surprising to learn that the racial composition of some pollsters' surveys looks little like his assumption of the 2016 electorate. Democratic firm Public Policy Polling's <a href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/2015/PPP_Release_National_61615.pdf#page=43&zoom=auto,-97,428" target="_blank">most recent national survey</a> found likely voters identifying as 74% white, and 26% non-white. If PPP's past success boils down to, what their director Tom Jensen <a href="http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2012/11/polls-in-the-end-ended-up-making-sense.html" target="_blank">called in 2013</a> <i>"... a well informed but still not entirely empirical hunch,"</i> you have to wonder what less-than-empirical hunch led them to peg the 2016 electorate at 74% white, 26% nonwhite. These figures represent an even <i>LESS</i> racially diverse electorate than the one that showed up in the <a href="http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/results/president/exit-polls" target="_blank">2012 presidential election</a>. And as I've already noted, the electorate has become <i>MORE</i> racially diverse in every presidential election since 1992. In other words, for the 2016 electorate to resemble PPP's racial composition, a major reversal of precedent is required.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>But pretending Jensen's hunch is correct, the GOP's failure to overtake Hillary with an electorate as <a href="http://elections.nytimes.com/2008/results/president/exit-polls.html" target="_blank">white as it was in 2008</a> would obviously be bad news for Republicans. And perhaps this is why PPP has consistently been one of the most GOP friendly national pollsters, at least with regards to their November 2016 horse race polling (behind Fox News). For example, take Jeb Bush. While he trails Hillary Clinton an average 51-42% per <a href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2016-general-election-bush-vs-clinton" target="_blank">Huffington Post's Pollster</a>, and by six points per <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/us/general_election_bush_vs_clinton-3827.html#polls" target="_blank">Real Clear Politics</a>, PPP finds Clinton up <a href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/2015/PPP_Release_National_61615.pdf#page=42&zoom=auto,-97,444" target="_blank">just 45-41%</a>. Had their racial composition more closely resembled Wasserman's prediction, the contest falls outside of the margin of error, and Jeb trails Hillary 46-40%.<br />
<br />
The Rasmussen Poll is nearly as guilty as PPP, with their likely voter population being <a href="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/platinum/political_tracking_crosstabs/february_2015/crosstabs_2016_presidential_candidates_february_28_march_1_2015" target="_blank">less racially diverse</a> than the one we saw in 2012 (73% white, 27% non-white). Note the favorable sample does little to help Jeb Bush, who still trails Hillary Clinton 45-36%. Had Rasmussen's racial composition matched Wasserman's proposal, Clinton's lead grows to 46-35%.<br />
<br />
Quinnipiac University's most recent national registered voter sample is identical to the racial make-up of the 2012 presidential election (<a href="http://www.quinnipiac.edu/images/polling/us/us05282015_demos_U32trdf.pdf#page=1&zoom=auto,-97,667" target="_blank">72% white, 28% non-white</a>), making it only slightly less diverse than the one being predicted by Wasserman. Unfortunately, Quinnipiac does not provide the crosstabs on how racial demographic groups plan to vote in 2016. But given what we know, it's safe to assume Hillary's margin over her GOP opponents would grow, albeit ever so slightly, had the sample's racial composition been 70% white, 30% non-white.<br />
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Now to be fair, not <i>all</i> pollsters are using less diverse racial compositions than suggested by The Cook Political Report. For example, the latest poll from CNN uses a dramatically <i>MORE</i> racially diverse sample than Wasserman predicts. Why? Two reasons: 1) The survey population is of all adults, rather than registered or likely voters, and thus naturally less white than the smaller pool of 'voters,' and 2) CNN weights their sample of adults to <a href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2015/images/06/30/trumpbushclinton.pdf#page=15&zoom=auto,-97,779" target="_blank">national Census figures on race</a>. The official 2010 Census put the share of national adults that are white at <a href="http://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/briefs/c2010br-05.pdf#page=3&zoom=auto,-97,766" target="_blank">64%, with 36%</a> identifying as non-white. Some back of the envelope extrapolation verifies that this is indeed the racial breakdown of adults in the CNN survey, making it six points more non-white than <a href="http://cookpolitical.com/story/8608" target="_blank">The Cook Political Report</a> sees it.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4sbT8Ev1snw7QVvrMdGwyBB3xWWTgsdC2IxXopRYQv0biJGUDSrHtpEH2xgc9_9jiJEFUxICKLXtNMYmevwTb50fu1IP9e7J3MMC4eGZBmLzWam_oTTEeDl9ubANCWBaUbD7YD04PVJU/s1600/Final+one.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4sbT8Ev1snw7QVvrMdGwyBB3xWWTgsdC2IxXopRYQv0biJGUDSrHtpEH2xgc9_9jiJEFUxICKLXtNMYmevwTb50fu1IP9e7J3MMC4eGZBmLzWam_oTTEeDl9ubANCWBaUbD7YD04PVJU/s1600/Final+one.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Table only contains polls that 1) make publicly available the racial composition of the survey sample, and 2) ask respondents who they support in the November 2016 presidential election.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
Not surprisingly, thanks to the notable lack of white voters in the sample, Hillary Clinton has massive leads over all of her competitors in the CNN poll. Looking specifically at Jeb Bush, and presuming the CNN survey was re-weighted to match Wasserman's 2016 prediction, we see Clinton's lead falling from 54-41% to 52-42%. Still impressive, but a bit less so.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrIQ66-TCyFIZ56hK6YFXdwgT8OmXnScf83FliFRpaT-8ZrdoI7cMiBCsXCYuArVz8vi_ZAM5wbu885XhsEiVFpMW-peHjdiCrb1w5Rol34wgqX2N4rQBf1JeYO7DgeEn9IOXMUUQXqzY/s1600/done.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrIQ66-TCyFIZ56hK6YFXdwgT8OmXnScf83FliFRpaT-8ZrdoI7cMiBCsXCYuArVz8vi_ZAM5wbu885XhsEiVFpMW-peHjdiCrb1w5Rol34wgqX2N4rQBf1JeYO7DgeEn9IOXMUUQXqzY/s1600/done.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Table only contains polls that 1) make publicly available the racial
composition of the survey sample, 2) ask respondents who they
support in the November 2016 presidential election, and 3) provide racial demographic breakdowns of how those respondents would vote.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
As you might expect, re-weighting the CNN, PPP, and Rasmussen polls to Wasserman's prediction on 2016 racial turnout, narrows the previously wide disparity in topline results. Before, Hillary's lead over Jeb ranged between 4-13 points. After the re-weighting, the range narrows to 6-11 points.<br />
<br />
For the record, there was at least <i>one</i> pollster over the last several months to weight
their poll in line with Wasserman's 70/30% white/non-white prediction -
the March <a href="http://maristpoll.marist.edu/wp-content/misc/usapolls/us150301/2016/Complete%20March%202015%20McClatchy_Marist%20Poll_2016_Tables.pdf#page=14&zoom=auto,-115,740" target="_blank">McClatchy/Marist poll</a> finding Clinton leading Bush among registered voters 49-42%.<br />
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For now, the oversight by those pollsters weighting their demographics to pre-2012-like racial identification seems pretty inconsequential to the topline. But as the 2016 election takes shape, and partisan preferences harden to the levels they did in 2012, it makes a difference. Pay attention to whether the racial composition of upcoming surveys fall more in line with David Wasserman's thinking.<br />
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<br />
<u>Side note</u>: Unfortunately, as you can see in the final table above, very few pollsters publicly provide not only their racial
crosstabs, but also ensure those tabs match their registered or likely
voter samples used in general election polling. So a big thanks to
CNN, PPP, and Rasmussen for making things easy. NBC/WSJ,
ABC/WaPo, YouGov, Fox News, and Quinnipiac - get with it!brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-69152457406186172602015-06-30T13:55:00.001-04:002015-07-06T04:37:21.847-04:00Jeb vs. George: A Comparison Of The Bush Brothers' Pre-Primary Polling<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW7oSYDCAU_xBpw-HdSIB00ZqVXKW3D-gOJduk2ioQD0P235a7iXCvnK1VENoies6UrfSl7CrrcvbAuMyacrZj50VBXb3noCEvNBS0qZUvQASNHnUW8uElsFnb0Lpz4k-FkP8rZ7sDeEM/s1600/Final+pic.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhW7oSYDCAU_xBpw-HdSIB00ZqVXKW3D-gOJduk2ioQD0P235a7iXCvnK1VENoies6UrfSl7CrrcvbAuMyacrZj50VBXb3noCEvNBS0qZUvQASNHnUW8uElsFnb0Lpz4k-FkP8rZ7sDeEM/s1600/Final+pic.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Barbara Bush <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/245650-barbara-bush-bashes-son-jeb-youre-not-my-favorite" target="_blank">recently quipped</a> that Jeb was not her favorite son. If pre-primary polling is any indication, he isn't America's favorite Bush, either. Photo courtesy of Eric Draper/AP.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Jeb Bush received welcome news last week from an <a href="http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/MSNBC/Sections/A_Politics/6_22_PollPDF.pdf" target="_blank">NBC/WSJ poll</a> finding him not only sitting atop the 2016 field in the Republican Primary, but the candidate most Republicans can see themselves supporting in the nominating contest. He's the strongest of three Republicans tested in a general election battle against likely opponent Hillary Clinton. <br />
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Great news for Bush diehards, right? Eh, it depends on who you are comparing him to. And if it's his brother, the news isn't so great.<br />
<br />
George W. Bush led his likely Democratic opponent in the June 1999 NBC/WSJ poll by a significant 51-35% margin (according to Roper's <a href="http://www.ropercenter.uconn.edu/ipoll-database/" target="_blank">iPoll database</a>). Jeb actually trails his likely Democratic opponent <a href="http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/MSNBC/Sections/A_Politics/6_22_PollPDF.pdf#page=9&zoom=auto,-97,462" target="_blank">48-40%</a>.<br />
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George W. also led his Republican primary opponents with a Hillary-esque 61% of the vote in the June 1999 NBC/WSJ poll. Elizabeth Dole was in a distant second at 11%. Jeb Bush attracts<a href="http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/MSNBC/Sections/A_Politics/6_22_PollPDF.pdf#page=13&zoom=auto,-97,536" target="_blank"> just 22%</a>, and is within the margin of error of the second, third, and fourth place finishers.<br />
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Other pollsters during the same time period found George W. Bush <a href="http://www.people-press.org/files/legacy-questionnaires/65.pdf#page=9&zoom=auto,-97,722" target="_blank">hugely popular</a> not just with Republicans, but with the general public overall. Jeb Bush is <a href="http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/i/MSNBC/Sections/A_Politics/6_22_PollPDF.pdf#page=5&zoom=auto,-97,741" target="_blank">viewed unfavorably</a> by more American adults than view him favorably, not to mention his relatively tepid ratings among members of the Republican base: <br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1MPMaf2lKMAncEmwd8S-hafxAe10A30YZDi9_uUzmFEqjoxPWqrXJE6oJcdesvur_oJ5V-N6EwYs9ZkPEai-QGv3OYwPYPIc4vUrlDufdqo3N-C7w7csrDtlcciSXYwRgCIe8Kx1-_Mw/s1600/Bush+post.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1MPMaf2lKMAncEmwd8S-hafxAe10A30YZDi9_uUzmFEqjoxPWqrXJE6oJcdesvur_oJ5V-N6EwYs9ZkPEai-QGv3OYwPYPIc4vUrlDufdqo3N-C7w7csrDtlcciSXYwRgCIe8Kx1-_Mw/s1600/Bush+post.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">*YouGov/Economist poll numbers represent a monthly average of their weekly tracking poll.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<a name='more'></a><br />
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Jeb has averaged a somewhat respectable 53/28% favorability rating among the Republican party faithful in the first half of this year. But keep in mind - this is his base. These are the people that he should have eating out of his hand, yet they aren't.<br />
<br />
On average, nearly one in 3 Republicans views the heir to the Bush legacy unfavorably, while just over half view him favorably. It gets worse when looking at specific polls. <a href="http://www.monmouth.edu/assets/0/32212254770/32212254991/32212254992/32212254994/32212254995/30064771087/1c2a9e72-6933-46c4-9d68-87d264821039.pdf#page=5&zoom=auto,-97,771" target="_blank">Monmouth University</a> recently found just 40% of registered Republicans view Jeb Bush favorably, while 35% view him unfavorably. <a href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/2015/PPP_Release_National_61615.pdf#page=3&zoom=auto,-97,754" target="_blank">PPP was out the same day</a> with a survey showing Jeb's favorability rating underwater with likely Republican primary voters, 37/40%. And the new YouGovUS internet tracking survey finds him with a profoundly <a href="https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/iay0mr88pc/econTabReport.pdf#page=48&zoom=auto,-268,519" target="_blank">mediocre 54/34%</a> favorability rating.<br />
<br />
Compare Jeb Bush's popularity among Republicans nationally with George W.'s from the same time period in the 2000 cycle:<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3hrQXDVuwDT470r3gd97-ujUrMVP86VnvDakmMeYIGtSUysfUCKUrxF8RXLeVxD8BU1jW1f5Z9W4L8SUnmsWYnEWQtpyV4IoIsZo8ewuCcsaFYTWPRQa9u_8KySjD7tt6tgrHS4L3Voo/s1600/Bush+post+2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh3hrQXDVuwDT470r3gd97-ujUrMVP86VnvDakmMeYIGtSUysfUCKUrxF8RXLeVxD8BU1jW1f5Z9W4L8SUnmsWYnEWQtpyV4IoIsZo8ewuCcsaFYTWPRQa9u_8KySjD7tt6tgrHS4L3Voo/s1600/Bush+post+2.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Data compiled from <a href="http://www.ropercenter.uconn.edu/ipoll-database/" target="_blank">The Roper Center's iPoll Database</a>. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
In the first half of 1999, George W. Bush averaged an astonishing 79/8% favorability rating across nine national surveys. Now, to be fair to Jeb, <a href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2013/07/comparing-pre-primary-favorability.html" target="_blank">neither Mitt Romney nor John McCain</a> saw anything like the popularity George W. Bush experienced from Republicans in the lead up to his nomination. Still, the difference between Jeb and George's place in the eyes of GOP primary voters at this point in both campaigns is stark. <br />
<br />
The contrast doesn't stop with favorability ratings. Jeb Bush's standing in the GOP primary horse race, while one of the leading contenders, is quite weak compared to George W. Bush's. In the first half of 1999, the elder brother Bush averaged 45% among GOP primary voters across thirty-three national surveys, and led in every single one. His closest competitor, Elizabeth Dole, averaged just 18%. So, not quite the level of Hillary Clinton in the 2016 Democratic primary, but close.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU7nlMMK18r4vFJ3_VrDKyiQ8Cvqj5jy3sNCyERvYos4erKIlR0S0VRuBsqTPJeSKy1iw4DcWWkubvlJCQGT0Q1HROqoi8C_fwVJ4fWlCkRHW4nr7yZNpy7ebWnYnnFbIiK_gtcdJVDqw/s1600/Bush+post+3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU7nlMMK18r4vFJ3_VrDKyiQ8Cvqj5jy3sNCyERvYos4erKIlR0S0VRuBsqTPJeSKy1iw4DcWWkubvlJCQGT0Q1HROqoi8C_fwVJ4fWlCkRHW4nr7yZNpy7ebWnYnnFbIiK_gtcdJVDqw/s1600/Bush+post+3.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Data compiled from <a href="http://www.ropercenter.uconn.edu/ipoll-database/" target="_blank">The Roper Center's iPoll Database</a>. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
Contrast that with Jeb Bush. Of the twenty-seven GOP primary polls taken since January this year, Jeb has led in eleven. He has averaged just 15% in primary horse race polling. While George W. led his closest primary opponent by an average of twenty-six points, Jeb leads his closest contender by an average of 2%. In late June 1999, George W. Bush had amassed <a href="http://www.gallup.com/poll/3751/bush-continues-dominate-republican-field-2000-election.aspx" target="_blank">a whopping 59%</a> support from Republicans. The most recent national GOP primary survey of the 2016 cycle, courtesy of Fox News, puts Jeb <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2015/06/24/0624152016iranweb/" target="_blank">at 15%</a>.<br />
<br />
And just in case base popularity and primary horse race polling hasn't convinced you of the younger Bush campaign's inferiority to his older brother's, consider the general election numbers. Jeb has averaged a paltry 41% to Hillary Clinton's 48% across twenty-three polls conducted since January of this year. During the same time period in 1999, George W. averaged an impressive 53-38% lead over the sitting vice president, across thirty-eight surveys.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhv1YSC1wvOF-5b9Vyn-rFJU7jgurUFJkbdJcJsKlIpoksTLpmQH-vk7Qf7hwPuIOjDcLy_044XYL1Pz2QuShx6ChDIzLb1-rswhqTJpj7wKnbayC5S2G2QoJ4SyG0bA4OylkSgrbypCJ8/s1600/Bush+post+4.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhv1YSC1wvOF-5b9Vyn-rFJU7jgurUFJkbdJcJsKlIpoksTLpmQH-vk7Qf7hwPuIOjDcLy_044XYL1Pz2QuShx6ChDIzLb1-rswhqTJpj7wKnbayC5S2G2QoJ4SyG0bA4OylkSgrbypCJ8/s1600/Bush+post+4.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bush vs. Gore data was compiled from <a href="http://www.ropercenter.uconn.edu/ipoll-database/" target="_blank">The Roper Center's iPoll Database</a>. Jeb vs. Hillary numbers were compiled from <a href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2016-general-election-bush-vs-clinton" target="_blank">The Huffington Post's Pollster</a>, <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/us/general_election_bush_vs_clinton-3827.html#polls" target="_blank">Real Clear Politics</a>, and <a href="http://www.argojournal.com/" target="_blank">The Argojournal</a>.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
Jeb's best performances against Hillary Clinton have consistently come from Fox News, peaking with their May 9-12, 2015 survey showing him ahead of Hillary by <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2015/05/13/fox-news-polls-huckabee-seen-as-more-ethical-than-most-clintons-favorable-slips/" target="_blank">one point, 45-44%</a>. But that's the <i>only</i> poll to show Jeb Bush with any sort of lead over Hillary Clinton across fifty-eight general election polls taken since January <i>2013</i>. Clinton has led led Jeb by <a href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2015/images/04/21/rel4a.-.2016.pdf#page=8&zoom=auto,-97,3" target="_blank">as much as seventeen points</a> in polling taken over the last six months. <br />
<br />
Unlike Jeb, George W. led in all thirty-eight general election polls released between January and June, 1999. Furthermore, of the 124 general election polls conducted between Al Gore and George W. Bush from January 1997 to January 2000, George W. led in all but five - all of which were conducted in 1997, and thus, very early in the campaign. His strongest polling lead over Gore during the January-June time period of 1999 was a Fox News poll, putting him up an <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?action=printpage;topic=51118.0" target="_blank">astounding 60-28%</a>! Jeb would give his right harm to see numbers like that against Hillary. But he's not even close.<br />
<br />
Having pointed out the obvious differences in their pre-primary polling results, I'd also caution that Jeb's substandard performance in comparison to his brother shouldn't preclude him from capturing the party's nomination. Mitt Romney and John McCain saw nothing even close to the numbers George W. experienced in the lead-up to the 2000 Iowa Caucus. And as FiveThirtyEight's Harry Enten recently noted, George W. Bush's pre-primary popularity was <a href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/why-donald-trump-isnt-a-real-candidate-in-one-chart/" target="_blank">quite the anomaly</a>.<br />
<br />
Regardless, the Bush brothers may be related, but Jeb's current polling trajectory couldn't be more different from George's.brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-9039219021777827122015-06-08T11:59:00.001-04:002015-06-08T11:59:44.571-04:00The Silent Center: How Republican Moderates Have Come To Dominate Recent Presidential Primaries<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsvRekOpz8oB2-GQ_CdkC5PL7gATuxZPbKVkf4LRMAQWMw-4HeDufd0RpvOzMj6pJvrGseXXO6GrFcKfpwMPv4JU2gExUv05_yTXHXKr3lSG4hiStIUFdhkQfLJQyAlzZwfHmAc8IzrOU/s1600/mike-huckabee-rick-santorum.w529.h352.2x.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsvRekOpz8oB2-GQ_CdkC5PL7gATuxZPbKVkf4LRMAQWMw-4HeDufd0RpvOzMj6pJvrGseXXO6GrFcKfpwMPv4JU2gExUv05_yTXHXKr3lSG4hiStIUFdhkQfLJQyAlzZwfHmAc8IzrOU/s1600/mike-huckabee-rick-santorum.w529.h352.2x.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Rick Santorum was the runner-up to the Republican nomination in 2012, as was Mike Huckabee in 2008. But if either contest had been limited to 'very conservative' primary voters <i>only</i>, they likely would have been the Republican nominees for President in their respective races. Photo is courtesy of <span class="buffer"><cite>Scott Olson/Getty Images.</cite></span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Jeb Bush raised a few eyebrows last December when <a href="http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/12/02/top-lines-memorable-quotes-from-wsjs-ceo-council/" target="_blank">he stated</a> that the eventual Republican nominee would have "<i>to lose the primary to win the general without violating your principles</i>." The seemingly paradoxical statement is an acknowledgement by Bush of the prevailing conventional wisdom in Republican presidential primaries - that Republican candidates damage their general election prospects by running right of mainstream America during the nominating contest. But more important, at least for the purpose of this article, was the implication that Republican candidates must beef up their conservative bona fides to win.<br />
<br />
This second notion is popular among political pundits, making its way into <a href="http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/run-2016/2014/12/05/john-kasich-charts-a-different-course" target="_blank">piece</a> after <a href="http://dish.andrewsullivan.com/2015/01/07/is-christie-too-liberal-to-win/" target="_blank">piece</a> examining the historically large crop of potential 2016 GOP candidates for president. And it's nothing new. Mitt Romney perpetuated the notion with his "<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mitt-romney-reframes-himself-as-a-severely-conservative-governor/2012/02/14/gIQAaMiqHR_story.html" target="_blank">severely conservative</a>" remark at the 2012 CPAC conference. John McCain's apparent insufficient conservatism was <a href="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=18664285" target="_blank">noted many times</a> by <a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/the_big_idea/2006/04/the_closet_mccain.html" target="_blank">pundits</a> during the 2008 primary campaign. <br />
<br />
The inclination to jump on the "too moderate to win the primary" bandwagon feels almost instinctual, especially for a party with as <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea_Party_movement" target="_blank">vocal of a strongly conservative faction</a> as the Republicans. Yet an analysis of exit poll results from the 2012 and 2008 Republican primaries demands a different conclusion. No - the overall Republican primary electorate is <i>not</i> averse to an admittedly moderate candidate. Far from it, in fact.<br />
<br />
Why? Because exit polling has indicated that self-identified moderates/liberals and 'somewhat conservative' voters greatly outnumber the far-right of the primary electorate. <br />
<br />
By combining the results of the twenty states to feature an exit poll in
the 2012 Republican primary, we find that self-described
moderates and/or liberals comprised 33.3% of the national electorate, 33.1%
identified as 'somewhat conservative,' and 33.5% identified as 'very
conservative.' In other words, the GOP's self-described ideology fits
very nicely into thirds.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8k9Hv99iu9yZ21dLblYn8PDWqUWB7dvlvD_KMZr6Wc89ksEyoOKhfKz_W8WfkqiNMkFZOXg7NTkJxdY3V13Oz6NXYt5gr6O_rZjFd2TjFk-q5l8bfq75KEadQthyAMOCyqpECSdzYf6c/s1600/Hmph.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh8k9Hv99iu9yZ21dLblYn8PDWqUWB7dvlvD_KMZr6Wc89ksEyoOKhfKz_W8WfkqiNMkFZOXg7NTkJxdY3V13Oz6NXYt5gr6O_rZjFd2TjFk-q5l8bfq75KEadQthyAMOCyqpECSdzYf6c/s1600/Hmph.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Red cells highlight states where self-identified moderates/liberals made up a plurality of the Republican primary electorate. Data in the table is courtesy of <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=40&off=99" target="_blank">Dave Leip's US Election Atlas</a> and <a href="http://elections.nbcnews.com/ns/politics/2012/new-hampshire/republican/primary/#exitpollsanchor" target="_blank">NBC News 2012 Republican Primary Exit Poll Results</a>.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>In 2008, moderates and liberals made up an even higher percentage of the Republican base - 36.5%. Those identifying as 'somewhat conservative' made up 35.2% of the electorate. Self-identified 'very conservative' primary voters made up less than 30% of the 2008 electorate (28.4%) <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTylNLwxUMcQ65CNTBYGeqf4ml4WZpTbk_YpiJ_KmEQytgWK97cge0eFiQdRJY68EHk0C5_IFPHO8UFkf2YW4fvdwvp2inwZtkNh6Kjxr6Od8ZmAf9AQTGlb3IONgnI4inqsNSLlUvt-A/s1600/harmph.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTylNLwxUMcQ65CNTBYGeqf4ml4WZpTbk_YpiJ_KmEQytgWK97cge0eFiQdRJY68EHk0C5_IFPHO8UFkf2YW4fvdwvp2inwZtkNh6Kjxr6Od8ZmAf9AQTGlb3IONgnI4inqsNSLlUvt-A/s1600/harmph.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Red cells highlight states where self-identified moderates/liberals made
up a plurality of the Republican primary electorate. Data in the table
is courtesy of <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=40&off=99" target="_blank">Dave Leip's US Election Atlas</a> and <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/images/PollingUnit/NHRepHorizontal.pdf" target="_blank">ABC News 2012 Republican Primary Exit Poll Results</a>.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
As the first chart above indicates, self-described moderates and liberals made up a plurality of the primary electorate in eight states in 2012, or 40% of the time. And some of those eight were vote-rich locales, like Illinois, Michigan, Ohio and Wisconsin, or early voting states crucial to a candidate's momentum, like New Hampshire. For comparison, 40% of exit-polled states in the 2012 primary featured an electorate where a plurality identified as 'very conservative,' while 20% of states had a plurality identifying as 'somewhat conservative.'<br />
<br />
In 2008, an even higher percentage of exit-polled states (56%) featured a plurality of GOP primary voters identifying as moderate or liberal. Thirty percent featured a plurality of of voters identifying as 'somewhat conservative.' Only seven of the twenty-seven exit polled primary contests featured an electorate with a plurality of voters identifying as 'very conservative.'<br />
<br />
Mitt Romney, the so-called establishment/moderate candidate of 2012, won all eight states where moderate and liberals identified as a plurality of the GOP electorate, by a margin of 45%, to Santorum's 31%, to Gingrich's 8%. Romney also carried all four states in which a plurality identified as 'somewhat conservative,' by a margin of 45-24-23%. Yet in the eight states where a plurality of the electorate identified as 'very conservative,' Newt Gingrich won the most votes against Romney and Santorum, 34-28-28%.<br />
<br />
Among moderate and liberal Republican primary voters <i>overall</i>, Mitt Romney carried the day with 44% of the vote, to Rick Santorum's 21%, and Newt Gingrich's 15%. Of the twenty exit-polled states, Romney won moderate and liberal voters in seventeen. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDyS32mYDfqypGRcDFwjDN3E9JK1n-uhXC_zcLY5Z0W35sPDdfwuhIhcKo8h_stVCjdRQXuMeYJxWlWDJ1ixo_qsqaC5htKOhrsa1qxqgDv9gITnr0psehgImuYs6ezceAsNq-qTiLpZA/s1600/larp.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjDyS32mYDfqypGRcDFwjDN3E9JK1n-uhXC_zcLY5Z0W35sPDdfwuhIhcKo8h_stVCjdRQXuMeYJxWlWDJ1ixo_qsqaC5htKOhrsa1qxqgDv9gITnr0psehgImuYs6ezceAsNq-qTiLpZA/s1600/larp.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Red cells highlight states where Romney carried the moderate and liberal vote. Gold indicates the same for Santorum, blue for Gingrich, and green for
Ron Paul.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
John McCain was even more successful with this group of voters in 2008, carrying the moderate/liberal vote in 23 of 27 contests, with a total of 55%, to Romney's 17%, and Huckabee's 14%. <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzP9g76jfP235Vt61cc73GNDjAmfCfhfCB9XKqEjoUbQCIl4yUwBs5h_oHUdqM60dJb5h-sUG1WlEGe9DlOovga1TsCpCHykgDsxCvnHa4Dhxx2L8GbZMxgy9Y8BcXPJI3imzzD2JjK6I/s1600/hump.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzP9g76jfP235Vt61cc73GNDjAmfCfhfCB9XKqEjoUbQCIl4yUwBs5h_oHUdqM60dJb5h-sUG1WlEGe9DlOovga1TsCpCHykgDsxCvnHa4Dhxx2L8GbZMxgy9Y8BcXPJI3imzzD2JjK6I/s1600/hump.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Red cells highlight states in which McCain won the moderate/liberal vote.
Blue is for states where Romney won the moderate/liberal vote. Gold is
for states where Huckabee won the moderate/liberal vote.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
In 2012, Romney performed equally as well among 'somewhat conservative' voters as moderate/liberal primary goers, defeating Santorum and Gingrich 46-24-21% among this group. McCain did the same in 2008, carrying 'somewhat conservative' voters against Romney and Huckabee 43-26-21%.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnuQdFjbheR2Q3f782LrxRxQINhghP7myG025r1TSuaywBDFR9HPjgMpDTgCOfL2I-oDzI46rO7zZRNpFJUpyCVdT89n85KIvC4ZUjUwdOZoBkc04Of_zAEuw6oW4KDcThsp3pxHhsmWs/s1600/WOMP.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgnuQdFjbheR2Q3f782LrxRxQINhghP7myG025r1TSuaywBDFR9HPjgMpDTgCOfL2I-oDzI46rO7zZRNpFJUpyCVdT89n85KIvC4ZUjUwdOZoBkc04Of_zAEuw6oW4KDcThsp3pxHhsmWs/s1600/WOMP.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Red cells highlight states where Romney carried the 'somewhat conservative'
vote. Gold indicates the same for Santorum, blue for Gingrich, and green
for
Ron Paul.</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGY1he1t9Ey_lcwdS9sZdNOJFoYWaby5Gdx7NXfHKqjTYA50M3jr7JpcMqeVgdKljieTnGhktPCdnJLhDmfQnyx4Z2r-oj-qRFtS_Pr_R5GgoDRuPdI_zG4fA74QvhdRmpy6jCcVgMD-c/s1600/Harf.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGY1he1t9Ey_lcwdS9sZdNOJFoYWaby5Gdx7NXfHKqjTYA50M3jr7JpcMqeVgdKljieTnGhktPCdnJLhDmfQnyx4Z2r-oj-qRFtS_Pr_R5GgoDRuPdI_zG4fA74QvhdRmpy6jCcVgMD-c/s1600/Harf.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Red cells highlight states in which McCain won the 'somewhat conservative' vote.
Blue is for states where Romney won the 'somewhat conservative' vote. Gold is
for the states where Huckabee won the 'somewhat conservative' vote.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
But among very conservative voters - the group that popular mainstream opinion would have you believe defines the Republican Party - the eventual 2012 nominee won less than 30% of the vote nationwide. Romney carried the 'very conservative' vote in only six of the twenty exit-polled contests. Rick Santorum actually won this group of voters the most often, carrying them in eleven of twenty contests, with 36% of the vote. Gingrich was strong with this group as well, winning 26%.<br />
<br />
Like Romney in 2012, the eventual 2008 nominee did quite poorly among the 'very conservative,' winning their support in just two of twenty-seven exit-polled contests, and just 24% of their total vote. The 2008 'very conservative' vote was split between Romney and Huckabee, 33-33%.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyd4QHoemCnqsM5K3Gfw_YH1rQQpMxv5x8NclE0m4vLecHT3cwntwsYfWHInPKPo4yQYJn7UEJep5SEK-DcOMTsMvCo2DTk9EomsearLqAygl5ksUkO4gO18PNG_6yfd33-kd_T0qsBys/s1600/very+con.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyd4QHoemCnqsM5K3Gfw_YH1rQQpMxv5x8NclE0m4vLecHT3cwntwsYfWHInPKPo4yQYJn7UEJep5SEK-DcOMTsMvCo2DTk9EomsearLqAygl5ksUkO4gO18PNG_6yfd33-kd_T0qsBys/s1600/very+con.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Red cells highlight states where Romney carried the 'very conservative'
vote. Gold indicates the same for Santorum, blue for Gingrich, and green
for
Ron Paul.</td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNudD_2GSRIw8ahtUdubXs9wuhREeH4LtcDSdZIyFPsGlrdAk7FJJYQS1Uam7mq421zkjgJMajQd4Svj_XeydySRadmQC2AI7AxCcwMJPvrHCGSCIUQvV2-3VfTL5p45P_wR4f3Nk7vRM/s1600/very+con+2008.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNudD_2GSRIw8ahtUdubXs9wuhREeH4LtcDSdZIyFPsGlrdAk7FJJYQS1Uam7mq421zkjgJMajQd4Svj_XeydySRadmQC2AI7AxCcwMJPvrHCGSCIUQvV2-3VfTL5p45P_wR4f3Nk7vRM/s1600/very+con+2008.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Red cells highlight states in which McCain won the 'very conservative' vote.
Blue is for states where Romney won the 'very conservative' vote. Gold is
for the states where Huckabee won the 'very conservative' vote.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
In light of the evidence above, is it still accurate to insist a moderate candidate move right in a Republican primary to win? Is the support of the most conservative members of the party a prerequisite to the nomination? Apparently not. As the charts above illustrate, if Romney had only 'very conservative' Republican primary voters to rely on in 2012, he would have won just 30% of the vote (rather than the 40% he won among GOP primary voters of all ideological stripes in the twenty exit-polled states). Instead of winning twelve of the twenty exit-polled states overall, he would have won just six. Likewise, in 2008, John McCain lost the 'very conservative' vote in 25 of 27 exit-polled
states, and managed a measley 24% of their total vote (vs. 42% among
primary voters of all ideological stripes in the twenty-seven primary contests to be exit-polled that year).<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJf2KCJc9v4ySO8GqTYhxkbGgAissv7kUQQTEOznChRGUIFu-cjDV8WqWjxj_zi1WOfUgTuI1aET_fp6BQTuS58qRiS-MPgOB6Q8at19a0_TEwQiWwc0_zspmrtLhrmidG0ALdLNoNAiU/s1600/chart.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJf2KCJc9v4ySO8GqTYhxkbGgAissv7kUQQTEOznChRGUIFu-cjDV8WqWjxj_zi1WOfUgTuI1aET_fp6BQTuS58qRiS-MPgOB6Q8at19a0_TEwQiWwc0_zspmrtLhrmidG0ALdLNoNAiU/s1600/chart.png" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
In other words, if conventional wisdom was accurate, and Republican primaries truly were dominated by right-wing activists and grassroots ideologues, Rick Santorum would have been their nominee in 2012, with 2008 being a nail biter between Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney. <br />
<br />
But just a note of caution in conclusion. While ideological identification in the last two Republican presidential contests verifies that a moderate can compete and perform well in a conservative party's primary, there are signs on the horizon that a change is coming. As noted above, the number of self-identified 'very conservative' voters rose quite sharply from 2008 to 2012, while the number of moderate/liberals fell ('somewhat conservative' primary voters remained stable). At the same time, the socially conservative leaning born-again, evangelical Christian vote rose from 44% of the GOP primary electorate in 2008, to 52% in 2012. Obviously, if trends like these continue in 2016, we could expect stronger performances from more conservative candidates like Ted Cruz, Scott Walker, Marco Rubio, etc, and weaker showings from the likes of Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, John Kasich, and other like-minded candidates. <br />
<br />
<br />
<u>A side note on separating the moderate/liberal vote</u>: In 2008, John McCain was equally dominant among both self-described moderate voters, <i>and</i> the much less numerous liberal voters. But that trend did not repeat itself in 2012. As the nominating contest turned into a toss-up between Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum, a small, yet influential portion of the restless, uncontested Democratic primary electorate became involved in the GOP contest. While they split their preference evenly between Santorum and Romney from a national perspective, they became critical to keeping Santorum in the game in some of the later contests, such as Michigan, Illinois, and Wisconsin. This phenomenon has been discussed before <a href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2015/03/operation-chaos-part-two-what-lack-of.html" target="_blank">in a prior post</a>. With the 2016 Democratic primary all but guaranteed to be a snooze-fest, might we see mischievous Democrats rallying to Ted Cruz, or some other Republican they view as weak in a general election, over someone they believe to be stronger in a general election, like Marco Rubio? <br />
<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6y2hSoO9xFyu1WwqFgjwOOJEMT1Fy1l6U4HGCxRhZFPF7K749QpgutuRMF51hB7I8B_JcBca6vDE6B4gyJ9EUQB5EMRYnDxNNzKBBwBG7ktKHxJM7JQEztCWMq4U-K5Pef31RDV7kWOk/s1600/last+pic.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6y2hSoO9xFyu1WwqFgjwOOJEMT1Fy1l6U4HGCxRhZFPF7K749QpgutuRMF51hB7I8B_JcBca6vDE6B4gyJ9EUQB5EMRYnDxNNzKBBwBG7ktKHxJM7JQEztCWMq4U-K5Pef31RDV7kWOk/s1600/last+pic.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Red cells highlight states where Romney carried the liberal
vote. Gold indicates the same for Santorum, blue for Gingrich, and green
for
Ron Paul.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
<u>Random Facts</u>: As mentioned just above, the Republican primary electorate would appear to be on a more conservative trajectory, at least based on ideological and religious identification. So just how conservative could it get? For a starting point, the five states from 2012 with the highest percentage of '<b>very conservative</b>' voters participating in the Republican primary were:<br />
<ol>
<li>Louisiana (49% of total primary electorate)</li>
<li>Nevada (49% of total primary electorate)</li>
<li>Oklahoma (47% of total primary electorate)</li>
<li>Iowa (47% of total primary electorate)</li>
<li>Mississippi (42% of total primary electorate)</li>
</ol>
The five states from the 2012 contest with the highest percentage of '<b>moderate/liberal</b>' voters participating in the Republican primary were:<br />
<ol>
<li> Vermont (53% of total primary electorate)</li>
<li> Massachusetts (49% of total primary electorate)</li>
<li>New Hampshire (47% of total primary electorate)</li>
<li>Michigan (39% of total primary electorate)</li>
<li>Wisconsin (39% of total primary electorate)</li>
</ol>
brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-45672720483567716932015-03-24T08:58:00.000-04:002015-03-29T23:32:35.896-04:00Polling Update: Hillary Clinton's Image Dinged In Wake of Email Scandal, Though The Injuries Are Minor<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGIs9_BmYby82O4PxZJQ2Fe0YlGpxGZ2O5siHrDibSObzlyNOzQp6OTRSJ6D6Z4bm6_97GjEcWlZ3X2RYOrpdvOGO5YG7IW3V7rANo7bCO2G0EdL6UuS-H7IhO2Ao4VMV5WFUtjwkSJE0/s1600/HillaryBW-e1426709021995.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgGIs9_BmYby82O4PxZJQ2Fe0YlGpxGZ2O5siHrDibSObzlyNOzQp6OTRSJ6D6Z4bm6_97GjEcWlZ3X2RYOrpdvOGO5YG7IW3V7rANo7bCO2G0EdL6UuS-H7IhO2Ao4VMV5WFUtjwkSJE0/s1600/HillaryBW-e1426709021995.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="image_caption" style="display: block;">Photo courtesy of Yana Paskova/Getty Images</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
In the seemingly never-ending spectacle that is the modern day presidential campaign, the month of March 2015 will likely be remembered for the <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/03/us/politics/hillary-clintons-use-of-private-email-at-state-department-raises-flags.html">New York Times story</a> revealing Hillary Clinton skirted State Department rules requiring work-related email retention. The fact that the former New York Senator was conducting government business over a private, in-home family email server dominated 2016 news for days afterwards. Naturally, three weeks into this story, the headlines and questions have taken a toll on Clinton's image.<br />
<br />
The days of soaring, <a href="http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0412/75589.html">rockstar-like favorability</a> ratings have come to an end for Mrs. Clinton (though this trend was emerging <a href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2013/06/returning-to-earth-hillary-clintons.html">even before 'emailgate'</a>). In fact, her post-scandal numbers more closely resemble the <a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiGIvrFeArNggOpY-NCcisBSRxyqCwy9oGqpPqlFMAE7Um0QIFkbX-OdatrwrXWMnrcZsdq38q8bD-mJ6RRL9xUbCYWLfkKb93vNXzlAnUa2w-2HLf6zNVmEfG5ObzkAxuPhhXlk5CP9WY/s1600/Hill+Pic+7.png">contentious days</a> of the 2008 Democratic Primary than the lofty highs from her stint as Secretary of State. <br />
<br />
Of the nine surveys to measure Clinton's favorability rating before and after the email scandal broke, all but one found her net favorable rating had dropped in its aftermath. The one that did <i>not</i> was <a href="http://newscms.nbcnews.com/sites/newscms/files/15110_nbc-wsj_march_poll_3-9-15_release.pdf#page=6&zoom=auto,-97,622">conducted March 1-5</a>, even though the email story broke late in the day on March 2, and didn't reach peak media fervor <a href="https://www.google.com/trends/explore#q=clinton%20email&date=today%203-m&cmpt=q&tz=">until days later</a>. The poll was also completed five days before Hillary's <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/hillary-clinton-email-questions-unanswered-115964.html">largely-panned</a> press conference on March 10.<br />
<br />
Beyond the NBC/WSJ poll, Clinton's net favorable rating dropped anywhere from six to twenty-four points before and after the story broke. <a href="https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/mfqsfo0scc/econToplines.pdf#page=1&zoom=auto,-97,412">Economist/YouGov</a> has taken <a href="https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/onbotxemly/econToplines.pdf#page=11&zoom=auto,-97,358">two polls</a> since the Clinton scandal broke, and has measured the smallest drop (from <a href="https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/2q8maq3vef/econToplines.pdf#page=11&zoom=auto,-97,765">52/44%</a> on July 7-10, 2014, to an average 48/46% post-controversy).<br />
<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2RPhQizKqFYrKk584MFvJgD31wYtX6FI4sbe8csY2BEscrNBHcKRWq7cGgHq392lkA2k_HQpog9MLkeptKYHEk-vt8lv2ZgX_nb2xdhoZ2yySvVWZ7V-EXePE_bCghidlhit6CA5WURY/s1600/pic.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2RPhQizKqFYrKk584MFvJgD31wYtX6FI4sbe8csY2BEscrNBHcKRWq7cGgHq392lkA2k_HQpog9MLkeptKYHEk-vt8lv2ZgX_nb2xdhoZ2yySvVWZ7V-EXePE_bCghidlhit6CA5WURY/s1600/pic.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The post-controversy Economist/YouGov numbers represent an average of two surveys, one conducted on March 14-16 and March 21-23, 2015. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
Public Policy Polling, of all pollsters, measured Hillary's largest favorability drop. Granted, their pre-email story survey is <a href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/2011/PPP_Release_WI_022813.pdf#page=2&zoom=auto,-97,377">two years old</a>. Regardless, a 56/37% to <a href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/2015/PPP_Release_WI_31015.pdf#page=2&zoom=auto,-97,703">43/48%</a> drop is stark nonetheless.<br />
<br />
Clinton averaged a 52/38% favorable/unfavorable rating among pollsters that tested her favorability both before and after the email story. She averaged 46/43% <i>after</i> the story broke. <br />
<br />
Other pollsters measured the effect of the email story on Hillary's public image in different ways, and the results are more mixed for the former First Lady.<br />
<br />
Economist/YouGov, for example, conducted extensive post-email polling on Clinton, and found <a href="https://today.yougov.com/news/2015/03/21/tracking-clinton-email-controversy-democrats-rally/">doubts about her sincerity</a> up sharply from last year.<br />
<br />
On the other hand, a Republican pollster found that just 36% of Americans have <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/259313168/WPA-Clinton-Questions">a less favorable view</a> Mrs. Clinton as a result of the email scandal. Twenty-nine percent say the same in a recent <a href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/260001798/Hillary-email-poll-topline-3-26-15">CBS News survey</a>. For comparison, 45% held a less favorable <a href="http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/WSJpoll093012.pdf#page=23&zoom=auto,-97,337">view of Mitt Romney</a> as a result of the infamous "47%" remark in the early fall of 2012. Thirty-two percent <a href="http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/WSJpoll093012.pdf#page=23&zoom=auto,-97,478">felt the same about</a> Barack Obama's 'You didn't build that' remark earlier that same year.<br />
<br />
Furthermore, Hillary's outstanding numbers in the 2016 Democratic Primary are still in great shape: <br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYnyw825uo8f6gZvOJQWN4C0Jx2mG0wbbuEFgG_VnsNWH6W9_f8bQj-nd65ybGS8ogUvVFz6DB31auAq8kP9buK0gC3_KyE3-2c1yPapBoqOYx1aogGCz2JmLuzHj7w32iSVchxtIc9_Y/s1600/Pic+2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgYnyw825uo8f6gZvOJQWN4C0Jx2mG0wbbuEFgG_VnsNWH6W9_f8bQj-nd65ybGS8ogUvVFz6DB31auAq8kP9buK0gC3_KyE3-2c1yPapBoqOYx1aogGCz2JmLuzHj7w32iSVchxtIc9_Y/s1600/Pic+2.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">*The pre-email scandal PPP poll in Wisconsin included former home-state Senator Russ Feingold as a 2016 Democratic Presidential primary candidate, while the post-email scandal survey did not. ^The post-controversy Economist/YouGov numbers represent an average of two surveys, one conducted on March 14-16 and March 21-23, 2015.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<br />
And while Mrs. Clinton's lead over her potential 2016 GOP contenders dropped across the board in the <a href="http://www.argojournal.com/2015/03/poll-watch-cnnorc-2016-national.html">latest CNN poll</a>, she still maintains double-digit leads against <i>all</i> of them. <br />
<br />
It may sound fair to say the Clinton's are nothing if not deceitful. But as they've shown time and time again, they are resilient as well. While emailgate has undoubtedly been unhelpful for Hillaryland, it's not as bad as it could be, and seems far from fatal. Absent new information, Clinton will survive with minor scrapes and bruises.<br />
<br />
<br />
<i>Updated on March 25 to include new St. Leo University, PPP, Economist/YouGov, and CBS News polls.</i> brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-34399050900401506822015-03-12T00:32:00.002-04:002015-03-15T21:09:22.185-04:00Operation Chaos Part Two? What The Lack Of A 2016 Democratic Primary Could Mean For The Republican Contest<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOt5op-lgQaf4GlM1Qrc2ZhUXNIaHeikWwIAwSvE3FC-GMh8k8_Cj7SxokWxitp9lp9XwdRb-pUT6FgVvqs_9jvUvJGpqKVXU42cTzEuPP8t9gcbZz6LWbrHe1pGm0oWwr0PwWXGUncmo/s1600/McCain+Santorum.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjOt5op-lgQaf4GlM1Qrc2ZhUXNIaHeikWwIAwSvE3FC-GMh8k8_Cj7SxokWxitp9lp9XwdRb-pUT6FgVvqs_9jvUvJGpqKVXU42cTzEuPP8t9gcbZz6LWbrHe1pGm0oWwr0PwWXGUncmo/s1600/McCain+Santorum.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">These two men may not share much in common, but both were the prime beneficiaries of independent and Democratic votes in their respective Republican presidential primary bids. Photo courtesy of AP/Dennis Cook.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
A recent piece <a href="http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/run-2016/2015/02/12/the-best-8-days-in-american-politics">featured in U.S. News & World Report</a> by <a href="http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/the-run-2016">The Run 2016</a> founder Dave Catanese briefly examined the effects of a non-existent Democratic Presidential primary on a competitive GOP nominating contest. His focus was New Hampshire, where self-identified independents make up a <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2012/01/06/opinion/avlon-new-hampshire-independents/">larger than average</a> share of both the Republican and Democratic electorates. Catanese's suggestion is that with Clinton virtually clearing the Democratic field, the Granite State's independent base will flock to the Republican primary. <br />
<br />
Exit polling indicates Catanese is correct. In 2008, when both political parties were deep in the throes of competitive contests, self-identified <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/images/PollingUnit/NHRepHorizontal.pdf#page=2&zoom=110,-122,200">independents and Democrats made up 39%</a> of New Hampshire Republican Primary voters. Four years later, with President Obama running <a href="http://www.thegreenpapers.com/P12/NH-D">unopposed</a> on the Democratic side, independents and Democrats, as a percentage of voters, jumped <a href="http://elections.nbcnews.com/ns/politics/2012/new-hampshire/republican/primary/#exitpollsanchor">twelve points to 51%</a>. <br />
<br />
To be fair, this anomaly isn't limited solely to the Granite State. In Iowa, independents and Democrats jumped from <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/images/PollingUnit/IARepHorizontal.pdf#page=2&zoom=110,-122,337">just 14%</a> of GOP caucus-goers in 2008 (when both Republican and Democratic primaries were competitive), to <a href="http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/primaries/states/iowa/exit-polls">25% in 2012</a> (when Obama ran unopposed).<br />
<br />
The number of non-Republicans voting in the GOP nominating contest <i>increased</i> from 2008 in sixteen of the twenty states that conducted exit polling in 2012, or 80% of the time.<br />
<br />
Why the sharp increase? Absent a uniform national '<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_primaries_in_the_United_States">open primary</a>' movement, the lack of a competitive primary on the Democratic side seems like the obvious culprit.<br />
<br />
Based on data compiled from the twenty-seven states to <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/images/PollingUnit/ALREPHorizontal.pdf">feature an exit poll</a> in the 2008 GOP primary, and final vote counts provided by <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=2008&elect=2">Dave Leip's US Election Atlas</a>, self-identified Republicans made up 76% of the Republican primary electorate, independents made up 20%, and Democrats made up 3%. All total, those who identified as something other than a Republican made up 24% of the national electorate.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg77PNkmPTIhv71g-3KYI9DYcIEo9xrRSFsXlUM-ipNBhGDCEg6PoK9LuLXAKg7c_AC7eSRl8OQma0EhD2gxqyG8IYCwL03AbqGDl4TcPpO38OXsZ_U5_G07LXFV3jLHbJXyNtoTMydFFw/s1600/Pic+3.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg77PNkmPTIhv71g-3KYI9DYcIEo9xrRSFsXlUM-ipNBhGDCEg6PoK9LuLXAKg7c_AC7eSRl8OQma0EhD2gxqyG8IYCwL03AbqGDl4TcPpO38OXsZ_U5_G07LXFV3jLHbJXyNtoTMydFFw/s1600/Pic+3.png" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=2012&elect=2">In 2012</a>, with all eyes on the GOP contest, Republicans dropped to just 70% of the primary electorate, versus 26% who identified as independent, and 5% who identified as a Democrat. That's a total of 30% of GOP primary voters who identified themselves as something other than a Republican. Again, these numbers are based on the twenty-states that <a href="http://elections.nbcnews.com/ns/politics/2012/Arizona/Republican/primary/#exitpollsanchor">conducted exit polling</a> in the 2012 GOP primary.<br />
<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDRSZk9cwcJrtJLi1LFuE4sEYnNCzQfOX_OyLlEAx0oy0jn8RhK4Vm275DUsAgyIddiGORqAb-BhMnUihzDQFvDwDQSsYiGxFnFzCPsG0LsG1U_oxyERGLmDe0YdltadxuxIS4tqdN7lY/s1600/Pic+2.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDRSZk9cwcJrtJLi1LFuE4sEYnNCzQfOX_OyLlEAx0oy0jn8RhK4Vm275DUsAgyIddiGORqAb-BhMnUihzDQFvDwDQSsYiGxFnFzCPsG0LsG1U_oxyERGLmDe0YdltadxuxIS4tqdN7lY/s1600/Pic+2.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Red cells highlight states where self-identified Republicans failed to make up more than a majority of the electorate.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a> As long-time New Hampshire Republican operative <a href="http://www.rathlaw.com/professionals-20.html">Tom Rath</a> notes in the <a href="http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/run-2016/2015/02/12/the-best-8-days-in-american-politics">Catanese piece</a>, <br />
<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>“If there is no race on the Democratic side, then the independents will look
increasingly at the Republican side. And you can’t predict where
they’re going to go. It feels more like a real election." </i></blockquote>
<br />
Now that we've established that independents will indeed look to the GOP contest absent the emergence of a serious challenger for Hillary Clinton, the emphasis falls on the second sentence quoted above. The problem is, neither current polling, nor Republican Primary results from 2008 to 2012 provide much insight into who stands to benefit from an influx of independents and Democrats in the 2016 GOP primary. <br />
<br />
Take 2008, for example. Few would be surprised to learn that John 'The Maverick' McCain was the biggest beneficiary of independent and Democratic votes in the Republican primaries that year. McCain carried independents against Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee by a 42 - 21 - 19% margin, respectively. If you throw Democrats and everyone <i>but</i> Republicans in the mix, McCain's margin against Romney and Huckabee grows ever-so-slightly to 43 - 21 - 19%. That's more impressive than how McCain performed with self-identified Republicans, which he carried against Romney and Huckabee just 42 - 27- 23%. In fact, McCain failed to carry self-identified Republicans in any primary state until Super Tuesday on February 5, 2008. Even then, it required the momentum from previous wins in NH, SC, and Florida to get there.<br />
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgF_IQ6LoH-TUOoRLBOWsV7S-aXqDiHZ2v7aSKPCthXW6g-gcmQ9k-AT5rNpY8RcJsdfNPgRmv4culFE3C8qdolGT79Vi4i_60qECl_1a4Q9KYaF1tXTF7Qsm2O5jWmTQ9CsapDeNfy7zk/s1600/Pic+4.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgF_IQ6LoH-TUOoRLBOWsV7S-aXqDiHZ2v7aSKPCthXW6g-gcmQ9k-AT5rNpY8RcJsdfNPgRmv4culFE3C8qdolGT79Vi4i_60qECl_1a4Q9KYaF1tXTF7Qsm2O5jWmTQ9CsapDeNfy7zk/s1600/Pic+4.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Red cells highlight states in which McCain won the non-Republican vote. Blue is for states where Romney won the non-Republican vote. And gold is for the states where Huckabee won the non-Republican vote.</td></tr>
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Of the twenty-seven states to feature a GOP primary exit poll in 2008, John McCain won self-identified Republicans in only fourteen of them, or just over 50% of the time. He won non-Republicans, however, in twenty-one contests, or 78% of the time, as documented in the table above. Both Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee carried Republicans in the exit-polled states over 25% of the time. But among non-Republicans, their winning percentage drops. <br />
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So there you have it. A John McCain-like moderate, a la Jeb Bush or Chris Christie, stands to gain the most in the event Hillary Clinton is crowned the Democratic nominee, thanks to the impending flood of 'non-Republican' voters, right? Eh, not quite. Prior primary results, as well as the somewhat limited data we have from current 2016 primary polling, does not support such a theory. <br />
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In 2012, you might be surprised to learn that it was arch social conservative Rick Santorum who benefited the most from primary voters who did <i>not</i> identify themselves as Republicans. Among this group of voters, which made up 30% of the GOP electorate in the twenty exit-polled contests, Mitt Romney defeated Rick Santorum just 34 - 26%. Ron Paul finished 3rd with non-Republicans, with 19% of their vote, while Gingrich carried 15%. See the table below:<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB8J1oRnINxeQCAO1L1qKWOvBkyfA3p58OagaJIYP_VEHqnAR_K5JKJOWV0Et8CF0yWF-4xeQqbCbAkY3bF9ZnWZKWtbalDzdCZ1E_pq5rxJLjecQJRbcwQH7scrgPsG2NGzpmY500wws/s1600/Pic+5.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhB8J1oRnINxeQCAO1L1qKWOvBkyfA3p58OagaJIYP_VEHqnAR_K5JKJOWV0Et8CF0yWF-4xeQqbCbAkY3bF9ZnWZKWtbalDzdCZ1E_pq5rxJLjecQJRbcwQH7scrgPsG2NGzpmY500wws/s1600/Pic+5.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Red cells highlight states where Romney carried the non-Republican vote. gold indicates the same for Santorum, blue for Gingrich, and green for Ron Paul.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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Among self-identified Republicans, however, Mitt Romney's advantage over Santorum, Gingrich, and Paul grew. He won 42% of Republicans, while Santorum picked up 28%, Gingrich 23%, and Paul collapsed to 6%.<br />
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Romney carried the self-identified Republican vote in thirteen of the twenty exit polls conducted for the 2012 GOP primary, or 65% of the time. He carried non-Republicans in only six states, or 30% of the time. Santorum carried non-Republican voters in seven states. Ron Paul carried them in five.<br />
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So what does all this mean for 2016?<br />
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Like Rath mentioned, we have no way of knowing, at least not based on primary surveys to date. Most pollsters either do not ask, or do not provide the crosstabs to the partisan identification question in presidential primary polling. And the few that do have revealed mixed results, to say the least. See the table below of 2016 GOP poll results by party identification to date:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWLaTbcT_wzTG5gbai4eF-H_D_X9Cb8FCkYrbeqSJRZQl9UBH1rcYjsDjQO8UlfN_F9b042hdJAxKjPdA-SC0a6IWQwhHbVVKS23c9xuLVN9vdjfeeJ8nlhiKdJljL1zh-FfDH7c3TXl8/s1600/PIC.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWLaTbcT_wzTG5gbai4eF-H_D_X9Cb8FCkYrbeqSJRZQl9UBH1rcYjsDjQO8UlfN_F9b042hdJAxKjPdA-SC0a6IWQwhHbVVKS23c9xuLVN9vdjfeeJ8nlhiKdJljL1zh-FfDH7c3TXl8/s1600/PIC.png" /></a></div>
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Thanks to the sheer volume of potential candidates, they're bunched together among both Republicans and non-Republicans. <br />
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Just for fun, let's just assume that the current conventional wisdom - that Hillary will walk to the Democratic nomination unchallenged - is correct, and the Republicans have a very crowded and competitive nominating contest. In that case, the partisan make-up of the 2016 GOP primaries would likely resemble that of 2012, another year in which the Democratic race was a sleeper.<br />
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And with 2012 as our guide, we could expect that the surge of non-Republicans to the ballot box might benefit a polarizing, firebrand conservative. This group certainly benefited Rick Santorum in 2012, and <i>not</i> because they felt any genuine affinity for the socially conservative rabble-rouser. It was because he appeared to be the most unelectable Republican that could potentially topple Mitt Romney (remember <a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/02/15/1065052/-Announcing-Operation-Hilarity-Let-s-keep-the-GOP-clown-show-going">'Operation Hilarity,'</a> inspired by <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2008/05/is-limbaughs-op/">Rush Limbaugh's Operation Chaos</a> in 2008?). In fact, <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/feb/28/rick-santorum-michigan-robocalls-democrats">Santorum actively sought</a> Democratic votes at times. Their support helped keep his performance in crucial states like Michigan, Ohio, Illinois, and Wisconsin nearly on par with Romney's.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIqDLQhe_fOkUBpwA-YL-J6G6Cp8zer894_WLg9p7k38fP4NBzxHD3-aRPACh8eXv7uzhx_H5g2GXbCsvN6bu2hgjKqwCmkmtkcq7XtwWULDSKHPwTGs7_jx3MITdSesPOJ4o6qg74hkg/s1600/Pic+6.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhIqDLQhe_fOkUBpwA-YL-J6G6Cp8zer894_WLg9p7k38fP4NBzxHD3-aRPACh8eXv7uzhx_H5g2GXbCsvN6bu2hgjKqwCmkmtkcq7XtwWULDSKHPwTGs7_jx3MITdSesPOJ4o6qg74hkg/s1600/Pic+6.png" /></a></div>
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Who is to say independents and Democrats won't do the same again? Suppose self-identified Republicans stick with the "establishment" candidate next year, as they did with Romney four years ago - a Jeb Bush, or even Scott Walker-type, while non-Republicans throw their support behind more quixotic bids like those by Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, or Ben Carson. One lesson of 2012 is that folks who cross party lines to vote in a primary are usually up to no good, and are more likely sabotaging, rather than genuinely supporting, the other party. In a year where there's a fair chance the Republican contest will be the only one worth watching, and independents and Democrats flood the process as a result, it's the Cruz/Carson/Paul type that stands to benefit most.<br />
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One thing is more certain: if the Democratic primary remains as uneventful as it has thus far (and there is <a href="http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/mar/11/hillary-clinton-could-face-jail-time-as-email-scan/">potential</a> to think that could change), the share of independents and Democrats in the GOP primary electorate will more closely resemble that of 2012 than 2008. If a strong challenger emerges for Mrs. Clinton, self-identified Republicans will probably comprise a larger share of the GOP electorate.<br />
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Much, much less certain is which potential 2016 GOP candidate is likely to benefit in the event of either scenario in the paragraph above. The somewhat instinctive assumption that independents would be more likely to support a less conservative candidate like Christie or Bush (as they did McCain in 2008), was blown apart in 2012 by Rick Santorum.<br />
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Either way, I'm sure Markos Moulitsas, who happens to <a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/02/17/1278315/-The-real-primary-fight-of-2016-and-it-s-not-an-alternative-to-Hillary">support Mrs. Clinton</a>, wouldn't mind another round of Operation <u> <span style="font-size: x-small;">insert favorite dramatic noun </span> </u>?brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-22625424530509549062015-01-23T10:21:00.001-05:002015-03-25T11:01:36.864-04:00Unlike Romney 3.0, Ex-Nominees Do Not Historically Poll Very Well In National Primary Surveys<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA7QydDvuZ9ZnE92k_pH6yju4jX7YTBui9_K7_dOI-htExDDNESkz8tT3Dz5G_ifM1e9ISLcL_mLvO-azIxTtWzaw1hmV6RQHNHs-uMqcyaxLha0JH9Sr5yBH_3Wnohepis2OmkhpNuIo/s1600/ROmney+Gore+Pic.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA7QydDvuZ9ZnE92k_pH6yju4jX7YTBui9_K7_dOI-htExDDNESkz8tT3Dz5G_ifM1e9ISLcL_mLvO-azIxTtWzaw1hmV6RQHNHs-uMqcyaxLha0JH9Sr5yBH_3Wnohepis2OmkhpNuIo/s1600/ROmney+Gore+Pic.JPG" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Looking exclusively at losing presidential nominees, Al Gore's 2004 primary polling numbers most closely resemble Mitt Romney's current status among the 2016 GOP field. Of course, Al Gore never took the second plunge. Photo courtesy of the Associated Press</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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Former Presidential candidate Mitt Romney has stormed back onto the political scene in a big way this month, reaching out to <a href="http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2015/01/09/wall-street-journal-mitt-romney-tells-donors-hes-considering-2016-bid/">former mega-donors</a>, reassembling <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/01/13/wonkbook-mitt-romney-is-getting-the-band-back-together/">the 'old team,'</a> and meeting with fellow <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/mitt-romney-jeb-bush-set-meet-privately-utah-060418301.html">potential major candidates</a>. And as poll after poll has shown, rank-and-file Republican Party members across the nation have taken notice.<br />
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A surprisingly solid <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/news/republicans-want-mitt-romney-jeb-bush-to-run-for-president-in-2016/">59% of Republicans</a> say they'd like for the former nominee, who attracted just <a href="https://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/w0wr8wc1sc/econTabReport.pdf#page=64&zoom=auto,-251,519">over 47%</a> of the popular vote in his failed 2012 bid, to give it another go in 2016. Only 26% think he should sit it out. Romney consistently sports the <a href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2015/01/in-mitt-vs-jeb-2016-invisible-polling.html">highest favorability ratings</a> of the potentially large field of Republicans candidates, at least where it counts - among the base. Last but not least, he leads comfortably in every national horserace survey of the GOP primary taken to date.<br />
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That final fact is somewhat unique in a historical context, and especially so when looking back over the last thirty years. Ex-presidential nominees frequently pop-up in the following cycle's primary polling. But it's much less frequent that they cast such a dominating presence over the rest of the field, so consistently.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7dBv51H5QJ-da47rcPi9a8Y2evHfuan1JB2ILo1EOUvN97aeZG3mvHvh2px430O276O6Swhvf4jq8NXCN4omwbB9Pl76yngpzElGqir75OL2l07h7JGaXroOMtPNAgtsdWqtdWXR6fYQ/s1600/big+post+pic.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7dBv51H5QJ-da47rcPi9a8Y2evHfuan1JB2ILo1EOUvN97aeZG3mvHvh2px430O276O6Swhvf4jq8NXCN4omwbB9Pl76yngpzElGqir75OL2l07h7JGaXroOMtPNAgtsdWqtdWXR6fYQ/s1600/big+post+pic.png" /></a></div>
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In fact, looking back at ALL twenty-one ex-nominee's polling performance in the following cycle's presidential primary in the modern polling era, former presidential nominees can be said to fall into three tiers.<br />
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<ol>
<li>Tier 1 - this group of former nominees had no trouble recapturing the party faithful's hearts and minds for the second time in a row following their presidential loss. Qualification for membership in this group requires the ex-nominee poll in first place in at least half of the following presidential primary surveys taken that include that candidates name. For example, because Mitt Romney has appeared in eight national 2016 GOP primary surveys to date, and has led in each, he would qualify for membership in this group. Other ex-nominees falling into this group are Al Gore in 2004, Richard Nixon in 1964, Adlai Stevenson in 1956, and Thomas Dewey in 1948. </li>
<li>Tier 2 - this group of former nominees polled reasonably well in primary surveys taken after their presidential loss, almost always hitting double digits, even finding themselves at the summit of some random surveys. They fall short, however, of the polling status achieved by the failed nominees in the above group. Seven of the twenty-one ex-presidential nominees from 1936 to 2012 fall into this category.</li>
<li>Tier 3 - ex-nominees in this group are defined either by their surprisingly shoddy, if not embarrassing polling performance in the following cycle's primary survey, or by their unwillingness to even entertain the idea of the presidency ever again, evidenced by their total exclusion from the following primary's polling. Nine of the twenty-one ex-presidential nominees from 1936 to 2012 fall into this category. </li>
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<a name='more'></a>Tier 1 consists of five former losing presidential nominees that went on to dominate polling in the following presidential primary, whether choosing to ultimately seek the nomination again, as was the case with Thomas Dewey in 1948 and Adlai Stevenson in 1956, or staying on the sidelines, as was the case with Richard Nixon in 1964 and Al Gore in 2004.<br />
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Besides Mitt Romney, I should note Al Gore is the only ex-presidential nominee since Adlai Stevenson in 1956 to dominate primary polling in the cycle following his loss. In 2004 primary match-ups that featured Hillary Clinton, Joe Lieberman, John Kerry, John Edwards, and Howard Dean, <a href="https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=700FD6570D12A4C1!340&authkey=!AGUu_P7HhTGnaoI&ithint=file%2cxlsx">Al Gore led in virtually all of them</a>. His polling superiority continued until <a href="http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/920433/posts">well after</a> he formally announced he <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/news/gore-at-peace-with-decision-not-to-run/">would not be a candidate</a> in the 2004 election.<br />
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That's why it should probably come as no surprise that fellow narrow-loser Richard Nixon was also the <a href="https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=700FD6570D12A4C1!341&authkey=!AEUrc-a7-99qt9M&ithint=file%2cxlsx">dominant polling force</a> during the 1964 Republican primary, having lost a <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1960">painfully close</a> election to John F. Kennedy four years earlier, and a <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=6&year=1962&f=0&off=5&elect=0">less close</a> gubernatorial election in California in 1962. Nixon led in the final poll to include him, taken in June of 1964, despite insisting he was <a href="http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=95crAAAAIBAJ&sjid=1fQFAAAAIBAJ&pg=1846,336429&dq=nixon&hl=en">not an active candidate</a> for the nomination. Both Stevenson in 1952 and Dewey in 1944, lost their respective general election contests, yet dominated polling in the following cycle's primary battle. Both were actually renominated, as well. <br />
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The seven former losing presidential candidates that fit into Tier 2 are a diverse group, ranging from Gerald Ford in 1980, to Hubert Humphrey in 1972, to yes, again - Adlai Stevenson (this time in 1960). The most recent example of an ex-nominee to fall into this category would be John Kerry in 2008. After a close loss to George W. Bush, Kerry <a href="http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/john_kerry_strongly_considering_2008_run/">publicly toyed with the idea</a> of running a second time, and performed reasonably well in polling, averaging 12% in a crowded field, and frequently hitting the <a href="http://www.gallup.com/poll/15025/hillary-clintons-gender-advantage.aspx">twenty-percent range</a>. But it was the field that ultimately did him in. He trailed Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in <a href="https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=700FD6570D12A4C1!342&authkey=!AH99Ow6fJxhunNg&ithint=file%2cxlsx">every survey in which the three's name appeared</a>, and was even surpassed by his ex-vice presidential running mate, former NC Senator John Edwards. Kerry gracefully <a href="http://www.nbcnews.com/id/16790110/ns/politics/t/kerry-says-he-wont-run-president/">stepped aside</a> in January of 2007, well before launching any sort of formal campaign apparatus.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbz26GhfkDULRochgjOHKGzdiTUnGffFZAWJ2HjFWyZkcj9kKxU_BOxu_lJVpctn7XljNy0sEr7XUwZ7weJyJqEyuH3o1NGXHHJiZezCCJ7EMjqWnr3KLiXaekeh1toq6bHu8H6nccCbY/s1600/hard+pic.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhbz26GhfkDULRochgjOHKGzdiTUnGffFZAWJ2HjFWyZkcj9kKxU_BOxu_lJVpctn7XljNy0sEr7XUwZ7weJyJqEyuH3o1NGXHHJiZezCCJ7EMjqWnr3KLiXaekeh1toq6bHu8H6nccCbY/s1600/hard+pic.png" /></a></div>
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According to the Roper Center's i-Poll database, former presidential loser Michael Dukakis mustered 14% of Democratic Primary voters support in an early 1989 survey, the only such 1992 primary poll to ever include the 'Massachusetts Miracle.'<br />
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Following his narrow loss to Jimmy Carter in 1976, Gerald Ford reemerged for a rematch with both Carter and Ronald Reagan. Of the twenty-eight 1980 Republican primary surveys taken to include Ford's name, the ex-President led in seven of them, <a href="https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=700FD6570D12A4C1!343&authkey=!AP8KePRXQk4m3NI&ithint=file%2cxlsx">and averaged 28% of the vote</a>, before finally announcing he <a href="http://www.geraldrfordfoundation.org/about/gerald-r-ford-timeline/">would not seek another term</a> as President in March, 1980.<br />
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Hubert Humphrey did similarly well in polling in the 1972 Democratic presidential primary, having lost the 1968 presidential popular vote to Richard Nixon <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1968">by less than a point</a>. Of the 18 surveys taken to include Humphrey, eventual nominee George McGovern, Edward Kennedy, Edmond Muskie, George Wallace, Eugene McCarthy, and more, <a href="https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=700FD6570D12A4C1!346&authkey=!ABIwbF-7XlB_CPU&ithint=folder%2c">Humphrey led in six</a>.<br />
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Rounding out Tier 2, Democrats simply couldn't quit Adlai Stevenson in 1960, not even <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1952">after two</a> consecutive <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1956">landslide losses</a> to President Eisenhower. He nearly got away with the nomination for a third time, <a href="https://onedrive.live.com/redir?resid=700FD6570D12A4C1!347&authkey=!AHA-n2YdwGJN3fw&ithint=file%2cxlsx">leading in six of fifteen primary polls</a> that included Edward Kennedy, Hubert Humphrey, and Lyndon B. Johnson. Other strong, though not quite dominant ex-nominees include Wendell Willkie in 1944, and Herbert Hoover in 1936, the former of which actually ran for the nomination again that year, the latter of which did not.<br />
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The final group, Tier 3, is littered with the tombstones of ex-nominees that either polled terribly in their cameo appearances in the following cycle's primary surveys, or didn't show up in polling at all. Perhaps the most notable of this group of nine presidential losers is President George H. W. Bush in 1996. Bush had just come off an <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1992">electoral landslide defeat</a>, though the popular vote was a bit closer. Had he chosen to run again in 1996, Bush would have been 72 upon taking office, one year younger than his boss Ronald Reagan was upon his reelection in 1984. Yet Bush never took the second plunge, and was never included in a single 1996 Republican Primary poll, at least not according to the Roper Center's i-poll database.<br />
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The same holds true for former nominee Bob Dole, who never made a single appearance in 2000 Republican primary polling (though his wife, Elizabeth, did quite well). Walter Mondale in 1988, Barry Goldwater in 1968, and Alf Landon in 1940 are all similarly positioned to George H.W. Bush. None of them appeared in any primary polling following their presidential loss. Senator John McCain in 2012, President Jimmy Carter in 1984, George McGovern in 1976, and Thomas Dewey in 1924, all performed relatively poorly against their presidential opponent, and all looked particularly weak against the proceeding presidential primary field, at least according to polling available at the time.<br />
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What does all this mean for Romney and the 2016 Republican field? Somewhere between 'very little' and 'moderately consequential.' As <a href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2013/11/the-predictive-power-of-very-early.html">discussed ad nauseam</a> on <a href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2013/11/the-predictive-power-of-very-early_15.html">this blog</a> before, <a href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2013/11/the-predictive-power-of-very-early_15.html">early primary</a> <a href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2014/02/the-predictive-power-of-very-early.html">polling</a> <a href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2013/11/the-predictive-power-of-very-early_20.html">isn't very</a> <a href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2014/02/the-predictive-power-of-very-early.html">predictable</a>. But as pointed out recently <a href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/2016-iowa-caucus-what-we-know/">at FiveThirtyEight.com</a>, we're now less than one year away from the Iowa Caucus. And these polls are only more likely to reflect the true nature of things on the ground as time goes by. The fact that Romney is doing so well isn't necessarily dependent on name recognition, as many Romney critics have speculated. Again, think John Kerry in 2006, John McCain in 2010, Dukakis in 1990, and Jimmy Carter in 1984. They all had high name recognition, but faded in primary polling in a sea of new faces and fresh ideas. Sure, Romney could fade, and may choose not to run at all. But as time ticks by, he's sitting pretty in the polling. brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-21495163045714063122015-01-15T08:30:00.000-05:002015-01-15T08:30:40.727-05:00In the Mitt vs. Jeb 2016 'Invisible (Polling) Primary,' It's Mitt By A Mile<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRTzj8UHyu_al_XehI0mkQ_qNTgCznmVpP_hvPDHibZEvBeQBIgZ6chimG1zQVTw3GwVVaTensTi9XqXrxpX4y8g07Zo27CD1oZBCNIRv5GE5IDQ4Pwq3CraIn3kt2v3DlhRuffNS_SIo/s1600/finally.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiRTzj8UHyu_al_XehI0mkQ_qNTgCznmVpP_hvPDHibZEvBeQBIgZ6chimG1zQVTw3GwVVaTensTi9XqXrxpX4y8g07Zo27CD1oZBCNIRv5GE5IDQ4Pwq3CraIn3kt2v3DlhRuffNS_SIo/s1600/finally.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A Jeb vs. Mitt rivalry has been the talk of the town of late. But as far as the Republican voting public is concerned, it's not even close. Photos courtesy of Getty Images.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Ever since Jeb Bush made waves last month with <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/12/16/jeb-bush-to-actively-explore-run-for-president/">an early announcement</a> about his presidential aspirations, the media has cast the 2016 Republican primary race as a Jeb vs. Mitt slugfest in the making. Both seemingly giants in their own party, pundits can't help but <a href="http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2015/01/14/377100391/what-if-mitt-and-jeb-really-do-go-at-it-hammer-and-tong">lick their chops</a> at the idea. For some, it's the political equivalent of the "immovable object" facing the "irresistible force." Except for one problem: the polling numbers don't quite match the hype. <br />
<br />
In the <a href="http://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/aaaoyud72v/econTabReport.pdf">first national survey</a> of the new year regarding the 2016
Republican Presidential Primary, it's clear to see why the Romney circle
is <a href="http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/politics/2015/01/09/mitt-romney-tells-former-campaign-donors-considering-third-run-for-president-say-sources/SVrFSx9RuKatxwrOzJ7P2J/story.html">ramping up chatter </a>of a third consecutive presidential
bid. <br />
<br />
According to Republican adults, not only is Romney more well-liked than fellow establishment bigwig Jeb Bush. But he is their preferred choice for the nomination by a shockingly wide margin, in the event the field is pared down to just the two of them.<br />
<br />
When Republicans are asked: "<i>If the choice was between Mitt Romney and Jeb Bush, which one would you want to be the Republican nominee for president in 2016</i>," <a href="http://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/aaaoyud72v/econTabReport.pdf#page=94&zoom=auto,-60,519">60% pick Romney</a>, while just 29% select Bush. Eleven percent are undecided. <br />
<br />
Color me surprised. What gives? I think of Romney and Bush as being too very comparable guys. Both have near 100% name recognition among Republicans. Both have their roots in political dynasties. They have similar temperaments, ideologies, and fund-raising bases. What gives Romney such a huge advantage over Bush? Who knows? But what we do know is that Romney's superior polling position is evident in more ways than one <br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>The YouGov poll discussed above finds that Republican adults nationwide <a href="http://d25d2506sfb94s.cloudfront.net/cumulus_uploads/document/aaaoyud72v/econTabReport.pdf#page=93&zoom=auto,-60,592">prefer Mitt Romney be their nominee</a> over a diverse field of candidates. He leads the pack of twelve with 28%, over double the vote share of his closest rival, Jeb Bush (who attracts 12%). The only other GOP candidate to poll in the double-digits is political novice and former neurosurgeon, Dr. Ben Carson.<br />
<br />
YouGov echoes recent national and state surveys finding Mitt outperforming Jeb. A new <a href="http://api.viglink.com/api/click?format=go&jsonp=vglnk_14212838897858&key=71d8b006de9acac41cea4b4332bce5e8&libId=ee9eab28-deec-41c8-843e-568233b86640&loc=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.argojournal.com%2F&v=1&out=http%3A%2F%2Fgravismarketing.com%2Fpolling-and-market-research%2Fiowa-poll-romney-leads-nascent-iowa-field-with-21-bush-at-14-walker-10%2F&title=The%20Argo%20Journal&txt=%3Cb%3EGravis%20Marketing%2FTownhall%20(R)%20Iowa%202016%20GOP%20Caucus%20Poll%20%3C%2Fb%3E">Iowa poll out yesterday</a> found Romney attracting 21% of caucus voter's support, while Jeb comes in third with 14%, behind "undecided" at 18%. In fact, Mitt leads Jeb in <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2016/president/ia/iowa_republican_presidential_caucus2-5256.html">both of two Iowa surveys</a> to include Romney's name as a candidate. The only New Hampshire poll to include Romney as a candidate in 2016 finds him with <a href="http://www.businessweek.com/pdfs/bloomberg-saint-anselm-purple-NH-survey-Q1-to-Q9-11-2014.pdf#page=2&zoom=auto,-150,743">30% of the vote</a>, nearly three times the support of his closest competitor, and dwarfing Bush's 8%. Mitt leads Jeb in every national survey to include both of their names. Consider the table below:<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0Q1IXtscR7msOlldF3X41TIfvp_P8zfPfp0OVFuNz9sygRmrTBZJn7fDFNyG9Qk8Quzzh5rA6mVGG8vpTEY01hmG6o-4qDhFLsxD74uuR-NT4_JVpqhpN3HA7UAiubMnHbUY1uPrfRMA/s1600/hush.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj0Q1IXtscR7msOlldF3X41TIfvp_P8zfPfp0OVFuNz9sygRmrTBZJn7fDFNyG9Qk8Quzzh5rA6mVGG8vpTEY01hmG6o-4qDhFLsxD74uuR-NT4_JVpqhpN3HA7UAiubMnHbUY1uPrfRMA/s1600/hush.png" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
<br />
Furthermore, in polls that test both Romney's and Jeb's favorability ratings, Mitt again comes out on top, and in a big way.<br />
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<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRGHsx33EIj8oMi7N0f6sxSMGHtcvp36DxcZ1YoAUAq3874ys7lLiHVXjI7F-jrudOb6NT7atsVvTdw98Oft-Nrx66WChBH_Ro84B5zovaK5uwAhv0Q_fUNHTp0kO37JsMVeJNylZbOMI/s1600/be+quiet.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRGHsx33EIj8oMi7N0f6sxSMGHtcvp36DxcZ1YoAUAq3874ys7lLiHVXjI7F-jrudOb6NT7atsVvTdw98Oft-Nrx66WChBH_Ro84B5zovaK5uwAhv0Q_fUNHTp0kO37JsMVeJNylZbOMI/s1600/be+quiet.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">(*) denotes the poll is of Republican Primary voters, and not simply
self-identified Republicans. (^) denotes the poll is a monthly average
of the The Economist/YouGov weekly tracking poll.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
In every circumstance in which Romney and Jeb are included in the same poll of Republicans, Mitt's favorability rating is significantly higher.<br />
<br />
Of course, none of this may wind up mattering in the end. A lot of the chatter about Romney's third run seems a bit speculative. Not to mention, as <a href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/five-reasons-romney-is-thinking-of-running/">Five Thirty Eight's Harry Enten first noted</a>, the terrible track record of former presidential nominees that do run again for President. That record gets even worse on their third run. There's no way Romney wants to be lumped into the same company as William Jennings Bryan, Herbert Hoover, Adlai Stevenson, and Hubert Humphrey. But as Enten also points out, and as the data above indicates, a third Romney nomination <i>could</i> happen. And from a head-to-head, favorability rating perspective alone, it seems almost inevitable. brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-68534220220300300512014-12-30T11:43:00.000-05:002014-12-30T21:06:34.273-05:00Hillary Clinton Exceeds Records Set By Her Husband Against Republicans In 2016, Says New CNN Poll<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhV8swb7D-QSN58wlS17NgYFISHBZYemwGZOQ9fBt_96hh0PTN9NYrEX7v_qs3wocLL9wYuPODKxLgktvsm55Jz73ivCIWpK8cGucZcpKeWduvIG3i87rRkEuZr8pzxWvssK9m0_Lbzb_c/s1600/title+image.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhV8swb7D-QSN58wlS17NgYFISHBZYemwGZOQ9fBt_96hh0PTN9NYrEX7v_qs3wocLL9wYuPODKxLgktvsm55Jz73ivCIWpK8cGucZcpKeWduvIG3i87rRkEuZr8pzxWvssK9m0_Lbzb_c/s1600/title+image.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Hillary Clinton laughs with ex-Sec. of Defense Leon Panetta. A recent CNN/ORC poll certainly gives her plenty reason to smile. Photo courtesy of Win McNamee/Getty Images</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
Still shaking off the sting of November's thumping, a recent CNN/ORC poll provided Democrats with some glimmers of hope. While most of the headlines generated by the poll were concerned with Obama's <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2014/12/23/politics/obama-approval-rating/index.html">sudden surge in job approval</a>, there was another eye-brow raising statistic in the release - Hillary Clinton <a href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2014/images/12/24/poll2.pdf#page=5&zoom=auto,-150,787">positively dominates</a> the entire 2016 Republican field, at a time when news of Jeb Bush's <a href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCAQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Ftime.com%2F3635737%2Fjeb-bush-announces-presidential-exploratory-run%2F&ei=WCCiVIzcGcqagwTp-oCwAw&usg=AFQjCNED4KDRhmrmjuGHXJAUTnfz6Rw5Jw&sig2=Uoo8ZdCGv1gGLODy94BkPw&bvm=bv.82001339,d.eXY">unofficial campaign launch</a> has sucked up much of the media oxygen in the room. <br />
<br />
So how does the recently much-hyped junior Bush stack up against the recently quiet ex-Secretary of State? Very poorly, actually.<br />
<br />
If the election were held today, Hillary would win a clear majority of the vote (54%), while Jeb Bush just barely cross the 40% mark. Supposing the margin between the candidates holds, it would be the worst popular vote performance for Republicans in a Presidential election since Barry Goldwater's <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1964">landslide 1964 loss</a>.<br />
<br />
And if Jeb Bush is not the Republican nominee, and you're a Republican voter, well...go ahead and bend over, per CNN, because 2016 is going to be a rough ride.<br />
<br />
The tough-talking New Jerseyan, who most think is a <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/george-will-chris-christie-lays-the-groundwork-for-a-2016-presidential-run/2014/10/08/f4e510ea-4e50-11e4-babe-e91da079cb8a_story.html">shoe-in to run</a>, trails Hillary by an embarrassing 56-39% margin. Candidates as diverse as Rand Paul, Mike Huckabee, and Ted Cruz, all trail ex-Sen. Clinton by 20 points or more. Hillary even <a href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2014/images/12/24/poll2.pdf#page=5&zoom=auto,-150,455">hits 60%</a> in a head-to-head against Sen. Cruz. <br />
<br />
If you buy the CNN/ORC numbers, Hillary's performance against all of these candidates is truly intimidating. Not only does she match her ex-two-term President husband's 1990s performance in many demographic metrics, she actually exceeds his showing in many more. Consider the table below, which documents the demographics in which Hillary Clinton performs exceptionally strong in the CNN poll, and compares her performance with past Democratic nominees for President dating back to 1972 (the beginning of the modern exit polling era). <br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9MdAKEc9kCEMXB9iFLtWi6-lZls-4oZEL-AruV6KqdzLot1bLmFe1LP3V6V1_trqjylXbIWr0RtoV352XKZftqg-0vw5Xjht4a_jW0TaHahNsfBDnfUMmgnGq2Gp6glZaRShPN5DBp80/s1600/a+pic.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9MdAKEc9kCEMXB9iFLtWi6-lZls-4oZEL-AruV6KqdzLot1bLmFe1LP3V6V1_trqjylXbIWr0RtoV352XKZftqg-0vw5Xjht4a_jW0TaHahNsfBDnfUMmgnGq2Gp6glZaRShPN5DBp80/s1600/a+pic.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Exit Poll data courtesy of Best & Krueger's <u>Exit Polls</u>. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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Clinton's performance against Jeb Bush among men, women, Democrats, and Independents, is the best performance for any Democratic presidential nominee since at least as far back as national exit polls track (1972). In other words, Hillary Clinton outperforms EVERY Democrat dating back to McGovern, in key demographics tested by the CNN/ORC poll. For example, she's up four among men, a feat not yet accomplished by any Democrat in exit polling to date. Only Bill Clinton came close to such an accomplishment when he carried the male vote by <a href="http://www.ropercenter.uconn.edu/elections/how_groups_voted/voted_92.html">3 points in 1992</a>. But even then, that election is not directly comparable due to the unique strength of third-party candidate Ross Perot.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>Hillary's 59-37% lead among female respondents in the CNN poll is a good deal more impressive than the previous Democratic record among women - Bill Clinton's <a href="http://www.ropercenter.uconn.edu/elections/how_groups_voted/voted_96.html">54-38% win in the 1996 election</a> against Bob Dole.<br />
<br />
Also noteworthy is the fact that Hillary's +88% lead over Jeb among Democrats is stronger than Obama's lead among Democrats over Romney in 2012, or any other Democrat's lead over a Republican since at least 1972.<br />
<br />
Finally, Hillary's 53-40% lead over Jeb Bush among Independent voters,
in the unlikely event it holds until election day, would
represent Democrats best showing with this group of voters since
before 1972. <br />
<br />
Believe it or not, these aren't the only places where Hillary Clinton is stronger than her opponents, past Democrats, and the big-dog himself, Bill Clinton. <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrjo8B9uXEKn0WaxpOAJCyecJICZm8A9uaESuCERlP_zZl7XJYxDI90-1wfdiUOoLAUxcazKgC0m8XXUBmHSBbpiYq5byCASrFR91Jo0f3NWsFKSfeTo-F8XDewyy18L6gLxh8MYQIVE0/s1600/oooojk.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjrjo8B9uXEKn0WaxpOAJCyecJICZm8A9uaESuCERlP_zZl7XJYxDI90-1wfdiUOoLAUxcazKgC0m8XXUBmHSBbpiYq5byCASrFR91Jo0f3NWsFKSfeTo-F8XDewyy18L6gLxh8MYQIVE0/s1600/oooojk.png" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
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<br />
Her performance among moderates, conservatives, whites, city-dwellers, suburbanites, and even RURAL communities (!!) has to be reassuring for Democrats, to say the least.<br />
<br />
But even a partisan observer would have to admit, all the scenarios presented by the CNN poll seem pretty rosy to Clinton-world, both in a historical context, as well as when being compared to recent national surveys of hypothetical 2016 match-ups. <br />
<br />
The strongest rebuttal of the CNN/ORC poll comes from a <a href="http://www.quinnipiac.edu/news-and-events/quinnipiac-university-poll/national/release-detail?ReleaseID=2116">November Quinnipiac Poll</a>, which found Hillary Clinton leading Jeb Bush 46-41%, just on the cusp of the the margin of error. Even more significantly, Clinton was only up 43-42% on Governor Christie. Remember, Clinton led Christie by seventeen points, per CNN. Rand Paul's 20-pt deficit against Hillary Clinton, as seen in the CNN poll, is a 5-pt deficit in the Quinnipiac poll. The same for Mike Huckabee, Paul Ryan, and Rand Paul. Virtually all of the tested GOP contenders look at least somewhat competitive with Hillary Clinton - the exact opposite of what was found by CNN.<br />
<br />
Beyond Quinnipiac, a recent <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2014/12/16/fox-news-poll-your-2016-presidential-election-fix/">Fox News survey</a> also found Jeb trailing Hillary Clinton just barely outside of the 3% margin of error, 49-42%. That also marks his best performance against Hillary to date in a Fox News poll. Both Chris Christie and Rand Paul trail Clinton by double-digits, though no where near to the extent seen in the recent CNN/ORC poll. It is worth noting that the Fox News poll samples registered voters, while the CNN poll samples all adults.<br />
<br />
Finally, a recent <a href="http://images.businessweek.com/cms/2014-12-06/14_15_22.pdf">Bloomberg/Selzer poll</a> of likely voters found Clinton ahead of Bush by only 6 points, with plenty of undecideds. Chris Christie, Rand Paul, and Mitt Romney all perform within single digits of Hillary Clinton, while Ted Cruz trails by thirteen points - still, a far cry from his 25-pt deficit seen in the CNN poll. <br />
<br />
So while Quinnipiac, Fox News, and Bloomberg paint a slightly better picture for Republicans than the recent CNN/ORC poll, one more recent survey serves to bolster CNN's findings; <a href="https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1380855/mcclatchy-marist-poll-2016-december-2014.pdf">the latest McClatchy/Marist poll of registered voters. </a>Like CNN, all 2016 GOP candidates trail Hillary Clinton by double digits among registered voters, though none by twenty points or more, as seen by CNN. <br />
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There's a <a href="https://twitter.com/aedwardslevy/status/544997793233117184">propensity by some</a> in the media to <a href="http://cookpolitical.com/story/6553">attack early presidential horse-race polls</a>, or those that report on such polls, because of their <a href="http://rothenbergpoliticalreport.com/news/article/white-house-2012-polls-not-so-fast">lack of predictive power</a> with regards to the final outcome. But others have noted that while that is often right, it <a href="http://www.pewresearch.org/2007/02/14/how-reliable-are-the-early-presidential-polls/">isn't always the case</a>. In 1967, polling accurately predicted a very close race in 1968. In 1982, a majority of polls had Reagan ahead of Mondale, though to a lesser extent than he won by in 1984. Same for 2002 and polling between George W. Bush and John Kerry. Not to mention that both Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush are fairly well known quantities - it's not as though there are a substantial number of undecideds waiting to be persuaded by one member of the two largest political dynasties in American history. <br />
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In the end, the CNN survey is a bad poll for Republicans. There's no way around that. Fortunately for them, it was released about a year and a half before it probably matters. brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-11277965120179082882014-12-28T23:21:00.001-05:002015-01-07T12:09:42.762-05:00Chris Christie's Republican Problem: A Year Of Scandal Damages His Ratings With An Already Suspicious Base<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQWORlsNon621-FLstNE1jSSLAz2HHzKrlx9x2dwz4wkAnkJJyUvlI9bXZh9c5NWcBA8EZVtkV36ISRFpIPerDVuaz0Uiifls3dqbR1TwRkI3BuRipr-_3SDFsdKXncopomAnO9cXEbL4/s1600/Final+Title+Pic.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQWORlsNon621-FLstNE1jSSLAz2HHzKrlx9x2dwz4wkAnkJJyUvlI9bXZh9c5NWcBA8EZVtkV36ISRFpIPerDVuaz0Uiifls3dqbR1TwRkI3BuRipr-_3SDFsdKXncopomAnO9cXEbL4/s1600/Final+Title+Pic.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Chris Christie is the least popular Republican in the 2016 primary field, and that's according to Republicans. Jeb Bush and Mitt Romney are both popular with the base. Center illustration is courtesy of <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2014/04/14/crossing-christie">Daniel Adel</a>. Illustration on the left is courtesy of <a href="http://www.wsj.com/news/articles/SB123457271366086479?mg=reno64-wsj&url=http%3A%2F%2Fonline.wsj.com%2Farticle%2FSB123457271366086479.html">Ismael Roldan</a>. Illustration on the right is courtesy of <a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/donkeyhotey/6575713629/">DonkeyHotey</a>.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
In a <a href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2013/07/comparing-pre-primary-favorability.html#more">July 2013 piece</a> written on this blog, I suggested that a bipartisanly popular Governor Chris Christie would likely have a harder time winning a GOP primary than all three of his recent predecessors, Mitt Romney, John McCain, and George W. Bush. The hypothesis was based on an examination of all four politician's favorability ratings with members of their own party in the lead-up to the presidential primary.<br />
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Some, myself included, were surprised to learn that, despite home-state <a href="http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2012/11/gov_christies_approval_rating_1.html">rockstar status</a> in the wake of his handling of the Hurricane Sandy recovery, and a national favorability rating in the positive double-digits with <a href="http://www.gallup.com/poll/162911/new-jersey-gov-christie-broad-cross-party-appeal.aspx">voters of all stripes</a>, Christie was in a worse position with his own party than <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/13/rick-santorum-mitt-romney-polling-elections-2012_n_1273709.html">known moderates</a> that ran for President <a href="http://newsok.com/mccain-struggles-to-woo-far-right/article/3202241">before him</a>.<br />
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Flash-forward eighteen months to present day, and the situation has only gotten worse for Governor Christie. Not only did the <a href="http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jan/8/chris-christie-aide-linked-email-road-closure-reve/">Bridgegate scandal</a> cause his home-state favorability rating to <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/01/30/how-did-bridge-gate-hurt-christie-it-diminished-his-crossover-appeal-to-democrats/=http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/01/23/chris-christies-poll-tumble-and-why-it-matters/">tumble hard back to earth</a>, but his image has <a href="http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/christies-standing-suffers-during-scandals">suffered nationally</a> as well. No longer are Democrats giving him the <a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/new-jersey-gov-chris-christie-popular-democrats-republicans-poll-article-1.1375781">benefit of the doubt</a> - he's essentially <a href="https://eagletonpollblog.wordpress.com/2014/01/22/new-polling-on-christie-ratings/">any old Republican</a> to them now. Independents, the group among whom Christie often saw his best numbers, now barely keep him <a href="http://www.quinnipiac.edu/news-and-events/quinnipiac-university-poll/national/release-detail?ReleaseID=2116">above water</a>.<br />
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But most important for his lingering presidential run, Christie is in a dangerously perilous position with the people he needs to win a primary - Republicans. In fact, his position is considerably worse than any one of the large pool of potential contenders bantered about by pundits. It's also considerably worse than serious contenders from years past, such as Mitt Romney, John McCain, and Rudy Giuliani. <br />
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Christie's trouble couldn't be more apparent than in a recent <a href="http://www.monmouth.edu/assets/0/32212254770/32212254991/32212254992/32212254994/32212254995/30064771087/77428dc4-6cb3-4a2e-be5d-22764e164efe.pdf">Monmouth University Poll</a> of fifteen possible Republican presidential candidates. He ranks second-to-last in terms of net favorability, beating out Indiana Gov. Mike Pence (who only 23% of Republicans are familiar enough with to rate at all; Christie, meanwhile, is the second best-known of the fifteen candidates tested, behind Mitt Romney).<br />
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<a name='more'></a>What's worse? Republicans are about evenly split in their views of the New Jersey Governor, with 36% viewing him favorably, while 34% rate him unfavorably. Compare that figure to Mitt Romney's 55% favorability rating (found in the same poll), or Paul Ryan's 11% unfavorable rating. And among the Tea Party supporters that made up <a href="http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/primaries/states/iowa/exit-polls">64% of the 2012 Iowa Caucus vote</a>, and <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/special/politics/primary-tracker/New-Hampshire/?customview=1,-1,total,4">51% of the 2012 New Hampshire Primary vote</a>, Christie is far and away the least popular potential 2016 Republican candidate. <a href="http://www.monmouth.edu/assets/0/32212254770/32212254991/32212254992/32212254994/32212254995/30064771087/77428dc4-6cb3-4a2e-be5d-22764e164efe.pdf#page=2&zoom=auto,-150,479">From the poll:</a> <br />
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<i>"[Christie] does better among those who are not aligned with the Tea Party - 41% favorable to 27% unfavorable, but is viewed negatively by Tea Party supporters - 27% favorable to 46% unfavorable. Christie is the only candidate tested in the poll with an "upside down" rating among Tea Party-aligned Republicans."</i></blockquote>
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And while other national surveys might not paint quite as dire a picture for Christie, they're not a source of comfort either. The November average of the Economist/YouGov weekly tracking poll found <a href="http://today.yougov.com/documents/?category=economist&year=&month=11">Christie at just +19</a> with Republicans, well below fellow establishment candidate Jeb Bush's +39. In fact, Christie's average 32% <i>unfavorable</i> rating among Republicans was the highest of the ten candidates tested by Economist/YouGov, followed by Jeb Bush's 22% unfavorable rating. <br />
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It doesn't look any better if you zoom out and look at the bigger picture. Christie's averaged just a 46% favorable, 32% unfavorable rating across twenty-five national polls of Republicans taken since January 2014. That represents a notable decline from from the 48/23% rating he averaged in surveys taken from the 2012 presidential election to mid-2013. <br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">(*) denotes the poll is of Republican Primary voters, and not simply self-identified Republicans. (^) denotes the poll is a monthly average of the The Economist/YouGov weekly tracking poll. Yellow highlighting denotes a net favorability rating in the positive single digits, or less. </td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td></tr>
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While a +14% favorability rating may be great among Independents, and certainly with the opposing party, it's a much less impressive figure to have within your own party. For example, George W. Bush averaged a <a href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2013/07/comparing-pre-primary-favorability.html#more">+66% favorability rating</a> among Republicans in the lead-up to the 2000 GOP presidential primary. Sarah Palin averaged a +51% rating in the lead-up to the 2012 GOP primary. Heck, even Mitt Romney and John McCain managed +37% and +32% ratings in 2012 and 2008, respectively.<br />
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Here's how Christie stacks up among Republicans against the 2016 field, as well as other major players from past Republican presidential primaries (the year in parentheses represents the time period of the sample size used in the average): <br />
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None of this is to suggest that Christie can't turn things around by the time 2016 rolls around. But there's very little doubt, at least based on polling, that Christie's base is more tepid about him personally than past perceived "moderate" or "establishment" Republican presidential candidates. Name recognition is likely what <a href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2016-national-gop-primary">keeps him near the top</a> of the crowded and unsettled Republican field for now. What is unclear is how he can carve out the kind of support from conservative Republicans that he would need to win the primary. That is especially hard to do when your opponent's net favorability rating averages 20-50 points higher than your own. <br />
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And for what it's worth, Chris Christie's weakness among the Republican party isn't limited to the national landscape. An examination of early state polling in the crucial Iowa and New Hampshire primaries finds that compared to Mitt Romney in 2012, Christie's favorability is weaker in both states, significantly so in the latter. Across six surveys of Iowa Republicans or GOP Caucus goers compiled from <a href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCAQFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.realclearpolitics.com%2Fepolls%2F2016%2Fpresident%2Fia%2Fiowa_republican_presidential_caucus-3194.html&ei=0s-gVNiJIsnUgwSHyYHADA&usg=AFQjCNHAG6Uo8GxDWPiQvNZOIrrL4c6lAg&sig2=ojjYVpWbf5kq8ilZYOa84Q">RCP</a> and <a href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2016-iowa-presidential-republican-primary">HuffPo Pollster</a> since January 2014, Christie averages just a 44/34% favorability rating. Romney averaged a <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2012/president/ia/iowa_republican_presidential_primary-1588.html">52/34%</a> rating across <a href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2012-iowa-gop-primary">twenty polls</a> taken from January 2011 until the Iowa Caucus. In New Hampshire, the difference is even more pronounced - Christie averages a 47/34% favorability rating across eight polls taken since January 2014. Romney averaged a much more impressive 67/24% rating. If this doesn't improve, Christie won't be able to rely on strong performances in the early states to propel him to the nomination. <br />
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As a side note, consider the chart below, which documents Christie's national favorability rating among Republicans since being elected governor of New Jersey in 2009. Note there are three distinct periods: 1) pre- Hurricane Sandy, pre-Obama embrace (January 2010 - October 2012), 2) re-election year, Hurricane Sandy era (November 2012 - December 2013), and 3) post-Bridgegate period (January 2014 - present).<br />
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As the table indicates, the great Christie polling surge that took place following Hurricane Sandy, and lasted until Bridgegate, was <i>in spite</i> of Republicans, not thanks to them. Instead, it was Democrats that largely lifted Christie's polling numbers to the dramatic highs he enjoyed for all of 2013. His numbers with Republicans have fallen steadily from their impressive highs of his early years in office, to the worse-than-mediocre lows of today. But for all intents and purposes, Republican distrust and distaste for Christie began when he was seen as providing comfort and cover for President Obama just days before the showdown against Mitt Romney in the 2012 election. It will be interesting to see if Christie can reverse this trend line with Republicans in 2015. If not, it's hard to see how he succeeds in a primary.brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-90218477057312428222014-12-04T09:02:00.000-05:002014-12-30T21:07:18.351-05:00A "firefight into a footnote." Why Mary Landrieu's Racially Tinged Runoff Strategy Won't Save Her<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sen. Landrieu appears with Hillary Clinton at a recent rally in Louisiana. Photo courtesy of Gerald Herbert/A.P. The quoted portion of the title of this article is courtesy of a recent <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mary-landrieu-deep-souths-last-senate-democrat-must-fend-for-herself/2014/12/03/7bfa56e8-7b20-11e4-84d4-7c896b90abdc_story.html">Sean Sullivan and Karen Tumulty piece</a> for the Washington Post. </td></tr>
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Sen. Mary Landrieu's campaign <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mary-landrieu-deep-souths-last-senate-democrat-must-fend-for-herself/2014/12/03/7bfa56e8-7b20-11e4-84d4-7c896b90abdc_story.html">is flailing</a>. Her ominous performance in the 2014 midterm, and her <a href="https://twitter.com/daveweigel/status/540196808136200192">panicked</a> (some would even <a href="https://twitter.com/daveweigel/status/540206880426299392">call desperate</a>) attempts at turning out black voters for the runoff this Saturday provide clear evidence of the perilous position she's in.<br />
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Just one month ago, Landrieu racked up her worst performance in her state's jungle primary since initially running for the seat <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Senate_election_in_Louisiana,_1996">in 1996</a>. She captured just <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=22&year=2014&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=2">42% of the vote</a>, compared to her two main Republican primary opponent's combined 55%. Then, recently, came even more daunting news of her predicament - <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Senate_election_in_Louisiana,_1996">she was down in early voting</a> in the runoff, as was African American turnout. As added insult, the DSCC has apparently <a href="http://politicalwire.com/2014/12/03/landrieu-says-democrats-abandoned-her/">chosen to stay out of the race all together</a>.<br />
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To boot, of the <a href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-louisiana-senate-cassidy-vs-landrieu">five runoff surveys</a> released since the November 4th jungle primary, Landrieu has trailed by no less than <a href="http://www.poppolling.com/useruploads/files/la_runoff_topline_.pdf">eleven points</a>, and by as much as <a href="http://gravismarketing.com/polling-and-market-research/current-louisiana-polling/">twenty-one points</a>. That's near-irreversibly awful, especially for a <a href="http://www.nola.com/news/index.ssf/2008/11/landrieu_wins_third_term.html">three-term incumbent</a>. <br />
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So it's no surprise Landrieu's latest campaign tactics have turned from <a href="http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2014/11/mary_landrieu_gets_personal_in.html">merely aggressive</a>, to potentially inciteful. Look no further than comments she made at a <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2014/12/02/landrieu-accuses-cassidy-of-being-disrespectful-to-obama/">campaign rally just Tuesday</a>, as reported by the Washington Post's Sean Sullivan, in which she claimed her Republican runoff opponent had been <a href="https://twitter.com/WaPoSean/status/539834069295431680">"disrespectful"</a> to the Democratic President. <br />
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The inference she is making is clear. She was addressing a <a href="https://twitter.com/daveweigel/status/540198557404262400">largely black audience</a>, and was echoing comments originally directed at African-Americans in <a href="http://www.buzzfeed.com/andrewkaczynski/in-mary-landrieu-ad-congressman-says-obama-will-be-impeached">an ad by Democratic Congressman</a>, Cedrick Richmond, who is also African-American.<br />
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When pressed further for an explanation of her comments, <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2014/12/02/landrieu-accuses-cassidy-of-being-disrespectful-to-obama/">Landrieu explained</a>: <br />
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<i>"[Cassidy] refers to [Obama] by his last name. Constantly."</i> <br />
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<i>She added:
"If you are going to refer to the president of the United States, he's
at least earned the title that the people gave him when they elected
him."</i></blockquote>
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For what it's worth, <a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2005/09/04/145277/-Landrieu-Strikes-Back-Says-She-Might-Punch-Bush">Landrieu has had her own brushes with Presidential disrespect</a>, according to the always objective Daily Kos.<br />
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But I digress. While Landrieu's campaign tactics as of late may seem off-putting, there's a definite purpose behind the attacks. The Democrat, if she has any chance of pulling off a miracle in Louisiana, is in dire need of historical black turnout, well beyond what was seen in the 2014 primary - or any recent statewide Louisiana race, for that matter. Why? Because in the 2014 primary, blacks comprised 65% of Sen. Landrieu's vote total, vs. just 2% of Bill Cassidy's. <br />
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In the 2014 primary, 29% of the primary electorate consisted of African American voters, <a href="http://electionstatistics.sos.la.gov/Data/Post_Election_Statistics/Statewide/2014_1104_sta.pdf">according to the Louisiana Secretary of State's office</a>. Yet Landrieu still finished well below the 50% threshold she would need to avoid the runoff. Such a feat would have required black turnout to approach the 40% level. Unfortunately for Landrieu, polls just <a href="http://winwithjmc.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Louisiana-Senate-Runoff-Executive-Summary-Release.pdf">aren't finding that</a> - <a href="http://www.poppolling.com/useruploads/files/la_runoff_topline_.pdf">in fact</a>, they're <a href="http://gravismarketing.com/polling-and-market-research/current-louisiana-polling/">finding nothing near</a> what <a href="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections/election_2014/louisiana/election_2014_louisiana_senate">she will need</a> in terms of <a href="https://s3.amazonaws.com/s3.documentcloud.org/documents/1360398/cassidy-survey-111214-memo.pdf">black turnout</a> to survive.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>Consider the three tables below. The first documents primary vs. runoff racial turnout in Louisiana in three scenarios: 1) <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2012/12/08/boustany-defeats-landry-in-louisiana-runoff/">2012, when no major contests took place</a> following a much-hyped <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2012/11/06/louisiana-election-results/1658249/">general election</a>; 2) 2003, when a <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=22&year=2003&f=0&off=5&elect=0">competitive gubernatorial runoff</a> occurred, and 3) 2002, when a <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=22&year=2002&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=2">contentious senatorial runoff</a> took place. The second table shows you the racial make-up of the December 6th runoff
electorate, as found by the five pollsters to poll the race since the
November 4th primary. The third table documents and averages Landrieu's and Cassidy's share of the vote among racial demographics in post-November 4th runoff polling.<br />
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As the first table above notes, the shift in racial demographics between a jungle primary and a heavily contested runoff tend to vary little, as was the case in the <a href="http://electionstatistics.sos.la.gov/Data/Post_Election_Statistics/Statewide/2002_1105_sta.txt">2002 Senate race</a> and the <a href="http://electionstatistics.sos.la.gov/Data/Post_Election_Statistics/Statewide/2003_1004_sta.txt">2003 Governor's race</a>. But racial demographics can vary wildly from primary to runoff in situations where the competitive contest is settled without the need for a runoff, thus depriving the runoff of a marquee match-up. An extreme example of this would be the 2012 election, where the main event (<a href="http://electionstatistics.sos.la.gov/Data/Post_Election_Statistics/Statewide/2012_1106_sta.pdf">Obama vs. Romney</a>) was settled in November, depriving the December runoff of a <a href="http://electionstatistics.sos.la.gov/Data/Post_Election_Statistics/Statewide/2012_1208_sta.pdf">major, vote-attracting contest</a>.<br />
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There was a time when the Louisiana Senate runoff was thought to be a <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mary-landrieu-deep-souths-last-senate-democrat-must-fend-for-herself/2014/12/03/7bfa56e8-7b20-11e4-84d4-7c896b90abdc_story.html">vital part</a> of the soon-to-be Republican Senate majority. But Republicans won on election night with <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/generic_congressional_vote-2170.html">room to spare</a>. A Landrieu loss would merely add to the GOP's already solid-majority. So there's reason to believe that a fair drop in turnout in the runoff is at least possible.<br />
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Just for fun, let's examine how Mary Landreiu's poll numbers would hold up in such a situation. The table below reweights the average of runoff polling to a <a href="http://electionstatistics.sos.la.gov/Data/Post_Election_Statistics/Statewide/2012_1208_sta.pdf">2012-style drop off among black voters</a> from the November 4th electorate. In other words, below would be the results of the average of polls if the white percentage of the electorate increases 5.3 pts from the primary (as it did in 2012), and the black share of the electorate decreases 3.8 pts ( the "other" share of the electorate also drops 1.5 pts).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpNVHutS66he9OzHQegeQZh3uJRjrrxSr2VUkK8Y0JCN48m6xAttECAC2uAX_VFuS-igbjvmLwbmHA7gjtN3F-MKJNXpM4VTYPCzRV2U9jFvgk4PvW4qUD3LFtpXX15PqMvNfYmf7f4g0/s1600/another.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhpNVHutS66he9OzHQegeQZh3uJRjrrxSr2VUkK8Y0JCN48m6xAttECAC2uAX_VFuS-igbjvmLwbmHA7gjtN3F-MKJNXpM4VTYPCzRV2U9jFvgk4PvW4qUD3LFtpXX15PqMvNfYmf7f4g0/s1600/another.png" height="102" width="400" /></a></div>
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<br />
In the event the white share of the electorate rises while the black share drops to a degree seen in 2012, Landrieu's average 15-pt deficit against Cassidy becomes a 20-pt deficit. Such a loss would put her in the company of <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=5&year=2010&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=3">Blanche Lincoln</a>, <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=5&year=2014&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=2">Mark Pryor</a>, or <a href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=42&year=2006&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=1">Rick Santorum</a>, in terms of terrible incumbent defeats.<br />
<br />
On the other end, what level of black turnout would be required for Landrieu to pull ahead of Cassidy in the average of runoff polls taken since November 4th? See below. <br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJqqj0uX5U1jSu6Xz-uNKIm5y0yykEQsoUpR5LjRl4mtVxMwZWOG5cLPaqmc-aNGHVFM5GyaxZojqHNTqPMR23BOg0G5Mpor3msMO0WK9FzkRCbEMdxWAVFOoS_ncUWBXqjOVi23P9bJY/s1600/hope.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJqqj0uX5U1jSu6Xz-uNKIm5y0yykEQsoUpR5LjRl4mtVxMwZWOG5cLPaqmc-aNGHVFM5GyaxZojqHNTqPMR23BOg0G5Mpor3msMO0WK9FzkRCbEMdxWAVFOoS_ncUWBXqjOVi23P9bJY/s1600/hope.png" height="103" width="400" /></a></div>
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<br />
As you can see, blacks would have to make up ~40% of the runoff electorate for Landrieu to poll ahead of Cassidy. As the tables above point out, that is incredibly unlikely to happen, at least from a historical perspective. <br />
<br />
So while Landrieu may be following the advice of her hired hands in <a href="http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/12/01/Landrieu-Ad-Republicans-Will-Impeach-Obama-if-Cassidy-Defeats-Me-in-Senate-Election">stoking racial fears and tensions</a>, it's highly unlikely to motivate the number of black voters needed to return to the polls for Landrieu to survive. Her only real hope lies in the fact that no survey of the Louisiana runoff has been conducted in the last two weeks (at least, none that has been publicly released). That's a lot of time in politics. But the tone her campaign has taken recently doesn't portend a late surge in support. <br />
<br />brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-85942925687527775342014-11-07T02:21:00.000-05:002014-12-30T21:07:40.532-05:00Did ex-Senator Udall's 'War On Women' Strategy Depress the Female Vote in Colorado?<i> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqo3aO5Wph49LHWf2t4T-KmyOe3sWgyK1fFy4ij7jJUJn3yvZ81sob2IGZK1I18Sbyk1F9sDNOKhXr2CHUy13AV1ng2LNDKdZVzLVJYTv8Y4NcK8pZGhpNQajJ9WX4VoVjxW6gaqr2AI4/s1600/Gardner+Udall.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqo3aO5Wph49LHWf2t4T-KmyOe3sWgyK1fFy4ij7jJUJn3yvZ81sob2IGZK1I18Sbyk1F9sDNOKhXr2CHUy13AV1ng2LNDKdZVzLVJYTv8Y4NcK8pZGhpNQajJ9WX4VoVjxW6gaqr2AI4/s1600/Gardner+Udall.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><u>Photo Courtesy of the NRSC</u></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</i><br />
<br />
<i>It's an interesting coincidence that female turnout, as a
percentage share of the electorate, was the lowest nationwide in
Colorado Tuesday night. Couldn't possibly have anything to do with the
sharply negative ads in the state, largely directed at women, could it?</i><br />
<br />
Nearly two years ago, Colorado's incumbent Democratic Senator was <a data-mce-href="http://www.denverpost.com/ci_23652778/gop-challengers-sen-mark-udalls-seat-face-big" href="http://www.denverpost.com/ci_23652778/gop-challengers-sen-mark-udalls-seat-face-big">considered safe</a> in a midterm election that would seemingly favor Republicans. Then came the backroom deal that <a data-mce-href="http://bigstory.ap.org/article/gardner-and-buck-out-colorados-senate-race" href="http://bigstory.ap.org/article/gardner-and-buck-out-colorados-senate-race">propelled Cory Gardner</a>
to the nomination. Knowing that Gardner was their greatest political
threat of the Colorado GOP bench, the Udall campaign began a focused
effort on convincing Colorado women that the Republican nominee for
Senate would eliminate their access to <a data-mce-href="http://www.9news.com/story/news/politics/truth-tests/2014/04/23/truth-test-udalls-first-ad-hits-gardner-on-abortion-and-birth-control/8073701/" href="http://www.9news.com/story/news/politics/truth-tests/2014/04/23/truth-test-udalls-first-ad-hits-gardner-on-abortion-and-birth-control/8073701/">abortions and birth control</a>. After the Obama/Biden campaign experienced <a data-mce-href="http://www.politico.com/story/2014/02/war-on-women-democrats-messaging-103957.html" href="http://www.politico.com/story/2014/02/war-on-women-democrats-messaging-103957.html">some success</a> with the so-called "war on women' tactic in 2012, Udall hoped to replicate their campaigns <a href="https://www.blogger.com/null">impressive performance</a> among females by singing a similar tune.<br />
<br />
This time, however, they were unsuccessful. Gardner has been <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/state/CO/senate" href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/state/CO/senate">declared the winner</a> with 93% of precincts reporting.<br />
<br />
Over time, Udall's single-issue focus on women's reproductive health drew criticism and ridicule from <a data-mce-href="http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2014/nov/03/senator-mark-udall-colorado-heckled-millionaire-donor" href="http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2014/nov/03/senator-mark-udall-colorado-heckled-millionaire-donor">all political corners</a>, most notably from <a data-mce-href="http://gazette.com/endorsement-elect-cory-gardner-to-u.s.-senate/article/1538870" href="http://gazette.com/endorsement-elect-cory-gardner-to-u.s.-senate/article/1538870">local Colorado newspapers</a> that <a data-mce-href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/10/10/the-denver-post-picks-cory-gardner-and-has-a-record-of-picking-winners/" href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/10/10/the-denver-post-picks-cory-gardner-and-has-a-record-of-picking-winners/">historically bent Democratic</a>. And indeed, Tuesday night's exit polling would indicate Udall's 'war on women' strategy failed. Though the Democrat <i>did</i> ultimately win the female vote, it was by a <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/state/CO/senate" href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/state/CO/senate">rather unimpressive 52-44%,</a> especially when compared to Udall's seventeen point loss among Colorado males, or Beauprez's <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/state/CO/governor" href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/state/CO/governor">twelve point loss</a> with women, or Buck's <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#val=COS01p1" href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#val=COS01p1">seventeen point loss</a> with females in 2010.<br />
<br />
But
there appears to be another interesting side effect of the "war on
women" overkill seen in the 2014 Colorado Senate race - women made up a
lower proportion of the electorate as compared to men than in ANY other
Governor or Senate contest that night, save only the Colorado Governor
race.<br />
Just 47% of Colorado voters identified as female, while 53% identified as male. For reference, the <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/race/house#" href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/race/house#">national exit poll</a> taken Tuesday found women made up 51% of voters, with men at 49%. Even Alaska, where <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/2014/02/17/opinion/sutter-alaska-ratio-rape/" href="http://www.cnn.com/2014/02/17/opinion/sutter-alaska-ratio-rape/">men outnumber women</a> in the total population, found <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/state/AK/senate" href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/state/AK/senate">higher turnout among women</a>
in their Senate race (48%) than Colorado. Of the forty-one exit-polled
contests on November 4th, women outnumbered men as a share of the
electorate in thirty-two of them, or 78% of the time. Men outnumbered
women in only four of them, or just 10% of the time. The five remaining
contests split 50/50 between male and female voters.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>These stats
alone aren't enough to conclusively state that Udall's campaign tactics
caused more women to stay away from the polls than otherwise would have.
But even browsing through past Colorado exit polls for President,
Governor, or Senator indicates that it's far from typical for Colorado
to feature the lowest female turnout in the country, as compared to
males.<br />
<br />
In 2010, the <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#val=COS01p1" href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#val=COS01p1">Colorado Senate</a> and <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#val=COG00p1" href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#val=COG00p1">Gubernatorial</a>
electorate was made up of equal percentages of men and women, along
with eight other contests that year. While this represented a lower
percentage of women than found nationally, Colorado was <i>not</i> at
the bottom of the heap. Eight states actually had a higher percentage of
men voting than women. Twenty-seven out of the total fourty-four
exit-polled contests that year found women exceeded men (or, 61% of the
time).<br />
<br />
Something similar occurred in 2012. Colorado's female turnout as compared to men, though it came in <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/results/race/president" href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/results/race/president">under the national average</a> again, was a net 7-pts higher than it was Tuesday. In fact, women <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/results/state/CO/president" href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/results/state/CO/president">made up a majority</a> of the Colorado electorate in 2012 (51%).<br />
<br />
More
significantly, out of about 300 Presidential, Gubernatorial, and Senate
contests that were surveyed by exit pollsters since 2006, only *THREE*
featured a lower, or AS low a percentage of female voters as the 2014
Colorado Senate race. Those three contests are, ironically enough, the <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/state/CO/governor" href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2014/results/state/CO/governor">2014 Colorado Governor</a> race (54% male, 46% female), the <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#val=HIS01p1" href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#val=HIS01p1">2010 Hawaii Senate</a> race (54% male, 46% female), and the <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#val=HIG00p1" href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#val=HIG00p1">2010 Hawaii Governor</a> race (53% male, 47% female). Again - only three!<br />
<br />
Colorado
has typically seen lower female turnout than most states, at least
according to exit polls conducted since 2008. But certainly not <i>THE</i> lowest in the country. And <i>never</i>
as low as 47% (see table below). Who is to say whether Udall's 'war on
women' strategy depressed female turnout, or motivated male turnout?
Indeed, who is to say any of this has anything to do with the 'war on
women?' But again, Colorado saw the lowest proportion of female to male
voters of the night on Tuesday. And the 2014 Colorado Senate contest
featured one of the four lowest proportions of female voters out of
nearly 300 exit-polled contests since 2006. I'd like to kindly submit
this to the DSCC, as they ramp up for 2016.<br />
<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCj8vDG-eXpk1_tLpbn8XQRRptVGVYaxvBxZ9TrvA0-9cB64GJBCm0a1xmJXJq_1ah-X0-HCxunZKahzSUFTUoHvWR0-uXMenbfRXBnISy74B_D-LiunIretDPsgWUuiSfY7PDApdhmPo/s1600/Chart.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCj8vDG-eXpk1_tLpbn8XQRRptVGVYaxvBxZ9TrvA0-9cB64GJBCm0a1xmJXJq_1ah-X0-HCxunZKahzSUFTUoHvWR0-uXMenbfRXBnISy74B_D-LiunIretDPsgWUuiSfY7PDApdhmPo/s1600/Chart.png" height="263" width="320" /></a></div>
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<div style="text-align: left;">
Update: Nate Cohn, who I respect, has pointed out that the Colorado exit polls are <a href="https://twitter.com/Nate_Cohn/status/530614464752934912">very likely wrong</a>. </div>
</div>
brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-29174652643552612014-10-14T10:25:00.000-04:002014-12-31T11:57:29.049-05:00Once Thought Vulernable, Nikki Haley Looks Poised For A Big Win – But There’s A Caveat…<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTjQWeH3SPZAlPdx5RIbOxbswuIhsKKto8RuO2WGRopQvbGpWBs6BsZr4PTkTfo4IYFHq-CjcL04gHmpMevmcZf1Q4IGpKVO0K4eAy83RdwwU77yUK7-mysiEWq4G3wdVikjtFd0TXffE/s1600/Nikki+Haley.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgTjQWeH3SPZAlPdx5RIbOxbswuIhsKKto8RuO2WGRopQvbGpWBs6BsZr4PTkTfo4IYFHq-CjcL04gHmpMevmcZf1Q4IGpKVO0K4eAy83RdwwU77yUK7-mysiEWq4G3wdVikjtFd0TXffE/s1600/Nikki+Haley.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo courtesy of the A.P.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
There was a time when South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley looked like she would have <a data-mce-href="http://www.politico.com/story/2013/05/nikki-haley-south-carolina-governor-91215.html" href="http://www.politico.com/story/2013/05/nikki-haley-south-carolina-governor-91215.html">serious trouble</a> in her bid for reelection, even as recently as <a data-mce-href="http://www.buzzfeed.com/mckaycoppins/nikki-haley-south-carolina#49ssn0l" href="http://www.buzzfeed.com/mckaycoppins/nikki-haley-south-carolina#49ssn0l">this June</a>.<br />
<br />
Her problem was multipronged. First, she was never elected by an
overwhelming mandate to begin with, kind of stumbling across the finish
line in 2010 with an <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=45&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=45&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0">anti-climactic 51-47%</a> victory during an <a data-mce-href="http://www.mtv.com/news/1651389/republicans-make-major-gains-in-midterm-elections/" href="http://www.mtv.com/news/1651389/republicans-make-major-gains-in-midterm-elections/">incredibly favorable</a> election cycle. That somewhat meek level of support <a data-mce-href="http://gop12.thehill.com/2012/04/nikki-haleys-approval-rating-sits-at-37.html" href="http://gop12.thehill.com/2012/04/nikki-haleys-approval-rating-sits-at-37.html">transferred over</a> into Haley's <a data-mce-href="http://gop12.thehill.com/2012/12/nikki-haley-gets-awful-job-approval.html" href="http://gop12.thehill.com/2012/12/nikki-haley-gets-awful-job-approval.html">job approval ratings</a>. Then came her frequent quarrels with the South Carolina legislature, a feature of her tenure which <a data-mce-href="http://beforeitsnews.com/opinion-conservative/2011/03/haley-reveals-legislature-report-card-drafts-463990.html" href="http://beforeitsnews.com/opinion-conservative/2011/03/haley-reveals-legislature-report-card-drafts-463990.html">began early</a>
on after announcing she would be issuing "report cards" to S.C.
lawmakers on criteria determined by her, and culminated in the summer of
2012 when the <a data-mce-href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/19/us/gov-nikki-haleys-budget-ax-is-blunted-by-legislators.html?_r=0" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/19/us/gov-nikki-haleys-budget-ax-is-blunted-by-legislators.html?_r=0">Republican legislature overrode</a>
a number of Haley's budget vetoes.<br />
<br />
And of course, who can forget the
proverbial cherry-on-top of her first two years in office - <a data-mce-href="http://www.postandcourier.com/article/20121026/PC16/121029399" href="http://www.postandcourier.com/article/20121026/PC16/121029399">the hacking</a> of four million South Carolinian's social security numbers.<br />
<br />
All
of those missteps aside, more recent events would tend to suggest that
Haley is going to weather the storm.<br />
<br />
Not long ago, Haley took the
opportunity to barnstorm the state, bragging about future business
investments that are expected to bring lots of<a data-mce-href="http://www.postandcourier.com/article/20140616/PC05/140619467" href="http://www.postandcourier.com/article/20140616/PC05/140619467"> job creation</a> to South Carolina. Couple that with a steady unemployment rate decline<a data-mce-href="http://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=z1ebjpgk2654c1_&met_y=unemployment_rate&idim=state:ST4500000000000:ST3700000000000:ST1300000000000&fdim_y=seasonality:S&hl=en&dl=en#!ctype=l&strail=false&bcs=d&nselm=h&met_y=unemployment_rate&fdim_y=seasonality:S&scale_y=lin&ind_y=false&rdim=country&idim=state:ST4500000000000&ifdim=country&hl=en_US&dl=en&ind=false" href="http://www.google.com/publicdata/explore?ds=z1ebjpgk2654c1_&met_y=unemployment_rate&idim=state:ST4500000000000:ST3700000000000:ST1300000000000&fdim_y=seasonality:S&hl=en&dl=en#%21ctype=l&strail=false&bcs=d&nselm=h&met_y=unemployment_rate&fdim_y=seasonality:S&scale_y=lin&ind_y=false&rdim=country&idim=state:ST4500000000000&ifdim=country&hl=en_US&dl=en&ind=false"> from 10.5%</a> upon taking office in January 2011, to <a data-mce-href="http://www.businessweek.com/ap/2014-09-19/scs-unemployment-rate-increases-to-6-dot-4-percent" href="http://www.businessweek.com/ap/2014-09-19/scs-unemployment-rate-increases-to-6-dot-4-percent">6.4% as of September,</a> and a smoothly handled Senate confirmation process for the newly appointed (<a data-mce-href="http://www.politicususa.com/2014/03/02/senator-tim-scott-south-carolinas-beloved-politician.html" href="http://www.politicususa.com/2014/03/02/senator-tim-scott-south-carolinas-beloved-politician.html">and popular</a>) Sen. Tim Scott, Haley seems back in the game.<br />
<br />
And polling bears that out.<br />
<br />
A base that once appeared unsure of Haley from a polling perspective, has <a data-mce-href="http://www.thestate.com/2013/09/24/2999429/poll-nikki-haleys-gop-voter-backing.html" href="http://www.thestate.com/2013/09/24/2999429/poll-nikki-haleys-gop-voter-backing.html">returned home</a> <a data-mce-href="http://media.clemson.edu/newsroom/Palmetto-Poll-June-2014.pdf" href="http://media.clemson.edu/newsroom/Palmetto-Poll-June-2014.pdf">in full</a>. Republicans aren't the only ones to take note of Haley's accomplishments. Her <a data-mce-href="http://www.postandcourier.com/article/20140722/PC1603/140729812" href="http://www.postandcourier.com/article/20140722/PC1603/140729812">job approval rating</a> with ALL South Carolinians is the <a data-mce-href="http://www.thestate.com/2014/04/16/3390115/winthrop-poll.html" href="http://www.thestate.com/2014/04/16/3390115/winthrop-poll.html">highest its ever been</a>. Sixty-two percent of likely voters say the state's <a data-mce-href="http://www.winthrop.edu/winthroppoll/default.aspx?id=9804" href="http://www.winthrop.edu/winthroppoll/default.aspx?id=9804">economic condition is getting better</a>, versus just thirty percent who say it's getting worse.<br />
<br />
Then come the head-to-head numbers, which seem to look better everyday. After <a data-mce-href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/main/2012/12/haley-trails-sheheen-graham-getting-stronger.html" href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/main/2012/12/haley-trails-sheheen-graham-getting-stronger.html">starting out trailing</a>
her Democratic challenger Vincent Sheheen in a 2012 poll, she's been
ahead in every survey since. She's ahead by double-digits in <a data-mce-href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/lv?key=0At9k6QrlThx6dGVMLTFnMEc0d1NfS29KM0piMWVVNFE&type=view&gid=0&f=true&colid0=0&filterstr0=SC-Gov&sortcolid=-1&sortasc=true&rowsperpage=1000" href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/lv?key=0At9k6QrlThx6dGVMLTFnMEc0d1NfS29KM0piMWVVNFE&type=view&gid=0&f=true&colid0=0&filterstr0=SC-Gov&sortcolid=-1&sortasc=true&rowsperpage=1000">practically all</a> of the non-Democratic Party affiliated polls of likely voters. Gov. Haley leads 49-37% in the <a data-mce-href="http://dd.aoshq.com/2014/gubernatorial/south-carolina/" href="http://dd.aoshq.com/2014/gubernatorial/south-carolina/">Ace Of Spades Decision Desk average</a>, leads 50-38% in the <a data-mce-href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-south-carolina-governor-haley-vs-sheheen" href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-south-carolina-governor-haley-vs-sheheen">Huffington Post Pollster average</a>, and leads 50-37% in the <a data-mce-href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2014/governor/sc/south_carolina_governor_haley_vs_sheheen-3477.html#polls" href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2014/governor/sc/south_carolina_governor_haley_vs_sheheen-3477.html#polls">Real Clear Politics average</a>.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>What was once referred to as a <a data-mce-href="http://www.thestate.com/2013/11/08/3085207/dga-says-sc-governors-race-a-top.html" href="http://www.thestate.com/2013/11/08/3085207/dga-says-sc-governors-race-a-top.html"><i>"top priority state"</i></a> for the Democratic Governor's Association, certainly can't be called that now, at least not based on <a data-mce-href="http://www.scnow.com/news/politics/article_f44aea3a-43d6-11e4-93ce-001a4bcf6878.html" href="http://www.scnow.com/news/politics/article_f44aea3a-43d6-11e4-93ce-001a4bcf6878.html">recent DGA ad spending: </a><br />
<blockquote>
<i><span class="paragraph-0">"The
Democratic Governors Association has spent a total of $5.1 million in
just four states, with South Carolina's $260,000 ranking last, behind
Michigan, Arkansas and Connecticut."</span></i></blockquote>
It's
virtually impossible to say Haley is not performing stronger than the
DGA, and indeed many Republicans, predicted she would after the
so-called calamity of her first few years in office. Yet aside from the
rosy picture, Republicans would be foolish to forget what happened in
2010, and <i>could</i> happen again.<br />
<br />
As noted three paragraphs
above, Haley is leading Sheheen by about 12-13 points, according to the
aggregation models, with just 20 days left until the election. But she
enjoyed <a data-mce-href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/05/10-sc-gov-ge-hvs_n_728645.html" href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/05/10-sc-gov-ge-hvs_n_728645.html">a nearly identical advantage</a> in the final 2010 Pollster average (they forecasted a <a data-mce-href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/05/10-sc-gov-ge-hvs_n_728645.html" href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/05/10-sc-gov-ge-hvs_n_728645.html">9-pt, 48-39%</a> win by the Republican). The Real Clear Politics final 2010 average gave <a data-mce-href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2010/governor/sc/south_carolina_governor_haley_vs_sheheen-1574.html#polls" href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2010/governor/sc/south_carolina_governor_haley_vs_sheheen-1574.html#polls">Haley an 11-pt lead</a>. Remember, she won by just less than 4.5 points.<br />
<br />
Regardless,
Haley is the clear favorite in her rematch with Sheheen this November.
Though her 2010 victory was closer than expected, there was no confusion
about who won. Her polling advantage is stronger now than at this point
in 2010, even if ever so slightly. She's better positioned from a
polling perspective than <a data-mce-href="http://dd.aoshq.com/2014-gubernatorial/" href="http://dd.aoshq.com/2014-gubernatorial/">many of her Republican colleagues</a>
up for reelection this year, including another female Governor that was
swept into office in the Tea Party wave of 2010, and whose name has
more often been batted around as a possible <a data-mce-href="http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2014/04/two_top_pa_gop_figures_back_ne.html" href="http://www.pennlive.com/midstate/index.ssf/2014/04/two_top_pa_gop_figures_back_ne.html">2016 presidential contender</a>
- Susana Martinez of New Mexico. And as a campaign spokesman has noted
before, Haley now has a record of job creation and unemployment
reduction to back her up.<br />
<br />
But if election night 2010 was any indication
of what we could see on November 4, 2014, be prepared to be a little
surprised by the South Carolina governor results. Polling averages <a data-mce-href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/14/gop-senate-forecast_n_5982110.html?1413291032&ncid=tweetlnkushpmg00000067" href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/14/gop-senate-forecast_n_5982110.html?1413291032&ncid=tweetlnkushpmg00000067">aren't infallible</a>.<br />
<br />
Though if Haley finally does nab a double-digit win, expect chatter <a data-mce-href="http://usconservatives.about.com/od/2016elections/fl/The-4-Republican-Women-Most-Likey-to-Land-on-a-2016-Presidential-Ticket.htm" href="http://usconservatives.about.com/od/2016elections/fl/The-4-Republican-Women-Most-Likey-to-Land-on-a-2016-Presidential-Ticket.htm">like this</a> about 2016 presidential ambitions to grow louder.brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-88953348031783199222014-10-10T09:18:00.000-04:002014-12-31T11:58:24.754-05:00Republicans Are Coming Home To Roberts In Kansas...And Why That Might Not Be Enough To Win<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjG0-6_z1Y4ZivtZHCA6sQgLGqDxV5kF_EfMg3VdHIqTlXdhN2u8od5JScEx6eirXFD4Xto60J6c_xoucOf35Ixy3bFbIkxkOhBuHWZCnDdMG_PLB0Vxc7kJtVBZ6m2fMuQgmyYUPABU2Q/s1600/Kansas+Image.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjG0-6_z1Y4ZivtZHCA6sQgLGqDxV5kF_EfMg3VdHIqTlXdhN2u8od5JScEx6eirXFD4Xto60J6c_xoucOf35Ixy3bFbIkxkOhBuHWZCnDdMG_PLB0Vxc7kJtVBZ6m2fMuQgmyYUPABU2Q/s1600/Kansas+Image.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo courtesy of Jim Richardson, National Geographic.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
For months, buoyed by <a data-mce-href="http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/pat-roberts-poll-job-approval-residence" href="http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/pat-roberts-poll-job-approval-residence" target="_blank">public polling</a>,
the media has been enthralled by the notion of a three-term Republican
Senator from a deeply red Great Plains state losing to a now
Independent, multi-millionaire ex-Democratic businessman. The Huffington
Post Pollster average pegged Senator Pat Roberts at <a data-mce-href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-kansas-senate-roberts-vs-orman-vs-taylor#!mindate=2014-01-01&maxdate=2014-10-02&estimate=custom" href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-kansas-senate-roberts-vs-orman-vs-taylor#%21mindate=2014-01-01&maxdate=2014-10-02&estimate=custom">39.8% in the average of polls</a> at the beginning of this week, while his Independent opponent sat at a healthy 46.6%.<br />
<br />
Now, with the inclusion of Wednesday's <a data-mce-href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2014/10/08/fox-news-poll-gop-sen-roberts-and-gop-gov-brownback-lead-challengers-in-kansas/" href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2014/10/08/fox-news-poll-gop-sen-roberts-and-gop-gov-brownback-lead-challengers-in-kansas/">Fox News poll</a> showing Pat Roberts ahead by five, and a <a data-mce-href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2014/images/10/08/kansassenatepoll.pdf" href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2014/images/10/08/kansassenatepoll.pdf">CNN poll</a> showing him up one point, the <a data-mce-href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-kansas-senate-roberts-vs-orman-vs-taylor" href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-kansas-senate-roberts-vs-orman-vs-taylor">Kansas Senate race is tied</a> in the Pollster average, and gives Roberts a 50/50 shot of holding on to his seat - quite the improvement from last week.<br />
<br />
Why
is Roberts seemingly closing so well, you might ask? Well, for the most
part, his base appears to be returning home, after a weeks-long
flirtation with Greg Orman. The two most recent polls finding Roberts
ahead of Orman overall also found him performing better among Republican
voters than in previous surveys. Orman's Republican support, <a data-mce-href="http://big.assets.huffingtonpost.com/KansasResultsPPP916.pdf#page=20&zoom=auto,-150,669" href="http://big.assets.huffingtonpost.com/KansasResultsPPP916.pdf#page=20&zoom=auto,-150,669" target="_blank">once in</a> the low-<a data-mce-href="https://www.suffolk.edu/documents/SUPRC/2014_final_Kansas_Crosstabs10-1.pdf#page=24&zoom=auto,-60,591" href="https://www.suffolk.edu/documents/SUPRC/2014_final_Kansas_Crosstabs10-1.pdf#page=24&zoom=auto,-60,591" target="_blank">30 percent range</a>, has been cut in half. Pat Roberts GOP support, once stuck in the <a data-mce-href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/2014/PPP_Release_KS_819925.pdf#page=13&zoom=auto,-150,739" href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/2014/PPP_Release_KS_819925.pdf#page=13&zoom=auto,-150,739" target="_blank">50 and 60</a> percent range, has swollen to over 70% (hitting a highwater mark of <a data-mce-href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2014/images/10/08/kansassenatepoll.pdf#page=8&zoom=auto,-150,725" href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2014/images/10/08/kansassenatepoll.pdf#page=8&zoom=auto,-150,725" target="_blank">84% in the new CNN poll</a>).<br />
<br />
<br />
<a data-mce-href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/10/another-chart.png" href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/10/another-chart.png"><img alt="another chart" class="size-full wp-image-1826 aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/10/another-chart.png" src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/10/another-chart.png" height="243" width="640" /></a><br />
<br />
<br />
But if Roberts is consolidating the Republican vote in a state with a <a data-mce-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cook_Partisan_Voting_Index#By_state" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cook_Partisan_Voting_Index#By_state" target="_blank">Cook partisan voting index of R+12</a>,
a state where the Republican party identification advantage over
Democrats hasn't dropped below R+19 in any exit poll since 1992, how is
he still barely scraping by Orman?<br />
<br />
The answer is two-fold: 1. Though
Roberts has made significant inroads with Republican voters, he's not
quite performing at the level of a typical Republican running statewide
in Kansas. And 2. Orman's advantage among Independent voters is larger
than any Republican or Democrat to run for statewide office in Kansas
since at least 1992 (according to available exit polling).<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>In
examining number 1 above, consider the table below, which documents the
voting patterns of Republicans and Independents in every Kansas
Presidential, Senate, or Governor race since 1992 (at least where exit
polling was publicly available).<br />
<br />
<a data-mce-href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/10/New-chart.png" href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/10/New-chart.png"><img alt="New chart" class="size-full wp-image-1824 aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/10/New-chart.png" src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/10/New-chart.png" height="278" width="640" /></a><br />
<br />
The
only time the Republican candidate for President, Governor, or Senator
has ever won less than 80% of the vote in Kansas was in 1992, when Ross
Perot's historic third party candidacy for the Presidency peeled off <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/1998/states/KS/polls/KS92PH.html" href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/1998/states/KS/polls/KS92PH.html" target="_blank">one in four Republican voters</a>.
President Bush walked away with only 64% of his own base. Bush won the
state regardless, given the unique competitiveness of Perot (he won <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=20&year=1992&f=0&off=0&elect=0" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=20&year=1992&f=0&off=0&elect=0" target="_blank">27% in Kansas</a>, compared to <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1992" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1992" target="_blank">19% nationwide</a>).<br />
<br />
Pat Roberts has won over 75% of Republican voters in <a data-mce-href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2014/images/10/08/kansassenatepoll.pdf#page=8&zoom=auto,-150,725" href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2014/images/10/08/kansassenatepoll.pdf#page=8&zoom=auto,-150,725" target="_blank">only ONE</a> of TEN polls taken that feature just Roberts and Orman, and leave off one-time candidate Chad Taylor, who <a data-mce-href="http://www.redstate.com/2014/09/03/chad-taylor-kansas/" href="http://www.redstate.com/2014/09/03/chad-taylor-kansas/" target="_blank">dropped out of the race</a> on September 3. Roberts attracts <a data-mce-href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2014/10/08/fox-news-poll-gop-sen-roberts-and-gop-gov-brownback-lead-challengers-in-kansas/" href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2014/10/08/fox-news-poll-gop-sen-roberts-and-gop-gov-brownback-lead-challengers-in-kansas/" target="_blank">only 73%</a>
of Republicans in the most recent survey, conducted by Fox News. If the
2014 Senate race is anything like the large majority of Kansas races
for senate, president, or governor over the last 20+ years, you would
expect Roberts to win 85% of the Republican vote, or better. If he did,
he would have led in every head-to-head survey between he and Orman
taken since August.<br />
<br />
Now, back to number 2 mentioned five
paragraphs above. Independent Greg Orman is doing shockingly well
among...who else, but self-described Independents. He's winning, on
average, 54% of their vote. The incumbent lags far behind at an average
of 25%. That roughly 30% advantage is larger than most candidates for
statewide office in Kansas over the last two decades. And it's the
primary reason that even though Pat Roberts is increasing his share of
the Republican vote, he <a data-mce-href="http://dd.aoshq.com/2014/senate/kansas/" href="http://dd.aoshq.com/2014/senate/kansas/" target="_blank">mostly lags behind Orman</a>, or <a data-mce-href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-kansas-senate-roberts-vs-orman-vs-taylor" href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-kansas-senate-roberts-vs-orman-vs-taylor" target="_blank">leads slightly</a> at best.<br />
<br />
The
most recent poll, as noted in the first table above, would suggest that
Roberts is slowly starting to chip away at Orman's massive lead with
Independent voters. But outside of Fox News, Orman's lead among
Independents is large enough to require that Roberts win a near
unanimous level of support among his own party, regardless of the
Republican's massive partisan identification advantage.<br />
<br />
In the
end, given the Republican dominance in Kansas, Roberts will likely
defeat Orman by winning at least 85% of Republican voters, even if he
loses Independents by up to 30%. The only problem for Roberts is that he
has yet to hit that level of support from his party. Obviously, the
more inroads he can make with Independents, the more he can afford to
lose Republicans to Orman. But if polling is any indication, it appears
as though Roberts is headed for a historic loss among Independent
voters. If Roberts intends to cede over 15% of the Republican vote to
his Independent challenger, he better hope Independents defy the
pollsters.brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-45515741082248861902014-10-01T21:27:00.000-04:002014-12-31T01:30:33.997-05:00What’s The Matter With…OKLAHOMA?!? Shock Poll Says Governor Fallin’s Fallin’<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHWvUBq4vUE5VVvrIe1RMFPsfpqyYWIPEf0RT6tElKVu1NqXniKZIYCf4e1cHV_NM3zS8d8HIP7erV8_as1K77Nppww_jmO4uhKgpVuXhA5cwL-qlYWKZQz0qD11UIuzCnmRz8endhspE/s1600/Mary+Fallin+Pic.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHWvUBq4vUE5VVvrIe1RMFPsfpqyYWIPEf0RT6tElKVu1NqXniKZIYCf4e1cHV_NM3zS8d8HIP7erV8_as1K77Nppww_jmO4uhKgpVuXhA5cwL-qlYWKZQz0qD11UIuzCnmRz8endhspE/s1600/Mary+Fallin+Pic.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo courtesy of the www.huffingtonpost.com</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br />
What a year, huh? Democrats are <a data-mce-href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2014/09/18/court-orders-democrat-chad-taylor-off-kansas-ballot-dealing-blow-to-gop/" href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2014/09/18/court-orders-democrat-chad-taylor-off-kansas-ballot-dealing-blow-to-gop/">dropping off statewide</a> ballots <a data-mce-href="http://www.alaskapublic.org/2014/09/02/walker-mallott-form-unity-ticket-to-oppose-parnell/" href="http://www.alaskapublic.org/2014/09/02/walker-mallott-form-unity-ticket-to-oppose-parnell/">like flies</a>. Bizarre <a data-mce-href="http://www.pressherald.com/2014/09/28/poll-shows-tightening-race-maine-governor/" href="http://www.pressherald.com/2014/09/28/poll-shows-tightening-race-maine-governor/">3-way contests</a> are putting typically loyal <a data-mce-href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/polls/nielson-brothers-polling-northern-plain-news-20619" href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/polls/nielson-brothers-polling-northern-plain-news-20619">partisan states</a> in play. Once <a data-mce-href="http://homernews.com/homer-news/local-news/2014-07-02/walker-says-he%E2%80%99s-taking-hickel%E2%80%99s-advice-running-as-independent" href="http://homernews.com/homer-news/local-news/2014-07-02/walker-says-he%E2%80%99s-taking-hickel%E2%80%99s-advice-running-as-independent">quixotic Independent bids</a> are gaining <a data-mce-href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2014/senate/ks/kansas_senate_roberts_vs_orman-5216.html" href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2014/senate/ks/kansas_senate_roberts_vs_orman-5216.html">real traction</a>
with voters.<br />
<br />
And now, in the sixth year of an unpopular Democratic
President's term, the Republican Governor of deep-red Oklahoma could be
in real danger of losing her re-election bid, at least according to her
Democratic <a data-mce-href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/241482942/OK-Gov-Clarity-Campaigns-for-Joe-Dorman-Sept-2014" href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/241482942/OK-Gov-Clarity-Campaigns-for-Joe-Dorman-Sept-2014">opponent's pollster.</a><br />
<br />
<a data-mce-href="http://www.claritycampaigns.com/#analytics" href="http://www.claritycampaigns.com/#analytics">Clarity Campaigns,</a>
the internal polling firm for Joe Dorman, finds Governor Mary Fallin
ahead just 47-45%, well within the survey's margin of error. Fallin's
job approval rating is upside down, with 42% approving, and 46%
disapproving.<br />
<br />
How could this be, in a state with an <a data-mce-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cook_Partisan_Voting_Index#By_state" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cook_Partisan_Voting_Index#By_state">R+19 partisan voting index</a>
(the third most Republican in the country)?<br />
<br />
Oklahoma isn't just some squishy RINO state, like North Carolina. It is Tea Party through and
through, more conservative than any one of the Romney-state
Congressional contests going down this November. To beat a dead horse,
Obama won just one-third of Oklahoma voters in both the <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=40&year=2008&f=0&off=0&elect=0" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=40&year=2008&f=0&off=0&elect=0">2008</a> and <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=40&year=2012&f=0&off=0&elect=0" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=40&year=2012&f=0&off=0&elect=0">2012</a> presidential elections.<br />
<br />
What
in the world could prompt such a state to even begin to consider
throwing out not only their first female Governor, but one they elected
on the <i>first</i> go-round, <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=40&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=40&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0">60-40%</a>?<br />
<br />
Whatever their reasons, there is <i>some</i> evidence to suggest that MAYBE, just maybe something is awry in the Sooner State.<br />
<br />
We'll start with the horse race polling. Two relatively dated surveys from <a data-mce-href="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections/election_2014/oklahoma/election_2014_oklahoma_governor" href="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections/election_2014/oklahoma/election_2014_oklahoma_governor">Rasmussen Reports</a> and <a data-mce-href="http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/07/28/upshot/explaining-online-panels-and-the-2014-midterms.html" href="http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/07/28/upshot/explaining-online-panels-and-the-2014-midterms.html">YouGov</a>
found Dorman within single digits of Gov. Fallin. That's at least
swinging-distance. Another poll, from a Republican firm, found the
incumbent Governor sitting at <a data-mce-href="http://www.theokie.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Sooner-Survey-Vol-23-Num-4.pdf" href="http://www.theokie.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Sooner-Survey-Vol-23-Num-4.pdf">just 44%</a> with likely voters in a head-to-head with Dorman. The frothers at <a class="g-profile" href="https://plus.google.com/110381261223277373334" target="_blank">+Daily Kos</a> <a data-mce-href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/08/04/1318896/-Daily-Kos-Elections-Morning-Digest-For-dark-red-Oklahoma-Mary-Fallin-s-poll-numbers-kinda-suck?detail=hide" href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/08/04/1318896/-Daily-Kos-Elections-Morning-Digest-For-dark-red-Oklahoma-Mary-Fallin-s-poll-numbers-kinda-suck?detail=hide">pointed out</a> that Clarity Campaigns had previously found Dorman down <a data-mce-href="http://okgazette.com/2014/07/24/51960/" href="http://okgazette.com/2014/07/24/51960/">just six points</a>, in a poll that wasn't publicly released.<br />
<br />
Last, but not the least important reason Fallin could be upset: she's no longer the popular figure <a data-mce-href="http://soonerpoll.com/in-wake-of-states-tornadoes-fallins-approval-increases-among-voters/" href="http://soonerpoll.com/in-wake-of-states-tornadoes-fallins-approval-increases-among-voters/">she was when we last saw her</a> as she comforted the citizens of Moore, Oklahoma, after a <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/21/us/severe-weather/" href="http://www.cnn.com/2013/05/21/us/severe-weather/">brutal tornado ravaged</a> the town in the Spring of 2013. And her biggest decline appears to have come from <a data-mce-href="http://soonerpoll.com/oklahoma-poll-fallins-favorability-slips/" href="http://soonerpoll.com/oklahoma-poll-fallins-favorability-slips/">Republicans and Independents</a>. Indeed, take notice of <a data-mce-href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/241482942/OK-Gov-Clarity-Campaigns-for-Joe-Dorman-Sept-2014" href="http://www.scribd.com/doc/241482942/OK-Gov-Clarity-Campaigns-for-Joe-Dorman-Sept-2014">this morsel</a> from the Dorman internal memo, on why their candidate is doing so well:<br />
<blockquote>
"His
coalition is built on a strong lead with Independents, winning 18% of
crossover Republican voters, and a consolidated Democratic base."</blockquote>
All that being said, I'm not quite buying it. It just seems like fool's gold, even grander than the notion of <a data-mce-href="http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/could-childers-win-in-mississippi" href="http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/could-childers-win-in-mississippi">Travis Childers offing Thad Cochran</a> in Mississippi.<br />
<br />
I'll grant that the Oklahoma Governor's contest feels closer than it <i>should</i>
be, but we're still talking about Oklahoma - a state that hasn't voted
for a Democratic President since LBJ. A state who's entire congressional
delegation is Republican. A state that had a town that banned dancing!!
But there are plenty more reasons than that to not buy the closeness of
this race, like the fact that evidence of a Fallin implosion isn't all
that solid.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a><br />
First, there's the fact that Clarity Camaigns is a
Democratic pollster, hired by a Democratic campaign to release
presumably favorable data about their candidate. The problem with this,
as <a data-mce-href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/how-partisan-are-partisan-senate-polls/" href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/how-partisan-are-partisan-senate-polls/">FiveThirtyEight's Harry Enten details</a>
extensively, is the high likelihood of partisan polling error. Granted,
Enten's data was limited to House and Senate polls, but substantial
error was present in both. Maybe Clarity will be proven right. But I
think the gist of Enten's article is that it wouldn't be wise to put all
of your eggs in a partisan polling firm's basket.<br />
<br />
The second
reason I'm skeptical of a successful Democratic insurgency goes back to
the quote from the internal polling memo above - the fact that Dorman is
picking up 18% of crossover Republican support, while consolidating his
own base. Unfortunately, there hasn't been a single exit poll taken of
Oklahoma in six years, and even then, the only data available is from
presidential elections. But the 2008 Exits found Republicans only
offering up <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls/#OKP00p1" href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls/#OKP00p1">5% of their vote to Barack Obama</a>.<br />
<br />
Third,
the excellent track record of the Sooner Poll is impossible to ignore.
Not only are they tested, their results have been accurate. They
rank easily in the top <a data-mce-href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/interactives/pollster-ratings/" href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/interactives/pollster-ratings/">10% of pollsters in FiveThirtyEight's 'Pollster Ratings,' and received a B+ score overall</a>.
Clarity Campaigns received a B-, but the grade was based on an analysis
of just one survey, vs the Sooner Poll's eleven. And it's the Sooner
Poll that has Gov. Fallin ahead 50-32%.<br />
<br />
Finally, if all else fails, Mary Fallin always has James Lankford. Lankford is running a <a data-mce-href="http://dd.aoshq.com/2014/senate/oklahoma-special/" href="http://dd.aoshq.com/2014/senate/oklahoma-special/">very, very strong campaign</a> in the special election to replace retiring Senator Tom Coburn. Who would have thought that he could wind up with Fallin on <i>his</i> coattails?<br />
<br />
Obviously, the Daily Kos guys and gals feel differently, and their points are mostly fair; like <a data-mce-href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/09/24/1332130/-Daily-Kos-Elections-ad-roundup-The-GOP-is-running-a-spot-in-Oklahoma?detail=hide" href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/09/24/1332130/-Daily-Kos-Elections-ad-roundup-The-GOP-is-running-a-spot-in-Oklahoma?detail=hide">why <i>would</i> Fallin be up on the air </a>at this late stage? But like the broken record says ... we need more data to determine if this sleeper-race is waking up.brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-11024210207859275592014-09-30T01:07:00.000-04:002015-10-11T21:41:04.417-04:00Are Democrats On The Verge Of Vanishing In The South? A Look At How They're Performing With White Voters in 2014 Senate Contests<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4oahdYb3PMFO2SzIQ8l6Y5h4fn5S3rav328fcQwtwYNMsp06kYMGjtLDXhyphenhyphenNJw2Ags_e42tbQkn-BU-2U0DqUcjxqsrgo3JDymq8MyUAUNte8IquWMNaSSQu4XaYH1mIApj9-UrcE_Bo/s1600/hssss.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4oahdYb3PMFO2SzIQ8l6Y5h4fn5S3rav328fcQwtwYNMsp06kYMGjtLDXhyphenhyphenNJw2Ags_e42tbQkn-BU-2U0DqUcjxqsrgo3JDymq8MyUAUNte8IquWMNaSSQu4XaYH1mIApj9-UrcE_Bo/s1600/hssss.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Come next month, the days when successful national Democrats were almost exclusively from the South may very well come to an end. Al Gore, left, and Bill Clinton, right, represent the last era of locally popular Southerners making the leap to the national stage. </td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
The Democratic struggle to win over white voters was a <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/25/politics/obama-40-percent/" href="http://www.cnn.com/2012/10/25/politics/obama-40-percent/">well documented </a>failure of the 2012 presidential election, in spite of their four point national <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php">popular vote win</a>. Republican Mitt Romney carried whites by a <a data-mce-href="http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/results/president/exit-polls" href="http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/results/president/exit-polls">20-pt margin</a>, a figure only exceeded by Ronald Reagan's landslide <a data-mce-href="http://elections.nytimes.com/2008/results/president/national-exit-polls.html" href="http://elections.nytimes.com/2008/results/president/national-exit-polls.html">re-election in 1984</a>.<br />
<br />
But in the South, where a large number of heated 2014 Senate battles
will be held in just five weeks, the white disdain for Democrats is even
more pronounced. <br />
<br />
Consider North Carolina, where Romney won nearly <a data-mce-href="http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/results/president/exit-polls" href="http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/results/president/exit-polls">70% of the white vote</a>.
Or Alabama, where he won 84%. Or Mississippi, where he carried roughly
NINE in TEN whites! Even in tough years for Republicans, like 2008, they
still perform stronger among white voters in the South, relative to how
they do nationwide. <br />
<br />
Given the large
number of high-profile Southern senate races this Fall, I thought it
might be interesting to check in on some of those GOP contenders, and
compare how they're doing with white voters now to how other recent
candidates performed.<br />
<br />
Consider the Arkansas Senate race between Sen. Mark Pryor and Rep. Tom Cotton. In an average of polls taken since August (only
those that provide racial demographic crosstabs), Cotton attracts 50%
of white voters, while Pryor draws 36%. Though that margin surpasses
Cotton's overall advantage over Pryor, it falls well short of <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls/#val=ARP00p1" href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls/#val=ARP00p1">McCain's 68%</a> among Arkansas whites in 2008, and John <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#ARS01p1" href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#ARS01p1">Boozman's 65%</a> in 2010. But the 2014 Pryor/Cotton race isn't comparable to those contests in the first place - it was <a data-mce-href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2013/08/is-mark-pryor-following-in-blanche.html" href="http://partisanid.blogspot.com/2013/08/is-mark-pryor-following-in-blanche.html">never expected</a> that Cotton would pull off a 20+ point victory. <br />
<br data-mce-bogus="1" />
<br data-mce-bogus="1" />
<a data-mce-href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/finally.png" href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/finally.png"><img alt="finally" class="size-full wp-image-1343 aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/finally.png" src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/finally.png" height="365" width="640" /></a><br />
<br data-mce-bogus="1" />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>So
the question becomes one of whether Pryor's current 14-pt deficit with
white people is high enough for him to lose overall this November. As
you can see in the table above, it is - but just barely. And based on
past exit poll data, that sounds about right. If Blanche Lincoln had lost the white vote by 14-pts in 2010, she would have drastically improved on her overall <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=5&year=2010&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=3" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=5&year=2010&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=3">58-37% loss</a>, but still comes up short, at 51-47%. Had Obama lost the Arkansas white vote by just 14-pts in 2008, his <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=5&year=2008&f=0&off=0&elect=0" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=5&year=2008&f=0&off=0&elect=0">twenty-point loss</a>
to John McCain would've essentially been a tie. And had Democratic
Governor Mike Beebe lost the white vote by fourteen points in 2010
(instead of winning it, as he actually did, <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#ARG00p1" href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2010/results/polls/#ARG00p1">62-36%</a>), he would have defeated Republican Jim Keet by the skin of his teeth, rather than his actual <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=5&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=5&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0">30 point landslide</a>. <br />
<br />
In other words, Cotton's performance with white voters in Arkansas is probably where you would expect it to be in a tied race.<br />
<br />
That's
not necessarily the case for another Republican challenger in the South
- Tom Tillis of North Carolina. Tillis leads Sen. Kay Hagan among white
North Carolinians 51-35%, or 16-points. Based on that fact alone, it's
hard to see how Tillis could be leading overall in NC if 2012 and 2008
election results are any indication. Consider the chart below:<br />
<br />
<br data-mce-bogus="1" />
<a data-mce-href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/finally-2.png" href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/finally-2.png"><img alt="finally 2" class="size-full wp-image-1345 aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/finally-2.png" src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/finally-2.png" height="451" width="640" /></a><br />
<br data-mce-bogus="1" />
<br />
As you can see, not even Elizabeth Dole, who lost her seat in 2008 by an 8<a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=37&year=2008&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=2" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=37&year=2008&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=2">-pt margin</a>, did as poorly with white voters as Tillis is doing now. She carried them by <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls/#NCS01p1" href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls/#NCS01p1">18-pts</a>.
Even more stark, Mitt Romney won 2.5 times more North Carolina whites
than Tillis has averaged in polls since August - and remember, Romney
only carried the state overall by <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/results/state/NC/president" href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/results/state/NC/president">two points</a>!
So why isn't Tillis losing to Hagan by more than he is, given his less
than impressive advantage with white voters? Because context matters,
and it's important to remember midterms are generally low turn-out, less
racially diverse affairs. If minority voters drop-off this November,
Tillis won't need as large of an advantage with whites as he would if he
were running in a presidential year. And as most polling has shown, <a data-mce-href="http://dd.aoshq.com/2014/senate/north-carolina/" href="http://dd.aoshq.com/2014/senate/north-carolina/">Tillis is likely behind Hagan today.</a> His standing with white North Carolinians bares this out. <br />
<br />
Georgia
is yet another Southern state where the Republican typically wins BIG
with white voters statewide, even when their overall victory isn't quite
so large. Consider the 2008 presidential election, where Saxby
Chambliss' <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls/#GAS01p1" href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls/#GAS01p1">44-pt advantage</a> among white voters only yielded him a <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=13&year=2008&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=2" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=13&year=2008&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=2">3-pt victory overall.</a> In 2012, when Romney won overall <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=13&year=2012&f=0&off=0&elect=0" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=13&year=2012&f=0&off=0&elect=0">by 8-pts</a>, he <a data-mce-href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/24/upshot/why-democrats-now-have-a-shot-in-georgia.html?_r=0&abt=0002&abg=1" href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/24/upshot/why-democrats-now-have-a-shot-in-georgia.html?_r=0&abt=0002&abg=1">likely carried the white vote</a> by an astounding 60-pts. Compare those figures to how Perdue has done in polling against Michelle Nunn since August:<br />
<br data-mce-bogus="1" />
<br data-mce-bogus="1" />
<a data-mce-href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/finally-3.png" href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/finally-3.png"><img alt="finally 3" class="size-full wp-image-1347 aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/finally-3.png" src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/finally-3.png" height="429" width="640" /></a><br />
<br />
<br />
While
Perdue's 37-pt advantage over Georgia whites is impressive, he
certainly falls short of John McCain, Saxby Chambliss, and Mitt Romney.
On the other hand - Perdue probably doesn't need to win whites by 44-pts
in a non-presidential election year to win overall. But considering
Georgian white's voting preference alone, he's cutting it close. <br />
<br />
Finally,
take a look at the white vote in Louisiana. Mary Landrieu trails with
this group by an average of 43-pts in polling since August. She only
trailed among whites by <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls/#val=LAS01p1" href="http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/results/polls/#val=LAS01p1">32-pts during</a> her <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=22&year=2008&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=2" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=22&year=2008&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=2">52-46% overall victory</a>
in 2008. Clearly, if white voter preference in Louisiana right now is
any indication of where it will be in November, then Mary Landrieu is
going to have a close race on her hands. For example, if she had lost
white voters in 2008 by the margin she is currently losing them, all of
other things remaining the same, she would have very narrowly lost to
John Kennedy, her GOP challenger.<br />
<br />
<br data-mce-bogus="1" />
<a data-mce-href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/Finally-4.png" href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/Finally-4.png"><img alt="Finally 4" class="size-full wp-image-1349 aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/Finally-4.png" src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/Finally-4.png" height="284" width="640" /></a><br />
<br data-mce-bogus="1" />
<br />
<br />
And
remember, under the scenario I noted above, Landrieu would have lost
under what was very likely a friendlier political climate than she'll
see this November.<br />
<br />
Normal caveats apply - lots can change between now and November, campaigns don't operate in vacuums, etc., etc....<br />
<br />
But
if current GOP averages with white voters in four high-profile Southern
states are any indication of the final result - Republicans can
probably breathe easy in Louisiana, with Democrats doing the same in
North Carolina. Arkansas and Georgia white voter preference would tend
to put those states right on the cusp. brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-1740371267750321502014-09-25T09:42:00.000-04:002014-12-31T01:45:02.758-05:00New Quinnpiac Poll Finds Gillespie Within 10 Points of Mark Warner - But He's Lagging With Republicans<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzaZO3lHsTalpI7HQQINdAXZxDCid0vQc0-y1-4Nl3K1qKkNtla-2qek3Tkv8MbfieL6WtLesbGGz7tovAIfhlhM4V_4mO0T-ur-bm_SpOaed05ieOR_Ja62dPNA1yGrs3byW_S2gb-DI/s1600/Warner+title+pic.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzaZO3lHsTalpI7HQQINdAXZxDCid0vQc0-y1-4Nl3K1qKkNtla-2qek3Tkv8MbfieL6WtLesbGGz7tovAIfhlhM4V_4mO0T-ur-bm_SpOaed05ieOR_Ja62dPNA1yGrs3byW_S2gb-DI/s1600/Warner+title+pic.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Photo courtesy of the A.P.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
A brand new survey out this morning from <a data-mce-href="http://www.quinnipiac.edu/news-and-events/quinnipiac-university-poll/virginia/release-detail?ReleaseID=2086" href="http://www.quinnipiac.edu/news-and-events/quinnipiac-university-poll/virginia/release-detail?ReleaseID=2086">Quinnipiac University</a>
finds the former head of the RNC, Ed Gillespie, within reaching
distance of popular Democratic Senator Mark Warner in the Virginia
Senate race. Warner, who sports an impressive 52/34% favorability
rating, only clocks in at 48%, while Gillespie attracts 39%.<br />
<br />
Quinnipiac's previous Virginia survey from March found Gillespie <a data-mce-href="http://www.quinnipiac.edu/news-and-events/quinnipiac-university-poll/virginia/release-detail?ReleaseID=2025" href="http://www.quinnipiac.edu/news-and-events/quinnipiac-university-poll/virginia/release-detail?ReleaseID=2025">trailing 46-31%</a>, though that was among registered voters. The new survey was conducted among likely voters, so it isn't exactly comparable.<br />
<br />
Looking
at the crosstabs, Warner has leads among women (50-37%) and men
(46-41%). Despite trailing by nine points overall, Gillespie actually
attracts more Independent voters than Warner, leading among this
subgroup 43-41%. Of particular note was the passage below from the
official poll release:<br />
<blockquote>
"<i>Actually Gillespie is tied
with Warner among independents but the incumbent's lead rests on Sen.
Warner doing about 15 percentage points better among Democrats than
Gillespie does among Republicans.</i>"</blockquote>
So Warner is doing
a better job of consolidating his Democratic base than Gillespie is his
Republican base. Warner racks up an astonishing 94% of Democratic
voters. Compare that figure to Gov. Terry McAuliffe's performance with
Democrats in the 2013 Governor race against Ken Cuccinelli, when McAuliffe
captured <a data-mce-href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2013/images/11/05/va.gov.exit.polls.1120p.110513.v2.final%5B1%5D.copy.pdf" href="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2013/images/11/05/va.gov.exit.polls.1120p.110513.v2.final%5B1%5D.copy.pdf">95% of the Democratic vote</a>. That's the same percentage won by <a data-mce-href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/results/state/VA/senate" href="http://www.cnn.com/election/2012/results/state/VA/senate">Tim Kaine and Barack Obama</a> in their respective 2012 matches.<br />
<br />
If
you buy the Quinnipiac numbers, it appears as though Warner has maxed
out his Democratic vote. But that isn't necessarily the case for Ed
Gillespie. The Republican is only capturing 78% of his base. That's
significantly lower than where Ken Cuccinelli wound up in 2013 (92%), or
even George Allen and Mitt Romney in 2012 (93%). In other words,
Gillespie likely has room to grow.<br />
<br />
Since Quinnipiac took the time
to point out the basis Warner's lead is predicated on, let's consider
how the survey would have looked had Gillespie performed as well among
Republicans as Warner did among Democrats. In other words, what would
the poll results have been if both Warner AND Gillespie attract 94% of
their bases?<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a data-mce-href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/blog-post.png" href="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/blog-post.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="blog post" class="size-full wp-image-1228 aligncenter" data-mce-src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/blog-post.png" src="http://dd.aoshq.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2014/09/blog-post.png" /></a></div>
<br />
<br />
What was a 48-39% lead for Mark Warner becomes a 44-43% lead.<br />
<br />
Obviously,
the campaigns don't take place in a vacuum, and the numbers will shift
between now and election day. But it is interesting to see how close of a
race we could have assuming two things: 1) Quinnipiac's numbers are
accurate, and 2) Republicans rally almost unanimously around Gillespie.brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-36490004899339283222014-09-23T11:42:00.000-04:002014-12-31T11:55:23.676-05:00Loving To Hate Pat Quinn: Why An Unpopular Democratic Governor Stands A Decent Chance At Re-election<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpH0ISAC5dVnwAdkuFskVG4eWnoZp70LPQJMV_CxVQI03WbtJgyI29TbXobWDxwAwM_mBt71vktc9rtoKaQu2dNGDUrzaBn6S5dAtACm_DExXLd9T2jpFRzHNtOs08Y5FrKWVTlZh26Iw/s1600/Quinn.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjpH0ISAC5dVnwAdkuFskVG4eWnoZp70LPQJMV_CxVQI03WbtJgyI29TbXobWDxwAwM_mBt71vktc9rtoKaQu2dNGDUrzaBn6S5dAtACm_DExXLd9T2jpFRzHNtOs08Y5FrKWVTlZh26Iw/s1600/Quinn.jpeg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gov. Quinn struggles to meet-and-greet supporters as union members protest his policies at the 2012 Illinois State Fair. Photo courtesy of the A.P.</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
There have been <a data-mce-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illinois_gubernatorial_election,_2014#Polling_3" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illinois_gubernatorial_election,_2014#Polling_3" target="_blank">twenty-two surveys</a>
of the 2014 Illinois Governor race since Republican businessman and
challenger Bruce Rauner captured his party's nomination in March.
Governor Pat Quinn has led in only two of them, averaging 39% across all
twenty-two polls (a number that should strike fear in the heart of any
incumbent).<br />
<br />
The Huffington Post Pollster average puts the challenger <a data-mce-href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-illinois-governor-rauner-vs-quinn" href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-illinois-governor-rauner-vs-quinn" target="_blank">ahead 46-44%</a>,
and gives Rauner a 53% chance of defeating Quinn in November - again,
making it very clear that Quinn is receiving no benefit whatsoever from
the power of incumbency. In fact, from a purely polling perspective,
Quinn is one of the most vulnerable Governors and/or Senators in the
country. His job job approval rating is<a data-mce-href="http://www.nbcchicago.com/blogs/ward-room/Despite-dismal-approval-ratings-Quinn-surges-past-untested-rauner-poll-275134991.html" href="http://www.nbcchicago.com/blogs/ward-room/Despite-dismal-approval-ratings-Quinn-surges-past-untested-rauner-poll-275134991.html" target="_blank"> awful</a> (see <a data-mce-href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=5&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CEMQFjAE&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.rebootillinois.com%2F2014%2F04%2F17%2Funcategorized%2Fmattdietrich%2Ffirst-poll-general-election-rauner-slight-edge-unions-strong-support%2F5204%2F&ei=vawfVKqLJYK_ggSat4HQDg&usg=AFQjCNEq5mM0u3UST8LyUxVrgqO4oQb8Dg&sig2=lfs2S15qz7kxtLbnKD4bpQ&bvm=bv.75775273,d.eXY" href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=5&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CEMQFjAE&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.rebootillinois.com%2F2014%2F04%2F17%2Funcategorized%2Fmattdietrich%2Ffirst-poll-general-election-rauner-slight-edge-unions-strong-support%2F5204%2F&ei=vawfVKqLJYK_ggSat4HQDg&usg=AFQjCNEq5mM0u3UST8LyUxVrgqO4oQb8Dg&sig2=lfs2S15qz7kxtLbnKD4bpQ&bvm=bv.75775273,d.eXY" target="_blank">here</a>, <a data-mce-href="http://gravismarketing.com/polling-and-market-research/illinois-telephone-survey/" href="http://gravismarketing.com/polling-and-market-research/illinois-telephone-survey/" target="_blank">here</a>, & <a data-mce-href="http://capitolfax.com/2014/02/03/collateral-damage/" href="http://capitolfax.com/2014/02/03/collateral-damage/" target="_blank">here</a> as well). Only <a data-mce-href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-pennsylvania-governor-corbett-vs-wolf" href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-pennsylvania-governor-corbett-vs-wolf" target="_blank">Tom Corbett</a>, <a data-mce-href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-kansas-governor-brownback-vs-davis" href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-kansas-governor-brownback-vs-davis" target="_blank">Sam Brownback</a>, <a data-mce-href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-connecticut-governor-foley-vs-malloy" href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-connecticut-governor-foley-vs-malloy" target="_blank">Dan Malloy</a>, and <a data-mce-href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-louisiana-senate-cassidy-vs-landrieu" href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-louisiana-senate-cassidy-vs-landrieu" target="_blank">Mary Landrieu</a> trail their opponents by a larger margin on Pollster.<br />
<br />
Fortunately
for Democrats, Pat Quinn has proven himself quite resilient in the face
of awful polling and brutal political headwinds before.<br />
<br />
Look no further than four years ago, when after a bitter contest and <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=17&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=1" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=17&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=1" target="_blank">razor-thin victory</a>
in the Democratic primary, Pat Quinn was elected to his own full term
as Governor, having stepped into the role in 2009 after former Gov.
Blagojevich was famously <a data-mce-href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/29/AR2009012902202.html" href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/01/29/AR2009012902202.html" target="_blank">removed from office</a>. His job approval ratings that year were disastrous, even on the <a data-mce-href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/PPP_Release_IL_110513.pdf" href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/PPP_Release_IL_110513.pdf" target="_blank">eve of the election</a>.
The general election head-to-head numbers were horrendous. Of the
thirty-three publicly released polls following the Feb 2, 2010
primaries, Quinn trailed his Republican challenger in <a data-mce-href="http://www.pollster.com/polls/il/-10-il-sen-ge-bvq.html" href="http://www.pollster.com/polls/il/-10-il-sen-ge-bvq.html" target="_blank">ALL but two</a>.
The final Pollster average in 2010 found Bill Brady (R) ahead by eight
points. The final RCP average found Brady up five points. Pollster and <a data-mce-href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2010/governor/il/illinois_governor_brady_vs_quinn-1361.html#polls" href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2010/governor/il/illinois_governor_brady_vs_quinn-1361.html#polls" target="_blank">Real Clear Politics</a> even picked up on a last minute surge for Brady! They were <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=17&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=17&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0" target="_blank">obviously wrong</a>,
as Governor Quinn went on to win 47-46%. And it was arguably the
largest polling miss of the 2010 cycle (ranking right up there with the
infamously incorrectly polled Nevada Senate race between <a data-mce-href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/05/10-nv-sen-ge-avr_n_727027.html" href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/05/10-nv-sen-ge-avr_n_727027.html" target="_blank">Harry Reid and Sharon Angle</a>).<br />
<br />
Further
complicating things for Republican chances at picking up this
Governorship this year, the most prolific pollster to date in the Illinois race,
We Ask America, has somewhat of a problematic <a data-mce-href="http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/10/which-polls-fared-best-and-worst-in-the-2012-presidential-race/" href="http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/10/which-polls-fared-best-and-worst-in-the-2012-presidential-race/" target="_blank">track record</a>, particularly<a data-mce-href="https://storify.com/DKElections/we-ask-america-s-lousy-2012-illinois-house-polling" href="https://storify.com/DKElections/we-ask-america-s-lousy-2012-illinois-house-polling" target="_blank"> in Illinois</a>.
Not to mention the fact that they make up 36% of all Illinois Governor
polls taken since the March 18th primary. To date, their results have
been highly favorable to Bruce Rauner. Out of their eight surveys taken since
the March 18 primary, Rauner has led in all of them, by as little as <a data-mce-href="http://weaskamerica.com/2014/09/21/illinois-michigan/" href="http://weaskamerica.com/2014/09/21/illinois-michigan/" target="_blank">three</a> points, and as much as <a data-mce-href="http://www.rebootillinois.com/2014/07/29/editors-picks/mattdietrich/reboot-illinois-poll-bruce-rauners-lead-grows-illinois-governors-race/21531/" href="http://www.rebootillinois.com/2014/07/29/editors-picks/mattdietrich/reboot-illinois-poll-bruce-rauners-lead-grows-illinois-governors-race/21531/" target="_blank">fourteen</a>.<br />
<br />
Great news for the GOP, right? Well, not when you consider that We Ask America's
only two surveys of the 2010 Illinois Governor race found Republican
challenger Bill Brady ahead by <a data-mce-href="http://weaskamerica.com/2010/09/17/illinois-governors-race/" href="http://weaskamerica.com/2010/09/17/illinois-governors-race/" target="_blank">ten</a> and <a data-mce-href="http://weaskamerica.com/2010/05/03/report-of-death-exaggerated/" href="http://weaskamerica.com/2010/05/03/report-of-death-exaggerated/" target="_blank">fifteen points</a>, the latter of which was Brady's largest poll lead of the entire cycle.<br />
<br />
This
isn't to pick on We Ask America. As noted above, all of the pollsters
were off in this race in 2010. Rasmussen Reports final poll on October 20, 2010
found Brady ahead of Quinn <a data-mce-href="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections/election_2010/election_2010_governor_elections/illinois/election_2010_illinois_governor" href="http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections/election_2010/election_2010_governor_elections/illinois/election_2010_illinois_governor" target="_blank">by eight points</a>, which also happened to be the final Pollster average.<a data-mce-href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/PPP_Release_IL_110513.pdf" href="http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/PPP_Release_IL_110513.pdf" target="_blank"> PPP</a>, <a data-mce-href="http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/IL_Topline.pdf" href="http://www.foxnews.com/projects/pdf/IL_Topline.pdf" target="_blank">Fox News</a>, <a data-mce-href="http://cdn.yougov.com/downloads/releases/2010_Election/ILrelease_20101030.pdf" href="http://cdn.yougov.com/downloads/releases/2010_Election/ILrelease_20101030.pdf" target="_blank">YouGov</a>, the <a data-mce-href="http://media.apps.chicagotribune.com/general2010/site_media/polls/poll_report_20101026_governor.pdf" href="http://media.apps.chicagotribune.com/general2010/site_media/polls/poll_report_20101026_governor.pdf" target="_blank">Chicago Tribune</a>,
and literally every other pollster in the final weeks of the 2010
campaign missed the mark, and none of them projected the actual winner.<br />
<br />
So
while the Democrats are again in the position of having to defend an
unpopular Governor and unpopular President in an unfriendly political
environment, history would suggest you should not underestimate Governor
Pat Quinn. In 2010, polling that consistently favored the Republican
challenger the entire time wound up being wrong. Given that, Governor
Quinn may be the happiest (and luckiest) vulnerable incumbent running
this year.<br />
<br />
<b>One final note</b>: the three most recent surveys are all good news for Gov. Quinn. The first <a data-mce-href="http://politics.suntimes.com/article/springfield/poll-quinn-leading-rauner-voters-not-satisfied/sat-09132014-1030am" href="http://politics.suntimes.com/article/springfield/poll-quinn-leading-rauner-voters-not-satisfied/sat-09132014-1030am" target="_blank">Chicago Tribune poll</a>
of the cycle finds Quinn surging into an eleven point, 48-37% lead over
Rauner - easily his largest lead of both the 2014 and 2010 elections. A
Global Strategy Group poll done on behalf of the Democratic Governor
Association also finds a rare Quinn <a data-mce-href="http://politics.suntimes.com/article/springfield/dem-poll-quinn-pulls-ahead-rauner-gov-race-first-time/thu-09112014-725am" href="http://politics.suntimes.com/article/springfield/dem-poll-quinn-pulls-ahead-rauner-gov-race-first-time/thu-09112014-725am" target="_blank">lead of 43-40%</a>. Finally, a nearly brand-new We Ask America survey actually finds Rauner <a data-mce-href="http://weaskamerica.com/2014/09/21/illinois-michigan/" href="http://weaskamerica.com/2014/09/21/illinois-michigan/" target="_blank">ahead 44-41%</a>, but notes that the new figures represent a significant tightening from their last poll just three weeks ago when <a data-mce-href="http://www.rebootillinois.com/2014/09/03/editors-picks/mattdietrich/reboot-illinois-poll-rauner-8-points-quinn-quinn-dominant-chicago/24375/" href="http://www.rebootillinois.com/2014/09/03/editors-picks/mattdietrich/reboot-illinois-poll-rauner-8-points-quinn-quinn-dominant-chicago/24375/" target="_blank">Rauner led Quinn 46-37%</a>.brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7158672864576052787.post-60749972067330066952014-09-17T11:33:00.000-04:002015-01-01T15:04:57.508-05:00How D.O.A. Is Governor Tom Corbett? Very, If Recent History Is Any Guide<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtoY7Ot77Mcgmt_DvcgW3PeGQiC8pb8fp8_Ed6dY2R_tHxh49AZ_L4A-6qmoKx0IhvFg1bRG1V6pvwfp_XcjEU3hKNZ9nN_w53e8bayLXnpmHKPu-qarcD1v3WqemhrcKrkdRSh6DcLkY/s1600/Corbett+title.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjtoY7Ot77Mcgmt_DvcgW3PeGQiC8pb8fp8_Ed6dY2R_tHxh49AZ_L4A-6qmoKx0IhvFg1bRG1V6pvwfp_XcjEU3hKNZ9nN_w53e8bayLXnpmHKPu-qarcD1v3WqemhrcKrkdRSh6DcLkY/s1600/Corbett+title.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">PA Gov. Tom Corbett (left) will likely soon have much in common with fmr. PA Sen. Rick Santorum (right). Like Santorum, Republican Corbett looks poised to loose his statewide reelection bid in a big way. Photo on the right is courtesy of <span class="image-caption current" style="opacity: 1;">Jeff Swensen/Getty Images.</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
You almost have to feel sorry for Governor Tom Corbett (R) of Pennsylvania. After a near <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=42&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=42&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0">double-digit victory</a>
in 2010, he's trailed every potential Democratic challenger in every
survey taken for the better part of eighteen months now.<br />
<br />
And while a <a data-mce-href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=8&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CGEQFjAH&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fblogs%2Fpost-politics%2Fwp%2F2014%2F09%2F11%2Fwho-is-the-most-vulnerable-governor-in-america-tom-corbett-in-a-landslide%2F&ei=1KEgVMuAL4L_sASMr4HgCw&usg=AFQjCNEkZ3jiFR6U8r7HUTeSZLrw33a-Hg&sig2=qTGlatB8ddsCLzrxMo1gGw&bvm=bv.75775273,d.cWc" href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=8&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CGEQFjAH&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.washingtonpost.com%2Fblogs%2Fpost-politics%2Fwp%2F2014%2F09%2F11%2Fwho-is-the-most-vulnerable-governor-in-america-tom-corbett-in-a-landslide%2F&ei=1KEgVMuAL4L_sASMr4HgCw&usg=AFQjCNEkZ3jiFR6U8r7HUTeSZLrw33a-Hg&sig2=qTGlatB8ddsCLzrxMo1gGw&bvm=bv.75775273,d.cWc">number of articles</a>
have been written about his deep unpopularity, none seem able to settle
on a single reason as to why he is likely to lose his job this
November. There's the argument that Corbett is simply <a data-mce-href="http://www.newrepublic.com/article/115767/tom-corbett-poll-approval-rating-pennsylvania-governor-plummets" href="http://www.newrepublic.com/article/115767/tom-corbett-poll-approval-rating-pennsylvania-governor-plummets">too far right</a> in a decidedly blue-leaning state. Or that <a data-mce-href="http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/college_guide/blog/tom_corbett_is_very_unpopular.php" href="http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/college_guide/blog/tom_corbett_is_very_unpopular.php">unpopular education cuts</a> have alienated moderates. Even lingering resentments over his involvement (or lack thereof) in the <a data-mce-href="http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/attytood/Why-Corbett-is-so-unpopular.html" href="http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/attytood/Why-Corbett-is-so-unpopular.html">Sandusky/Paterno</a> scandal has been implicated.<br />
<br />
Whatever the reason, the data is clear - Gov. Corbett is the most vulnerable incumbent in the country, by a mile.<br />
<br />
As
noted in a previous post on this blog, out of a host of vulnerable
incumbent governors and senators, Corbett is in the weakest polling
position. His best polls since challenger Tom Wolf <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=42&year=2014&f=0&off=5&elect=1" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=42&year=2014&f=0&off=5&elect=1">captured the Democratic nomination</a> on May 20 came from a pair of <a data-mce-href="https://today.yougov.com/news/2014/09/10/battleground-tracker-2014-pennsylvania/" href="https://today.yougov.com/news/2014/09/10/battleground-tracker-2014-pennsylvania/">consecutively released</a> surveys finding him down eleven points, one of which was from a <a data-mce-href="http://www.harperpolling.com/polls/pennsylvania-statewide-poll--9-2-9-3" href="http://www.harperpolling.com/polls/pennsylvania-statewide-poll--9-2-9-3" target="_blank">GOP polling firm</a>.<br />
<br />
Yes... an ELEVEN POINT deficit is the BEST Corbett has managed against Tom Wolf, and even those polls <a data-mce-href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-pennsylvania-governor-corbett-vs-wolf" href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2014-pennsylvania-governor-corbett-vs-wolf">look like overly favorable outliers</a>.<br />
<br />
One PA Gov poll out Monday found Corbett <a data-mce-href="http://www.mcall.com/mc-muhlenberg-morning-call-pennsylvania-governor-midterm-election-poll-htmlstory.html" href="http://www.mcall.com/mc-muhlenberg-morning-call-pennsylvania-governor-midterm-election-poll-htmlstory.html">down 54-33%</a>. Less than two weeks before that, Quinnipiac University found him <a data-mce-href="http://www.quinnipiac.edu/images/polling/pa/pa09112014_prb83nx.pdf" href="http://www.quinnipiac.edu/images/polling/pa/pa09112014_prb83nx.pdf">down 59-35%</a>. The current Pollster average gives Tom Wolf a twenty-two point lead.<br />
<br />
Is
there anything Corbett can do to pull this one out, given the size of
his polling deficit, and the amount of time left in the campaign? No,
not if you consider incumbent Senate and Gubernatorial polling data from
back to 2004.<br />
<br />
<a name='more'></a>According to the numbers, incumbents lose their jobs
rarely enough. But it's exceedingly rare for them to lose them by the
margin Corbett is poised to lose by this November. Even worse for
Republicans, no senator or governor has managed to improve their
September polling numbers to the extent Gov. Corbett would need to win,
at least not dating back to 2004.<br />
<br />
Consider 2012, for example.
There were twenty-eight incumbent governors and senators that competed
in their respective state's general election that November. Only one of
them, <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=25&year=2012&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=1" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=25&year=2012&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=1">Scott Brown</a>, was defeated for re-election. But the head-to-head polling against Elizabeth Warren was nowhere <a data-mce-href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2012-massachusetts-senate-brown-vs-warren" href="http://elections.huffingtonpost.com/pollster/2012-massachusetts-senate-brown-vs-warren">near as panic-inducing</a> as Corbett's has been thus far.<br />
<br />
In
2010, there were thirty-six incumbent governors and senators that made
it to their state's general election, and again, only FOUR of them were
defeated. <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=55&year=2010&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=3" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=55&year=2010&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=3">Russ Feingold</a> and <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=39&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=39&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0">Ted Strickland</a> suffered relatively narrow losses, while Iowa Governor Chet Culver <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=19&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=19&year=2010&f=0&off=5&elect=0">fell even harder</a>. Yet still, Gov. Culver's general election polling against Terry Branstad <a data-mce-href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/09/10-ia-gov-ge-bvc_n_728380.html" href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/08/09/10-ia-gov-ge-bvc_n_728380.html">didn't look as bad as Corbett's</a>, and his final result was actually an improvement from his September 2010 polling average.<br />
<br />
During
the 2008 Republican bloodbath, 38 incumbent governors and senators
competed in that November's general election, and five of them lost.
Among them, Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska didn't look terribly strong by
the end of September 2008, but his polling numbers <a data-mce-href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/26/08-ak-sen-ge-svb_n_724962.html" href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/26/08-ak-sen-ge-svb_n_724962.html">weren't as weak</a> as Corbett's are now. And of course, Stevens went on to <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=2&year=2008&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=2" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=2&year=2008&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=2">lose anyway</a>. The same applied to <a data-mce-href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/27/08-mn-sen-ge-cvf_n_724897.html" href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/27/08-mn-sen-ge-cvf_n_724897.html">Norm Coleman</a>, <a data-mce-href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/27/08-nh-sen-ge-svs_n_723398.html" href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/27/08-nh-sen-ge-svs_n_723398.html">John Sununu</a>, <a data-mce-href="http://www.pollster.com/polls/nc/08-nc-sen-ge-dvh.html" href="http://www.pollster.com/polls/nc/08-nc-sen-ge-dvh.html">Elizabeth Dole</a>, and <a data-mce-href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/27/08-or-sen-ge-svm_n_724886.html" href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/06/27/08-or-sen-ge-svm_n_724886.html">Gordon Smith</a> - all incumbents with poor, but not terrible numbers in September, that went on to lose in November by varying degrees.<br />
<br />
In 2006, fifty-six(!!) incumbent senators or governors faced challengers in the November general election, and only SEVEN lost. <a data-mce-href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/senate/va/virginia_senate_race-14.html#polls" href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/senate/va/virginia_senate_race-14.html#polls">George Allen</a>, <a data-mce-href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/senate/ri/rhode_island_senate_race-17.html" href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/senate/ri/rhode_island_senate_race-17.html" target="_blank">Lincoln Chafee</a>, <a data-mce-href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/senate/mo/missouri_senate_race-12.html#polls" href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/senate/mo/missouri_senate_race-12.html#polls" target="_blank">Jim Talent</a>, <a data-mce-href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/senate/mt/montana_senate_race-11.html#polls" href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/senate/mt/montana_senate_race-11.html#polls" target="_blank">Conrad Burns</a>, <a data-mce-href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/senate/oh/ohio_senate_race-2.html#polls" href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/senate/oh/ohio_senate_race-2.html#polls" target="_blank">Mike DeWine</a>, and <a data-mce-href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2010/governor/md/maryland_governor_ehrlich_vs_omalley-1121.html#polls" href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2010/governor/md/maryland_governor_ehrlich_vs_omalley-1121.html#polls" target="_blank">Bob Ehrlich</a> all failed to win re-election, and had smaller polling deficits to overcome than Corbett today.<br />
<br />
Thirty-two
incumbents governors and senators faced re-election in 2004, and only
three lost - Governor Kernan of Indiana, Governor Benson of New
Hampshire, and of course, Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschule. All
three's polling indicated they were better positioned than Corbett is
today. All three lost anyway.<br />
<br />
So as not to beat a point to death
(too late, I know), consider the two past campaigns that are most
similar to what the Corbett/Wolf contest looks like today.- fellow
Pennsylvanian Rick Santorum in 2006, and Blanche Lincoln in 2010. Like
Corbett, the signs of a tough re-election campaign <a data-mce-href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/senate/pa/pennsylvania_senate_race-1.html#polls" href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2006/senate/pa/pennsylvania_senate_race-1.html#polls" target="_blank">appeared early</a>
for the Santorum campaign in their 2006 contest against Bob Casey (D).
Like Corbett, Santorum rarely trailed Casey by less than double-digits.
And of course, Santorum went on to lose in <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=42&year=2006&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=1" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=42&year=2006&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=1" target="_blank">spectacular, historical fashion</a>.
In fact, his 59-41% defeat in 2006 is the second largest for any
incumbent governor or senator since at least 2004, maybe longer.<br />
<br />
The
largest defeat belongs to the next closest comparison to the state of
the Corbett/Wolf race . . . the Lincoln/Boozman battle of 2010. Like
Santorum in 2006 and Corbett today, Lincoln just <a data-mce-href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/02/10-ar-sen-ge-bovl_n_727252.html" href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/02/10-ar-sen-ge-bovl_n_727252.html" target="_blank">couldn't catch a break</a> in her polling numbers. And like Santorum, the final result reflected that - she received an even more embarrassing <a data-mce-href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=5&year=2010&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=3" href="http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?fips=5&year=2010&f=0&off=3&elect=0&class=3" target="_blank">58-37% shellacking</a>.<br />
<br />
None
of this is to say that because it has hasn't happened a single time
since 2004 that it isn't possible for a sitting governor or senator to
erase a twenty point polling deficit in the final 6 weeks of a campaign.
But odds are odds, and they certainly seem heavily stacked against
Corbett winning re-election.brandonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16905828332573240843noreply@blogger.com0