Posted on 08/11/2005 9:12:25 AM PDT by Tumbleweed_Connection
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton's lead over potential Republican opponent Jeanine Pirro has slipped, but still remains hefty, a statewide poll reported Wednesday.
The WNBC-Marist College poll, conducted by Marist College's Institute for Public Opinion, had the former first lady leading the Westchester County district attorney, 50 percent to 28 percent. Clinton led Pirro, 64 percent to 28 percent, in an April poll from the Poughkeepsie-based institute.
The poll was conducted Tuesday, one day after Pirro announced that she would seek the GOP nomination to challenge Clinton's re-election bid next year.
"Some of Hillary's soft support went to undecided," said Marist pollster Lee Miringoff. People are saying, `I'll take a look at Pirro."'
A majority of New York voters, 56 percent of them, said they didn't know enough about Pirro to form an opinion about her.
Clinton's approval rating was 54 percent in the new poll and 56 percent in April.
While 55 percent of voters said they believed Democrat Clinton would run for president in 2008, only 35 percent of them said they wanted her to.
New York voters were divided on whether Clinton should pledge to serve her full, six-year Senate term if re-elected. Thirty-nine percent said she should take the pledge while 44 percent said she should not. In 2000, when she first ran for Senate, Clinton made such a pledge. She has, thus far, avoided the issue as she prepares to run for a second term.
The new Marist poll came out as Pirro began a three-day formal announcement tour of the state.
The GOP nomination is also being sought by Manhattan lawyer Edward Cox, former Yonkers Mayor John Spencer and tax attorney William Brenner of Sullivan County. The poll did not ask voters about their chances.
Marist's telephone poll of 400 registered voters was conducted Tuesday and has a sampling error margin of plus or minus 5 percentage points.
LOL, you know that hurts.
Look like this race is shaping up to be much more entertianing than I imagined it would be.
TeHe.
How can the much beloved one be only at 50%? According to the MSM she could beat Jesus Christ by thirty points. What is going on?
50-28? It's a real nailbiter.
2. Poll is of registered voters.
Sounds like a lot more in the "undecided" camp.
Hillary Clinton is an obese sow who will never be President. Our first female President will not be a shrieking pig. It will be someone elegant, like Condi.
And the GOP cat is smarter, saner, more articulate, and a helluva lot prettier.
That took what one day?
Let's see how the polls go after all the pooh is thrown on the wall. Let's see what sticks and on whose image will it stick to.
Lots of pooh that I can think of there hitlery.
Bet she drops out of this race. Or else maybe Mrs Pirro has an unfortunate though timely accident which has been known to happen around the clintons.
> The poll was conducted Tuesday ...
And Dick Morris's quote (attributed to McAuliffe) that
Hillary "doesn't want the job" [of Senator] hit the
streets on Wednesday.
With Pirro emphasizing this catchy slogan, any polls
in the near future will show what resonance it has
with the electorate.
Pass the popcorn. Stay tuned.
If people work hard for Pirro and she gets contributions from the rest of us in other states, she will have a shot at this. Part of her problem is that people outside of NYcity do not know much about her. Can it be possible that people are starting to get Hillary fatigue?
The Repulicans are pathetic since they allow people supporting baby killers to run on their ticket.
I've been a registered Republican for a LONG time, but am now getting pretty tired of the hypocrisy...
Please FReepmail me if you want on or off my ‘miscellaneous’ ping list.
I'm sure Hillary's using her potty mouth cussing away cause now that she's going to be compared with Pirro, she's got to start brushing her hair, puting on make-up again, give old crusty a rest and get booked into a fat farm.
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton... remains hefty, a statewide poll reported Wednesday.
Way too risky.
THAT's gonna leave a mark!
Interesting.
You think she'll risk it all?
Yeah - Terry McAuliffe - great source for political insight - guy was a total loser.
The only woman I would have considered for President was Jeanne Kirkpatrick.
I concur with you. A loss in '06 for clinton would pretty much derail her presidential aspirations.
Every time I see hillary in one of her pantsuit outfits, I can't seem to get the picture of Chairman Mao out of my mind.
I'm still waiting for the SNL skit where Hillary is portrayed as overweight and eating a bucket of chicken. Much like how SNL portrayed Linda Tripp.
I'm sure Lorne Michaels will do so, right?
Link or transcript? TIA
If these poll #s keep tightening up (which I suspect they will) she'll have to spend a lot of money. .....the last thing she wants to do. And Pirro will tear Hillary apart in the debates, which will expose her weaknesses.
She'll drop out.
And can sustain an argument without "YOU KNOW" and doesn't do HEAD BOBBING
HA! Pirro is a good-'lookin older woman... 'ol Crusty is a dried-up, sexless opportunist. This will be a lot closer than many here think.
2. Poll is of registered voters.
Even if Hillary wins, if that win is not as easy as everyone predicted it would be, she will go into the '08 Dim Primaries damaged. And if her reelection bid gets ugly, she will be even more damaged.
And the ash trays are flying fast and furious as we speak
The one thing that Pirro must start doing immediately is that at EVERY opportunity, she must say that during the campaign she wants, and expects at least SIX debates with Hillary , all around the state. She has to plant, and keep cultivating the idea, so that Clinton won't be able to duck it later..<P.
Of course, expect Clinton's team to respodn that Pirro is NOT the GOP candidate, so it's premature fro her to demand anything..to which Pirro replies thatCLinton has yet to announce that she is indeed running for re-election..
But if this Weldon thing has legs, she's finished. 9-11 effected Dems and Repubs equally and they won't tolerate someone who stood by her man while he gave terrorists a free ride.
And as we cannot get Hillary to do anything but sloganeer, I do not know if she is more articulate than the witch either.
Sure she is prudier, but that would cover most of the population (of either sex of any genus or species.) Heck, I am purdier, bet you are too.
Listen, I am no Pirro fan, she is as much of a RINO as one can be, and is no doubt up to her ears in corruption too, but anyone that can give Hillie a horse race is OK in my book, at least for the moment.
I would like to see Cox run and win, that would be the best outcome, but it is rather unlikely, to say the least.
I just hope Pirro calls Hillary out. I also hope she forces her to speak in a venue where she is not "handled" by her adoring fans in the Media. I live in NY and I do not think that since Hillary has been Senator she made any public appearances that where not highly scripted and where the real public was kept at a very far distance. Maybe she has upstate, but not down in the City. I know because if I could get to one I would go just to watch someone heckle her.
I have met her, and she is terrible in an uncontrolled environment. If Pirro is one tenth the beatch she appears to be, and if she can get under Hillary's skin, it could be quite a display that we see from old Hille.
Now would be a good time for GOP to start looking into vote fraud in NYC. I still maintain that that is what put her over the top last time. I really cannot believe that she honestly won by the margins that she did.
I sure going to enjoy watching it, and my guess is that that will be a pretty common feeling here in NYS.
LOL!
Hillary is not just beatable, Jeanine Pirro will beat her.
I've posted the reasons elsewhere, but they come down to this:
New York is split between the city, the suburbs and upstate.
Most of the city always goes Democratic - although they hate crime so much they voted for the Republican Rudy.
The suburbs tip 50/50.
Upstate is Republican.
Hillary won the 2000 Senate race for a variety of reasons:
She was the President's wife, running against a nobody.
New Yorkers predicted a Gore win and more Democrat establishment, so Hillary was a good call.
Lazio was relatively conservative, and male, and the "spin" was that picking on Hillary was abusive.
And most importantly, Hillary campaigned upstate. Hillary spent a lot of time. She went to the diners. She pressed the flesh. In a Presidential year, Lazio was not the best funded, nobody thought he could win, and upstate was left alone on the assumption it would go Republican.
Hillary won under those conditions, but she was never tested. She has never been tested, never been forced to answer questions in a showdown.
This time it's very different.
It's an off-year, so zillions of dollars of Republican money will pour in from all over the country to help beat Clinton. Pirro will be able to run ads early and often.
Clinton too, but to do it she'll have to dip into her Presidential war chest.
Bill Clinton's not in the White House, Bush is. And the Republicans control Congress. Hillary's glamorous tie to the liberals' fave President has passed its half life. People are buying a used car now, not an exciting ticket to more Clinton years.
Pirro is from the suburbs and is well-respected there as a prosector. Downstate, she is known. Upstate, which is naturally Republican territory, she is not, but she will be. She will go upstate and ask for their votes, and she is more likely to get them than Hillary. Remember, Hillary got them in 2000, when she was the President's wife going into small towns and promising them jobs...and her opponent was nowhere to be seen. Not this time. Those jobs didn't much materialize, she ain't the President's wife anymore, and even if she spends her whole summer off on campaign upstate, she can at best only reduce the lead Pirro will have among upstate voters.
Lazio was relatively conservative and male.
Pirro is socially liberal and female.
Thus, all of the knee-jerk hot-button issues Clinton could push to garner votes are not there. Pirro's pro-choice and pro-gay-marriage.
But Pirro's been hard on crime, and is a tax conserative.
These positions are both very popular among suburban and upstate voters, and crime fighting is even popular in the City. New Yorkers hate crime. They've had enough of it over the years. Pirro's crime-fighting credentials are impeccable. Hillary Clinton's credentials are...ummm...
Pirro is a prosecutor. She's more articulate then Clinton, and she'll hammer home her questions. Clinton will have to restrict debates.
They're both women: the chivalry factor goes right out.
So does the female vote advantage for Hillary.
This race is going to be hard fought, but when you add up the factors, Pirro is the better candidate, objectively, based on what New Yorkers care about. She will win the Senate seat in New York.
I hope Pirro comes out swinging. Takes the offense and makes hillary know, from the beginning, she will be running a catch-up defense. That b**ch can be beaten. If Pirro never gives her a chance to get in control of the situation.
From your description it makes me think that Pirro is a female Guiliani.
Of course, I am rooting for her with little more enthusiasm than I'd root for a Democrat primary opponent to unseat Hillary.
She would spin it somewhere along the way as "not being fair" to the people of NY, or some other such hooey.
Just my opinion, I know, but Hillie is in a completely other space than any other politician out there.
But I would agree with you that bowing out might well cost her the election.
I think Hillary is so power mad that see would not see that far ahead.
She may be crazy as a fox, but she is still quite mad, you know.
Well, I hadn't thought of it that way, but you may just be right.
I saw Pirro on Fox the other day, talking about running. My first thought was "She's going to call Hillary out." She can force her to speak to more reporters, which she hasn't done and didn't do in 2000.
Besides, it's like a Freeper dream: an actual prosecutor after Hillary Clinton!
You forgot the vote fraud downstate.
Single issue politics is not the way to go...rather we need to look at all the issues and find someone that, over all, best represents our way of thinking.
excellent analysis..cogent...right on all points..
Media polls are generally liberal campaign related. How does this further that cause?
I made no such claim; I said that Hillary bowing out could very well be the only thing that could save her political career. ....for the time being.
i'm waiting for the report that suggests all the "ums" and "you knows" shrillary blurts is a sign of superior thought faculties
lol...yup, and Hillary's worst nightmare. This should fun. ...while it lasts.
I think Pirro can beat her; sooner or later, somebody is going to ask Hillary is she's going to serve the entire six years if she wins, don't you think?
I seriously doubt even the Clintons believe they can run the "The people of Arkansas (read New York) want me to run for president" ruse again.
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