Posted on 11/13/2007 11:13:48 AM PST by pissant
The American electorate is a fickle mistress. Just ask former Sen. Fred Thompson (R-Tenn.).
When Thompson announced his candidacy for president just after Labor Day most national polls showed him running a close second behind former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and the majority of state polls had him in the top three.
No longer. Thompson's campaign has yet to take off as expected and voters -- especially in crucial early states like Iowa, New Hampshire and Florida.
The most recent data comes from New Hampshire where two surveys were released over the weekend. The first, conducted by theUniversity of New Hampshire for the Boston Globe, put Thompson in sixth (yes, SIXTH) place with just three percent of the vote. (Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney led the way with 32 percent.) In a Marist University poll Thompson again took sixth place with just five percent support. To be clear, Thompson was never a frontrunner in New Hampshire but polls conducted in the run-up to his announcement and just after he formally entered the race show him regularly polling in double digits.
Thompson's shrinking support is apparent in other early states as well. The last three polls taken in Iowa put Thompson in fourth, fifth and fourth place, respectively, and his high water mark in any of those surveys is 11 percent. In Florida, too, Thompson appears to be fading. A new poll conducted for the Miami Herald and St. Petersburg Times showed Thompson in fifth place (eight percent) behind Giuliani (36 percent), Romney (19 percent), Arizona Sen. John McCain (12 percent) and former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee (nine percent).
(Excerpt) Read more at blog.washingtonpost.com ...
Zheesh, if it’s a typo or a mistake it’s not like he hasn’t been pinged four times to say “Whoa! I didn’t mean that.”
Its sad that so many evangelicals support Huckabee because it is bad strategy since the fiscal conservatives won’t support him. However, I totally understand why they don’t like Thompson. Thompson basically took it forgranted that he had our support and then continually went out of his way to lose our support. First, he said that he didn’t go to much much or want to talk about his faith, then he said that he didn’t support the marriage amendment, then instead of trying to patch thing up with Dobson he said that he didn’t care to talk to him and didn’t march to anyone’s drum, then he refused to take a position on the Terri Schievo case, then he stated that he would not support the Human Life Amendment or legislation under the 14th Amendment to ban abortion, and finally he stated that he thought the Schievo case should have been left to the state courts (which killed her by depriving her of water) and said that he was upset that some people (us social conservatives) had “made a political football” out of the case. So, at the end of the day is it any surprise we don’t like Fred. He could hardly have done a better job of offending and alianating us if that was his goal.
All it means is that the Intrade contract is priced at 6 (which I believe is actually 60 cents).
***A contract priced at 6 translates to a 6% probability, per Intrade’s spiel. See, look below, once again, it says stuff like “ contract was trading at 63, meaning, traders gave him a 63% chance of being re-elected. “ You’re using the word, “means” — all it means. They’re using the same word with a different suffix — meaning. What it means. That is what it means.
Since our contracts trade between 0 and 100, you can think of the price at any time to be the percentage probability of that event occurring. Let’s go back to our George Bush example, on December 1, 2003 the George Bush re-election contract was trading at 63, meaning, traders gave him a 63% chance of being re-elected.
If you thought President Bush will be re-elected you would expect that price to go up - towards 100. In that case, if you bought one contract at 63 and Mr. Bush did get re-elected you would make the difference between your purchase price - 63 - and the closing price - 100 - or 37 points. How much profit would that be? Click here.
It’s important to realize that you don’t have to hold your contracts until the result of the event is decided - you can get out of your position at any time until the event is over. So if you change your mind about the outcome you can come back to the exchange, enter an order and close out your position, whether it’s for a profit or loss depends on you.
Like that makes a lot of sense.
Absolutely. And as soon as we get the fence in place we should look into it.
***Excellent answer.
Thompson is probably not a christian, and certainly has let it be known to Dobson that he “won’t dance to his tune”.
Are those your words, in bold?
Reagan Impressed even those who disagreed with him.
***I think Hunter impresses those who disagree with him. All they can fixate on is his name recognition. “Other than that” we keep hearing over and over. They’re just a bunch of wuss conservatives who give up too soon — Give Up Too Soon Cons, Pragmacons, CINOs, PragmaCINOs, etc.
Ok, I will bite. I would want to do more research before I would make a definitive statement. But the fact that Thompson seems to have given up meeting together with other Christians, is rumored to have led a wild life chasing women in between his marriages, seems to value federalism over life, and doesn’t talk publically about his faith all raise questions about whether he is truly a Christian.
Ok, I will bite. I would want to do more research before I would make a definitive statement. But the fact that Thompson seems to have given up meeting together with other Christians, is rumored to have led a wild life chasing women in between his marriages, seems to value federalism over life, and doesn’t talk publically about his faith all raise questions about whether he is truly a Christian.
You are willing to spend a lot of time and effort trashing a good and viable conservative candidate in order to attempt to prop up another good but nonviable candidate who has has had most of a year to achieve low, single digit numbers.
***If Hunter is nonviable, we’ll know soon enough. That’s what primaries are for. When was the last time there wasn’t a surprise in the primaries?
“Raise questions?”
What are your answers? And who are you to be giving those answers?
Probably a member of the Mittiac brigade at FR, sent in to create a stinky pile and smear it around to cover Mitt’s religious tracks.
The context of this is basically, where will the evangelical support land? It is not on whether Fred is a good guy or a christian or a 5 point Calvinist. That part doesn’t interest me. The fact that Dobson could not endorse Fred does interest me. If I called up Fred and asked some pointed moral questions, he wouldn’t bother to answer me. But the fact that Dobson would get the back of the hand treatment from Fred is telling, and this latest Huckabee bump is mostly from impatient evangelicals. Dobson should have endorsed a candidate a while ago but he’s chosen to wait until poll numbers come in (sounds familiar) and for that I’m disappointed in him.
I don’t think he values federalism over life if he voted for the partial birth abortion ban.
If he can drop roe v wade by appointing judges then I would hope congress could then pass a law banning most other abortions.
Yes. That’s what that whole brouhaha with Dobson was about, and that’s what the leaked email said, IIRC.
Do you know why Dobson would not endorse Fred? Can we trust that leaked memo to be a reflection of what Dobson thinks?
But is that your opinion? Fred is not a Christian?
I sure can. I believe Big Jim leaked it himself to force Freddie to rush up and kiss Big Jim's ring.
Didn't work.
Thompson is not a Christian?
***Correction: read what I actually wrote. Thompson is probably not a christian.
Source: Dobson’s leaked letter. This isn’t news.
Why don’t you ask me, since you’re busy distorting what I wrote.
I don’t view myself as qualified to completely answer your question since I can’t read Fred’s heart. However, I think people like Dobson who have indicated that they don’t believe Fred to be a Christian have plenty of evidence that they can rely on. And I have been amused by the hysterical reaction by some Freepers to these statements.
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