Posted on 01/13/2008 5:43:00 PM PST by freespirited
This weekend, CNN released results of general election trial heats, pitting each of the four leading Republican candidates for President against both of the leading Democrats.
The unmistakable message from this national exercise (surveying 840 voters on January 9 and 10th) is that Mitt Romney unequivocally qualifies as the weakest candidate the G.O.P. could field.
In the head-to-head contest with Barack Obama he is utterly wiped out, losing by a margin of 22 points (59% to 37%). Against Hillary Clinton, Romney fares little better, falling 18 percentage points behind (58% to 40%).
The results for other candidates show that this is a Romney problem, not a Republican problem.
John McCain, for instance, virtually ties both Obama and Clinton running 48%-49% against Obama and 48%-50% against Clinton. In other words, in a trial heat against Barack Obama, Senator McCain runs a startling 21 points closer than does Governor Romney.
Even Mike Huckabee (despite remaining virtually unknown to many Americans) draws slightly stronger support than Romney running 3 points closer to Obama and 4 points closer to Clinton.
After spending more money than his major opponents combined, Romney appears more and more clearly unelectable, and a Saturday column by Gail Collins in the New York Times gives a clear explanation why. Unfortunately, theres something about Romneys perfect grooming, his malleability and his gee-whiz aura that seems to really irritate both the other candidates and the voters, she writes. What bothers voters about Romney, as it turns out, is not his Mormonism but his inherent Mitt-ness.
Shes right, of course. As Ive said repeatedly over the last several weeks, the problem for Romney isnt his faith, its his phoniness. Its even worse to see that in-authenticity combined with an all-too-visible mean and nasty streak in going after his rivals.
I know many good people and committed conservatives who say they like Romney and insist, despite his back-to-back losses against flawed candidates in Iowa and New Hampshire, that hed still be the strongest Republican in November.
How then, do they explain his devastatingly poor performance in the latest trial heats a performance that corresponds to his similarly feeble showing in prior polls (particularly against Obama) conducted by Rasmussen, USA Today/Gallup, and Zogby?
With key primaries coming up in Michigan and South Carolina, support for Romney would seem to indicate a powerful and problematic Republican death wish.
I think the whole Presidential field of candidates is pretty lame if not scarily bad or disastrous.
In this whole country of almost 300 million people, don’t we have more people qualified to run than this circus of so so’s?
Menance Kookyspinich? Why wasn’t he laughed out of the race a million years ago? Where did he ever get the weird that he could actually be President? Jon Carry? Al Bore?
Geeesh. Fred Thompson seems like one of the few real people running, and he ain’t gonna make it.
I’m depressed for our future and the future of Western civilization.
Okay, what is your solution to that problem?
Vote for a weak candidate.
Some of us have been saying this for a long time. He would be our John Kerry. Too many things to nail him on in his record of flip-flops. U.S. Army Retired |
New Zealand is nice too.
The whole entire primary is wide open and as you can tell by post on FR everyone has their own guy.
To say the Republican party is fractured is an understatement. Republicans are hard headed enough to doggedly promote their guy and their guy only---but once that gets weeded out people are going to have to make a choice one way or another.
I believe that the fact they have done this poll dead in the middle of the primary makes it utterly useless in determining anything other than propaganda.
Hillary Clinton actually beats Barack Obama right now in the polls.
Oh wait, you say, that’s not fair, because she’s a democrat.
Yep. So McCain polls better in the general election against a left-wing opponent than a conservative does? It makes sense, he gets a lot of independents saying they will vote for him.
I’ll admit that — McCain polls very well in general election matchups. Question is, do we settle for McCain because he wins easily, or do we push a conservative and do the work to win by a percentage point.
Did they even include Thompson on this poll? I know the Survey USA folks have not been doing side-by-sides with Thompson for a month or two now.
I guess this makes Medved happy.
CNN released ......blah, blah, blah. No point in reading any further.
They could report a universally known truth and it wouldn’t matter.
They have absolutely NO credibility, none, zero, zip.
I think I’ll go watch a movie....
When are the Mitt Wit's going to comprehend that fact?
Pure unadulterated bs!
It’s pure ignorance. Mormons are the most decent, hard working, dedicated, workers and Romney will be a very very good president. As I Christian, I don’t agree with his theology but nor do I agree other Christians, so let’s leave that for the Lord to judge.
So, you would be OK with a fundamentalist Muslim running for president of the US? For the most part, at least in the US, they are hard working, dedicated workers.
I have listened to Medved for several years and have been really disappointed in him of late. His mean-spiritedness toward Romney is just about more than I can take. I haven’t yet made a decision on the primary on the 5th but Medved’s snide nastiness doesn’t help me. I find Huckabee smarmy and phony but Medved seems to like him. What am I missing?
the polsters of course were homosexual nazis in favor of open borders.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.