Posted on 01/07/2011 9:36:58 AM PST by SeekAndFind
It will be more than a year before New Hampshire voters trudge to the polls for the first primary in the nation, but the New Hampshire Journal feels it’s just the right time to take the Granite State temperature on the Republican field. As expected, Mitt Romney from neighboring Massachusetts takes the early lead in the poll, but perhaps the extent of that lead will provide a mild surprise. Romney leads Sarah Palin by 23 points, and Mike Huckabee is the only other candidate in double digits:
Former Mass. Gov. Mitt Romney holds a commanding lead in New Hampshire in the early stages of the race for the 2012 Republican Presidential nomination, according to a new survey commissioned by NH Journal and conducted by Magellan Strategies. The survey is the first statewide survey of Granite State Republicans and Republican-leaning independents in 2011.
Romney leads former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin by 23 points, with Romney earning 39% and Palin earning 16%. Mike Huckabee (10%), Newt Gingrich (8%), Texas Congressman Ron Paul (7%), former MN Gov. Tim Pawlenty (4%), Rick Santorum (3%) and MS Gov. Haley Barbour (1%) all trail significantly behind. Romney finished second to Sen. john McCain in the 2008 New Hampshire Republican Presidential primary.
Palin, however, has a strong base of popularity in New Hampshire, which indicates that she has room to grow if she chooses to run:
Despite her ballot position, Palin is very popular with Republican voters. 59% view her favorably while 31% have an unfavorable view of her. More Independents (50%) have a favorable view of her than and unfavorable view (41%). This data reflects Independent voters who say they are likely to vote in the Republican presidential primary.
Two-thirds of the respondents in this poll are independents, who can vote in either the Republican or Democratic primary (but not in both). All of the independent respondents in this poll stated that they will vote in the GOP primary, which makes sense, as Barack Obama will likely not face a serious primary challenger in 2012. That means the action will be with the Republicans, and the importance of the independent vote will increase accordingly.
Will that water down conservative impact on the choice in New Hampshire? In NHJ’s model, at least, the answer appears to be no. Eighty-one percent of all respondents described themselves as “conservative,” and 54% as “very conservative.” Sixty percent described themselves as conservatives on social issues “such as same sex marriage and abortion,” and 46% as “very conservative.”
Again, this is very early, but New Hampshire will get a lot of attention in the next year. Romney was expected to win in NH in 2008 but ended up losing to John McCain, and the nomination slipped away from him. Palin has yet to publicly state her interest in the race, but if she does decide to run this year, we’ll know it when Palin starts spending time in the Granite State. Mike Huckabee’s positives in the state are almost as high as Palin’s (55/27), but he is probably counting more on Iowa than New Hampshire. Everyone else is in serious dark-horse territory, but then again, we probably haven’t seen all of the Republican candidates yet, either.
Update: Two corrections; first, the lead is 23 points, not 26 as I originally wrote, and Romney came up short in 2008, not “last year”. Caffeine shortage strikes again!
This means very little. If Sarah comes in a strong second in this state and first in other states, the primaries will be all but over.
BOHICA?
I do kinda hate the fact that by the time the primaries get to Texas the nominee has been chosen most times.
Mitt Romney, who created state-run healthcare in Massachussetts, is supposed to be different from Obama....how?
I posted this before when this was posteed earlier.
B*llsh!t poll... will not give us much in the way of internals but what they do say proves this is a manufactured poll... not a poll of republicans but of any home that holds a registered independent or republican... no random calling... hand picked phone numbers... no mention how many of each or whether they talked to the registered voter or a dope smoking teenager answering the phone.
Also see the data that they do give, does not jive with their own polling interpretations. The poll also references romney’s weaknesses and state that they are big negatives... This is why the debates will destroy 99% of all of these wannabes... willard will not survive reminding the voters of who and what he is... he is the MOST target rich candidate... plus the groups that they claim that support him the most are the very groups that despise him for all that he is and has done.
I went and searched for info on Magellan polling... the company that did this poll... surprise... it is owned and operated and funded by the RNC. The dims have attacked them as a republican party PR firm. These days... that means it is as big of an enemy propaganda machine as the media is for the dims. Here is a bit from daily kos:
“”Magellan Polls” a GOP Front for Bob Ehrlich Share14 1by justdafacts Wed Jul 07, 2010 at 10:27:56 PM PST
Magellan Strategies, the firm behind the “poll” claiming Bob Ehrlich leads Gov. O’Malley, is not a legitimate pollster. In fact, they’re not pollsters at all.
Instead, they’re a Republican consulting firm on the payroll of the Republican National Committee and Americans for Prosperity that publishes polls tailor made to boost Republican candidates. Their tagline is,”Magellan Strategies Helping Republicans Win Elections.””
Nothing but a machine polling propaganda outlet, designed to push rinoid party hacks, inside the beltway, blue blood, limo riding, elitist, socialist repubic candidates! I also found that Flaherty has worked for romney... gee that is a surprise... his bio states that he is soley owned and operated by the RNC... how many of you believe anything out of the RNC? He is an RNC employee and liberal republican party hack elite!
“Despite her ballot position, Palin is very popular with Republican voters. 59% view her favorably while 31% have an unfavorable view of her. More Independents (50%) have a favorable view of her than and unfavorable view (41%). This data reflects Independent voters who say they are likely to vote in the Republican presidential primary.
Romney APPEARS popular with all subgroups of the Republican electorate. Large percentages of seniors (76%), social conservatives (76%) and fiscal conservatives (76%) hold favorable views of him. Romney has struggled with social issues, such as ABORTION, in the past and many conservative pundits have speculated that HIS HEALTH CARE PLAN in Massachusetts could cause PROBLEMS for him on the right. Nevertheless, Granite State Republicans are very comfortable with him as the presidential campaign season officially opens.
Huckbee and Pawlenty are also viewed substantially more favorably than not. Gingrich, Santorum and Barbour have relatively higher unfavorable ratings.
In a memo released about the survey, Magellan pollster David Flaherty stated, “This survey is a very early measurement of the potential 2012 Republican Presidential primary field. Mitt Romney’s strength is not surprising considering his close second place finish to John McCain in 2008 and his regional advantage of being a former border state Governor. Many political observers have commented on the “late” start of the 2012 Presidential primary campaign in comparison to the 2008 Presidential primary. We agree with this observation, and view the survey results as an “uninformed” snapshot of likely New Hampshire Republican Presidential primary voter opinion.”
The survey was conducted on Tuesday, January 4th from 6:00 to 8:00pm using automated telephone calls to a sample of 1,451 voters randomly drawn from a New Hampshire voter file among households containing at least one registered Republican or independent voter. Independent voters were screened for their intention to vote in the 2012 Republican Presidential primary. The response data was weighted to reflect past Republican primary voting demographics from the 2008 Republican Presidential primary election. Three attempts were made to interview each household in the sample. This survey has a margin of error of 2.57% at the 95 percent confidence interval.”
LLS
Isn’t the GOP switching up the primary system this time around to make it more fair for all states? I know they had a plan for that but don’t know if it was adopted.
Exactly. ObamaCare = RomneyCare, V.2
Big deal,New Hampshire is too small to circumcise.
Let the real states like Texas determine the candidate.
I’m not saying I want NH nuked, daisycut, or anything like that, but I sure as Hell wish they would just go the eff away!
I think you just might be right.
I will never again vote for one of the Northeast Bluebloods. We have had enough of that over the past 100-125 years. If they were not born there they were educated there.
Never again.
I know it tweaks some people, but if Romney wins the GOP nomination I’m not going to vote for him. Maybe I’ll write in Sarah Palin, but I absolutely will not vote for ‘the lesser of two evils’. The Good Old Boys who run the GOP have GOT to get in through their elitist and thick skulls that some of us are NOT going to vote for who they tell us to vote for. They’re supposed to SUPPORT who WE vote for!
The Good Old Boys’ opposition to Tea Party candidates this last election cycle has left me wanting to see the GOP cleansed of this evil bunch of Janissaries. On the upside, a lot of real conservatives are standing up to them as they compromise on gays at the CPAC conference. Maybe by 2012 they’ll get the message.
Uh, yeah.
We are letting a blue lib state have a huge impact on our nominee every time. Now I know why the media loves the New Hampshire thing. What a bunch of libs up there. How’d McCain work out for you New Hampshire?
I just read the numbers. Sarah is the best of the rest in NH. Sounds to me as though that is the story.
Okay, it’s the state next door. It’s an hour or so from his place to Nashua. He can pretty much campaign there at will when he’s in town. And he still can’t break fifty percent? Really, guys?
Yeah, right.
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