Posted on 06/19/2007 6:52:38 AM PDT by Neville72
There’s change at the top in the race for the Republican Presidential nomination.
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds former Tennessee Senator Fred Thompson earning support from 28% of Likely Republican Primary Voters. Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani attracts support from 27%. While Thompson’s one-point edge is statistically insignificant, it is the first time all year that anybody but Giuliani has been on top in Rasmussen Reports polling. A week ago, Thompson and Giuliani were tied at 24%.
It remains an open question as to how Thompson will hold up once he actually enters the campaign and has to compete directly with other candidates. To date, he retains the allure of the new kid in town while GOP voters already know the things they don’t like about the others. Still, Thompson’s rise to the top provides a telling measure of how the other GOP hopefuls have failed to capture the imagination of the party they hope to lead.
Once gain this week, Arizona Senator John McCain and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney are tied for a distant third. This week, both men attract 10% support. Last week, they were both at the 11% level of support. For McCain, this is a continuation of a downward trend. For Romney, it reflects a fairly steady position. Romney is doing well in selected state polls but has been unable to gain much traction and expand his support nationwide.
Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee and Kansas Senator Sam Brownback are each the top choice for 2% of the likely voters.
The combined total for five other candidates in the race is just under 3%. Those candidates are Congressman Ron Paul, Congressman Tom Tancredo, former Governor Tommy Thompson, Congressman Duncan Hunter, and former Governor Jim Gilmore. Eighteen percent (18%) say they’re not sure how they will vote.
This is the first Rasmussen Reports poll to exclude former House Speaker Newt Gingrich as a candidate. Gingrich earned 7% support in last week’s polling but has recently made statements indicating he is not likely to enter the 2008 race as candidate.
Giuliani remains the most well-liked candidate in either party. He is viewed favorably by 82% of Republicans nationwide and unfavorably by 15%. Thompson, not as well known, is the only other candidate with so few Republicans holding an unfavorable opinion of him. The actor turned Senator turned actor again is viewed favorably by 59% of Republicans and unfavorably by 14%.
Among Republicans, Romney and McCain both have lower favorables and higher unfavorables than the frontrunners. For Romney, those GOP numbers are 56% favorable and 28% unfavorable. McCain, among the nation’s best known political figures, is viewed favorably by 55% of Republicans and unfavorably by 40%.
While Giuliani is well liked, only 21% of Republicans view him as politically conservative. Twice as many, 42%, believe that Thompson is politically conservative.
Rasmussen Reports releases updated polling data on the Republican nominating contest every Tuesday. Results for the Democrats are updated on Mondays. The current survey is based upon national telephone interviews with 618 Likely Republican Primary Voters conducted June 11-14, 2007. The margin of sampling error is +/- 4 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. The Rasmussen Reports sample includes not only Republicans, but also independents who say they are likely to vote in a Republican Primary.
In some states, independent voters are allowed to participate in Republican primaries. In others, only Republicans can participate. Among Republicans only in the current poll, it’s Thompson 29% Giuliani 24% Romney 11% and McCain 10%.
McCain’s recent decline in the polls has been tied closely to his support for the unpopular immigration reform bill. A Rasmussen Reports analysis of what happened to the McCain campaign noted that the man once considered a maverick is now the candidate most closely aligned with President Bush on two hot-button issues—the War in Iraq and immigration. That linkage is problematic when just 27% of voters nationwide say the President is doing a good or excellent job handling the situation in Iraq and only 15% give him favorable reviews on the immigration issue.
Rasmussen Reports continuously updates general election match-ups and other measures for all Republican and Democratic Presidential candidates. Also regularly updated are favorability ratings for Members of Congress, Other Political Figures, and Journalists along with public attitudes towards Congress, the War on Terror, and other topics.
The ones they play at PSU frat parties, I suppose.
You get the yokels in Happy Valley drunk enough, they'll dance to anything.
They produce some of the finest basket weavers in the country, as well.
No. I want to beat Hillary. If it means going with someone a bit to the left of me I’m ok with it.
Earlier in the thread someone wrote that Thompson is down 5 points on Hillary. He’s down 5.5 in the RCP average. The argument is that he is unknown and so his numbers may rise. Hillary has 50 percent unfavorables. So even with being relatively unknown, Thompson should be even with Hillary if half the electorate hates her. Maybe I’m wrong. I’ll concede that. But maybe I’m not. Clearly I’m outnumbered here, but there are plenty of people, Giuliani supporters, and supporters of other GOP candidates that share my view of Thompson. I just really hope we’re not throwing this away.
no, you are correct, that is my understanding as well.
Actually he did, a few weeks back in the Rasmussen poll. And he's inside the margin of error at the moment.
You ever been to State College, PA? What else are you going to do except watch the weather?
;)
My brother went there for his graduate work in the 90's
when you boil all that down, i am afraid what you are left with is the old “only Rudy can beat Hillary” line of crap and that has been discredited here long ago. the reason fred is doing as well as he is, before he has even entered the race, is the extreme dissatisfaction with the field of republican candidates. NO ONE is enthused about them. Fear of hillary will only do so much and it won’t get boots on the ground, and $$$$ contributed to a lackluster candidate who is only grudingly supported by people who are voting simply because they are terrified of a hillary win. that’s why rudy can’t win. that, and the fact that libs are going to vote for a dem, not dem-lite rudy.
i am from southwestern PA, almost everyone from my graduating class from HS went to either Penn State, Pitt or WVU. i didn’t apply to anywhere but Pitt, because i wanted no part of the boondocks : )
That's right. When presented with a choice between a Democrat acting like a Democrat and a Republican acting like a Democrat, the voters will select the real thing.
Looks like you outted him! LOL!
Spewing trollisms like “you must move leftward” are sure-fire signs of liberals.
They sure are persistent little varmints!
Vermints, or vermin? Either one works for me.
Actually, I typed “varmints.” I didn’t give it much thought and have no idea how it came to be part of my vocabulary as I can’t say that I’ve ever written it before. (I’m thinking maybe it came from watching the Beverly Hillbillys or something.) Anyway, Wikipedia’s description of vermin probably comes close to my intended application to liberals:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vermin
The term is also used as an extremely pejorative characterization of a particular class or group of people as inferior and subhuman, and often considered social parasites. Application of the term can be wide, having been applied over the centuries in different languages, to various groups, and its use is usually based on a perception that the target group’s views are “disease-like,” or that such groups exist out of sociological balance with the common society.
I misspelled varmints as vermints. Sorry...
You are correct. “Varmints” are the critters that live in my woods. They are best seen as road kill, or at some local eateries they may be referred to as the “Special of the Day”.
1) The candidates that have lost their run at the Presidency on the Republican ticket were—wait for it-— Not Southerners. the last two Democrat winners were, what? Southerners. History looks favorably on that region in prounoumcing who will be the next president of the United States. Bush 41 won, but his opponent was from MASS while he had Reagan’s coattails. In ‘92 Clinton beat him. I’m not saying only a Southerner can win, but I’d choose someone from the Mid-west as more likely to have the upset then a person from the northeast.
2) If the media has successfully painted the GOP as anti-Immigrant, then why is the ONLY area they score better then dems on Immigration? And why are the polls so against amnesty?
3) The voters the GOP lost in the last election are known as Reagan democrats. That is, CONSERVATIVES that left the DNC because they didn’t represent them but left the GOP now because the DNC ran candidates with conservative platforms while the GOP became liberal lite.
4) You state Rudy is better then Hillary, even if he’s a little to the left of you. Hillary’s record is comparable to Rudy’s, in all but maybe the war. So does that mean your beliefs in essence reflect that of Joe Leiberman’s? I’d praise you for that if you were a Dem, but on a republican ticket it is unacceptable to me. that position will not bring the Reagan Dems back.
Hmmm... below is the Wikipedia addition for “varmint.”
I guess it works too. Liberals doing great damage by trying to destroy conservatism.
(but that “subhuman” part of the vermin description did hit home, lol)
So you have no problem placing politics over principle? It used to be that the idea was to win in order to advance your principles. Now it seems that the idea is to retard your principles in order to win.
Giuliani may be a “bit to the left” of you, but he’s so far left of me that I can’t tell he’s there.
Great summation!
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