If Sarah Palin does decide to make the leap and go for the 2012 Republican nomination, she’ll have her work cut out for her, according to a report in The Politico:
A new poll of New Hampshire voters is the latest in a string of surveys suggesting that if Sarah Palin chooses to run for president, she’ll struggle in the crucial early states.
The WMUR Granite State Poll released late Monday afternoon puts Palin close to the basement, trailing not just frontrunner Mitt Romney, but even the little-known former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty. More daunting: She’s viewed unfavorably by a full 50 percent of likely Republican primary voters, compared to the 33 percent who view her favorably.
This is not the kind of obstacle that’s easy to overcome. And what’s the likely reason – she’s down so low that she can see Santa Claus from her poll position? Read on:
“If Palin wants to win here, and she’ll have to to get the nomination, she’ll have to focus completely on fiscal issues,” speculated University of New Hampshire pollster Andrew Smith, who conducted the Granite State poll. “And there’s no reason to think that would be enough — as the only ‘Republican’ less popular than her is the Donald.”
Veterans of presidential politics typically dismiss early national polling, in which Palin is, on average, running third behind Romney and Huckabee. But the participants in the 2012 race are keeping a close eye on the polls in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina—since they play a key role in shaping the presidential contest—and in all of them, Palin’s numbers are underwhelming.
In New Hampshire—a state she’s avoided and where even her boosters see her as a bad fit—Palin’s performance is especially weak.
The data suggests that, for all the press coverage she receives, Palin is not the GOP’s frontrunner by any empirical standard. Republican primary voters may share along with Palin a common contempt for liberals and the news media, but so far that’s not translating into actually support for her as a presidential candidate.
So what could the factor be that would explain this low poll number plus the other low ones that have been associated in recent weeks with her name?
“If Palin wants to win here, and she’ll have to to get the nomination, she’ll have to focus completely on fiscal issues,” speculated University of New Hampshire pollster Andrew Smith, who conducted the Granite State poll. “And there’s no reason to think that would be enough — as the only ‘Republican’ less popular than her is the Donald.”
Veterans of presidential politics typically dismiss early national polling, in which Palin is, on average, running third behind Romney and Huckabee. But the participants in the 2012 race are keeping a close eye on the polls in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina—since they play a key role in shaping the presidential contest—and in all of them, Palin’s numbers are underwhelming.
In New Hampshire—a state she’s avoided and where even her boosters see her as a bad fit—Palin’s performance is especially weak.
The data suggests that, for all the press coverage she receives, Palin is not the GOP’s frontrunner by any empirical standard. Republican primary voters may share along with Palin a common contempt for liberals and the news media, but so far that’s not translating into actually support for her as a presidential candidate.
The bottom line is that all the bloggers, Rush Limbaugh riffs, Glenn Beck comments, and CYA praise of Palin may not be enough to successfully woo enough voters in primaries where she’ll have to go beyond Facebook, Sean Hannity p.r. pieces interviews, and snarky zingers.
Stay tuned — because that is where polls suggest Palin may have her future: on TV, not in the White House.
But things could change. If she starts to appear as a more serious, substantive candidate. (As my grandmother used to say: “If I had wheels, I’d be a trolley car.”)
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.