Harris Poll: Thompson Pulls Ahead Of Giuliani
A new Harris poll suggests two trends (if these are indeed echoed in other polls): former Senator and actor Fred Thompson has now pulled ahead of former Mayor Rudy Giuliani (showing a still fluid GOP race) and Senator Hillary Clinton continues to be ahead among Democratic voters (perhaps showing a consolidation of her status):
After officially declaring his candidacy, U.S. Senator Fred Thompson moves ahead of former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani in the race for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination. One-third (32%) of those who say they will vote in a Republican primary or caucus will vote for Thompson while 28 percent will vote for Giuliani.
Even though there’s always a margin of error, that shows more than a “dead heat.”
Much further back is John McCain, who continues his downward slide with 11 percent saying they would vote for the Arizona Senator, and 9 percent who say they would vote for former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney.
And then there’s this:
On the Democratic side, Senator Hillary Clinton continues to build on her large lead. Just under half (46%) of those who would vote in a Democratic primary or caucus would vote for the former First Lady while one-quarter (25%) would vote for Illinois Senator Barack Obama. Former vice president candidate and North Carolina Senator John Edwards is further back with 14 percent saying they would vote for him. No other candidate is in double digits.
Unless she seriously shoots herself in the foot or flubs, this suggests she is solidifying her support among a large chunk of Democratic voters.
Meanwhile the poll found an interesting generational aspect that indicates some candidates have younger supporters (voters who are less likely to vote) and some older supporters (voters who are more likely to vote).
On the Democratic side, Senator Obama does better than Senator Clinton among Echo Boomers (those aged 18 to 29). While 42 percent of this youngest generation will vote for him, 37 percent will vote for her. However, in the age group that is most likely to actually vote, Matures (those 61 and older), Senator Clinton leads Senator Obama by a very wide margin (56% versus 16%). In fact, one in five Matures (21%) will vote for John Edwards, so he is ahead of Senator Obama as well in this key age group.
On the Republican side a similar difference occurs. One-third (33%) of both Echo Boomers and Generation Xers (30 to 41) will vote for Rudy Giuliani while Fred Thompson garners just 8 percent and 22 percent of these generations respectively. But, again among those generations more likely to vote, Fred Thompson is ahead. It is close among Baby Boomers (those aged 42 to 60) as one-third (33%) of this generation will vote for Giuliani and 37 percent will vote for Thompson. Among Matures, the lead is greater – 44 percent will vote for Thompson and 16 percent will vote for Giuliani. Interestingly, one in five (20%) of the youngest generation, Echo Boomers, say they will vote for the oldest candidate, John McCain.
Bottom line: The race is now more fluid on the Republican side and it’s possible the race can go down to the wire. The race is more stable on the Democratic side — suggesting that the Democrats are likely to be able to rally around their candidate much earlier than the Republicans.
7 Responses to “Harris Poll: Thompson Pulls Ahead Of Giuliani”
[...] The Moderate Voice says: Bottom line: The race is now more fluid on the Republican side and it’s possible the race can go down to the wire. The race is more stable on the Democratic side — suggesting that the Democrats are likely to be able to rally around their candidate much earlier than the Republicans. [...]
As a Democrat, this is music to my ears. Fred Thompson will get destroyed by Clinton in a general election matchup. He’s an uninspired, uninspiring, vague, DC lobbyist. It’ll be fun here in Tennessee poking holes in him on his home turf…just like the Republicans did here to Al Gore. Rudy would have forced Hillary to play defense in places like PA and NJ. With Thompson, it’ll be Bush-redux in the Northeast (zero support) and Hillary will trot out her husband in Arkansas, Ohio, Missouri and in the Southwest.
Hmmm… interesting. I don’t think any of the Republicans are inspirational enough to get people to register to vote and then vote for them. Whereas I think both Obama and Clinton are energizing enough to get people to sign up and then vote for them. What I mean by “energizing” is that this is the first time we have a real opportunity to elect either a woman or African American as President- truy a change from white men.
So I think the other component is which candidate is inspirational (or energizing) enough to get new blocks of people out to vote? If Obama is energizing enough to get the Echo Generation out to vote then he could win. My Mom (who falls into the “Elder” category- the category most likely to vote- and she has voted in every election since the Revolutionary War…) is talking about sitting this election out because she is fed up with the way the country is. So perhaps those youngest people, who traditionally don’t vote will be energized by this race and vote for a change.
I believe a lot of African Americans won’t vote for Obama because they feel that he could never win because he’s black….
As far as Thompson being ahead of Giuliani- well isn’t that special…. The Republicans need a leader and each of the current candidates leave something a large part of the Republican base cold.
While it seems that the Dems are pretty happy with their choices and can rally around the person they support, the republicans are wishy-wshy about their candidates and if someone better than the person they are currently supporting comes along, they;ll defect to support that person. Thomson’s enough of a novelty (and unknown) for Republicans who aren’t entirely happy with their current “first choice” to flock to.
But once the general election is here and it’s Dem vs. Rep., then the Rep. candidate will get a lot of support and bash whoever the Dem. We all know that Hillary will fight back as hard as possible against what is sure to be the relentless Rep. smearing of her.
I made a comment on TMV a few days ago that I thought a lot of Thompson’s comments on various issues were so broad and no one could disagree with them. That’s where his support is coming from- people read into his comments whatever they want. He tries to be folksy (like Bush) but there really is no substance to him.
What this says to me is that for all the talk from Democrats about being the party of change, establishment types are in control of the party. Why else the surge in support for Hillary, who was one of the strongest Democratic supporters of the war in 2002-2003?
Gotta agree with Elrod- even big bucks GOP backers are not crazy about Thompson-he’s missed meeting fund-raising goals, and potential allies like James Dobson and Bob Novak have deemed his candidacy a dud.
Giuliani has the best chance to defeat Clinton, and has actual charisma and national security cred. Thompson is mainly running because Tennessee Republicans Howard Baker and Bill Frist recruited him, not because he has any great vision for the country.
He will only get the votes of registered Republicans. Given the study which came out earlier in the week stating that fewer voters are identifying themselves as Republican, that would not be enough. It may be important to Republicans that a conservative run, but it should not be all they care about, either.
Clinton, Obama or even Edwards could easily defeat Thompson.
Nick: concerning your question about Hillary’s support despite her vote for the war- I was against the war from teh beginnning, I thought Bush was lying to us and he had a motive to. I believed that if the war really would be as “slam-dunk” as Bush claimed then the argument for the war should easily stand on its own merits. However Bush did not let the UN weapons inspectors finish their job, he asked us to trust him because when we won the war and in the country he would be able to find the WMDs (but he could offer no evidence of their existence, just saying the evidence was classified) and he discredited his critics.
So I can forgive Hillary, She has since explained why she voted to give Bush authorization. I think it was a calculation on her part… I’m still not happy that she supported it, but what’s more important is where she stands today. I think HIllary’s evolution on the war follows that of the general American public (most Americans were for the war, too). So the Dems, I think, understand her yes vote against her. War is horrible and we have gone through a lot these last five years (Bush started his push for the war in 2002). The American public has gone through a long reckoning process and so has Hillary. They can relate to her on that point. I could see how many people who were for the war back then but are now against it would support Hillary over an anti-war candidate.
StockBoySF,
Hillary Clinton and George W. Bush may currently be at odds with one another with regards to whether we stay in Iraq, but there is one thing the two of them have in common: employing a revisionist view of history in order to justify their decisions in 2002-2003.
You argue that Hillary Clinton “has since explained why she voted to give Bush authorization.” However, the truth of the matter is that Hillary Clinton continues to mislead the American people about her position in 2002-2003. The way she tells it now, she agreed in 2002 with granting George W. Bush the power of waving the big stick in order to get Saddam Hussein to comply with weapons inspections, and that she didn’t actually support Bush invading Iraq without the support from the international community.
However, as recently as March 6, 2003 (a mere two weeks before the invasion of Iraq), Hillary Clinton stated to Code Pink (a left-wing organization) that she whole-heartedly supported the invasion of Iraq and that having the backing of the international community was not necessary. The entire conversation was caught on video and was the subject of one of my earlier posts.
Hillary Clinton, like George W. Bush, is being dishonest about her reasons for supporting the 2002 Iraq War resolution and conveniently revising her 2002-2003 views. That alone, is a reason for opposing her candidacy for presidents.
In terms of honesty and standing up for the courage of their convictions, Democrats could surely do better than Ms. Clinton.