Is it a sign that direct and apparent “surrogate” attacks from New York Senator Hillary Clinton’s camp have backfired? Perhaps…
Two new polls bring continued good news for Illinois Senator Barack Obama in his campaign to get the 2008 Democratic Presidential nomination — and no-so-good news for Clinton.
And the CONTEXT of these polls is important. As Clinton continues to suffer bad press due to the “mistakes” some close to her campaign have made in somehow slipping and bringing up allegations about Obama’s youthful drug use and several times stressing family ties to Muslims, Obama’s image in the press and elsewhere seems to be steadily on the ascent. (Note the Cagle Cartoon above…as just one example).
Trending is important in polling. And while Clinton could win on primary election days, at this point the polls are painting the portrait of a candidate who is anything but inevitable and arguably a difficult sell in an election. One poll (see below) has several GOPers beating her in a general election.
POLL #1: A USA TODAY/Gallup Poll finds Obama is coming on strong in New Hampshire and is now tied with Clinton:
Democratic presidential hopefuls Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama are locked in a dead heat among New Hampshire voters in a statewide USA TODAY/Gallup Poll, underscoring the volatility of the race less than three weeks before the nation’s first primary.
Among Republicans, Mitt Romney’s lead has narrowed to single digits over John McCain, who hopes to repeat the victory here that ignited his presidential campaign in 2000.
The survey’s fundamental finding is uncertainty: More than four of 10 voters in each party say they may change their minds before the Jan. 8 primary. That fluidity could magnify the impact of late-breaking news, last-minute gaffes and the Iowa caucuses that will open the presidential season five days earlier.
“People are just taking a hard look at this point,” says Jim Hardy, sheriff of Hillsborough County and a McCain supporter who is greeting voters at a campaign town hall with the Arizona senator at Pelham High School on Wednesday night.
At best, this shows some wavering among Clinton’s previous support. At worst, it would indicate that New Hampshire voters — who are usually highly-independent — may indeed be concluding (as some have suggested) that they don’t like the “politics as usual” image now coming from the Clinton camp.
Keep in mind that Clinton was on the ascent or at least holding steady until her camp and her husband went on the offensive against Obama — an offensive not always based on criticism of policies but veering into personal areas (and sometimes inaccurately-portrayed personal areas).
POLL #2: A new Zogby poll shows Obama would be the hardest candidate for GOPers to defeat and that Clinton would lose to several Republicans. Some excerpts:
Illinois Sen. Barack Obama would defeat all five of the top Republicans in prospective general election contests, performing better than either of his two top rivals, a new Zogby telephone poll shows.
His margins of advantage range from a 4 percent edge over Arizona Sen. John McCain and a 5 percent edge over Arkansas’ Mike Huckabee to an 18 percentage point lead over Mitt Romney of Massachusetts, the survey shows. Against New York’s Rudy Giuliani he leads by 9%, and against Fred Thompson of Tennessee he holds a 16 point edge.
Clinton has improved her performance in this poll:
Democrat Hillary Clinton of New York would defeat Romney by a narrow 46% to 44% margin and Thompson by a 48% to 42% margin. She would lose to Huckabee 48% to 43%,to Giuliani 46% to 42%, and to McCain by a 49% to 42% margin . The data suggest that Clinton has improved her position slightly. A November Zogby Interactive poll showed her losing by small margins to all five of the top GOP candidate.
What does all of this suggest?
It suggests that the presidential races on both the Democratic and Republican sides are more wide-open than ever — perhaps more so than in any year in recent history.
See-saw mainstream (and media) coverage may proclaim X, Y or Z the front-runner, but the situation could change on a dime.
There is no “inevitable” candidate at this point — and everyone running has, to a certain extent, an ‘electability” issue.
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.