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Obama gets a bounce while Democrats avoid too much negativity (not Republicans)

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Taniel
on January 5, 2008
in NH-Dem and NH-GOP
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Post-Iowa data is starting to come in and the biggest poll news today is Rasmussen’s survey of New Hampshire with the biggest Obama lead we have seen yet all year in any NH poll:

  • Barack Obama comes in with 37%, followed by Clinton’s 27%. Edwards gets 19% — so Clinton is now closer to third-place than to first in this survey.
  • Among Republicans, McCain has the lead: 31% to 26%. But the huge surprise is Ron Paul’s 14%, the highest number he has reached yet, and putting him third ahead of Huckabee at 11% and Giuliani at 8%.

The last Rasmussen poll was released on December 19th and had Clinton up 31% to 28%. How much of this is due to an immediate bounce that will fade as days go by? After all, there is only 5 days between Iowa and New Hampshire which leaves very little time for Clinton to work against Obama’s momentum, even less time than Howard Dean had 4 years ago. Meanwhile Suffolk and Zogby updated their tracking polls today with the first numbers that are — partly — taken after the caucuses. Movements here are much smaller but keep in mind only a part of the sample was polled after Iowa:

  • Zogby has the Democratic race slightly tightening, with Clinton ahead of Obama 32% to 28% with Edwards at 20%. Richardson gets 7%. Yesterday, it was 32-26 for Clinton.
  • Among Republicans, the race is tightening as well. Yesterday, McCain led 34% to 30%, with Huckabee at 10% and Giuliani at 9%. Today, McCain gets 32% and Romney 30%, with Huckabee at 12%.

Now, the Zogby poll was taken January 2nd to 4th, and Zogby says only 20% of the sample was polled after the caucuses. Zogby added that among the 100 people polled on the 4th, Obama was up 8% and Clinton down 4% — but those numbers obviously have a gigantic margin of error so we’ll have to wait a big longer to know how much of a bounce Zogby is measuring.

Meanwhile, Suffolk is a better indicator today because it’s a two-day tracking poll and half of its sample was polled post-Iowa. And Obama is clearly getting a bounce here:

  • Clinton is now ahead of Obama 36% to 29%, with Edwards at 13%. This is the smallest margin Clinton has had all week. Yesterday, it was 37% to 25% in Clinton’s favor, with Edwards at 15%.
  • Among Republicans, however, there is no movement at all: Romney and McCain both gain a point, with Romney up 30% to 26%. Huckabee and Giuliani are tied at 11%.

We’ll have to wait for more data to measure what effect Iowa has had, of course, and the tracking polls of the coming days. For now, we have a few interesting news coming out of New Hampshire. For one, Fred Thompson is officially saying he is skipping New Hampshire. Stuck between 1% and 4% in the polls, Thompson has collapsed in the state for a few weeks now and he is trying to protect himself from possibly disastrous results — just as Giuliani tried to spin the 3% he got in Iowa on Thursday.

Second, Hillary Clinton has decided to not go negative at least in her advertisement. There was a lot of speculation that Clinton would start airing attack ads against Obama to make up some of the lost ground and wound the Illinois Senator who the Clinton campaign thinks is getting a pass from the press; but the Clintonites probably realized that 5 days of attacks ads is not enough to get a negative message to stick, and that they should have started earlier if they wanted to use such a strategy.

The Republicans, on the other hand, are not holding back as the McCain-Romney war is turning increasingly negative. Check out this flier Romney is mailing to NH households in which he blasts the Giuliani, McCain and Huckabee immigration plans. Another area in which Romney thinks McCain is vulnerable is taxes and McCain’s opposition to Bush’s first-term tax cuts. And Romney dared attack McCain on flip-flopping today (quite an audacious move given Romney’s own record): “I can’t quite understand the position he has — he voted to make them permanent, but if he could he would have voted against them one more time.”

McCain might find an ally in Huckabee, however, who might want to bury Romney even more to take out one of his toughest competitors. One of Huckabee’s top staffers, Ed Rollins, declared today: “We’re going to see if we can’t take Romney out. We like John. Nobody likes Romney.” It is actually fairly common to hear that rival campaigns detest Romney more than anyone else, so Romney is going to find it increasingly difficult to smoothly run his campaign with every other camp looking to destroy him. It’s unclear what Huckabee can do to hurt Romney in the run-up to Tuesday, but we could get our first clues tonight at the ABC debate if Huckabee runs to McCain’s rescue.

Baseline New Hampshire polls: Last set of pre-Iowa numbers

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Taniel
on January 4, 2008
in NH-Dem, NH-GOP and Nat-Pres
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Suffolk and Zogby released their two tracking polls from New Hampshire today, and both surveys were in the field prior to the Iowa results being announced. That will not be the case tomorrow, but today’s numbers are nonetheless useful: They provide us with a final pre-Iowa baseline that will give us a precise idea of just how much Obama (and perhaps Huckabee) got boosted after their caucus win. And don’t forget: New Hampshire is much easier to poll than Iowa.

  • In the Democratic race, Suffolk has Hillary maintaining her lead, 37% to Obama’s 25%. Edwards gets 15%. Yesterday, it was 39% to 23%.
  • Zogby has a tighter race: Clinton is at 32% to Obama’s 26%, with Edwards close behind at 20%.

  • Among Republicans, Suffolk has Romney taking the lead for the first time, up 29% to 25% (it was 29-25 for McCain yesterday), with Huckabee at 13% and Giuliani at 9%.
  • Zogby has close numbers as well, with McCain up 34% to 30%, with Huckabee at 10%, Giuliani at 9%. Zogby also showed Paul at 7% and Thompson at… 2%.

Remember the time that Clinton was up 20% or more in every New Hampshire poll? That was in October, and it basically meant that she could survive an Iowa stumble and still win New Hampshire — for a 20% meltdown in 5 days was hard to imagine. But she lost that edge way before Iowa voted and Obama has a much smaller deficit to make up. We will know tomorrow how much ground he has made up, and I would expect some big movement inthe coming days. The big unknown is how much — if at all — Edwards moves.

Among Republicans, it is striking that McCain took the lead for Romney before Iowa even voted, which is going to make things very difficult for Mitt in the coming days. As I said before, McCain has one good thing and one bad thing going for him: (1) He might not get as big a number of independents to vote him for as he would like given Obama’s new-found front-runner status, and (2) Giuliani’s meltdown (I believe he will not be invited to this week-end’s debate? though that has to be confirmed) means more votes for McCain.

Rudy Giuliani’s reaction to yesterday’s results is priceless, by the way. Asked to justify how he can remain viable with a 3% showing that puts him sixth, much closer to Duncan Hunter than he is to Ron Paul, Giuliani answered: “None of this worries me — Sept. 11, there were times I was worried.” Remember Joe Biden’s joke at the Philly debate? “There are only three things he makes in a sentence… A noun and a verb and 9/11.” Giuliani is becoming his own caricature in the past few days — and frankly he has nothing else to do given how far he is from the action and from the press right now, as no one is paying any attention to Florida where he is spending most of his time.

Meanwhile, Rasmussen has found that Barack Obama has opened up national leads against Giuliani and Romney. A month ago, Giuliani and Obama were tied at 43%. Today, Obama leads 47% to 37%. Obama leads Romney 45% to 39% (which is probably the first time Romney looks more competitive than Giuliani). Hillary Clinton has not been polled for a while (but we should expect numbers soon) so let’s avoid comparisons for now, but obviously very good news for Obama. And in the primary daily tracking poll done by Rasmussen, that can also be used as a baseline to see how things evolve in the coming Iowa days: It’s Hillary at 38%, Obama at 26%, Edwards at 18%. Among Republicans, McCain gets 18%, Romney 17%, Huckabee 16% and Giuliani 14%. Thompson is at 13%. We will look in the coming days to see whether there are significant changes.

Update: Add a third New Hampshire poll taken prior to the causes to the list of baseline numbers. This one is from ARG, and why many of you will probably be weary of trusting them because of their prediction of a 9% Clinton victory keep in mind that polling Iowa is a very difficult exercise and they clearly had underestimated the youth vote more than anything else. ARG is a New Hampshire based company and they are reputed to be much better in NH polling. This poll has been taken from Jan 1st to 3rd, so we will start getting post-Iowa results tomorrow:

  • Among Democrats, Hillary is barely ahead of Obama, 35% to 31% with Edwards at 15%.
  • Among Republicans, McCain has opened up his biggest lead yet, 35% to 25%. Huckabee is at 12%, Paul at 9% with Giuliani fifth at 8%. Thompson only gets 1% — very much in line with every other poll. Can Hunter beat Thompson?

The morning after, Democrats: We have a new favorite

Published
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Taniel
on January 4, 2008
in IA-Dem, NH-Dem and Nat-Dem
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The Democratic results might not have been a surprise considering the Obama campaign itself was predicting victory in the final days, but they upend the state of the race dramatically. Hillary Clinton was the inevitable front-runner all the way until the end of October; after the Philadelphia debate, she lost her inevitability but she was still favored to win it all. That is no more true; the roles have been reversed, and Barack Obama has to be anointed the new favorite to become the Democrat nominee.

The scenario that played out last night was Clinton’s nightmare: She came in third and Barack Obama came in first. The one comforting thought has to be that she managed to stay in a tie for second-place (only 7 delegates separate Edwards and her) but the press is loving the symbol of Clinton coming in third and is going to run with it for the next few days.

Yet, it is undeniable that something big happened last night. Turnout surpassed anyone’s expectations, even those of the most optimistic Obama aides. Nearly 240,000 Iowans went to caucus for Democrats which is nearly the double of what it was in 2004. Among the 57% who were first-time caucus goers, Obama demolished his adversaries: He got 41% to Clinton’s 29% and Edwards’s pale 18%. On the other hand, Edwards led among voters who had already caucused. Furthermore, and while Obama did win a huge share of independent voters (41%), they only comprised 20% of voters — much less than what some had predicted. Hillary Clinton cannot claim that Barack Obama won solely on the basis of his strength among non-Democrats, as the two were tied among registered Democrats. Obama appears to have won mostly because of a turnout surge among the youth who participated in much greater numbers. And a stunning 57% of the 17-29 year old crowd voted for Obama. This is what Howard Dean tried to pull off 4 years ago and failed miserably at.

As predicted, realignment played a huge role in the results — especially the Richardson-Obama deal. What is most puzzling is not that there was such a deal in the first place (there is ample documentation that Richardson voters did go massively for Obama last night and that precinct captains told them that those were the instruction), but why did Richardson and Obama keep it secret and the campaigns kept denying it? To avoid the press talking about it in what could undermine the purity of victory? Obama would have won without Richardson’s boost but his lead could have been smaller. And we’ve got to wonder about the ethics of not publicizing such a deal and repeatedly denying it.

A second observation about second-choice preferences is that they pushed Clinton into third-place. Entrance polls showed Edwards trailing Clinton by about 4-5% in raw votes, and he managed to narrowly pass her at the end. That conforms to a lot of anecdotal evidence across the state as observers reported that Clinton gained very few votes between the two rounds of counting and Edwards very often passed her in places where he was third in hte first round of counting.

What does this mean for the rest of the race? Clinton knows that early wins for Obama could make him invincible in the coming weeks, especially if the African-American vote in South Carolina flips in favor of Obama (it has been tied for most of the year). Clinton can hardly afford to wait until Florida where she cannot even campaign due to her pledge — though it will be interesting to see whether she is tempted to go back on her promise once Iowa and New Hampshire have voted — and has to get back on track in New Hampshire. Polls have Clinton up in New Hampshire by varying margins — anywhere between 4% and 15%, and we will see in the coming days just how much of a bounce Barack Obama gets.

And Clinton is working fast to move on from Iowa — and has started questioning the legitimacy of the caucus process. Her staff is murmuring that Iowa has never elected a woman in any gubernatorial and congressional election, which, to be fair, is a rather disturbing fact. And Hillary said today in New Hampshire: “You’re not disenfranchised if you work at night. You’re not disenfranchised if you’re not in the state.”

Don’t underestimate Clinton’s chances in New Hampshire. Given that Obama and Clinton were almost tied prior to Iowa, Obama has to be given a slight edge in the Granite State, but Clinton’s organization and network is much stronger here than it was in IA. Bill Clinton is very popular in the state and will be dispatched everywhere in the coming days — and she has many other surrogates. The big question now is how negative will Hillary Clinton go in NH; she had started to go down that route in December and then stopped. But she could have no other path at this point: Obama has got momentum, people are starting to see he is electable after all and a second loss could be near-fatal. And one mystery: What will happen in Michigan? With Dodd’s exit, Clinton is now the only candidate in the race. She’ll try to spin it as a “I stayed and was not afraid of the fight,” will anyone buy it?

The trouble for Clinton: Movement candidacies pick-up steam remarkably fast. Many high-profile Democrats such as Al Gore and Ted Kennedy might have been staying away from endorsing for fear of offending the likely nominee, but now that Hillary has been defeated once Obama could start seeing the tangible benefits of that. Money, of course, but such high-profile names could start lining up behind him. Obama’s victory in Iowa could make the rest of the campaign fundamentally different. And with Obama as the favorite, the spotlight is now turned on him — with everything good and bad that entails. More attention, people taking him more seriously… but also increased criticism and negative stories coming out.

And what this means for other candidates: John Edwards had a good showing. But let’s face it, he is toast. He put everything in the caucuses, and he would have won if turnout had been lower. But he is tied for second — and got less than he did in 2004. That said, it is undeniable that Edwards did great given that the press barely covered him for much of the year. That he remained competitive with Obama and Clinton despite the way the campaign was framed speaks to his resilience and his talent as a campaigner. But Edwards needed a win to remain viable. He has no real organization in later states and not that much money — and what next for him? Where does he go, and where does he win?

He is presenting himself as the underdog and the change agent who defeated the status quo, but he got a higher share of the vote among conservatives than among liberals; and as the white male of the race, he definitely attracted some of the status-quo vote. His speech last night meant that he is staying in the race — and he has been reframing it as an Obama-Edwards race now. Look at what he said today: “I am not the candidate of glitz; I am not the candidate of glamor. I am the candidate who will fight with every fiber of my being every step of the way.” But the more he stays in and is competitive, the better that is likely to be for Hillary Clinton as it gives her an opening to corner Obama.

Meanwhile, Joe Biden and Chris Dodd both dropped out. It is still unclear whether they are planning to endorse anyone but the results must have been disappointing for them. Biden apparently got about 5% at the entrance but less than 1% of the delegates. More than anything, this frees up a ton of endorsements: Chris Dodd especially had the backing of the prized firefighters union, and we’ll have to see where they go next. And Ted Kennedy was rumored to be reluctant to endorse anyone given his friendship with Dodd, so this could also liberate him. Keep in mind that Dodd grew into a whole new persona over the past few months and positioned himself to challenge Reid for Majority Leader at
some point in the future. And contrary to reports in the press, Mike Gravel is not pulling out.

Confusion reigns in Iowa (Updated)

Published
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Taniel
on January 3, 2008
in IA-Dem, NH-Dem and NH-GOP
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Confusion reigns in Iowa today as to whether the Obama and Biden campaigns are trying to strike a voter-exchange deal. The Washington Post, not known for engaging in unsubstantiated gossip, reported that the two camps were talking earlier today: Obama would get Biden supporters in districts where Biden is unviable, and the Delaware Senator would get some extra Obama voters in places where Obama has “spare voters” (the concept of which, by the way, looks strikingly undemocratic). The Washington Post sourced this from both people in both the Biden and Obama campaigns.

But TPM has gotten both a Biden spokesperson and an Obama spokesperson to say on the record that there is no such talk going on. From Biden’s comes a strong statement: “No discussions have taken place. We have not made any deals or arrangements. We are strong enough on our own.” Hard to know what’s going on at this point, but the stakes are very high: it is a deal like this that could ensure that Obama wins tonight — or at least guarantee that he does not come in third.

Don’t forget that there is no reason for the campaigns to have to publicize such a deal. Its enforcement will rest on precinct captains knowing what’s going on and pushing their supporters towards a candidate. The order can come top-down at the last minute without it being really relayed to the media. Though such behind-the-scenes moves could also muddy anyone’s showing if it looks to be too obscure and hidden from the public. So I for one doubt that Obama and Biden would be close to striking a deal if their spokesperson are denying it that intensely. It is for now impossible to know what is going on — and the situation is looking increasingly confused.

Meanwhile, poor Fred Thompson is stuck having to argue he is not going to drop out in the coming days no matter what happens in Iowa. “This is absolutely made up out of whole cloth,” said Thompson. This has got to be the nightmare of any campaign: Be stuck answering questions on Iowa television about whether you are 24 hours of withdrawing the morning of the first votes being cast. It’s obviously impossible to know what Thompson is thinking. He has suggested he wants to get in second in Iowa — and it is equally absurd for him to withdraw if he does not get that than it is for him to not withdraw if he can’t even get double-digits in the state he has spent so much time in during the past few weeks.

And in New Hampshire, Suffolk released the third installment of its daily tracking poll:

  • Among Republicans, Romney has climbed a bit since yesterday: Down 32% to 23% then, he is now trailing 29% to 25% against McCain. Huckabee is at 12% and Giuliani at 9%.
  • Choice quote from the release: “Giuliani’s numbers have declined in seven consecutive polls, from a high of 37 percent in March 2007 to 9 percent as of Jan. 3, 2008.”

  • Among Democrats, Hillary Clinton is maintaining a double-digit lead up 39% to 23% for Obama and 17% for Edwards, who is still very much in the running — at least for second place.

Keep these numbers in mind, as they will be very useful to see what the impact of Iowa will be in the coming days. The numbers that will be released tomorrow will still be pre-Iowa (taken on the 2nd and 3rd) but the evolution on Saturday and Sunday will tell us a lot about what kind of bounce the tonight’s winners are getting.

Update: And the confusion continues. Now it is the New York Times which is reporting that Obama has a deal with Richardson to do pretty much what the Washington Post said he was going to do with Biden. The WaPo now is saying that the Biden-Obama deal has fallen through.

The NYT however is saying that the Obama-Richardson arrangement has already been made. In other words: Obama offered to help Biden be fourth and the deal didn’t work out, so he is now going to help Richardson be fourth? Both Richardson and Obama spokesperson are once again denying there is a deal, though the explanation of Richardson’s spokesperson is that “Richardson will be viable in nearly every precinct so the point is moot.” If that’s their reason as to why there is no deal…

Morning poll delivery: Iowa and New Hampshire all tied up

Published
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Taniel
on January 2, 2008
in IA-Dem, IA-GOP, NH-Dem and NH-GOP
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The daily installment of the Zogby tracking poll is out and it has some minor movement in Barack Obama, Fred Thompson and Mitt Romney’s favor:

  • Among Democrats, Obama gains two points and Clinton loses two: They are now tied at 28% for the first time. Edwards gets 26% — putting the three in a complete tie, but that’s before realignment.
  • Among Republicans, the race at the top gets closer and is now separated by only 2 points: 28% to 26% in Huckabee’s favor (it was 29-25 yesterday). Behind, John McCain holds at 12% and Thompson rises at 12%.

Zogby points out that Obama is gaining among independents and, though he warns that the gains are small, how much Obama can rely on independents has become the dominant story in these finals days because of the DMR poll. In 2004, Zogby’s tracking caught the Edwards rise but a few days late — is something similar happening here?

Meanwhile, CNN/WMUR has a new poll from New Hampshire:

  • In the Democratic race, Hillary Clinton leads 34% to 30% for Obama, with Edwards at 17%.
  • This is a slight improvement from the last CNN poll of two weeks ago in which Obama was up 30% to 28%.

  • In the GOP race, Romney and McCain are tied at 29%, with Giuliani at 12% and Huckabee at 10%. Don’t forget that McCain led in his first poll from the state yesterday, and we have seen a few polls with the two candidates tied — which in itself is a huge surge for McCain. The trendlines are clearly in his favor but at this point any movement will be dictated by the results of Iowa on Thursday.

One other key statistic: 63% of independents who are planning on voting in NH say they will do so in the Democratic primary. That number was 54% a month ago. McCain and Obama are the two candidates who want to benefit from independents, so if that number goes down again it would hurt Obama and benefit McCain, and vice-versa. This competition is one of the most fascinating dynamics of the campaign since it atypically cuts across party lines.

And one another news item this morning: The Politico is now reporting that the total amount of money the Huckabee campaign spent on the negative anti-Romney material over the week-end (the material which the candidate then scraped though he showed some of it to the press) was $150,000. For a campaign with scarce resources, that’s a pretty large sum. Could Huckabee not have made up his mind before shooting the ads? It’s not as if he was not told of the decision prior to the preparations starting.

Non-Iowa polls: ARG surveys New Hampshire, and Rasmussen has McCain in front

Published
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Taniel
on December 30, 2007
in NH-Dem and NH-GOP
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A day after releasing numbers from Iowa, ARG came out with a new NH survey — showing the GOP race tied up and Edwards rising among Democrats:

  • In the Democratic race, Hillary Clinton gets 31% to Barack Obama’s 27%. But most of Clinton’s decline benefits Edwards, who rises to 21% — the highest he has been since the spring in ARG polls. No other candidate gets more than 5%.
  • In the Republican race, ARG shows a tie just as it did two weeks ago: McCain and Romney both get 30%, with everyone else far behind: Huckabee is at 11% and Giuliani is in free fall at 9%. Ron Paul lurks close behind at 7% while Thompson gets 3% - true to his usual form.

The puzzling result in this poll is that undeclared voters (a third of the sample, so not that small a subgroup) report preferring Edwards over Obama 38% to 23%. That is a striking number given that independents are supposed to be Obama’s strong-point. So let’s not jump to to many conclusions on the basis of one poll but if confirmed this trend could hurt Obama greatly. Though something to think about is what happens to this 38% if (and it’s a big if) Edwards loses Iowa and all but drops from the Democratic race. Obama could then be in a position to coalesce some of Edwards’s support around him.

Among Republicans, it is remarkable that Romney has maintained himself at the same level for months now. The difference is just who is second to him — and McCain has surged into a tie based solely on his own rise, fueled by Giuliani’s collapse. I don’t think any public poll has had Rudy in single-digits here before, but the downward trend is confirmed by all other polls out there. Does Giuliani really hope to get no bad press and survive until Florida if he can’t even get in the top three in a Northeastern state in which he looked so strong just a month ago?

  • Rasmussen has McCain on the rise

I rarely report on Rasmussen’s daily tracking numbers, but milestones like today’s have to be at least quickly mentioned. In the Democratic race, nothing has changed for a while and, if anything, Clinton looks even more solid than she did in the past, leading 42% to 23% for Obama and 16% for Edwards.

But this is the first time since daily polling started that John McCain is on top of the GOP race. Granted, he only gets 17% and that is only one point above Romney and Huckabee’s 16% and Giuliani’s 15% (Thompson gets 12%), but however insignificant his move upward it is undeniable that McCain has gotten much of his potential back at this point: He is in a strong position in New Hampshire and is being endorsed by newspaper after newspaper. That he has grabbed his first lead of the year in Rasmussen’s daily tracking says something about the state of the GOP race — just as it is very revealing of the fact that it is still anyone’s game that there are four candidates within 2%.

LA Times and Strategic Vision poll IA, NH: Tight for Democrats, less so in GOP

Published
by
Taniel
on December 28, 2007
in IA-Dem, IA-GOP, NH-Dem and NH-GOP
. 1 Comment

LA Times has just released its latest numbers from Iowa and New Hampshire for both the Democratic and Republican race, and they underscore the importance of next week’s vote. Now, the poll has been in the field from the 20th to the 23rd and then on the 26th, not the best time poll considering how quickly things change in the last week of a campaign and the shady nature of Christmas week-end polling. And we also just got the new numbers from Strategic Vision; its field dates are December 26-27th, so post-Christmas week-end which could make them slightly more reliable. With that disclaimer, let’s go straight to the numbers:

Democrats

  • In Iowa, Clinton comes in on top with 29% against 26% for Obama and 25% for Edwards.
  • But among the “most likely caucus-goers,” numbers are sensibly different: 31% for Clinton, 25% for Edwards and 22% for Obama — suggesting Barack’s support could be weaker.
  • And in a sure sign that Clinton is winning the experience argument, 79% of Iowa Democrats say she is ready to be president; 43% say the same about Barack Obama. That could clearly pause problems for Obama in a general election.
  • In New Hampshire, however, Obama has dramatically improved his position, now leading 32% to 30%, with Edwards at 18%.

  • Strategic Vision only polls Iowa, and it has an even tighter race: Obama gets 30%, Clinton 29%, Edwards 28%. A week ago, Obama was three points up. Two weeks ago, it was an eight-point lead.

The Iowa race is virtually tied between the top-three candidate; but do notice that no one is talking of a Clinton Iowa free fall anymore. The period in which Obama consistently led in Iowa polls is over; given the tied New Hampshire race, it seems safe to say that if Clinton or Obama win iowa they will be significantly favored to win New Hampshire as well — which is already a huge victory for Obama given that as late as October it looked like Clinton would easily keep a NH lead even if she stumbled in Iowa.

Republicans

  • In Iowa, Huckabee has opened up a huge lead — and there is no evidence that it is tightening here: he leads 37% to 23% for Romney. Everyone else is far behind: Thompson and McCain are 11%, with everyone else in single-digits.

  • In New Hampshire, Romney gets great news, as he keeps his lead far ahead of John McCain: He gets 34% to McCain’s 21%, with Giuliani at 15%. Huckabee says in single-digits, at 9%.

  • In the Strategic Vision poll, the race is tightening here: 29% for Huck to 27% for Romney. now, Strategic Vision finds Thompson at 15% and McCaina t 14% — potentially leading to some shake-up by next week. Last week, Huck got 31% and Romney 25% — with McCain only at 8%, confirming that there is some movement in favor of the Arizona Senator here.

The polls are contradicting each other on whether the Iowa race is tightening at the top. Romney has a significant organizational edge over Huckabee, but that can only take him so far — not make him overcome a 14% spread. It looks like Huckabee might be set to survive the deluge of oppo research and negative stories after all, though don’t dismiss the massive nature of Romney advertising in the state right now and his ability to close the gap, especially if it’s as small as Strategic Vision suggests. As for McCain, a third-place finish would be a huge victory for him — and there very well could be some surprising movement in his favor.

At least Romney gets the clearest New Hampshire lead he’s had in a while; McCain had been coming immediately behind him for about 2 weeks, but Romney has not gone down at all. Instead, McCain has swapped positions with Rudy Giuliani and taken most of his support — and that should leave some hope for Romney that he can pull of a New Hampshire victory after losing the Iowa caucuses. Though that could very depend on how big his loss is — making January 3rd very important.

NH poll shows Obama and McCain rising — and leads to criticism of Barack’s health care plan

Published
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Taniel
on December 23, 2007
in NH-Dem, NH-GOP and health care
. 8 Comments

A new day, and the bad New Hampshire polls keep coming for Hillary Clinton and Mitt Romney. This time, it’s from the Boston Globe.

Democrats

  • Obama and Clinton are in a statistical toss-up with Obama up 30% to 28%. Edwards gets14%and Richardson 7%.

In the last Boston Globe poll in the beginning of November, Clinton was up 35% to 21% — and that was already considered a tightening of the race. Look at my write-up from November 11th: “Make it three: Clinton sliding in yet another New Hampshire poll” It is telling how things have changed since then. The state that was once Clinton sure firewall in case of an Iowa stumble could now be her deathbed if she loses in the caucuses.

One internal numbers shows that a plurality of Democrats say they oppose mandates on health care. This has obviously been a huge debate on the campaign trail — one of the only major policy disagreements that have been debated in the past few weeks.

There has been mounting criticism in the past months that Obama is giving Republicans arguments they will use in the health care battle that will follow a Democrat victory in 2008. Paul Krugman has been relentlessly hitting Obama for echoing right-wing rhetoric on health care, but this new poll that has Democratic voters opposing mandates is the most recent evidence that Obama is leading public opinion in the wrong direction — and is convincing them of what Republicans like to argue: choice is important, forced governmental programs are dangerous, etc. Here’s a short excerpt from MyDD:

In the event of an Obama presidency, Obama will have already conceded the point on a mandate, potentially opening the door for a system that is not truly universal in that more than 10 million Americans might not be covered. And because the American system generally requires compromise (notwithstanding the petulance of the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.), starting positions matter greatly. By taking a starting point that arguably incorporates something less than a system with full universality and taking off the table a system with an individual mandate — in a sense, by already compromising with the right even before the debate has begun — Obama has greatly increased the likelihood that an eventual compromise bill stops far short of full universality.
Even more troublesome, Obama may have also helped take a mandate off the table for other potential Democratic presidents, particularly Clinton and Edwards, both of whom incorporate a personal mandate into their plan. If a majority of Democrats don’t support a mandate, then there’s just no way that a program with a mandate is going to make it through Congress.

Republicans

  • Mitt Romney is now barely ahead of McCain: 28% to 25%, with Giuliani down at 14% and Huckabee getting 10%.
  • 6 weeks ago, Romney was massively on top, 32% to Giuliani’s 21% and McCain’s 17%. These trend-lines are very much a confirmation of everything we’ve seen in the past 2 weeks.

It is really no surprise that Romney is now going after McCain given that he is sinking fast in New Hampshire. Just like Clinton, Romney could now be eliminated in the state in which he was pretty much sure he would win.

And to make matters worse for Romney, the Concord Monitor has just anti-endorsed him, calling him a phony candidate that New Hampshire has to stop. Romney “most surely must be stopped, they say, calling NH to “vote no.” They basically accuse him of artificially having built himself up in the past few years as the ideal conservative candidate. It’s really a hilarious must-read editorial that McCain has already started circulating.

We have now reached Christmas, which means numbers are unlikely to change much anywhere until January 3rd. Given that Iowa is tied, it means that if Obama or Clinton wins Iowa they will surely boost themselves up to a New Hampshire victory 5 days later. And if except if Edwards pulls through, we are in for an all-out NH brawl. Among the GOP, Romney would surely pull through if he comes in first in Iowa, but is it realistic to expect him to hold off McCain if he can’t even win in Iowa? We’ll soon know — 9 more days to Iowa!

New Hampshire polls: Has Sununu made a comeback?

Published
by
Taniel
on December 21, 2007
in NH-Dem, NH-GOP and NH-Sen
. 6 Comments
  • New Hampshire: Competitive in both parties

Gallup just released its latest poll from New Hampshire, and both parties are moving into toss-ups. Last month’s Gallup poll had Clinton and Romney up in double-digits, now:

  • Among Democrats, Clinton and Obama both get 32% — with Edwards hovering behind at 18%.
  • Among the GOP, Romney is now only leading 34% to 27%, while Giuliani (who had a chance to win this thing only 10 days ago) has now collapsed at 11%. Huck and Ron Paul get 9%.

The tie in the Democratic race has now become a common story — but I am still trying to understand what is going on in the Republican race: Only one poll for now has shown McCain tying Romney in the state, but all NH polls of late have Romney’s lead that was clearly double-digit 10 days ago dramatically cut, and McCain on the rise — this movement is coinciding with Rudy’s fall, which implies that McCain is drawing his votes from Giuliani.

This also makes what was last week the most likely scenario (Huck wins IA, and Romney holds on to win NH) increasingly unlikely, as McCain could probably overtake Mitt if things go badly for him in Iowa. And what a story that would be: Romney failing to win either of the early states (and probably being eliminated for good), and McCain suddenly in the running. We’re almost there — and you bet Giuliani would love that. McCain-Huckabee in IA and NH would mean a muddied race, and his big-state strategy would suddenly make sense again.

  • NH-Sen: Sununu is now ahead?!

As far as Senate polls go, this one is a shocker. For months, any poll of the New Hampshire Senate race has shown Jeanne Shaheen with a double-digit lead — which sometimes got up to 20+. Some polls did have high single-digits, but Shaheen soon picked up again after that. And now we get a new ARG poll :

  • Incumbent GOP Sen. Sununu is ahead 52% to 41% — a rather dramatic swing in his favor.
  • Democrats are much less aligned behind Shaheen (78%) than GOPers behind Sununu (93%), and the undeclared break in favor of the Republican.

One possible explanation is that Shaheen was on the news in the past two weeks… after her husband made those comments about Obama’s drug use. Possible. If that it is, it will probably not last. NH is currently ranked number 2 of my Senate Rankings, and this poll is such an outlier from everything we have seen that it is impossible to take it into account to change the assessment of the race. But it goes without saying that we’ll keep a close on the next few New Hampshire Senate polls — if Sununu is tied or ahead, we have a race in our hand. Which would be a huge blow for Democrats.

McCain on fire?! ARG comes out with completely insane early-state polls

Published
by
Taniel
on December 20, 2007
in IA-Dem, IA-GOP, NH-Dem and NH-GOP
. 3 Comments

McCain in front of Romney in Iowa?! Really?!

Well, probably not. But it still points to the McCain rise, and, combined with his NH strength, this could be the start of a new media narrative. And we all know how much the media loves to help John McCain.

I really apologize for my inability to post about most things other than polls today. But with ARG releasing completely insane polls of Iowa and New Hampshire, I have trouble staying away. The Democratic numbers are very much in line with everything else we have been seeing (toss-up in Iowa, Clinton rising again in New Hampshire), but the GOP results are out of the loop entirely:

  • In Iowa, Hillary is ahead 29% to Obama’s 25% and Edward’s 18%. Plus and minus the margin of error, we get every other poll we’ve seen in the past 24 hours. But here again the trendlines are fascinating: Obama led in late November 27% to 25%. The Obama momentum has clearly been halted.
  • In New Hampshire, Clinton is back up by a solid margin: 38% to 24% for Obama, and 15% for Edwards. This confirms other polls we saw this week showing Clinton regaining her footing.

  • But GOP numbers are out of control. In Iowa, it’s Huckabee with 28%, McCain with 20% (?!!!) and Romney at 17%, barely ahead of Rudy’s 13%. The bad news for Huck here: Only 38% of his backers say they are definite, versus 80%+ of McCain and Romney voters.
  • In New Hampshire, Romney and McCain are tied at 26%, with Giuliani at 16% and Huckabee at 11%.

Obviously, the hugly shocking numbers are from the GOP side here — and I am inclined to just dismissed the Iowa poll as a complete outlier. There has been absolutely no survey showing even the faintest McCain surge in the state — and the AZ Senator has no ad, no organization and plan to compete in the caucuses. Even if there were to be some small movement, it would not really be able to go anywhere.

But there is no question that McCain is really surging in the past two weeks — starting with his three big newspaper endorsments! Iowa might be a huge reach for him, but New Hampshire is not. And you can imagine that the media will go crazy if McCain pulls even a strong third in Iowa. Forget the Democratic race or the GOP victor, the story will be McCain’s surge, his comeback, his magnetic power… and he might very well turn up to be unstoppable in New Hampshire. And it goes without saying that however much Romney could possibly accomodate himself from being second in Iowa, he cannot possibly go on in the race if he comes third.

So does this mean McCain could become the Republican nominee? Well, the Politico is starting to print stories celebrating his comeback. And you can be sure more media coverage will ensure, as this is one storyline the press wants desparetly. Don’t put too much stock in that Iowa poll — but the New Hampshire one is confirmed by most other polls that show some major McCain movement in the state. If Romney stays weak in Iowa, he could be toast in NH as well.

Ultimately, a McCain victory in NH could be the ideal scenario for Giuliani who could probably swamp McCain in money and organization in the states that are coming after — especially as McCain would be unlikely to win in South Carolina so the field would stay very muddied. So a McCain victory in NH would be just one step.

But it could have an unlikely victim: This could prove a huge problem for Barack Obama. If NH independents are energized by McCain again, they will massively flock to him and vote — denying Obama his strongest constituency to win the primary on January 8th.

Early-state polls: IA and NH tied for the GOP as Huckabee dips, McCain on fire; Clinton rises in NH

Published
by
Taniel
on December 19, 2007
in IA-GOP, NH-Dem and NH-GOP
. 1 Comment

It was clear for the past week that Huckabee had peaked too soon for his own good. With the whole field- not just Mitt Romney - pounding him and with the media coming out with negative story after negative story, Huckabee was bound to drop — and he is. A Rasmussen poll earlier this week showed Huckabee losing his lead in South Carolina, now tied at 33% with Romney. And now take a look at the new Iowa poll released by Rasmussen:

  • Huckabee is at 27% and Romney at 26%. McCain has jumped up to a stunning 14% in a state he has barely been to. The rest of the field is muddied, with Giuliani at 8%, Thompson at 8% and Paul at 6%.
  • A week ago, Rasmussen had Huckabee up 39% to 23% — so this is a big drop for Huckabee, and it’s explained by his numbers among evangelicals: He went from 62% to 49%.
  • And the big number: His favorability number among GOPers in Iowa dropped from 81% to 67%. The mailers are having an effect.

The evolution of the race is veyr much the same in yesterday night’s WaPo poll that also has shows a toss-up. Consider this now: Iowa has become a wild horse-race. If Romney pulls it off, he would get a huge amount of momentum and attention, something he would not have gotten with a victory as of a month ago when his victory was assured. Now, Romney wins Iowa and he might very well be unstoppable in later states. And he does so having avoided his opopnents from attacking him too much or sending mailers against him, since they’re all focused on his opponents.

And in this wild Iowa context, new polls show New Hampshire becoming more competitive as McCain is literally on fire and is now competing with Romney, having left Giuliani far behind in two new polls!

  • CNN/WMUR has a survey today showing Romney still far ahead, and ahead of McCain 34% to 22%, with Giuliani slipping to 16% and Huckabee to 10%. McCain and Giuliani were tied last week.

  • In a new Rasmussen poll, however, the numbers are stunning: Romney has 31%, McCain has 27%, Giuliani has 13%, and Huckabee 11%.

If Romney pulls off Iowa, I can’t imagine him not getting the necessary bounce to be 100% sure of winning New Hampshire. But if Huck wins the caucuses, well then all cards are shuffled and New Hampshire becomes a huge race between McCain and Romney — with Giuliani seemingly out of the picture now that he scaled back his advertisement and moved out to Florida.

We also got two corresponding polls from Democrats — and they are as important as they show Clinton regaining her footing. A week ago, she had lost her lead everywhere — CNN showed it at a tie, and Rasmussen had Obama up. The movement now is not dramatic but it points out to some fundamentals shifting back towards Obama:

  • In the CNN poll, Clinton moved up to 38% and Obama is at 26%, ahead of Edwards at 14%. A week ago, it was 31-30.
  • Her lead is smaller in Rasmussen, 31% to 28% with Edwards at 18%, but the trendline is the same.

The story out of this: Clinton has a way to clinch the nomination without Iowa; it looks increasingly unlikely that Obama could pull it off. And Ben Smith from the Politico has a telling explanation of the dynamics of New Hampshire: “I hate to say it…but what do you think people in New Hampshire learned about Obama last week?” Indeed. A sad, but plausible explanation.

Rasmussen is claiming it has released an Iowa poll for Dems today, but it does not look available on their website — I’m not sure what’s going on there, and will add the poll when it becomes available.

Endorsed by Lieberman, McCain shows signs of life in New Hampshire - does that pose a threat to Obama?

Published
by
Taniel
on December 16, 2007
in NH-Dem and NH-GOP
. 1 Comment

John McCain is on an endorsement roll. A day after receiving the nod of the Des Moines Register and the Boston Globe, he is now set to receive the endorsement of ex-Democratic Senator Joe Lieberman of CT. This is not particularly shocking given how far to the Right Lieberman has drifted since the Iraq War began — and he was not particularly progressive to begin with. And given Lieberman and McCain’s already cozy relationship, this will add fodder to talk of a ticket between the two.

I am somewhat puzzled by this news, however. McCain is running in the Republican primary, and the biggest criticism that he has faced has been his lack of conservative credentials; his supposed moderation and bipartisanship have angered many in the GOP base who do not view McCain as a true Republican. In this regard, a Lieberman endorsement could help McCain with moderates, but it also associates the candidate with the Democratic VP nominee from 2000. Even if Lieberman has since gone independent, he still calls himself a Democrat and caucuses with his old party in the Senate.

The benefits of the endorsements are obvious — and if the campaign chose to take on these drawbacks, it must be because they realize how important it is for McCain to win New Hampshire and its independent voters. That has always been McCain’s strongest base — and his hope for a comeback. He trashed George Bush in the state in 2000 based on his strength among non-Republican voters in the primary who chose his more moderate and anti-establishment message; and polls show today he is still in the running to win New Hampshire a second time, particularly if Mitt Romney stumbles.

The Boston Globe’s support of McCain yesterday could definitely have the same effect as the Lieberman one: Show New Hampshire independents that McCain is still one of them — and make them choose to vote for him on January 8th.

And why is McCain showing signs of life dangerous for Barack Obama? Independent voters can choose to vote in the Democratic or the Republican primary — and they cannot do both. Polls have shown that Obama’s main source of strength in the state are also independent voters, among which he typically crushes Hillary Clinton. For him to be competitive in January 8th, he needs the largest possible number of independents to choose to vote in the Demofrcratic primary rather than the Republican primary.

This hardly seemed to be a problem until recently. With McCain left for dead in July and the Republican field leaving voters uninspired, the CW was that the huge majority of independents would go vote in the Democratic primary — for Obama. But if McCain continues showing signs of life and directly appeal to independent voters, that’s votes directly taken from Obama’s.

And here’s a poll from NH that was released Friday but that I forgot to report: It has Clinton at 34% ahead of Obama’s 25% and Edwards ’s 15%. Obama is stronger than he was earlier in the fall — but the survey underscores he has not completed his take-over yet.