Huckabee Slipping
By: Robert D. Novak
TOWNHALL.COM
Great news for Team Romney!!
WASHINGTON — While public polls show Mike Huckabee leading Mitt Romney in Iowa, a new survey of an oversized sample shows Huckabee slipping and no longer ahead of Romney.
A private corporate interest commissioned a phone bank survey of 15,000 Iowans who say they will attend Republican presidential caucuses Jan. 3. It showed Romney with 30 percent and Huckabee at 26 percent. Sen. John McCain was third with 12 percent and Rudy Giuliani fourth at 9 percent. Fred Thompson had only 1 percent, with slightly fewer votes than Rep. Ron Paul (also at 1 percent).
Thank goodness that Huckabee’s monumental incompetence to be POTUS is becoming abundantly clear to the voters of the great state of Iowa. His stands on immigration, taxes, pardons for dangerous criminals and his complete cluelessness on foreign affairs has caught up with him and I believe the people of Iowa are going to stop his campaign in it’s tracks on Jan. 3.
~~John Cronin~~
December 29th, 2007 at 1:21 am
Just saw this comment over at the POLITICO website.
“Wake up Iowa. Huckabee doesn’t have any idea what he’s doing. Why does he have so much trouble with current events? Because it takes him so long to come up with catchy one-liners. The man is utterly incompetent in foreign affairs and has a liberal streak a mile long. Couching it behind his toothy grin and his folksy southern charm will win him a good amount of delegates. But here’s to hoping voters see through him on caucus night.”
December 29th, 2007 at 3:31 am
I doubt Novak’s claim.
That company would have had to call nearly 1 million phones to identify 15000 people that will actually turn out at the Iowa caucuses. I’m sure they must have used some targeting strategies . . . but that might include targeting wealthier zip codes and might sway things towards Romney.
It’s gonna be a squeaker . . . the Huck lovers love him and a huge part of his core supporters there will be utterly unmoved by any of the gaffes he’s making (hey, he’s “one of us” they say . . . and they feel quite “religious” about supporting him).
I think Huck’s losing his soft support and swing voters with his gaffes and exposed record and the conservatives coming out against him.
Should be fun!
December 29th, 2007 at 6:45 am
If many are supporting Huckabee for reasons of religious affiliation they would, I think as Jeff points out, look past any subtle or stark limitations of his candidacy. This home team phenomenon plays out weekly in many cities and towns in the packed stadiums as locals or dedicated fans overlook their team’s lack luster performance and record and lustily cheer on a losing season.
December 29th, 2007 at 10:41 am
I’d give “religious” voters more credit than that. If they would “look past” the fact that that man might have a little difficulty finding Pakistan on a map of the Middle East, if they would “cut him some slack” for not knowing what the NIE is and a whole laundry list of other embarrassing gaffes, then they would be complicit in putting the country at great risk for electing a man who is in completely over his head.
Huckabee is pro-life and that’s a good thing. Protecting innocent life that is forming in the womb is one of the most important roles of government. So is protecting 300 million people from the global enemies that seek our destruction. Huckabee is revealing himself to be a man who is so completely unprepared to be Commandeer in Chief, that conscience requires one of two things to happen: 1. withdraw from the race and throw his support to a candidate who is much, much more sophisticated than Mr. Huckabee, 2. the religious right needs to realize that it is morally the right thing to do to elect a man who will protect this country so that we can continue to be pro-life, pro-family, God- fearing, church-going and all the other good things that matter to “religious” voters.
In the final analysis, I think the religious right will come to the conclusion that it is more important to elect a serious, sophisticated and PREPARED man, than it is to elect a good schmoozer who has a knack for delivering cute one-liners.
December 29th, 2007 at 11:55 am
Jeff/John,
I hear so much that if the polls are accurate and they are close, that Romney’s organization in Iowa will help him win. Any idea of how much it really means? How far behind can Romney be in the polls and still win because of his organization?
December 29th, 2007 at 3:34 pm
David D,
It’s my understanding that campaign’s give much more weight to their own internal polling than they do to the public polls. The internal polling (as of two weeks ago) showed a much closer race in Iowa than what you could see on a site like Real Clear Politics.
That being said, I think it is always wise to take any poll with a very large grain of salt. The Iowa caucus goers traditionally make up their minds right before the actual voting starts and, as you know, if their candidate doesn’t receive at least 15% of the vote, they have to join another group that meets this minimum criteria and so there will be a lot of votes shifting to other candidates even after the process has started.
You bring up a good point about organization. Just having the ability to get the voters out to the polls on a bitter cold night is a feat in itself. This is an area where Team Romney excels and where Huckabee is relatively weak. Huckabee has a good deal of support from the local churches and that will be a factor on caucus night. However, Team Romney is bringing in volunteers by the BUS LOAD to help in the “get out the vote” effort. By the way, it is important to realize that the volunteer workers are some of the same people who will ride by bus to Washington later in the month to demonstrate against the awful Roe v. Wade anniversary on Jan. 22. Hopefully, those of us on the religious right who support Romney and those of us who support Huckabee will realize that we want most of the same things and we will join forces to help ensure Republican control of the White House in 2008.