Colorado-Rasmussen: Giuliani leads Clinton by 10%, Thompson and Clinton tied

[Tender Branson]

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Giuliani-R: 50%
Clinton-D: 40%

Clinton-D: 45%
Thompson-R: 45%

Arizona Senator John McCain leads Clinton by just three points while the former First Lady is essentially even with former Tennessee Senator Fred Thompson and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney. However, Clinton doesn’t attract more than 45% support against any of the GOP hopefuls.

Sixty percent (60%) of Colorado voters say that Democratic Governor Bill Ritter is doing a good or an excellent job. Twenty-six percent (26%) say fair while 10% believe Ritter is doing a poor job.

Those numbers are much stronger than President Bush earns in the state. Thirty-seven percent (37%) of the Colorado’s voters give the President good or excellent marks while 18% say he’s doing a fair job and 45% say poor.

As for the 2008 hopefuls, Clinton is viewed favorably by 46% and unfavorably by 52%.

Giuliani is the best liked of all the candidates, 58% favorable and 39% unfavorable. Thompson’s numbers are 44% favorable and 38% unfavorable. McCain is viewed favorably by 44%, but another 51% have an unfavorable opinion of the man once viewed as the GOP frontrunner. Romney is viewed favorably by 41% and unfavorably by 45%.

http://rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/giuliani_leads_clinton_in_colorado

[Tender Branson]

First impression:

1) Yehaaa, finally a poll from Colorado !

2) Meeeh, Clinton suxx !

3) Thumbs up to Bill Ritter !

4) No Senate poll !

[Tender Branson]

New updated GE election map with all the latest state polls (Rasmussen, Quinnipiac, SurveyUSA, R2000 etc.):

Giuliani vs. Clinton:

Clinton: 241 EV
Giuliani: 147 EV

Changes: First CO poll with Giuliani ahead, OH flips from toss-up to Giuliani, Clinton keeps NH and FL

[Person Man]

There were other polls in Ohio, Colorado and Florida?

[MasterJedi]

These polls and that map are all useless, I hope you know that. It doesn't matter who's ahead now, no matter who it says is ahead. Wait until after the nominees are chosen, then you can start going crazy about polls. We should all focus on the nomination polls, not the GE ones.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Bubba was unpopular in Colorado IIRC.

[agcatter]

Agreed that until people start focusing on the race (months away) these polls mean little.  Giuliani is no more going to win Colorado by 10 than he will lose Florida by 5.  Polls now are interesting but still don't tell us a lot at this time.

[Person Man]

Well Thompson has a tough fight and Bush is doing worse in CO than in OH by a point or two. There could be possible more discontent for liberals to lock into in CO. Then again, Rudy would probably sweep the west but lose NM. Heck, I am considering voting for him. Rudy really takes out the umph from the bedroom dems, which what most dems are in the west. Then again, the hispanic vote will be much harder to get.

[agcatter]

Pretty good analysis. 

[cp]

These polls and that map are all useless, I hope you know that. It doesn't matter who's ahead now, no matter who it says is ahead. Wait until after the nominees are chosen, then you can start going crazy about polls. We should all focus on the nomination polls, not the GE ones.

Ok, these maps are definitely uninformative as to the final result: the nominees haven't been chosen, they're from different sources, they use different samples, etc. But they're hardly useless.

Even taking this composite with a grain of salt a few conclusions can be reasonably drawn:

1. The Democrats have a tremendous advantage at this point. They are expanding at the Republicans' expense in all corners of the country while Repubicans have failed to make any inroads into Democratic strongholds, CT notwithstanding.

2. Guiliani's moderate stances aren't swaying the masses. Guiliani, on paper at least, should be gutting the Democratic faithful on the issues. With so much crossover appeal, especially in places like California and Florida, a moderate Republican should be at least tied with a Democrat like Hilary Clinton. But he's not.  He's made barely a dent in the Northeast, nothing on the west coast, and only just slipped past the post in the midwest.

3. Clinton's target audience is listening. I haven't seen WV flip Democrat in the map since 2000. Clinton's whole strategy in the primaries is to get chummy with the lower income, salt-of-the-earth, populist types in the Democratic Party. From this map it looks like she's done that and managed to snatch some Republican voters too.

[Mr. Morden]

These polls and that map are all useless, I hope you know that. It doesn't matter who's ahead now, no matter who it says is ahead. Wait until after the nominees are chosen, then you can start going crazy about polls. We should all focus on the nomination polls, not the GE ones.

I'd actually go even farther than you do, and say that, even after the nominations have been decided (which will presumably happen in February), the polls will still not be very useful in predicting who will win and by what margin.  Frequently, the race doesn't really crystallize until after the conventions, so we might not have a good indication for another year.

However, leaving aside what the polls tell us about who would win nationally, what about the question of relative strength of the two parties between different states?  If, hypothetically, we got a bunch of polls showing the Democrats stronger in Florida than Ohio or stronger in West Virginia than Colorado, then might that not tell us something interesting about what the electoral map might look like next year, depending on what the overall national popular vote margin is (which we won't be able to guess for a long time yet)?

[Person Man]

Pretty good analysis. 

Thanks. Also the fact that Guiliani is an Italian-American might sway me to vote for him. I, for one, am half-Italian.

[Tender Branson]

These polls and that map are all useless, I hope you know that. It doesn't matter who's ahead now, no matter who it says is ahead. Wait until after the nominees are chosen, then you can start going crazy about polls. We should all focus on the nomination polls, not the GE ones.

Not so negative Master. What should we do in the next 1 year instead of interpreting all the polls that pop up ? Baking cookies and cakes ? I know that it is way too early now and even a week can be a looong time in politics, but I´ll keep updating this map no matter what anyone says (at least I´m updating it until early next year when www.electoral-vote.com takes over my job ...)

[Sam Spade]

Bubba was unpopular in Colorado IIRC.

Yep.  The halcyon days of the CO GOP.  Of course, no other polls validate this result.

I'll make a couple of comments here as to the four Rasmussen polls received today:

The Ohio and NH polls essentially match "fairly" recent iterations by other companies - thus, I see no reason to believe they're not true.  Giuliani tied with Hillary in OH, Hillary with a slight lead in NH.  Thompson performs better in Ohio and worse in NH.  Romney is the opposite (may have something to do with constant advertising).  Ohio and New Hampshire are not places where the polling tends to go faulty (2006 NH excepted) - that adds another layer of believability.

The Florida iteration comes close to matching Q - and that would in turn show a slight Clinton lead over Giuliani (and larger leads over the others).  Of course, Florida polling has more problems than answers - and this poll's internals looks pretty strange to me for a couple of reasons (not listed here).  And the usual Florida polling Dem lean would likely push that result towards a tie (Giuliani only).  Anyway, I'll simply wait for M-D here - if it validates this, then this is probably correct - if not, then no.

And if you think this Florida commentary is confusing, just wait until we get to general election polling from New Mexico and Wisconsin. 

[agcatter]

I agree with Sam that MD will give us a very good handle on Florida even this far out.

[Tender Branson]

I agree with Sam that MD will give us a very good handle on Florida even this far out.

... if they ever do GE polls additionally to their primary polls.

[Sam Spade]

I agree with Sam that MD will give us a very good handle on Florida even this far out.

... if they ever do GE polls additionally to their primary polls.

They will.  Give them time - the election isn't tomorrow.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

Hillary has some inherent strengths, and some inherent weaknesses.

Pushing Colorado off the table is one of those weaknesses.

[Tender Branson]

Hillary has some inherent strengths, and some inherent weaknesses.

Pushing Colorado off the table is one of those weaknesses.

I´m wondering now if the Clinton campaign will actually go for Colorado if these numbers stay this way until early 2008 when she´s the DEM candidate and Rudy the Republican one ...

[Rawlings]

Hillary has some inherent strengths, and some inherent weaknesses.

Pushing Colorado off the table is one of those weaknesses.

I´m wondering now if the Clinton campaign will actually go for Colorado if these numbers stay this way until early 2008 when she´s the DEM candidate and Rudy the Republican one ...

Why would you spend time in money in Colorado when you could mop up the election in Ohio and Florida?  Hillary's style and politics play far better in places like Florida and Ohio.  She can pour loads of money and spend lots of time here, she still won't clear Kerry's 47%.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

Hillary has some inherent strengths, and some inherent weaknesses.

Pushing Colorado off the table is one of those weaknesses.

I´m wondering now if the Clinton campaign will actually go for Colorado if these numbers stay this way until early 2008 when she´s the DEM candidate and Rudy the Republican one ...

Hillary would have a much easier time winning states like Missouri, West Virginia, and Arkansas.  She could probably win the damn election with nearly 350 EVs and still not carry Colorado.

[Person Man]

Although the polls in CO usually favor GOPers by 3 or 4 points. This probably means that Thompson is gonna get beat in CO and that Guiliani is going to win by 46-53.

[Reaganfan]

Pretty good analysis. 

Thanks. Also the fact that Guiliani is an Italian-American might sway me to vote for him. I, for one, am half-Italian.

So am I...what's your other half? Mine is German.

[Small Business Owner of Any Repute]

Although the polls in CO usually favor GOPers by 3 or 4 points. This probably means that Thompson is gonna get beat in CO and that Guiliani is going to win by 46-53.

Fred Thompson is not going to be the nominee.  But if he some how were to win, he's still not losing Colorado to Clinton.

[Rawlings]

Although the polls in CO usually favor GOPers by 3 or 4 points. This probably means that Thompson is gonna get beat in CO and that Guiliani is going to win by 46-53.

I don't think so!  Fred Thompson isn't even in the race yet, and he's already tied with the already well known Clinton.  In most states Romney and Thompson are running behind Clinton.  The fact that these two unknowns are actually tied with Hillary in Colorado tells me that the GOP should be spending their time on the senate race--not the POTUS race.  The GOP could win Colorado by ten points and still lose the senate race....