Cross Posted from the FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog

Cross Posted from the FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog

According to a new Quinnipiac Poll, Rudy Giuliani now trails Hillary Clinton 50%-42% in the Empire State. The former mayor does well in the suburbs and upstate, but not enough to compensate for Clinton’s 66%-27% lead in NYC. Giuliani is in a dead heat with both Obama and Edwards, largely on residual strength in NYC.

Neither John McCain nor Mitt Romney pose so serious a threat to the Democratic control of New York’s 29 electoral votes for the past 5 Presidential elections.

One of the major benefits to having Rudy Giuliani lead the Republican ticket in 2008 in his unique ability to put in play states that Republican Presidential candidates have not won in two decades or more. New York is one of those states, according to a new Siena College poll. While Giuliani trails Hillary Clinton by 12 points, this is actually a 2 point improvement from a poll conducted by the same firm in November. In addition, the former Mayor leads Barrack Obama 45% to 42%.

Of course, if Giuliani carries New York, then that means he is carrying just about every other state on election night. While his ability to win these states will certainly depend on conditions in Iraq, his strength in these early polls, and under these circumstances, should give every Republican hope.

Nearly one-third of all Americans say they would “definitely” vote for Rudy:

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) now leads former North Carolina Senator John Edwards 48% to 41% in an Election 2008 Presidential match-up. While the GOP hopeful has been ahead of Edwards in every Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey, the gap between them had closed to only couple of points in recent months. Giuliani leads by ten points among men and two points among women. The former Mayor leads by eight among unaffiliated voters. Other Rasmussen Reports data shows that 31% of voters say they would definitely vote for Giuliani if he is on the 2008 ballot. Twenty-eight percent (28%) would definitely vote against him. Edwards fares far worse on that scale—20% would definitely vote for him while 39% say they would definitely vote against. Giuliani is the current frontrunner for the Republican Presidential nomination. Edwards has been consistently in third place among those seeking the Democratic nomination. Edwards trails Senators Hillary Clinton (D) and Barack Obama (D) among Democrats, but performs as well or better than those candidates when matched against Republicans in a general election poll. Edwards is viewed favorably by 47% of voters and unfavorably by 45%. The 2004 Democratic Vice Presidential nominee has seen his unfavorable ratings climb from 37% at the beginning of 2007. Since November, Guiliani’s stratospheric favorable rating has ranged from 63% to 71%. It is now 66%, down from 70% last month. Still, those figures are far higher than those of any other major Election 2008 candidate (see a summary of ratings for all Republican and Democratic candidates).

Rudy has increased his general election showing against Hillary and Edwards to eight and seven points respectively.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) leading New York Senator Hillary Clinton (D) 49% to 41% in an early Election 2008 match-up. Those figures are close to the lead voters gave the Mayor in our late February poll. Support for both candidates has dipped slightly since then, and Giuliani no longer crests above 50%. But the new numbers are consistent with the arc we’ve seen since November showing the mayor gradually increasing his advantage.

And in last week’s Rasmussen poll, the Mayor continues to lead in the GOP race for the Republican presidential nomination - leading his nearest competitor Senator John McCain by 21 percentage points.

Hizzoner continues to surge and some negative campaigning has commenced.

Is this campaign shaping up for a Rudy landslide?

Stay tuned…….

Cross Posted from the FullosseousFlap’s Dental Blog

Previous:

The Rudy Giuliani Files

The narrowing of the numbers between Mayor Giuliani and Sen. McCain in the most recent CBS/NYT poll was the cause of much debate here yesterday. It seems that the poll caught the attention of Mark Blumenthal of Pollster as well, who offered the following analysis:

Both the February and March surveys involved a hypothetical two-way match-up between Giuliani and McCain (Q49), and the decline in Giuliani’s support appears to be just barely statistically significant. For those wondering (as I did), surveys interviewed 314 registered Republicans voters who say they are likely to vote in Republican primary in February and 603 in March (the most recent survey involved an oversample of Republicans; unweighted counts are at the end of the CBS releases here and here).

Given the sample sizes, the seven point drop for Giuliani (from 50% to 43%) is just barely statistically significant at a 95% confidence level, although the five point increase for McCain (29% to 34%) is not.

However, there are some very good reasons for caution here. First, when I say “barely” I mean the Giuliani decline would not be significant if we needed to be 96% confident. And the precision of my calculation requires a statistical assumption (simple random sampling) that is iffy when pollsters weight their data (as this and virtually all other public polls do).

Next, remember that four other surveys conducted over the last 10 days - including the just released CNN/ORC survey - show no comparable Giuliani decline. In fact, while the changes on any individual poll may have been within sampling error, all four show a slightly larger Giuliani lead (see also the trend in evidence on our Presidential tracking chart).

Keep in mind, of course, that the CBS/NYT survey involved a hypothetical two-way Giuliani-McCain match-up, while the others asked respondents to choose among all of the likely Republican candidates. Notice that the CBS/NYT results are better for both Giuliani and McCain - the perfectly logical result of offering just two choices rather than roughly ten. Perhaps the Giuliani decline occurred mostly among those who only opted for Giuliani (in February) because their first choice was not an option.

Consider finally the issue of the “oversample” of Republicans on the most recent survey interviewed by redialing households “at which a self-identified Republican had been interviewed in [CBS/NYT] polls over the last seven months.” Of course, the pollsters can compare the oversample to Republicans in the base sample to see if the former was more hostile to Giuliani. In response to my email query, CBS Survey Director Kathleen Frankovic confirms that she saw “no indication that the oversample was hostile to Giuliani.”

When it comes to methodology, the CBS/New York Times surveys are top notch. But yes, early or late, even the best polls can produce “fickle” results. So given all of the above, readers should be cautious about making too much of the observed Giuliani decline until confirmed elsewhere.

The last two polls that measured the Rudy/McCain head-to-head matchup were the March 4th Newsweek poll that showed Rudy with a 25 pt. lead on McCain, and the February 17th CBS poll that showed Rudy with a 21 pt. lead on the Senator. So as Blumenthal advises, we should use caution when make a conclusion based on this data alone.

Nevada has some good news for Republicans…

News 4/Reno Gazette-Journal, GOP and Dem Primary with General Election Poll Republicans

• Rudy Guiliani 38%
• John McCain 18%
• Newt Gingrich 13%
• Mitt Romney 4%
• Sam Brownback 1%
• Mike Huckabee 1%
• Tom Tancredo 1%
• Duncan Hunter 1%
• Condoleezza Rice 1%
• Chuck Hagel 1%
• Others 1%
• Undecided 20%

Democrats

• Hillary Clinton 32%
• Barack Obama 20%
• Al Gore 11%
• John Edwards 11%
• Bill Richardson 2%
• Wesley Clark 2%
• Mike Gravel 1%
• Dennis Kucinich 1%
• Chris Dodd 1%
• Joe Biden 1%
• Undecided 18%

General Election

• John McCain 44%
• Hillary Clinton 39%
• Undecided 17%
• Interesting to note… HRC only beats McCain by 4 pts. among women (which is within the MoE) while McCain beats her by 14 pts. among men.

• John McCain 43%
• Barack Obama 42%
• Undecided 15%

• John McCain 44%
• John Edwards 40%
• Undecided 16%

• John McCain 44%
• Al Gore 40%
• Undecided 16%

• Rudy Giuliani 46%
• Hillary Clinton 38%
• Undecided 16%
• Interesting to note… Rudy runs 1 pt. behind HRC among women while beating her by 1 pts. among men.

• Rudy Giuliani 44%
• Barack Obama 42%
• Undecided 14%

• Rudy Giuliani 46%
• John Edwards 40%
• Undecided 14%

• Rudy Giuliani 45%
• Al Gore 42%
• Undecided 13%

Thanks to Mark at Decision ‘08 for the tip.

Rasmussen’s latest shows Hizzoner with an all-time high 21 pt. lead on Sen. McCain:

Rasmussen Reports 2008 GOP Primary Poll, conducted March 5-8, 2007.

• Rudy Giuliani 37%
• John McCain 16%
• Newt Gingrich 11%
• Mitt Romney 10%

No other Republican cracked 2%.