9/19/2010

2 Responses to “Poll: Would Sarah Palin Beat Obama in 2012?”

1. Much as I would LOVE for Sarah to become president, given the limited choices of your poll, I cannot respond.

   aunursa (dd38d2) — 9/19/2010 @ 4:24 pm

   
   

2. Most bare-bones polls like this largely useless, but I think patterico may be on to an exception here.

   First, this is a conservative, lean-Republican blog (Most here know I am neither, FWIW), which goes to the issue gaining nomination. There have been questions conducted by professional pollsters which show, as I understand, that generally speaking her own strongest supporters do not see her as a viable candidate for POTUS. But her own strongest supporters are not necessarily (I say not likely) representative of the larger group that decides on nomination, which is diverse across the entire country, and about which I hazard that patterico and his regular commenters have a more realistic appreciation of her chances at gaining the nomination.

   Second, note it appears I am going here against the grain of the question, which superficially is aimed at determining something important about a head-to-head contest between nominees. Maybe it seems paradoxical, but I think not: the issue of such a contest comes down 1) to relative enthusiasm among party faithful i.e. GOTV, and 2) the ability to sway independents in a depressed electorate (more comparable to 2000 than to 2008).

   On 1), I cannot see how she can count on enthusiastic support from any sector within her own party, including her strongest supporters, relative to the amount of enthusiasm her being nominated would energize the Democratic base, which is currently divided between center-left support for Obama such as one finds in the Daily Kos and Huffington Post for example, and pure left progressive disappointment and even opposition to him such as one finds in FireDogLake and a host of similarly placed smaller blog communities which add up to somewhere between a quarter to a third of Dem support. Nominating Palin would close that divide.

   On 2), where the electorate is more a matter of potential, more ephemeral, lower commitment and lower information, she already has a fairly strongly developed image that does not serve the safety and security image that normally animates such folks. I would contrast her losing as VP in 2008 to say Nixon losing as P in 1960 on the basis that Nixon did not lose on any perception of naivetee or lack of sophistication on foreign policy or economic issues, and indeed the head-to-head debates were then, and even on review now, very close to a draw (I remember watching them at the time and feeling Nixon was a lot more concrete and realistic and showed more experience and sophistication than Kennedy.)

   The third point is that Republicans have really got to start getting serious about where they put their energies for 2012. I see Mike Pence won the Values Voters straw poll, which is in itself not very compelling; but Pence is a viable national candidate, with a firm presence that is difficult to mock and (so far as I know) not a lot of negatives. But more interesting is that THOSE voters chose him over Huckabee, who would be in a battle with Palin for the same constituency, and with Palin quite a bit back of both.

   So, I see this poll as the first in a series aimed at narrowing to the viable choices as early as possible, and introducing the concept with perhaps the most obvious candidate for elimination.

   shooter (32dc25) — 9/20/2010 @ 3:54 am