http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2007/12/11/fred-thompson-is-done-with-new-hampshire/ Fred Thompson is done with New Hampshire This is a risky move, but I understand why Fred is doing it. New Hampshire lost half of its delegate count by holding its primary early (making it a little less desirable). But his bad numbers in New Hampshire indicate that Iowa is all or nothing for him now. Iowa is a caucus, so there is no penalty assessed there for going early. Wyoming started it's caucuses today for crissakes. A finish lower than 2nd in Iowa will kill Fred's momentum for South Carolina. And no wins in the first 3 primary states will absolutely undermine his campaign bid. Should get interesting with Romney, Huckabee and Thompson "all in" for Iowa. I'm expecting loads of attack ads. lol Not like this one, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XRjFLC3-Gs
wow that is pretty sick. Iowa really is gonna be a blood bath now hahaha does anyone smell low voter turnout? ahh it smells great!
No. He has more money and a bigger national campaign than the other candidates. Btw, a 3rd place finish ahead of Giuliani and McCain would be very impressive. But we might mess that up and win the whole damn thing.
incorrect, unless you have a source...last I heard Romney and Shrillary still had more.... only in the minds of the lunetic fringe....btw, where are his tv commercials, radio commercials, etc? there are none here in SC but still 3rd place...face it, the nation is NOT rallying around RP.
Paul is running for the Republican nomination. Romney's campaign is insolvent. Please consult the FEC filings for Q3. Hmmm. I know that the new IRS ad is playing on the radio in SC or will be soon. There are three campaign offices, in Greenville, Charleston and somewhere else if you want to get yourself a lawn sign. I think they have all kinds of campaign materials, should be able to fix you up with just about anything. You guys wouldn't have given him 7th place 2 months ago. Wait for it. Hey, you know that Sanford and Paul are pals right? Sanford was another one of those NO voters in Congress.
I like Thompson, but he had to know he started this thing off badly. Waiting till the last minute, missing key debates that gets him in front of those that would vote for him. I don't believe he's taken it very seriously. I'd be very surprised if RP finished above sixth place. He has consistently polled at 5% in just about every poll I've seen. Even the latest Iowa poll has him at 5%. Now, the down side to that is, that I don't believe it's typical republicans that make up his base. And this *really* will be confirmed once the primaries get going. I honestly believe, as we've seen right here on DP, that many, many liberals/left leaning voters are being drawn to him. As such, it would make perfect sense that he's consistently polling so low. When pollsters call republicans to find out who they are voting for, they are not calling liberals. I'm not saying that to be negative on him, I believe it's a valid observation. If it turns out to be that, there's going to be one hell of a shake up forthcoming.
GTech, most polls poll people who voted in the 2006 republican primary am i not correct? also, there's a certain level of truth to "polls". When somebody calls your house and asks who you are supporting, that doesn't mean the person is actually going to go out and vote for that person. People usually interpret it "who do you think is going to win?" you're again not thinking rationally if you think that we'll only account for "5%" of the vote when it comes down to it. And you're pondering about 6th place? wow. hey do me a favor, since i won't be there to see it, take a picture of your face when you see the results so i can see your reaction. thnx
Nate, most pollsters look for 2004 and 2000 Republican primary voters. But in 2004 in particular, only 6% of the GOP voted in the primaries, because Bush was the incumbent, and the party wasn't running any serious challengers against him. It's unlikely many 2004 Bush Republicans would vote for Paul. That he is able to get 4 or 5% is actually a major breakthrough.
sorry, yeah I meant 2004 not 2006. that's an interesting fact.. so let's see.. these polls represent 6% of the GOP basically? of course you can count in 2000. sure we'll round up to 15%, that's a pretty good indicator of what the GOP really wants, right GTech?
http://www.iowaindependent.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=1598 Paul is fast rising. Already in 3rd place in the Iowa poll. And face it, 80%+ of those people are going to show up at the polls. And those polls are only among LIKELY registered republicans. Basically those who voted in the 2004 primaries. Paul has 10x more support with independents, disenchanted republicans who didn't vote last time, and even democrats who are switching over for him (quite a lot). If Paul has even 5% support, and most Iowa polls are now showing 6-7% among hardcore (likely goers) republicans, he wins. Because the voting eligible population turnout for the GOP caucus in Iowa is only 3%. So if Paul can get out that 4% "crazy" part of the population, which he WILL, Paul will have something like 60% of the vote. Most GOP primaries and caucuses have 1-6% VEP turnout. It's extremely low. Only New Hampshire is a stark contrast and will be tough with 20% turnout, that will be tougher than Iowa actually. Hell, Ron Paul has almost 1,000 meetup members in Iowa. Only 30,000-50,000 people vote at the caucus. If they have 3 family members, and 3 convinced friends each, they have 7,000, or about 20% of the vote right there. The fact is his meetup group by themselves could win the election with enough campaigning. Not to mention, with exception to Huckabee, there is NO enthusiasm for the other candidates. Everyone I know who likes Paul (about 100 people) is going to vote in the primaries. The people who like the other candidates (about 20 I've met) most likely WILL NOT. Only 1 huckabee person said they would vote for him definitely, but I changed his mind after I made him watch the youtube video where he begs for new taxes. I'd say for voter turnout: Ron Paul supporters: 80-90% turnout Huckabee turnout:15% McRomliani turnout: 5% (maybe romney does better in turnout cuz the mormons will be out in full force for him)
It is a disadvantage to all of the campaigns, including Paul's that the Caucus is on the night of a bowl game IIRC, and the weather should be horrible.
Actually that's a huge advantage for Paul. In the small little world of many uninformed men, talk of the game should overtake any hope of talk about who to vote for at the caucus at the company water cooler. That's good news! Most of us Paul supporters are more politically aware, and are already dead-set on voting. The liberty and love types. Not the football crazy redneck "get them jihadists!" types really. As for the weather, our dedication is much much much much higher, so that's also good news for Paul.
not 100% certain yet...I like Huckabee, but I have not done enough research fully on all the candidates. that didn't answer my question....do you have a source? or are you going to avoid that question? the only thing I have seen is a guy driving a minivan with "Ron Paul for president" painted on the side....I wish I would have taken a picture, but then again, I don't care to help their (very small) campaign. again, off by 35% from first place...yep, he sure is rising in the polls!!! Sanford is also not that well liked here. The only reason he is still gov. is that no other republican really ran. His admin has been filled with bad calls, a decrease in funding for education, and scandals (google "Thomas Ravanel and Cocaine" and you will see what I mean.).
I gave you a source. The Q3 filings from the FEC. http://www.fec.gov Well 3 offices is hardly small. IIRC, Huckabee doesn't even have a single office in SC. When the telephone polls predict the winner, second place and third place accurately, I'll worry about % points. All they are good for is reflecting opinion trends, not voter turnout. And Iowa and New Hampshire ALWAYS influence the outcome in South Carolina. That's funny. Sanford is going to be a much sought after running mate. He's one of the bright young stars of the GOP. Last I checked, he was doing a great job wiping out the state debt, lowering taxes and decreasing spending. He's a Fiscal Conservative's wet dream.
Cyrus - you make very good points. The way these primaries are set up should make things extremely interesting. I think the Ron Paul phenomenon makes the MSM's polling pretty much meaningless. And as many have mentioned - Much of Ron Paul's support comes from outside of the Republican base. I've never vote for a Republican in my life yet I just bought a Ron Paul shirt and I plan on contributing to his campaign on the 16th. I actually prefer Dennis Kucinich BUT... Ron Paul's stance on civil liberties and foreign policy has won me over. I feel like I have to support him - I really feel that our country is at a crossroads right now and if we don't change the road we are on - we are headed nowhere FAST I'm tired of the lies of all the main stream candidates (in both parties) - Ron Paul is a breath of fresh air. He's someone that people who have never cared about politics before can get excited about. Someone who actually tells the truth, who actually says what he believes. It's a real wake up for people. People are so used to politicians like Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee. People who will say anything to get elected. People with no morals. Ron Paul is someone that you can actually believe in... and he's got a lot of great ideas too. While I do not agree with his libertarian views on all topics - I must admit that his logic has won me over quite a bit... to the point where I am questioning a lot of my own beliefs about the role of government. I've long been a social libertarian - I believe strongly in people's civil liberties. But now I'm considering that maybe I've been wrong about the other aspects... My views have run close to socialism economically. I really think that Ron Paul's ability to articulately explain his ideas have lead some liberals like myself to reassess where they stand. I'm not ready to say I'm a Libertarian just yet... but I'm doing more research on it... You know... that's what's so great about the whole Ron Paul thing - it's really encouraging people to think, to think about the issues. Who cares who has a 400 dollar hair cut? Who cares who's black? Who is a woman? blah blah blah, the usual absolute crap that the MSM feeds us. Let's talk about the ISSUES!
Zibblu, I think that is the biggest thing that people underestimate about the Ron Paul campaign. They call us crazies and accuse us of taking over the party to prop up our candidate, when in reality we had different ideals, but are beginning to re-examine them because what Paul says makes so much sense. I was loosely liberal before this election, not because I like the Democrats or hate the Republicans, but because in my mind the Democrats seemed to be closer to defending my biggest issue, civil liberties. In my mind religious radicalism and evangelicals have hijacked the Republican party to enforce their way of life upon everyone, and that is why I could never vote for the Republican candidates of the past few elections. Ron Paul has changed everything, he's a strong Christian who doesn't want to make me live his version of life, and he's open with what he believes and why, and he doesn't bullshit around and pander for votes. He said he wants free trade with Cuba in Miami! He's not afraid to stand up for his beliefs, and he doesn't play traditional politics. The man has stronger convictions and is more honest than every other candidate on stage combined, and it's something that has worked wonders in opening my mind to the traditional conversative mindset.
so you want me to do your work for you? no thanks. Furthermore, my question wasn't in response to Q3...it was as a whole...which was how your post was reflected. Now go do your own work, present a source as I asked, one that is credible that I don't have to do the work for. But I did go back and do your work for Q3, just to prove you wrong. Here are the two links. As you can see, RP is way behind $$ wise verses Mitt...which is what I said and directly opposite of what you said. Mitt's Q3 RP Q3 never said Huck did...but three offices and no one here is talking about him? yeah, thats good work all right. true...polls really arn't good for anything, except saying "hey look, we are winning a poll." I personally don't like them very much. he may be doing some of those things, but he is not helping the state where the state really needs it, i.e. education. Furthermore, like I said, all the scandals in his current term are (IMO) already hurting his previous terms. Sen. Lindsey Grahamnesty is also hurting Sanford, as they endorsed each other and are good buddies. If Grahamnesty is not careful, he is going to be out come next election.