Thread: John McCain pumped by Super Tuesday poll numbers

John McCain pumped by Super Tuesday poll numbers

BY TOM BRUNE | tom.brune@newsday.com; Staff
February 4, 2008

WASHINGTON - As top Republican presidential contenders John McCain and Mitt Romney head into tomorrow's mega-primary in New York and 20 other states, a question hangs over the GOP contest: Is it all over but for the voting?

Two major national opinion polls released yesterday found McCain now has twice as much support among GOP voters as Romney, with Mike Huckabee coming in third and Ron Paul trailing behind.

Several other recent local polls find McCain leads in most of the states that will hold contests tomorrow except two - Massachusetts and Utah, which represent Romney's home state and base. McCain also takes a slight lead in delegates - 93 to Romney's 77 - into tomorrow's Super Primary, but he appears assured a majority of the 1,081 up for grabs at day's end, most analysts said.

It takes 1,191 delegates to win the nomination.

"We won't know until we see the results, but if McCain performs at the ballot box as he has been polling, then he will have a prohibitive lead in delegates, although not enough to clinch," said Republican pollster and analyst Whit Ayres.

"If all Romney and Huckabee can do is pick up a handful of states between them, the race will be effectively over."

Romney conceded nothing as he campaigned yesterday in Illinois and Missouri.

Instead, he mounted a strong effort to rally the party's conservatives around him, particularly those who have long harbored distrust and even a visceral dislike of McCain for his maverick and, in their eyes, liberal rhetoric and legislation.

Asked on ABC's "This Week" how he can turn around McCain's momentum, Romney pointed to the party's base.

"I think the answer is that you make sure as you go across the country that you build the support among the base of our party, to remind them that this is a battle, in some respects, for the heart and soul of the Republican Party," Romney said.

"Frankly, if we want a party that is indistinguishable from Hillary Clinton on an issue like illegal immigration - that we're going to have John McCain as a nominee - that's the wrong way to go," he said.

But Romney also finds himself fending off Huckabee, who campaigned in Georgia and Tennessee yesterday.

Huckabee, expected to win his home state of Arkansas, could siphon off conservative votes for Romney in the South.

"I think it's time for Mitt Romney to step aside," said Iowa winner Huckabee on CNN. "If he wants to call it a two-man race, fine. But that makes it John McCain and me."

McCain made his own case for the conservative vote, and last night headed to take on Romney on his home turf of Massachusetts.

"If you examine my record, it's more conservative than Governor Romney's is," he said on CBS' "Face the Nation. "I am proud of my conservative record, and I will run on it, and I'm proud of the supporters that I have."

The Arizona senator, 71, flew to Westchester County yesterday, then boarded his "Straight Talk Express" campaign bus to roll to a rally at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield, Conn.

There he shared the stage with another maverick, Connecticut's Democrat-turned-independent Sen. Joseph Lieberman, where an enthusiastic crowd drowned out a heckler with chants of "Mac is back!"

After the rally, McCain begged off questions about his choice for vice president, including Lieberman. McCain said he first must win the nomination, adding he was "guardedly optimistic" that he would.

Later, he relished in a visit to the former Massachusetts governor's home turf, greeting supporters and football fans clad in New England Patriots jerseys at the Green Dragon Tavern in Boston's Faneuil Hall neighborhood.

Inside, he was welcomed by former Massachusetts governor Paul Celluci, who has endorsed McCain. Talking to people on the street outside, McCain said, "We're going to compete here."

McCain certainly could take comfort from two new polls.

The Washington Post-ABC News poll said McCain had 48 percent of GOP support, twice Romney's 24 percent. Huckabee had 16 percent and Paul 7 percent.

The Pew Research Center for the People & the Press said McCain led Romney 42 percent to 22 percent. Romney was statistically tied with Huckabee, with 20 percent, and Paul had 5 percent.

Both polls had a 5 point margin of error for GOP results.

McCain also could take some encouragement from the delegate count: McCain leads with 93, Romney has 77, Huckabee 40 and Paul 4.

McCain, polls show, is poised to win at least 201 delegates in what once were Rudy Giuliani strongholds: the winner-take-all states of New York, New Jersey, Connecticut and Delaware.

Even if Romney wins all six contests that are not primary votes but conventions or caucuses - contests he has targeted - and splits the 500-plus up for grabs, McCain would still emerge with more delegates.

Staff writer Keith Herbert contributed to this story from Fairfield, Conn.

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld ... 6538.story

Who will win the Republican nomination?


Who will win the Republican nomination?

Mike Huckabee (40 responses)

6.0%

John McCain (233 responses)

35.2%

Ron Paul (252 responses)

38.1%

Mitt Romney (137 responses)

20.7%

662 total responses (Results not scientific)

http://www.newsday.com/news/nationworld ... 6538.story

Latest Zogby Ca Poll 2-3

Romney 40
McCain 32
Huck 12
Paul 5


Ramussen

Romney 38
McCain 38
Huck 10
Paul 6

Polls show tight race
03/02/2008 18:56 - (SA)

Washington - New opinion polls on Sunday showed a tightening Democratic race between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, just two days before the unprecedented "Super Tuesday" national nominating showdown.

Surveys on the Republican side, nationally and in key electoral battlegrounds, meanwhile showed Senator John McCain apparently poised to take a stranglehold on his race ahead of former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney.

The close Democratic race reflected in the polls and the party's complex system of proportionally doling out delegates to national conventions suggests no clear winner will emerge in the race on Tuesday.

A new national poll for the Washington Post and ABC had Clinton with a slim four point lead over Obama 47% to 43%, within the margin of error, and in line with other recent similar polls.

Obama closing fast

Clinton had small leads in most other significant states, but Obama, an Illinois senator appeared to be closing fast.

In the delegate-rich state of California, Obama and Clinton appeared to be locked in a pitched battle: a Field Poll had her up 36 to 34%, down from a 12 point lead in mid-January.

Obama lead by 45% to 41% in a Zogby poll in California, while the former first lady led her rival 45% to 36% in a McClatchy survey.

In another battleground, Missouri, where Clinton was campaigning on Sunday, she led Obama 47% to 41% according to a McClatchy/MSNBC poll.

In Georgia, where Illinois Senator Obama is trying to thrust home his advantage among African-Americans, he leads by 47% to 41%, the MSNBC poll found.

In New Jersey, in New York Senator Clinton's backyard, she led 46% to 39% in an MSNBC survey, and topped Obama by 50% to 36% in a Monmouth University/Gannett poll.

McCain set for clear victory

In western Arizona, another battleground, Clinton led Obama 43% to 41% according to MSNBC.

In contrast to the Democratic race, McCain, who has recently emerged as the Republican front-runner despite his differences with conservatives, looked set for a clear victory on Tuesday.

The former Vietnam war hero led 48% to 24% over Romney in a Washington Post/ABC News national poll, with former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee back on 16%.

McCain led state polls in New York, New Jersey, Missouri and Illinois by comfortable margins.

In California, where McCain snapped up the endorsement of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger last week, he held a comfortable lead in two polls, but trailed Romney by three points in the Zogby survey.

Sen. John McCain is poised for a landslide victory in New York's Republican presidential primary, based on a Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby poll released Monday.

McCain, R-Ariz., widened his lead over former Gov. Mitt Romney, R-Mass., by eight percentage points in a single day.

McCain drew 53 percent support in the latest poll, compared to 19 percent for Romney, a gap of 34 points. McCain had led 49 to 23 percent in Sunday's tracking poll, a margin of 26 points.

New York's Republican primary will be held on Tuesday. The third major candidate, former Gov. Mike Huckabee, R-Ark., received 8 percent support both days.

The survey released Monday was conducted Feb. 1-3 by Zogby International, a Utica polling firm. Zogby interviewed 883 New York Republicans, resulting in a margin of error of 3.4 percentage points.

The Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby poll did not extend to the Democratic primary, where home-state Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., is expected to easily defeat Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill.

http://www.bizjournals.com/buffalo/stor ... aily6.html

Romney Surge in California?

Just when it seemed the presidential contest couldn't get more exciting,a Zogby poll puts former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney ahead of Arizona Sen. John McCain in California by eight points.

That's at sharp odds with a Field Poll released Sunday that has McCain up by eight points in the Golden State, which really is a pot of delegate gold for both Republicans and Democrats.

Political experts often discount Zogby polls as unreliable and put a lot more weight in the state Field Poll. Yet while Zogby used a small sample of just 915 likely voters, with a 3.3 point margin of error on both sides, the Field Poll sample was even smaller, at 481 likely GOP voters.

A new Suffolk University poll (the only one to predict New Hampshire's Democratic race correctly) puts McCain in the lead in California 39-32 but notes heavily reliance on early absentee voters and a large undecided element. Among voters likely to vote Tuesday, the Suffolk poll puts the two neck-and-neck.

Both Zogby and the Field Poll show McCain's advantage lies with moderates, and Romney's with conservatives. Might be that McCain's poor performance in the Reagan Library debate last Wednesday night where he flashed his temper and trashed capitalists has some Republicans taking a second look.

Romney has strong backing from conservative talk radio, including Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity, who blanket much of the country's airwaves all day long. Limbaugh has been hammering McCain and Romney picked up on the theme Sunday with ABC's George Stephanopoulous, declaring his race with McCain a "battle...for the heart and soul of the Republican Party" and warning that McCain would make the GOP "indistinguishable from Hillary Clinton" on tax cuts, global warming and immigration.

McCain on the other hand is way ahead in national polls and most of the Republican establishment has jumped on his bandwagon. Just in case, McCain is now running ads as "the true conservative" in the GOP race.

Still, the Zogby poll certainly explains Romney's last-minute visit to Long Beach tonight. A Romney upset in California would be unlikely to negate McCain's likely wins in other big states but it would roil the GOP contest. Romney declared that if he wins California, "It means you're going to have a conservative in teh White House.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/sfg ... y_id=23963

Mike Huckabee picked up a glowing character endorsement today.

From CBS Evening News, Feb. 4, 2008. “Mike Huckabee has been subjected to the millions of dollars of attack ads by Mitt Romney.....I think He’s a very good and decent man and I admire him. And I admire his humor and I think he’s elevated the entire presidential debate and campaign.â€

http://www.presidentpolls2008.com/