Dr. Paul trails Hillary by 10 percent in latest poll

Posted October 21st, 2007 by futureinmind

This is up from trailing by 15 % in July.
http://www.rasmussenrepor...

The latest Rasmussen Reports survey of Republican Congressman Ron Paul's electoral strength shows him trailing top Democratic candidates by double digits. Senator Hillary Clinton leads Paul 48% to 38% (although among male voters, Paul lags Clinton by only two points).

Senator Barack Obama leads the Republican Congressman 50% to 38%.

Paul has gained ground since beginning his presidential campaign as a virtual unknown outside of his congressional district and some libertarian and conservative circles.

But the enthusiasm of supporters, his strength in GOP straw polls, and his surprising fundraising ability have yet to make him competitive in either GOP-nomination or general-election match-ups. In Iowa, Paul attracts just 2% of the vote and he has yet to top 3% in the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll.

If Paul somehow manages to overcome long odds and win the Republican nomination, just 17% of Republicans and 12% of all voters think Paul has any chance of winning the general election. As the Republican nominee, only 4% believe Paul would be Very Likely to win in November 2008.

Still, Paul's showing against both Clinton and Obama has improved moderately since July. Then, Paul lagged Clinton by 15 percentage points, Obama by 20.

Paul is viewed favorably by just 26% of all voters, unfavorably by 32%. In April, only 14% had a favorable opinion of him.

Rasmussen Reports has not gauged perceptions of Paul's ideology. But he is known as a libertarian and gold bug who in Congress continually casts a lone nay vote in protest of legislation he regards as unconstitutional. In the GOP field he is conspicuous for his opposition to the war in Iraq.

The Paul campaign has reported that it raised about $5 million over the summer and at the end of September had $5.3 million on hand.

output

Random Question: Articles of Impeachment

On October 22nd, 2007 wg3323 says:

Has Dr. Paul signed on to either of the two articles of impeachment that have been introduced by Kucinich and McKinney? I'm not sure what his position is on those....

in case you failed to notice,

On October 22nd, 2007 outdream says:

they omitted pointing out that ron paul trailed hillary by merely 10% when it was his turn, that's a closer margin than any of the other candidates.

These numbers are great. You

On October 22nd, 2007 netzorro says:

These numbers are great. You all remember that Dr. Paul wasn't even a consideration to win when he first entered the race, now we have him gaining strength everywhere!
Now we really have to focus, less than three months before the first primary.
Redouble your efforts and donations, we CAN WIN this thing.
Everyone start researching how your precincts elect delegates to the County conventions. We MUST have delegates starting at the precinct level and then the County and State conventions.
Delegates win elections, thats the bottom line.

I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies.The issuing power should be taken from the banks and restored to the people to whom it properly belongs.
Thomas Jefferson

consider this

On October 22nd, 2007 Erik_Geib says:

Yes, I'm about to use the Dems to make my point, but consider this:

John Kerry was faring far worse in similar "polls" at this point in 2004 than Dr. Paul is doing today. Speculative polling, particularly as it pertains to polling, is a farce. People think they can use polls much like psychologists and social scientists use experiments and statistics to determine behavior, but as it pertains to opinion, particularly of a political nature, this logic is severely flawed.

"Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together."
-Dwight D. Eisenhower

Consider this: (First Post)

On October 21st, 2007 TheTDK says:

Traditional polls for Ron Paul have not registered better than single digits in state polls. Recently, there have been some notable improvements in these numbers but still no correlation between the money raised and poll showings enjoyed by the other candidates of both parties.

Many speculate that Ron Paul’s supporters are ALL young, cell phone users without landlines and this has been skewing the poll numbers. This may be true to some degree, but my experience to date has shown me that Paul supporters are from very diverse age groups. The number of young people is notable, however, and has drawn such a fervent response from the young voters of our country. They're out there and they actually care!

To my point, and question: Given the candidate's message of Freedom, Liberty, Individualism and Privacy, with a general "Don't Tread on Me" attitude; Could it be possible that a LARGE percentage of Ron Paul supporters are more likely to have Caller ID and less likely to take a call from a party or number they don't recognize? How many of you readers "like" to do surveys? A few I'd guess, but I suspect many Paul supporters consider this an intrusion on their busy lives and don't wish to be bothered.

Typical "traditional polls" have what’s called a "non-response rate", or people who refuse to take part, either by not answering the phone or refusing when answered. These "non-response rates" vary, but are typically about 35% of contacts attempted or more. A 15% non-response rate or less is considered an exceptional poll result. How many Paul supporters are being missed by these polls because of this very common, American behavior, of ignoring unwanted calls?

Is the phone poll entirely missing a huge population of Americans that has been growing steadily year after year?

“First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”
Mahatma Gandhi

- I figure we are 3/4 of they way to winning.

well...

On October 22nd, 2007 check says:

The same point was brought about in the last election. Some people were 'sure' John Kerry would win the general election when all the polls indicated that throughout the campaign his support and Bush's support were more or less even. The claim was that there was a huge number of people who were not represented simply because they did not have landlines and thus were not being counted in the surveys and that these trendy/techy cell phone-carrying hipsters would be more likely to vote for Kerry than Bush. And while it is true that these people were left out of the polls, we saw that on election night in November 2004 there really wasn't any surprise influx of Kerry votes (if you believe the results).

That being said, the focus now should be on winning the primaries. In that regard I'm pretty optimistic that Ron Paul supporters are more likely to 'bother' to vote in the primaries than Giuliani, Thompson or Romney supporters. In the end though it's not how loud your supporters are that matters, it's how many supporters you actually have.

yes but

On October 22nd, 2007 Jedimetroid says:

bush was ahead in the polls in 2000 and yet Gore won the popular vote

Telephone polls are largely BS

On October 22nd, 2007 ironman77 says:

For many different reasons. First, they do not take care with how they ask the questions. the callers are not trained, and so they Bias the interview with things like intonation, They don't provide redundant questions to make sure the question was understood. Some organizations like Gallup and zogby are a bit beter with these things, but not perfect. Others, done by the press are terrible

The samples that they look at are suspect, either based on a call list, or a other biased method (as you point out). If someone wants scientific information they have to use face to face, knock on door type sampling like the CDC and health orgainizations.

Last, most polls reported are national polls, they are meaningless, since we live in a republic, but they are used to sway voters, not predict outcomes.

So Biased

On October 21st, 2007 Cameron Davis says:

I encourage everyone to read the fine print on all the stipulations Rasmussen puts on its polls. It is completely ridiculous, they add all kinds of criteria until the poll says what they want it to say. Take anything Rasmussen reports about polls with a grain of salt, their polls are like reading tea leaves.