WPA’s Weekly Political Brief

As part of our continuing effort to keep our clients and friends up-to-date on the political environment as we head toward Election Day, 2012, every Friday WPA compiles the key numbers from the week and provides analysis of key trends. In addition to the key political numbers, this week’s analysis includes: Three key swing states, [...]

 

Obama as a Hawk, is there a foreign policy argument for re-election?

Asked at any point before May 1st of last year, the question above would have been ridiculous.  Outside of liberal intellectuals and college students, whose idea of “restoring America’s reputation in the world” is something on the order of “surrender and tell the bad guys you want to be friends,” few would have credited the [...]

 

West Virginia Democratic Presidential Primary Results

In yesterday’s Democratic primary in West Virginia, Keith Russell Judd, an inmate in a federal prison in Beaumont, TX serving a 17-year sentence, scored a whopping 40% of the vote against President Obama.  This clearly suggests that the once heavily Democratic West Virginia will be a solid state for Mitt Romney in the general election, as [...]

 

PPP Survey – TX Sen: Dewhurst Begins to Falter

  (from the PRIsm Political Report) Public Policy Polling released the results of their latest Texas US Senate Republican primary survey (4/19-22; 400 TX likely GOP primary voters) revealing that prohibitive favorite David Dewhurst, the state’s three-term Lt. Governor, may be headed to a run-off  election with former Texas Solicitor General Ted Cruz, a first-time [...]

 

Why the Media Silence on Operation Fast and Furious?

It wouldn’t be surprising if you missed it, but the White House is refusing to allow a Congressional Committee access to a key witness in the ongoing probe into Operation Fast and Furious. Operation Fast and Furious is, of course, the incredibly stupid policy of letting automatic weapons find their way into the hands of [...]

 

WI, DC and MD Presidential Primary Results

In swing Wisconsin, Romney won,  but his 42-38% margin over Santorum was again unimpressive.  Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX-14) placed third with 12%, followed by former House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s 6%.  But, Maryland might have been a bit more surprising.  Though it was a clean win for Romney, as all expected, he still couldn’t break the [...]

 

The Hill – Republican Contenders Ese High Court Hearing to Blast President, Each Other

 By Josh Lederman – 03/26/12 08:46 PM ET The Republican presidential contenders seized Monday’s Supreme Court hearing as a ready-made opportunity to bash President Obama — and each other. Rick Santorum, who is struggling to keep momentum in his campaign, made the highest-profile play to capitalize on the first day of arguments, traveling to Washington [...]

 

Illinois Primary Results

(from the PRIsm Political Report) Mitt Romney easily won the Illinois primary last night finishing exactly as the late polls predicted, 47-35% over Rick Santorum.  Delegate-wise, it is more difficult to project this soon into the post-election process because Illinois is a “loophole primary” and voters were actually choosing individuals on the ballot to fill [...]

 

WPA’s Weekly Political Brief

As part of our continuing effort to keep our clients and friends up-to-date on the political environment as we head toward Election Day, 2012, every Friday WPA compiles the key numbers from the week and provides analysis of key trends. In addition to the key political numbers, this week’s analysis includes: Romney and potential trouble [...]

 

President Approval Rating Still Upside Down

President Obama continues to have dismal approval ratings, as 43% of Americans approve of the job he is doing, while 48% disapprove of his job performance as President.  Here’s the lasted Gallup chart that tracks daily the President’s job approval rating.   % Approve % Disapprove 03/3-5/2012 43% 48% 03/2-4/2012 45% 48% 03/1-3/2012 48% 46% [...]

 

Looking Ahead to Super Tuesday

(from the PRIsm political report) It’s quite possible that Super Tuesday, designed to give one presidential candidate a boost toward the eventual party nomination, may not be particularly definitive in 2012. Initial polling has been published, or trends are clear, in nine of the thirteen states hosting caucuses or primaries on or before Super Tuesday, [...]

 

New Numbers in Massachusetts and Hawaii

  (from the PRIsm Political Report) Hawaii    The Hawaii US Senate campaign is turning crazy.  Now, another new poll reports starkly different results to some others already in the public domain.  Ward Research, a Hawaii-based survey research firm, conducted a new poll with an abnormally long sampling period for the Honolulu Star-Advertiser newspaper (1/26-2/5; [...]

 

WPA Poll: Manzullo/Kinzinger Tied in IL-16

(from RollCall) By Shira Toeplitz Posted at 1:24 p.m. today Rep. Adam Kinzinger (above) faces fellow GOP Rep. Don Manzullo in a primary next month. (Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call File Photo) Illinois Republicans Don Manzullo and Adam Kinzinger are locked in a competitive primary, according to a new survey from a super PAC supporting Kinzinger. [...]

 

The Truth About the Generic Ballot

An interesting comment caught my eye in the Washington Post’s The Fix blog yesterday. The article repeated a Democratic talking point that Democrats lead on the generic ballot by “several points” and this is evidence that they might take back the house. For those of us who have worked in polling for more than a [...]

 

Polarization and Politics

Chris Cillizza and Aaron Blake over at The Fix posted an interesting analysis of Gallup data showing that opinions of Barack Obama are the most polarized by political party of any President at this point in his term in recent history.  George W. Bush was second at this point in his presidency and also had [...]

 

Fancy Speech Mr. President, But the Public Doesn’t Buy It

Americans’ worries about maintaining their standard of living (51%), or being able to pay medical bills (43%) or losing their job (34%) in the next 12 months are among the highest Gallup has measured in the past 20 years, on par with the levels seen in 1991 and 1992. These results are based on a [...]

 

US Economic Confidence Levels Off

The Gallup U.S. Economic Confidence Index remains near its seven-month high at -29 in the week ending Jan. 15, similar to -27 the prior week. However, economic confidence continues to trail the -19 of a year ago. The Gallup Economic Confidence Index is an average of two components: Americans’ ratings of current economic conditions and [...]

 

Resetting the Presidential Race: Obama Vulnerability

It is now less than 11 months until American voters will pick our next (and hopefully new) President.  While most of the stories you’ll read are, rightly, about the Republican nominating contests, the fundamentals of the general elections are taking shape around us every day and worth an examination. So let’s take a look at [...]

 

Gallup Comparison of 2012 GOP Primary versus 2003 Dem Primary

PRINCETON, NJ — The lead in the Republican nomination race has thus far changed seven times since May in Gallup polling. Mitt Romney, Rick Perry, Herman Cain, and Newt Gingrich each held the top spot at various points in 2011, with Romney’s standing rising and falling as other candidates surged and faded. Mike Huckabee led [...]

 

Republicans Must Stand up to Occupy Wall Street Protests

Several clients and friends have asked for our thoughts on the Occupy protests and their impact on public opinion.  This is fueled, perhaps, by the fact that some Republicans and Republican consultants are of the belief that the Occupy protests reflect a real threat to conservatives. Perhaps most notably, Frank Luntz[1] recently claimed to be [...]

 

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