Polling a Three-Way Presidential Contest

Public Policy Polling has released the results of a survey gauging support for particular third party Independent candidates in next year's presidential election.   Excerpt:
we took a look at seven possible independent candidates against Obama and his strongest GOP challenger, Mitt Romney, and found that the chances of defection by GOP-inclined voters are stronger than are cracks in the Democrats’ armor. Despite their grumbling, Democrats remain pretty united behind Obama, and six of the seven possible independent candidates would hurt Romney more than the president. 
The seven potential Independent candidates mentioned in the survey were: Michael Bloomberg, Jon Huntsman, Ralph Nader, Sarah Palin, Ron Paul, Bernie Sanders, and Donald Trump.  Bloomberg (10%), Palin (21%), Paul (15%) and Trump (18%) broke through to double digits.  You have to be careful with PPP surveys though because their samples always skew toward the Democrats and Republicans.  While most polls these days find that 40% of their respondents identify themselves as Independents, only 21% of the respondents to this survey were Independents.

3 comments:

TiradeFaction said...

Isn't Palin pretty concretely a Republican? I'm not sure why she's considered an "Independent" in this poll?

DLW said...

Palin's got enuf a committed base that she could threaten to run as an independent if she's not given her due by the Republican party in some shape and form.

And both major parties are coalitions of coalitions and Palin, like many politicians, is first for Palin...
dlw

DLW said...

The low response rate of independents to polls often reflects their relative apathy or alienation from politics..., which does not bode well for those trumpeting a centrist third party candidate.

It looks like Obama's going to get reelected and so we should be focusing on other venues for reform...
dlw

 
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