Survey: Ron Paul dead even with Obama in hypothetical 2012 race

[xsquid]

Source: USA Today

Rep. Ron Paul, the Texas Republican who struggled to crack 10% in presidential primary polls in 2008, runs dead even with President Obama in a new Rasmussen survey out today.

The survey of 1,000 likely voters in a hypothetical Obama-Paul race gave the Democratic president 42% and the veteran congressman 41%. Paul was particularly strong -- as you would expect -- among independents. He out polled Obama 47% to 28% among voters who are not affiliated with either major party.


Read more: http://content.usatoday.com/communities/onpolitics/post/2010/04/survey-ron-paul-dead-even-with-obama-in-hypothetical-2012-race/1

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I for one think the swing toward extremests like paul is alarming or bare minimum noteworthy, but yes I know everything is still rosy for us *Sarcasm*. I'm sure I will get hammered for posting this, but I am suprised by this much increase by paul even in rasmussen polls.

[tomhayes]

1. Shows how unreliable these surveys are

Because Ron Paul will lose support MASSIVELY if he actually has to appear in public and the average America understands his agenda.

This "survey" is hogwash.

[FBaggins]

5. Yes and no.

It's as valid as a poll vs. a "generic republican" - the candidate inherits the politives of the label without the negatives associated with a specific candidate.

It means that the candidate is in some degree of trouble (as if we didn't know that). BUT, "generic republican" (or "republican I've heard of but know nothing about" as with Paul) eventually has to be replaced on the ballot by an ACTUAL republican.

[xsquid]

8. Agreed. I don't thimk the moonbat has

a chance in hell, but that just means someone could step in his place pretty easily if they see someone like paul favorable now.

[No Elephants]

55. I disagree. I don't think people go to the polls to vote for a generic.

Sure, maybe the hard core (and conscientious voter) base of each major Partty does that, but the base doesn't swing an election.

And let's not forget, Tea Partiers now claim they are not Republicans.

[KansDem]

2. I can see it now! "Paul/Palin 2012"

It's time to get "P-ed" on!

It'll give "trickle down economics" a whole new image!

[AzNick]

17. He can't stand her... n/t

[Jackpine Radical]

24. Tinkle-down economics.

[Historic NY]

57. oh the pee-pee party....drink the tea and go pee....

[No Elephants]

61. Male homosexuals used to call the john the Tea Room. So, no Larry Craig jokes, please.

:evilgrin:

[krabigirl]

89. will never happen

[pinboy3niner]

3. USA Today jumps the shark--again

From their story:

"This raises the obvious question: will the Pauls be the next political dynasty, like the Kennedys and Bushes?" :rofl:

[xsquid]

11. Yea, that's pretty funny. nt

[No Elephants]

62. It jumped the gun, too. Polls this far away from an election are meaningless.

Yet, they still cost money. So, I'm sure USA Today has no agenda in reporting the results of this poll as though they were meaingful. None at all. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gannett_Company

:sarcasm:

[Skink]

4. maybe Fred Thopson will run again.

[tnlefty]

26. I doubt that he could stay awake long enough.

:evilgrin:

[No Elephants]

59. Yes, please.

[Democat]

72. Haha - I forgot about Thompson. He was a Tea Bagger before there was a Tea Party!

And now he's been totally forgotten.

[Turbineguy]

6. Did they leave out:

"among Republicans"?

[xsquid]

10. It said indepents, and no matter what everyone

thinks of rasmussen polls he was the closest on the last two presidential elections. I'm not saying it's the most accurate right now, just that dismissing it as nothing to worry about may not be the best thing to do.

[No Elephants]

60. I never count an election until final numbers are certified. (Or Scalia speaks.) However, Tea

Partiers now consider themselves independents, not Republicans.

That has to skew polls.

[karynnj]

7. Likely because he is better known for things like opposing the war and

libertarian stands on most social issue - not his extreme positions on small government. If he ran, those would be seen as extreme.

(Not to mention - that among the Republicans, there are a large number as likely to say "Obama" as we were to say "Bush" In addition, I think Paul gets some people here who like him on the wars - but hopefully would reject him otherwise.)

[pocoloco]

31. Yeah, those wars ain't that important....

[No Elephants]

56. Isn't Paul anti-choice, too? (Bizarre, but not unusual, for a "libertarian.")

Libertarian Drew Carey's definition of a libertarian: A "libertarian" is a Republican who likes pot."

Bill Maher is the only guy I know who is so pro cigarettes and pro pot that he considers himself a Libertarian (with a capital L), even though he seems quite liberal. Otherwise, they are all small government folk.

[krabigirl]

91. No, many libertarians are pro-choice. Gary Johnson fwiw

[slackmaster]

9. OMG! Ron Paul is DEAD?

I didn't even know he was sick.

RIP Ron.

:evilfrown:

[Robb]

12. I had the same reaction.

Headlines. :D

[slackmaster]

15. I did a lot of technical writing and proofreading when I was younger

I can't help myself.

[No Elephants]

58. Then you must have noticed there was no comma after "dead."

Granted, though, the headline could have been phrased better. (I used to write headlines for my union's newspaper, as well as proofing for scholarly publications.)

BTW: My husband taught me an almost foolproof technique for proofreaders: read backwards when proofing )solely for technical errors, of course). You won't get so absorbed (or lulled) by content that you miss a typo or other purely technical error.

And, a friend who heads the English Dept at a community college was paid as an expert witness to testify about a comma. I don't remember the sentence, only that his testimony had to do with the manufactuer's instructions or warning for a tea kettle. The plaintiff had been burned while using it and the legal issue was whether the manufacturer's warning (or instruction) was adequate.

ETA: I proofed before my left eye got scarred permanently. Anyone can find typos aplenty in posts now, though. I can't type; glasses cannot correct my vision and I have no patience with the spellcheck feature.

[slackmaster]

75. I would have hyphenated dead-even to make it clearer

Whether that's the right way to do it or not.

Perhaps "tied" would have been a better choice.

[Regret My New Name]

88. Someone tied Ron Paul up?

[boppers]

83. *(solely

:evilgrin:

[BrklynLiberal]

22. That was my first thought was too...

[struggle4progress]

33. Apparently, even Obama being in the race couldn't save Ron Paul

[chrisa]

42. A survey has determined him dead.

Some doctors weren't sure, others said he might be of the undead, and a couple agreed that he could very well still be alive.

[No Elephants]

67. LOL

He does look as though he could be of the undead.

[No Elephants]

53. You should have known he was sick, no matter how physically healthy he may or may not be.

There was plenty of evidence.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

13. The Cubs will win the WS before the GOP nominates Paul. -nt

[n2doc]

19. Heck, the Nationals will win the WS before Paul gets the repub nom. n/t

[RainDog]

14. Paul most likely has support because of this anti-war, anti-corporate stances

not because of his libertarian economics.

he's one of the few on the R side of the aisle that don't think every war is a good thing.

[No Elephants]

70. "libertarian economics"-= no taxes. Many of his positions are driven solely by money, so I would

characterize him as either anti-war or anti-corporate.

[GodlessBiker]

16. Paul is an extremist? No. Mitch McConnell is an extremist.

[geek tragedy]

38. Ron Paul wants to legislatively overturn Roe v Wade and all

pro-gay rights court decisions. He's an anti-woman homophobic nutjob.

[Prometheus Bound]

45. As I understand it, he is against Roe v Wade because it was not a constiututional issue.

And therefore shouldn't have been decided by the SC.

He says it's a state issue, so he would stay out of it.

[No Elephants]

65. Nope. He says he is strongly "pro life" because he is an obstetrician.

And, he introduced the Sanctity of Life Act, which is inconsistent with saying that his only view on this is that the federal government should leave the issue exclusively to the states.

And, like so many who claim to be pro-life, he is really simply anti-choice. You can discern that from reading the rest of his positions.

Sorry, but he is anti-choice and homophobic. He just tries to couch those wingnut views in way that sound less insane than most. And, because he is supposedly ok with stem cell research, maybe he is a hair less extreme than Dummya, but that's about it.

It's very convenient to say "leave it to the states" decades AFTER the SCOTUS said the states can't deny legal abortions. It's also very convenient to say "leave same gender marriage to the states" AFTER so many states enacted Constitutional amendments banning it and Congress enacted DOMA. He still likes him some "Don't ask, don't tell," and spoke in favor of the Defense of Marriage Act.

People spoke of states's rights when defending Jim Crow, too. It's often, if not always, bullshit. Here's the bullshit to American-English translation: "I don't want to pay a political price for my neocon positions, so I blabber about the Constitution. Most people have no clue what it says or means, so they'll look no further; and I'll probably get away with it."

[JerseygirlCT]

82. +1 and some nt

[Ter]

84. He opposes any federal abortion language

He wants in entirely left up to the states.

[JerseygirlCT]

81. "State issue" is what people say when they want to

mess with someone else's rights.

[JerseygirlCT]

80. Yeah there's your small government, libertarian philosophy

at work.

Which means he's a fraud, like the rest of them.

And don't forget about those racist newsletters he claims he had nothing to do with.

He's a racist, anti-woman, homophobic nutjob.

[krabigirl]

90. no, he wants it left to each state

[No Elephants]

64. From his wiki

"The political positions of Ron Paul (R-TX), former United States presidential candidate in 1988 and 2008, have been labeled conservative,<1> Constitutionalist,<2> and libertarian.<3> Ron Paul's nickname "Dr. No"<4> reflects both his medical degree and his assertion that he will "never vote for legislation unless the proposed measure is expressly authorized by the Constitution."<5> This position has frequently resulted in Paul casting the sole "no" vote against proposed legislation."

Sounds pretty extreme to me. And, clearly, he does not understand how the Framers intended the Constitution to work. Or pretends not to understand. Either way, he's wrong.

[n2doc]

18. Yeah right. Paul can't even win the Repub Nomination

Let alone beat Obama. I sincerely hope he runs as an independent. Should prove quite amusing.

[brooklynite]

20. Even our FRiends don't believe this poll...

[BrklynLiberal]

21. Who set up this RIDICULOUS survey???????????? The AEI?

[Doremus]

23. I hope Ron Paul is the Republican nominee. It'll clinch our win. Bring him on.

[Recursion]

27. Yeah... German Social Democrats said that in 1930... NT

[struggle4progress]

34. "Let's put another rightwing wacko from Texas in the White House" won't excite

voters in 2012: most of them had their fill of W

[FarLeftFist]

25. A thousand people?!

Can we stop calling these polls, I have more than that many people living on just my block alone.

[dmallind]

74. MoE on a good 1000 person sample is 3.1%. About normal for polls.

The idea that you need thousands upon thousands of responses to accurately reflect a population of many millions is entirely subjective and erroneous.

[Jefferson23]

28. Sheesh, that title.

[Lisa0825]

29. He did well in polls before the last cycle too... and you saw how that turned out. nt

[Turborama]

51. Ghouliani was a "front runner" for some time, too.

It won't be long before polls are spammed all over the place for 2010. The poll season for 2012 has started already?

[high density]

30. Does anybody know who Ron Paul is?

I think if you listed a blind issue vs. issue look at the two candidates, Obama would win by a blowout. Quite frankly, most of the "independents" simply do not know what they are voting for in Ron Paul. It's fun to bitch about taxes, but then when your services and benefits start drying up, they start to think differently about some of these evil "socialist" programs.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

43. He makes Mounds and Almond Joy, right?

:shrug:

[No Elephants]

71. No. He ALWAYS feels like a nut.

And if he doesn't, it's only because he doesn't know any better, which seems to be the case with nuts from Texas.

(Sorry, LBJ. I don't mean you!)

[Unvanguard]

32. That would be a hilarious election, and Obama would win it 60-40 at worst, easily. n/t

[MilesColtrane]

35. Ron Paul the next President?

My God, the Mayans predicted this!

[Ter]

36. When was the last time a sitting House member got his party's nomination

for President?

[Alexander]

46. James Garfield, 1880

William Jennings Bryan came very close in 1896, but he resigned his House seat a few months before the convention.

[No Elephants]

63. Garfield was shot after 3 months though. (Just sayin')

[geek tragedy]

37. I welcome the war between the Paultards and the Palin Pod People.

Let the various crazy factions inside the GOP fight for the right to lose to Obama.

[Codeine]

39. Adjust for Rass house effects

and you get something like +10% for Obama, according to Nate Silver.

[tritsofme]

40. That doesn't seem very true.

At least historically:
http://beta.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/elections2/election_20082/2008_presidential_election/final_rasmussen_poll_results_presidential_election

[No Elephants]

73. Any Presidential poll more than two years out has an agenda. They are way too unreliable to be

meaningful. And I suspect publishing such a poll by a "news" outlet without any mention of that unreliability has an agenda, too.

[chrisa]

41. If these poll results mean anything,

Why was the same thing happening in the last election, and Ron Paul got at most 2% of the vote in any given state?

[bemildred]

44. Every time I read "Ron Paul dead" I have to pause.

That's a bad headline.

[onenote]

69. I buried Ron Paul.

[DainBramaged]

47. One word proves the poll is bullshit, Rasmussen

[IndianaGreen]

48. Ron Paul is despised by the GOP fundies and neocons

He won't win the GOP nomination, although he can make the race very entertaining as he runs circles around the hypocrite Mitt Romney and the idiot Sarah Palin.

[New Dawn]

85. Exactly. He has no chance of winning the GOP nomination.

I have a hard time imagining a Mormon like Mitt Romney winning it either.

[Occulus]

49. I choose to read this with strategic punctuation

"Survey: Ron Paul dead, even with Obama in hypothetical 2012 race"

:D

[truthisfreedom]

50. *yawn*

[boppers]

52. Didn't Ron Paul win everything last election, except for the voting part?

While we're at it, why don't we declare Rick Astly and Chuck Norris as cultural treasures?

[No Elephants]

54. A poll about the 2012 Presidential election? ZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzz

[sufrommich]

66. Ron Paul would never make it out of the republican primaries. nt

[onenote]

68. facially absurd poll. Paul probably ranks around 50 percent in terms of 'never heard of"

If you go to pollingreport.com and check out some of the polls done in the past few months that ask about various political figures, like Reid and Boehner it shows that they regularly end up with "never heard of" or "don't know enough about" ratings of between 25 and 50 percent. Ron Paul? Almost a given that he's at a comparable level.

[MattBaggins]

76. So it is now official

So called independents are actually retarded.

[bamacrat]

77. Scary. If that happened people would be begging for big government after Paul.

He would cut everything. The only upside is he may actually cut the defense budget and end the wars.

[Name removed]

78. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Douglas Carpenter]

79. this reminds me of 1992 polls showing Ross Perot beating both Bill Clinton and Bush Sr

The Washington Post | June 2, 1992

Political independent Ross Perot leads President Bush and apparent Democratic nominee Bill Clinton in the latest Washington Post-ABC News presidential preference poll.

The survey found Perot with a statistically insignificant lead of 34 percent to Bush's 31 percent among registered voters. Clinton trailed with 29 percent in the poll taken last week

http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1P2-1008602.html

Like Ross Perot, Representative Ron Paul does have a certain type of folksy charm about him and is full of lots of clever anecdotes. But once people discover what Mr. Paul is actually advocating beyond clever quips about getting government out of peoples lives and getting America out of the empire business - both very popular ideas, at least in theory - and they stop to realize that he is talking about ideas that both liberals and conservatives for admittedly different reasons find beyond completely unacceptable - but actually threatening - people will realize that they may like many of his clever quips and agree with much of what he says - but they cannot and will not support his very real broad agenda which almost all liberals, conservatives and moderates will consider downright loony - again for different reasons once they find out what he is really advocating - Even if they may strongly agree with parts of it - which even I do - They will find other parts to be way beyond the pale.

[fascisthunter]

86. um yuh.... this poll is garbage, as most of what Rasmussen Spews

nice try righties, but major fail... AGAIN. :hi:

[and-justice-for-all]

87. Ron who?? nt

[LynneSin]

92. I think Republicans are going to focus on congress the next 3 election cycle and Prez in 2016

That's what they did in 1996 - Dole was never really a strong contender and the Republicans were trying to build Bush into their candidate for the future. Instead see them focus on winning back congress so by 2016 they have total control of congress & White again (so they hope - but I hope we fight that!).

Sure Palin is trying to make herself a contender but her and Paul do not have mainstream appeal.

[krabigirl]

93. I think Paul or another libertarian-leaner will run as an independent in 2012.