Interesting polls.

[MH1]

http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=270
Scroll down to "Who Leads the Democratic Party" (although the others are interesting too).

http://people-press.org.nyud.net:8090/reports/images/270-10.gif
(Follow the link for commentary.)

Contrasting that with the ARG poll (showing "undecided" edging Hillary in most states, who is way ahead of the pack, then Kerry leading the trailers in most states)...

You know, I just can't believe that folks will actually pick Hillary over Kerry, when the time comes to choose. It just makes no sense. Of course I don't understand in what sense people would say that she is "leading" the Democratic party now. Unless they heard in the MSM that she is "leading" in the 2008 polls and confused that with actually "leading the Democratic party"?

Anyway, I thought these were interesting. Considering how the media has been shilling for Clinton, and certain Dems have been trying to suppress any visibilty by Kerry, I think Kerry's doing well to still be leading all the others by a significant margin in the Pew poll.

[karynnj]

1. I agree with your conclusions

Kerry has been down played constatntly while Hillary hyped - yet Kerry is among Democrats essentially tied with Bill Clinton. This was taken in the first week of February (from about this survey), so it was right after the Alito filibuster.

17% is as high as I can remember seeing Kerry since the election - so I think the filibuster and the increased media presence is helping Kerry. (It's cool that it's the Republicans that see it less.) It is interesting that Al Gore is so much less as this was after his speech.

Really interesting poll - I need to read the whole thing at a later stage.

[wisteria]

2. I find it hard to believe people would pick Hillary over Kerry also.

I think you may be right about the media influence here also. People hear she is leading and assume that mean she leads the party also. Personally, she is so undeserving of all of this fame. It all stems from Bill Clinton. I would hope people wouldn't vote for her because they think she is the best candidate or the actual party leader.

[ProSense]

4. I find it hard to believe people picked

Hillary over Bill Clinton as the leader of the Democratic Party. Take Hillary out of the equation and I could almost believe the closeness of Bill and Kerry.

These polls are getting ridiculous.

[sandnsea]

3. Maybe the "I want Bill back" crowd

Maybe the trick is to start pointing out the errors in Bill's policies. Sort of an "I wish Bill woulda' xyz", like gotten things in the trade agreements Kerry wanted, or secured social security when he could have, or something from the New War that didn't get done, that sort of thing. Not an overt campaign, more subtle like, remind people how much Clinton traded away without damaging his overall Presidency.

[TayTay]

5. Not bad.

This is a good place to start from. Remember, Hillary would have to go out on her own and campaign. At some point in time it becomes an issue whether or not she can stand on her own two feet without the support of Bill.

Sen. Kerry ran a good race. He has also been somewhat visible since the loss and has become more visible since Katrina happened. There is a reservoir or good feeling out there that can be tapped. Ahm, despite what you read on the liberal web there are a lot of Dems out there who realize that he very narrowly lost the '04 race. Narrowly. And he did not fade away after the loss, but went back and did his job as a US Senator. He does have fortitude, and that is an admirable quality. He can also out-friggin-work ya. That quality will be seen. (I wrote about this early last year. A characteristic trait of New Englanders when faced with adversity is to 'work harder.' All of life's little problems can be solved if you friggin work harder at it. It's a regionalism that sort of is true.)

[karynnj]

6. One thing I will be very interested in seeing is

whether the polls look different when you look at just the sum of the swing states. I think there are many in the blue states that really don't understand that between 1992 and 2004 there was a major change in the media. So, they buy that Kerry ran a poor campaign and had no message.

In the swing states, Kerry was there so often - and presumably was covered better by the local media. More people would have seen him or at minimum heard from friends/neighbors/co-workers who did.

I agree that Hillary hitting the campaign trail will be an experience. In addition to loving the Road to the WH, the one thing I got out it is that the candidate has to engage people as equals. The idea of Hillary handling questions of the sort Kerry got is interesting. I know she campaigned in NY but that's it. (I thought it was interesting when one guy told Kerry they were about the same age then demanded to know if he used something (hair growth product) to have so much hair - Kerry was funny saying just pray,it was natural, and then mentioning his mom had good hair.) Could Hillary take a year of that?

[TayTay]

8. Good points.

Plus the Hillary praisers are fibbing about her win in NY. She did not carry upstate NY, even against a weak candidate in '00. She had a tough race to get Moynihan's seat and she would have a very tough time in '08, if she runs.

We see a skewered version of Kerry in the liberal web. He does have a reservoir of support. That, plus it's too early and opinions have certainly not solidified. It is interesting to see where he is vis a vis Gore though.

[ginnyinWI]

14. New Englanders

That comment resonates with me. I'm reading David McCullough's bio of John Adams right now, and call me Kerry-obsessed, but SO many traits he describes Adams as having are those that I also see in JK. So yeah, it must be the New England/Puritan roots showing themselves.

Things like strong convictions. Strong moral principles. Never walking away from work that needs doing, even in the face of opposition. Strong sense of duty and honor. Ambitious and determined. Fiercely patriotic. Lots of energy and hating to be idle! And he could be very angry under the surface, but would still be diplomatic and civil to people, for the sake of advancing the creation of a new and unified country.

[Mass]

7. Considering that people dont really know who is the leader and are

mainly reflecting what the media say, this is a fairly good result.

The media have been hammering for weeks now that Kerry was not the leader of the party, that people did not want him and there is still as many people who believe that he is the leader than who believe that Bill Clinton is the leader and nobody else comes close (except Hillary of course that the media has been promoting as the party leader for most of last year)!

I would say this is somewhat unexpected.

[karynnj]

9. I agree

Maybe we should tell the DCCC! It is interesting that Kerry got this while the media was ridiculing his filibuster, the DLC is pushing almost anyone not named John Kerry as a leader, and he spent almost half the previous month outside the country working rather than politicking.

This may be what triggered Hillary's sudden swing to criticizing Democrats for not speaking out. She may see that the keep in the shadows strategy created a leadership vacuum that Kerry was beginning to fill more than anyone else. The problem was she criticized the Democrats more than Bush and she isn't leading on any of the key issues.

[TayTay]

10. I agree with that Karyn

One of the things the filibuster did was force some people out of the shadows and out of the defensive posture of not saying anything really controversial at all. Hillary was forced to take a stand and in doing so she was 'outed' as a liberal. This will happen more and more as the time gets closer to people really declaring runs for '08.

Ms. Clinton cannot continue to be both DLC and a liberal. At some point in time she is going to be majorly clobbered over her stand (and non-stand) on Iraq and her lack of deep, deep criticism over the current Admins handling of foreign policy. She will have to engage with other Dems in a lively and controversial argument with other Dems over where she differs with current policy and what a Hillary Presidency would actually entail. She is trying, right now, to be all things to all people and run on a fuzzy picture of her being the second coming of Bill. This won't play.

BTW, what is Hillary's Health Care proposal right now? Where does she stand on nuclear Iran and the 'cartoon' controversy that is currently roiling the waters? What is her position on the economy and taxes and such? She will have to come down on that and come down definitively before the end of the year. She has Warner and Vilsack and Bayh running to her right and Kerry running somewhat to her left (somewhat is a carefully chosen term here.) What does Hillary do to fend off the other Dems who find her positions murky and based on thinness and the desire to straddle the fences?

[karynnj]

11. In terms of her positions, I tried to find out. I surfed over to her

Senate web site.

Unlike Kerry, she doesn't seem to issue statements on issues as they occur. There is a "news" section and there's an issue section. the issue section is more like "Here's my accomplishments." But, there seems to be nothing on what she thinks should be done in the future.

I think you're right that she will have to choose where she stands. I think on the filibuster, she didn't really have a choice, which is why Kerry is probably not on her lists of favorite Senators. If she opted not to vote yes, her speech would be seen as hot air.

I think all 3 of Kerry's speeches on Alito were better than her one speech - but his last one was incredible (even with McConnell being a jerk). What I like best is that he can defend his position without even mentioning abortion.

[ginnyinWI]

15. What flies in the face of all of this spin

is what we saw last week--JK got up and called for a filibuster and got 24 other Senators to vote with him. And he got the netroots mobilized as well. Now the leading bloggers are acting like it was THEY who led the charge, but it wouldn't have happened without JK first standing up and issuing the clairion call. That's otherwise known as LEADERSHIP. You have to have followers to be a leader, and I don't know who is following Hillary except certain members of the media.

[globalvillage]

12. I thought it was James Carville.

:sarcasm:

[karynnj]

13. One thing suspicious about the AGR poll

is that the Democratic results were from 600 likely Democratic voters, contacted between Feb 2-9, the Republican was 600 likely Republican voters, contacted between Feb 2-9.

The McCain - Hillary results were based on 1200 likely voters contacted between Feb 2-9.

If they used 600 Republicans and 600 Democrats to get their 1200 voters, this is beyond stupid. (They could do it if they weighted the two groups appropriately.)

This may account for the bizarre Massachusetts result.

[ginnyinWI]

16. a statiscally insignifican amount of people.

There are what, 100 million voters in this country? Sheesh. No self-respecting sociological study would dare use such a small sampling of the population!

[karynnj]

17. The sample size is adequate if you are comfortable with the

confidence intervals. A larger sample size is needed only if more precise results are needed. Sample sizes are picked to guarantee a level of precision. Here it's clear that Hillary and McCain are pretty far out front. (The surprise is that McCain is because the CW was that he couldn't win the primary and he is dominating them more than Hillary is.)

What is important is that the sample is really random - giving each individual in the defined population an equal chance of being selected.

[Mass]

19. Actually the size of the sample is quite good for a political sample

The MOE would be +-3 % with a 95 % confidence interval.

However, the whole premise of the poll is bad. Hypothetical polls for races that are not yet defined are totally meaningless, particularly that far from an election. In addition, we have no way of knowing if the sampling itself is representative of the population ( % rep, %dem, % ind - likely voters? - what does that mean 3 years before an election , ...).

[BlueIris]

18. Give it a year. Billary won't even be a blip on the screen.

Ahem. No, I don't want Hillary to be president, how could you tell? And electability has nothing to do with it, before anyone flames. I just...don't.

I actually think that both Bill and Hill have set themselves up for some major fall-out because of the alliances they've professed. Even though I'm less critical of their motives than some here, um, yeah, I think they kinda screwed themselves on that front.