Thread: GOP primary polling in the next two weeks.

With the definite entry of New Gingrich into the GOP primary fray and the exit of Mike Huckabee from said fray, coupled with the surprise performance of Herman Cain at the GOP debate SC and Mitt Romney's implosion with his speech over "Romneycare" vs. "Obamacare", it is fair to say that the polling numbers for the 2012 GOP nomination are about to change radically.

Consider this: for a guy who hadn't even announced, hadn't made trips to IA, hadn't put money into this thing, Huckabee's numbers in a crowded GOP field were quite amazing. His absence would logically mean that SOCONS and FICONS will be looking for a new standard bearer, depending on how you look at Huckabee.

Nate Silver did a pretty good write-up on this called "Who benefits if Huckabee doesn't Run?". In short, he matched up criteria for likely voters for Huckabee to see where they would fit with other candidates. FACIT: Cain, Palin and Gingrich come out on top as most likely recipients of what would have been the "Huckvote".

Now, this is a little for fun, but I am going to make a educated guess and let's see what the next couple of weeks brings.

Here are the current RCP polling averages for all the candidates, calculated before Huckabee pulled out:

Romney: 16.6 (steady)
Huckabee: 16.4 (steady)
Trump 12.9 (declining)
Palin 10.6 (steady)
Gingrich 7.7 (steady)
Paul 7.2
Bachmann 4.3
Pawlenty 3.6
Daniels 3.3
Santorum 2.0

There has been no polling yet for Cain, but I suspect his name will be included in the polling soon. Since he is of a similar cloth to Palin and Bachmann and assuming that he actually got some traction from the debate from more people than just a FOX survey group, let's start Cain at about 5.5.

I am assuming that Santorum will bottom out because of his culpability in the John Ensign scandal.

Which leaves as the last great mystery the name Daniels. Will he run, or not?

Final assumption is that Romney will lose at least 4 points in polling this week. His team is hoping against hope that he does not lose more than that. If he really bottoms out, then no amount of excel spreadsheets are going to help him here....

So, here is how the averages could look within 2 weeks, when all is said and done:


Romney: 12.6 (declining)
Palin 12.4 (+2.8, Huckvoters)
Gingrich 11.7 (+4, Huckvoters)
Daniels 11.0 (assuming his name is included in polling)
Trump 10.9 (-1, continued proof of gravity causing one to fall on his ass)
Paul 8.0 (+0.8 announcement bounce)
Pawlenty 5.6 (+2 Huckvoters)
Cain 5.5 (assuming his name will be included in polling)
Bachmann 5.3 (+1 Huckvoters)
Santorum 1.0 (race to the bottom)
Undecided: 16.0

Now, like I said, this is just a guess,but an educated one. Those Huckvoters are going to have to decide who they would pick next, and depending on region of the country, that may differ.

Why such a jump for Daniels? Well, because the media is all over Daniels right now, he is currently flavor of the week or such and as such, if his name appears on polling, there is a distinct chance that he will gain traction.

And don't forget Palin. Even without announcing, she still has a very loyal core of voters who are really hoping that she throws her bonnet into the ring.

If this does not happen, and Romney does not take a hit from his "my health care plan is not like Obama's health care plan" speech, if indeed his numbers actually increase in spite of the fact that the Huckvoters are not really thrilled with Mitt at all, then that means that the republican voters have decided early to coalesce around one front runner, in the hope that he can unseat an incumbent president.

This is all conjecture at this point, but in two weeks I will come back and compare the RCP averages with these predictions of mine. Should be a lot of fun!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!