Romney's negatives hit new high, poll finds

[kpete]

Source: The Hill

Romney's negatives hit new high, poll finds
By Meghashyam Mali - 03/28/12 06:42 AM ET

A new poll shows Mitt Romney, who is locked in a prolonged GOP nomination fight, with lagging approval ratings, raising questions about his strength in a likely November match-up with President Obama.

Half of those surveyed hold unfavorable views of the GOP front-runner, a new Washington Post/ABC News poll released Wednesday finds.

In the poll, 50 percent of all surveyed and 52 percent of registered voters held unfavorable opinions of Romney. Thirty-four percent hold positive views on Romney, the lowest for any leading presidential contender in Post/ABC polls dating back to 1984.

The poll also finds that Romney’s unfavorability tops Obama’s highest unfavorability rating in the poll's history.

Read more: http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/polls/218651-poll-romney-negatives-hit-new-high

[Kalidurga]

1. Wowsers

I can't believe that many people gave Rmoney a favorable rating. Seriously, I know it's early and a few people out there have no idea what he is about. But, to be fair neither do most people who know Rmoney personally. I think the trick to getting people to not like Rmoney is to have them spend more time with him.

[Jamaal510]

2. Sounds like their "Grab A Bite With Mitt" thing didn't work, then.

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[nxylas]

3. Hope to see that headline again in October

Not sure it means that much in March.

[grantcart]

5. Positives don't mean anything in March

Negatives do.

There is a lot of scientific research that shows that negative numbers are much more intransgent than positive numbers because people are disinclined to voice a hard negative opinion arbitrarily while they are more inclined to say "he's OK" if they don't have a definitive opinion.

Moreover a challenger that has a higher negative than an incumbent is fairly rare because the incumbent has spent the last 4 years pissing people off. For example the President's approval record is roughly 50% and disapproval roughly 50%, but some of the disapproval is for doing too much and some for not doing enough.

The high negative will have another significant effect, deep pockets will not be encouraged to waste money and will channel money into Congressional/Senate races rather than see it go into a black whole of negativity.

[grantcart]

4. What goes up . . .

Can go up even further. Go Mitt go.