The latest Wall Street Journal poll on the Texas gubernatorial race is out.
34.8% - James "Rick" Perry (continuing his downward spiral to his lowest point yet)
23.1% - Chris Bell (continuing to rise to his highest point yet)
22.7% - Richard "Kinky" Friedman (remains stuck in third)
9.6% - Carole Keeton "Rylander McLellan But-Not-Grandma" Strayhorn (crashes through the floor into the single-digit basement to her lowest point yet)
If this were a three-way race, it would be neck and neck between Bell and Perry with all the momentum heading Bell's way. Kinky's vanity campaign may prove to be Perry's saving grace. There is polling analysis on the Stop Kinky blog:
"Bell also threatens Perry. Several recent polls have identified Perry's current level of support at 35% with a continuing significant downward trend. This would be disastrous for an incumbent in most situations, but Perry is less threatened because the 65% of the vote which is currently "not Perry" is divided among three significant alternative candidates (plus Libertarian James Werner whose support is negligible). Of all the candidates, Bell's support is most consistently trending upward (most recent polls have identified Bell's current levels of support between 18% and 21% and raising). There are two historical voting trends which strongly indicate that the upward trend of Bell's support will continue to even higher levels.
First, Perry, Strayhorn, and Kinky have very well established name identification among Texas voters. Bell, on the other hand, is identified by less than half of likely Texas voters. We know from previous elections, once a candidate achieves a very significant level of name identification with a likely voter without achieving that likely voter's support, it becomes substantially more difficult for the known candidate to win that voter's support. The fact that Bell has the most room to increase his name identification indicates that he also has the easiest task of building his support. Moreover, we also know from past elections that Bell's name identification will rise as the election nears as a result of the fact that Bell is the nominee of a major party. Among likely Texas voters who can identify the names of all four main candidates, Bell is polling at 28% to Perry's 32%, which is barely outside the margin for error.
Second, Bell (and Perry) will receive a boost from straight-party voting which polls undercount (people answering polls generally deny voting the straight-party ticket but past elections confirm that about half of Texas voters choose a straight-party ticket in a statewide election during a non-presidential year). In recent non-presidential elections, about 23% of the Texas electorate has voted for the straight-party Democratic ticket (and about 28% have voted the straight-party Republican ticket). Moreover, in recent past elections where the Democratic candidate has accepted the party's nomination but essentially chose not to campaign, those types of statewide Democratic candidates have nevertheless received about one third of the vote (despite the fact that pre-election polling consistently identified levels of support much lower than 33% of the Texas electorate for such non-campaigning Democrats). When statewide Democrats mount a campaign, they generally receive about 43% of the vote during non-presidential elections. Undoubtedly, if Bell could achieve Democratic Party unity, he would easily win, but Strayhorn and Kinky will certainly disrupt the party unity for both Democrats and Republicans."
More (including a comparative issue analysis plus more polling analysis implying that c4n3p might not be done just yet and why Kinky's numbers have peaked) here:
http://stopkinky.blogspot.com.
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
