Moonage Political Webdream

SurveyUSA came out with their governors’ popularity polls for 2006.  I
love looking at these things.  Here’s some things I noticed:

• Compared to 2005, 10 Republican governors are losing popularity, 6
  Democrat governors are as well.
• Compared to 2005, 17 Republican  governors are gaining popularity,
  15 Democrat governors are as well.
• In 2005, 11 Republican governors were more unpopular than popular ( can
  you say, in trouble? ), 7 Democrat governors were as well.
• In 2006, 8 Republican governors are in trouble, 7 Democrat governors as
  well.
• There are currently 28 Republican governors, 22 Democrat.  This
  means at this time, 31% of the Republican governors could be in trouble, 29%
  of the Democrat governors.  In 2005, those figures were higher for
  Republicans and exactly the same for Democrats.
• The most unpopular governor, bar none, is Bob Taft of Ohio.  He’s
  done a pretty good job in apparently alienating his own party.
• The governor sinking fastest, bar none, is Kathleen Blanco of Louisiana. 
  Good.
• The two fastest rising stars are Bob Riley of Alabama ( 29% swing ), and
  Haley Barbour of Mississippi ( 28% swing ).

My conclusions are:

• What sticks out to me the most is that given the perceived unpopularity
  of President Bush, you’d think that the Republicans would be more adversely
  affected than what is showing.  However, the Republican governors are
  picking up spots while the Democrats have remained the same.  If the
  elections for all 50 states were held tomorrow, the counts look like they
  would remain pretty much the same.  That leads me to believe the same
  thing I’ve always believed, all politics are local.
• Of the states affected most by Katrina, the Republican governors have
  experienced a huge increase in popularity while the lone Democrat is falling
  like a brick.  All media focused on placing all blame on FEMA and Bush. 
  Stars came out trashing Bush.  However, it appears the local people
  perceived things a little differently.  FEMA is FEMA, it didn’t respond
  any differently for Louisiana than it did for Mississippi or Alabama. 
  Sure, the impact of Katrina was different, but the leadership format is
  exactly the same in all three states.  People in Mississippi and
  Alabama have rewarded their governor, the people of Louisiana have pretty
  much abandoned theirs.  Bottom line, the local people apparently have
  seen the difference in effective leaders and ineffective leaders regardless
  of what major media reported.  That’s a good thing.  Kathleen
  Blanco taking the worst hit in the US makes me feel a LOT better about
  things.
• Last and probably least, the nature of politics on a national level is
  like a pendulum, it swings one way and then the other.  Local politics
  is usually more stagnant.  The party in power tends to remain in power
  for long periods of time.  What I’m getting at is although some
  governors are in horrid shape, the people voting will simply vote for
  another member of the same party.  What you most definitely can not do
  is use these polls to gauge any national trend.  A couple of governors
  are of the minority party in their state, and are in bad shape.  In
  those two states you can probably fairly predict the majority party will
  take them back, but in some states such as Louisiana, no matter how
  unpopular the Democrat is, their replacement will most likely be yet another
  Democrat.  Because of that, I didn’t bother to make any predictions on
  a national level based on these numbers.
• Numbers are fun to play with.  But when it comes to local politics,
  that’s all they’re good for.

On a more local level,

RCP has pointed to races this fall that these numbers might give a clue to some
changes:

• Ehrlich (R-MD): plus 4 net rating (48 approve - 44 disapprove)
• Rendell (D-PA): plus 3 net rating (49-46)
• Perry (R-TX): plus 1 net rating (48-47)
• Doyle (D-WI): minus 4 net rating (44-48)
• Granholm (D-MI): minus 7 net rating (45-52)
• Blagojevich (D-IL): minus 8 net rating (44-52)
• Minner (D-DE): minus 11 net rating (41-52)
• Baldacci (D-ME): minus 16 net rating (39-55)
• Kulongoski (D-OR): minus 20 net rating (36-56)
• Schwarzenegger (R-CA): minus 35 net rating (36-61)
• Murkowski (R-AK): minus 36 net rating (29-65)

That’s seven Democrats and four Republicans.  Once again, that seems to
totally buck what major media is telling us.

• Technorati
  governor poll,
  Kathleen Blanco,
  Haley Barbour,
  Bob Riley

Technorati Tags: Polls

Tags: Polls

No Comments »

Trackback This Post | Subscribe to the comments through RSS Feed