Say Anything Blog

The privately-owned GOP Bloggers.org is running a Presidential preference straw poll, hosted by a number of conservative bloggers, such as Captain Ed.  The results of the poll can be found here, and like the American economy or situation on the ground in Iraq, there is quite a difference between the reality and the general impression left by the mainstream media.

As of this morning, the leading candidate of those polled is Mitt Romney who is the first choice of nearly 28%.  Newt Gingrich is second with just under 25% and Rudy Giuliani is third with 22%.  John McCain was the first choice of barely 4% of those taking the poll.

The section on candidate acceptability (rather than first choice) is just as interesting.  Here too, Mitt Romney leads with 49% advantage of positive over negative votes, with Newt Gingrich again second at just under 48%, and Giuliani third with 36.7%.  In this category, John McCain actually leads those with more negative votes than positive with a startling 53.6%.

What this tells me is that McCain, despite a huge campaign war chest, a stealth campaign organization, and the almost explicit endorsement of the media, is in some serious trouble with those who take their conservative politics seriously.  McCain’s situation is in some ways the mirror image of Hillary’s:  anointed the “front-runner” by the press, they face an increasingly difficult task of actually getting their party’s 2008 nomination.

The run-up to the 2008 campaign promises to be hugely entertaining.  On both sides of the aisle.