Last month I examined the current landscape of the Republican leadership. Now, courtesy of the latest Gallup Poll, we can transition to a similar topic - the leading potential candidates for the GOP Presidential Primaries in 2012.
While the previous Gallup Poll reported that Rush Limbaugh and Newt Gingrich had a very slight edge over the rest of the field as the most influential voices in the Republican party, neither polled as a particularly serious contender for the 2012 GOP nomination. Instead, according to the latest Gallup Poll, Republicans support Romney with a leading-but-hardly-dominating 26%, followed closely by Palin with 21% and Huckabee 19%, followed by Gingrich with 14%.
For those pundits who had taken the rare opportunity to tune out of the Presidential race, Romney leading the pack must look like a complete reversal of his 2008 campaign when he was never the front-runner and had to drastically outspend his opponents just to stay in the ring. So what has changed? This time around, at least in the early goings, Romney is not only fund raising better than his likely opponents, but he is also seeing results in the polls. A sign of things to come or simply the default choice? Impossible to know for sure, so I will refrain from speculation.
While Romney has been quietly amassing resources and laying a foundation out of the spotlight, his most controversial opponent, Sarah Palin, has been doing what she does best - staying in the spotlight. On July 25th, 2009, Palin will officially resign as Governor of Alaska. While many that oppose Palin are rejoicing at the news, and her constituency is still scratching their collective head, all that is certain about this development is that no one knows what exactly motivated the move or how it will play out by 2012. Either way, democrats, republicans and independents are going to be talking about it for a while. But maybe that’s the entire point. Sarah Palin is flashy, but she is also polarizing and despite showing early fund raising infrastructure Palin has raised less than half as much as Mitt Romney in 2009.
Mike Huckabee, who is sitting at 19% in the polls, is right in the mix with Romney and Palin. If you suppose that Romney has the financing and Palin has the flair then Mike Huckabee has the charisma. Huckabee gained a lot of momentum in 2008, coming out of relative obscurity and winning over many Republican voters with his charm and candor. Huckabee doesn’t have much fund raising prowess, at least not yet, but it ’s hard to find a person that actively dislikes Mike Huckabee, and that might have something to do with the fact that as of July 20th, 2009, Huckabee polls the best of any likely GOP candidate against Barack Obama.
Whoever does come out on top will need to compete with the fundraising behemoth that is the Obama campaign, which raised over $750 million throughout the 2008 campaign. Barring an Obama meltdown in his first term, there is no reason to expect he won’t be able to raise a similarly ginormous amount of money in the face of a strong Republican opponent. In light of Obama’s vast resources, any successful challenger will need very deep pockets. Advantage Romney.
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Tags: Barack Obama, gallup poll, gop, mike huckabee, mitt romney, polling numbers, presidential race, republican party, Sarah Palin
