The news story:
Twenty-nine percent of Republicans questioned in a new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Friday say they are most likely to support Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin for the GOP presidential nomination in 2012. Right behind the 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee, and well within the poll’s 4.5 percent sampling error, is former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee. Twenty-six percent of those questioned say they are most likely backing the former, and possibly future, Republican presidential candidate.
Twenty-one percent of Republicans polled say they most likely would support former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, another GOP hopeful from the last campaign who may put his hat into the ring again.
Nine percent say they would probably back Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, who is considered a rising star in the GOP.
Here’s the most important thing in the poll:
“Among GOP men, the same pattern emerges — no clear advantage for Palin, Huckabee or Romney,” says Holland. “But among Republican women, it’s a different story. Palin has a 10-point edge among Republican women, winning 32 percent support among them to 22 percent for Huckabee and 20 percent for Romney. With the sampling error, that’s not enough to say for sure that Palin is in the lead, but it does indicate that if the primaries were held tomorrow, Palin would have a good chance of being the favorite among GOP women.”
As readers of this blog know, I’m a booster of Bobby Jindal for 2012 – I think he’s the very best we’ve got and that he would be a great President. On the other hand, Choice Number Two for me is Sarah Palin – she doesn’t have the stupendous background of Bobby Jindal but she has core, conservative principles…and she also has political magnetism of a high order and that, I think, will eventually determine the winner of the GOP nominating process in 2012.
Being a conservative Republican, I know a fair number of conservative, Republican women and it seems to me that devotion to Sarah Palin is high amongst such women. They love her, plain and simple – because she’s so clearly one of them. All those MSM/left attacks on her? Just made such women love Palin even more. Its going to be very hard for any other GOPer to cobble together such a strong base of support – while Jindal, Romney, Huckabee, et al battle it out for GOP men, Palin may walk away with GOP women and take the nomination rather early in the process.
Of course, this all depends on who actually runs in 2012…lots of GOP toes in the water right now, but conditions in 2012 are unknown and unknowable at this point.
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