Thompson, Fred

There goes the only candidate who was talking about small government.  Such a disappointing campaign in a disappointing campaign season.

Now we're going to get non-stop big-government pandering from every candidate in both parties.

I'm so excited.

From Patrick Ruffini, who used to work for Rudy's campaign and is one of my favorite bloggers:

The fascinating thing is that the much-predicted social issue rebellion isn’t happening. Rudy had his huge social issues fight last spring. He was bruised from it, but by clearing the decks in Houston, he was able to recover. If the current shift from Rudy has any catalyzing event, it might have been the NYPD story. That makes sense on one level — voters can more readily dissect a personal narrative than a policy debate, even over partial-birth abortions. At the same time, Rudy’s slide has coincided with the broader Huckaboom, which has been especially punishing on the Mayor’s poll numbers. The likability-minded conservatives who kept Rudy at improbable highs for so long are finally jumping ship.

At this point, the Republican Presidential race is as fluid as any I've ever seen. I've been saying for months that only Romney and Giuliani has realisitic scenarios in which they could win the nomination.  Now, I think that Huckabee and McCain can find a path to the nomination, as well - and McCain has been absolutely without hope for more than six months.  I think Huckabee's boomlet has already subsided, and we'll start to see the effects of that in national polling shortly, but I can't be too sure - I never really saw the appeal of a such a big-government candidate anyway.

On February 5, there could still be four choices remaining (I think Thompson will drop out after not winning SC):  Giuliani, McCain, Romney and Huckabee. 

Hang on - if nothing else, it's going to be fun to watch.

As most of you are aware, I'm a fan of Fred Thompson.  I'll be on the ballot as a delegate for Thompson in the February primary.

Of course, the Thompson campaign has fallen on some hard times of late.  While he rode the second spot in the polls for most of the summer and fall, he's now showing third or fourth in many of them.  He's not on the map in New Hampshire. 

Thompson announced last week a renewed emphasis on Iowa, including a two week bus tour starting next week.  The first step in that renewed emphasis was the debate yesterday in Iowa.  By most accounts Thompson won and scored points in a number of areas.  The result has been that a number of pundits are taking another look at Thompson's campaign, and speculating about whether he can turn it around in Iowa.

I think he can.  The same traits that made Thompson popular are still there.  He's a rock solid conservative who sticks to his principles.  He has an affable manner that I believe is appealing to the public.  I don't think that any other Republican can unite the various wings of the party as well and still be able to take on the Democratic nominee this year.  While a host of issues have arisen about the other frontrunners, I don't think that any "silver bullet" has been found that hurts Thompson's electability.

Politics and the trends in national campaigns are hard to predict.   So I truly think it's anyone's game.  (Well, not Duncan Hunter)

For some interesting commentary check out Byron York from National Review, Philip Klein from the American Spectator, and Dean Barnett from the Weekly Standard.  Rush was pretty effusive today as well.

One of the aspects of Fred Thompson's campaign for President that has appealed to me is that I've always had the sense that he was willing to take on tough issues.  Early on he said that he'd be talking about things that might cause him to lose the race, but he was prepared for that.

Last week, he took on the toughest of issues, Social Security, the so called third rail of politics, that will kill anyone who dares suggest any changes to the system.  Unlike Barack Obama, who is not touching the third rail himself, but rather throwing taxpayers on the rail and letting the trains run at the same time, Thompson's plan doesn't involve tax hikes and puts some common sense back in the system.

The plan has two parts.  One is to index initial benefits to wages as adjusted by inflation, instead of by wage growth.  Thompson's proposal mirrors the work of University of Illinois Professor Jeffrey Brown whose 2005 article on the subject demonstrates how this simple change to the program can actually fix the problem of social security running out of money in the future.  Essentially what it means is this.  Under the current system, in calculating your initial retirement benefit, your past wages are adjusted based on the average growth in wages.  So if wages increase at more than the rate of inflation (typical) then the money you earned twenty years ago is actually valued at more than its inflation adjusted amount.  My recollection of this back in the 70s was that it was done because during the Carter years, inflation actually was higher than wage growth, although my memories are certainly sketchy on that.

The other part of the plan allows workers to voluntarily start private retirement accounts, much like 401Ks.  Under this part of the proposal, workers who opt into the voluntary retirment accounts would see their retirement age for maximum benefits rise.

Positive review from the Wall Street Journal and interesting analysis from ABC News.

I was surprised to read on Real Clear Politics this morning that John McCain has passed Fred Thompson to move into second place in the Real Clear Politics polling averages.

Discuss.

From the good people at Capital Fax Blog, we bring you this Rasmussen Reports poll of Illinois:

BUSH TOTALS: 31% good or excellent… 68% fair or poor… (32 and 67 in Rasmussen’s August poll)

BLAGOJEVICH TOTALS: 16% good or excellent… 83% fair or poor… (22 and 78 in Rasmussen’s August poll)

Those are terrible numbers for both the President and Governor, but much, much worse for the Governor.  I don't know if it's possible to recover from numbers like that.

For some context, this is from November 2002, just as Blagojevich was winning election for the first time, and Ryan was just getting ready to leave office:

Arguably, there have been other defining moments in Ryan’s tumultuous four years as governor. But after that statement at the mansion, after Bauer was convicted, Ryan’s job approval ratings plummeted to historic lows, never to rebound. A proud man, Ryan chose not to run for re-election. In August, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, his disapproval rating was 69 percent.

The results aren't exactly analagous, as the questions aren't worded the same way, but it's probably safe to say that Blagojevich's approval is in George Ryan territory.

One thing that I do know that if I were a Democratic candidate on the ballot in 2008, I'd be nervous about my opponent tying me to the Governor.  I think we'll see lots of "Democrat X is close to Blago" and "Republican Y is close to Bush" attacks next year regardless.

There are also Presidential head-to-head matchups in Illinois (although there are no interparty results):

• Clinton - 45%
• Giuliani - 42%

And:

• Clinton - 47%
• Thompson - 40%

Of course, Sen. Obama clobbers everyone in Illinois.  There are some other issue-related questions in the poll, too, so read the whole thing.

Don't look now, but after a few weeks of a tightening race, Rudy Giuliani has bounced back to roughly a ten point lead over Fred Thompson in the Real Clear Politics Republican Presidential Primary polling averages.

Rudy also has regained the lead in the Rasmussen Daily Presidential Tracking poll, which Thompson led briefly, and to which some of his supporters were pointing as evidence of his strength among more regular GOP Primary voters.  In fact, Rasmussen is the only poll I've seen that has ever shown Thompson in the lead nationally, and now they no longer do.

Standard disclaimers:  Rudy's my preferred candidate at the moment, but it's early, polling is only polling, the elections are state-by-state, yada, yada.  Discuss if you like.

At about the 3:20 mark of this clip, you can see some questions and answers with Fred Thompson about the threat by some leaders of social conservatives that they'll run a third-party candidate if the GOP doesn't nominate the right person in 2008, and about Jim Dobson's personal attack on Thompson.

Thompson's response:  "I'm not going to dance to anybody's tune."

I know that the Dobsonites weren't referring to Thompson when they made the threat, but I love his response.  The GOP needs to be more than a collection of interest groups who make demands upon the party and its nominees to pay homage or else.

Conservative does not equal Republican, and Republican does not equal conservative.  Case in point:

A powerful group of conservative Christian leaders decided Saturday at a private meeting in Salt Lake City to consider supporting a third-party candidate for president if a pro-choice nominee like Rudy Giuliani wins the Republican nomination.

The meeting of about 50 leaders, including Focus on the Family's James Dobson, the Family Research Council's Tony Perkins and former presidential candidate Gary Bauer, who called in by phone, took place at the Grand America Hotel during a gathering of the Council for National Policy, a powerful shadow group of mostly religious conservatives. James Clymer, the chairman of the U.S. Constitution Party, was also present at the meeting, according to a person familiar with the proceedings.

"The conclusion was that if there is a pro-abortion nominee they will consider working with a third party," said the person, who spoke to Salon on the condition of anonymity. The private meeting was not a part of the official CNP schedule, which is itself a closely held secret. "Dobson came in just for this meeting," the person said.

Now, I certainly don't think such an effort is either warranted or helpful, but I do notice that when a socially conservative candidate wins a Repubican nomination, there's very little talk of this group or that coalition breaking off to run a third-party candidate.

A few quick thoughts.

First, please remember this story when you hear Democrats complain that the Republican Party is completely controlled by social conservatives.  If such were the case, you'd never hear the all-too-often threats about people taking their ball and going home.

Second, a third-party anti-abortion nominee is going to accomplish only one thing - ensuring the election of a pro-choice Democratic nominee.

Third, if people are floating and leaking stories like this just a few weeks after Thompson's announcement, what does that tell us about their perceptions of Thompson's campaign?

Fourth, this really reinforces that the only thing that can screw up 2008 for the Democrats is the Democrats.

Last week, IP had a post about the recent Gallup poll which had a 34-22 Giuliani advantage over Fred Thompson.  A week later Giuliani has dropped four of those points.  I commented at the time

I also think that the wide margins in these polls is less an indication that any of them is an outlier as it is a difference in how one polls Republicans.  How you ID them, etc is important to the poll and I think those methodoligies differ greatly.  I have no idea who has a more accurate way of doing that.

Well, today, Jim Geraghty at the CampaignSpot talks to Scott Rasmussen who offers up his own thoughts on selecting Republicans for polls.  I'm not sure that Rasmussen has everyone's methodologies down as well as he infers, but it appears clear that the Rasmussen poll, which has Thompson up 28-19 is much more restrictive on who they poll.  We'll have to hold an election to find out who is more accurate. 

I also liked Rasmussen's last line in the article

We just did a poll last night that showed 58 percent of voters saying everything that has been going on with the campaign so far has been generally annoying and a waste of time.

No surprise there.  I think you can thank Mitt Romney primarily for the lengthening of the campaign season this year.  If he gets the nomination, he'll look like a genius, but we'll all be exhausted.

One other polling note.  Thompson is using John McLaughlin for his polling.  Unlike the national polls which don't require any accuracy because they exist merely to give the national reporters an easy story to write, McLaughlin has to be accurate to keep his job.  We used him in the Johnson primary in 2000 and he was dead on with his numbers, leading me to believe that his method of choosing Republicans is pretty solid.  Unfortunately, Thompson's not leaking any numbers.

Rudy Giuliani's Illinois campaign garnered some attention over the weekend.

Rudolph Giuliani stepped up his presidential campaign in Illinois on Friday, launching a blitz of telephone banks targeting 20,000 Republican voters and releasing a list of 154 GOP leaders who are jumping on the former New York mayor's bandwagon.

Former Illinois Gov. Jim Thompson and state House Republican Leader Tom Cross of Oswego are among those stumping for Giuliani -- who, like them, comes from the more moderate wing of the party.

As political strategists contemplate whether a gun control and abortion rights supporter can attract enough conservative support to win the Republican nomination, Thompson said Friday that he thinks voters should be focusing on other things.

"The nation's security is the No. 1 issue in my view," Thompson said in an interview. "Unless the nation is secure, you can't offer the American people any other issue. ... None of those issues will matter if the nation's not secure."

What are the other Presidential campaigns doing in Illinois?  I have heard that Mitt Romney's got some staff on the ground, but I don't know who they are.  I know several local people who are supporting Fred Thompson, but I don't know if he has any staff or operations on the ground yet.

For all the FredHeads out there, this is what you've been waiting for:

Discuss.

While some people think that I usually only post about GOP Presidential polling when I see something favorable to my current preferred candidate, Rudy Giuliani, I actually post when I find something that interests me.  Often they're the same thing, as is the case with this latest CBS poll:

In all, 38 percent of Republican primary voters favor the former New York City mayor, a slight increase from last month. Senator-turned-actor Fred Thompson is next; he's favored by 18 percent of Republican primary voters, a seven-point drop from last month. Thompson has yet to officially announce his candidacy.

The third choice, at 13 percent, is former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, who improved five points from one month ago. He was followed by Arizona Sen. John McCain, who came in at 12 percent.

Republican primary voters appear to be growing more content with the Republican candidates for president: 46 percent say they are satisfied with their choices, up from 36 percent a month ago and 30 percent in June. But 49 percent say they are not satisfied.

Giuliani, defying conventional wisdom, continues to show strength among groups not expected to be favorable towards his candidacy. He leads the field among conservatives, those who live in the South and West, evangelical Christians, and voters who think that a candidate's personal life should be a factor in deciding whom to support.

First, this poll is probably an outlier - this is the largest margin for Rudy and his highest percentage since this Spring.  One of the reasons I try to discuss polls in aggregate, using a site like Real Clear Politics, is that aggregation reduces the influence of outliers. 

That said, this poll will have Rudy's lead back into the double-digits, which is also a first since this Spring, and I do think that's interesting enough to discuss a little more.  As one can also see from the RCP chart, the trend appears to be (and I must stress the word "appears") that Rudy's support is increasing, while Fred Thompson's, after a boomlet in the late Spring, seems to have stalled.  It's a small change, but after six or eight weeks of Rudy's average lead creeping from 18 to 13 to 8, watching it creep back up into the 10-12 range is noteworthy.

Second, there's still five months to go before first votes are cast, and things will change multiple times between now and then.  Polls are a snapshot of today, and can be useful in anticipating outcomes - but the polls are not outcomes themselves.

The conventional thought on Fred Thompson and his obligations to the Law and Order television series were that he had finished his work there, exiting the show by telling his Assistant District Attorney "I won't be in this chair forever"
 
Now however, it appears that Thompson will be making an appearance on the show this Sunday in the premiere episode for the new season.  This seems to be a little soon for a season premier, but I'm not all that familiar with such things.  Are there a few more law and order episodes yet to air with Fred Thompson?  Is he likely to make a memorable swan song?
 
In any instance, if he is indeed slated for more new shows on Law and Order, it will demonstrate one thing that I find refreshing.  The people closest to him have been able to keep this secret.  That ought to upset the media, which thrives on leakers, but make other people happy who want a President who is surrounded by people who won't undermine him. 
 
EDIT:  Oops.  Sorry.  It appears that the show is listed under "Season 18" but is actually a rerun (surprise) from the previous season).  Stil wondering if there's a Thompson show in the mix yet though.

We've had some energetic discussions around here about the polling for the 2008 Republican Presidential Primaries, and their reflection of Rudy Giuliani's strengths and weaknesses.

Here's two articles that are a good point/counterpoint:

Point - Will Giuliani be the next McCain?:

But what about the Republican "front runner", Rudy Giuliani? While he has consistently remained ahead in polls of Republican voters, and his campaign is in infinitely better financial shape than McCain's, Giuliani's trend in support is eerily similar to McCain's downward trajectory.

Since early March, Giuliani's support has fallen by an estimated 8 percentage points. McCain's fell by 10 points since January. And the rate of decline has been a bit steeper for Giuliani than for McCain. The saving grace for Giuliani has been that he started his decline from a higher point, around 33%, while McCain's slump started down from 25%.

Counterpoint - Giuliani Campaign's Analysis of Recent Trends:

• As the race developed early in the spring, the race quickly but briefly, developed in to a two-way race, and our initial bounce extended into the beginning of this two-way race. The two-way race divided most of the Republican primary vote between 2 major candidates -- the nature of a two-way race generally forces undecided or leaning voters to make a choice between the leading candidates and many broke our way.

• As McCain's trend line declined Mitt Romney's slowly rose and Fred Thompson entered the race. Senator McCain is still a candidate for President and continues to receive a substantial vote share.

• Fred Thompson now seems to be the beneficiary of an announcement (or pre-announcement) bounce. And Fred Thompson's entry to the campaign has effectively made this now a four-way race.

I should note that the Counterpoint is written by someone working for Rudy's campaign.  Still, it provides for more interesting discussion, but please read both before commenting - the quotes I've selected aren't comprehensive, and there's lot's more in there.  And while I'm supporting Rudy right now, I'm not sharing this information to "spin" for him.  I actually enjoy discussing this stuff, even with people who support other candidates.

I should also spend more time discussing polling in the Democratic Primaries, but those polls have been so stable - Hillary Clinton with a consistent 10 to 15 point lead over Barack Obama - that there's little new for me to say.

For your amusement:

This is a short blurb, with no details about sample size or methodology:

On the Republican side, Rudy Giuliani leads with 30%, followed by Fred Thompson who jumped into second place with 21%, Sen. John McCain at 12% and Mitt Romney at 11%.

UPDATE:  Here's the source - American Research Group.  They're generally well-regarded.  Sample was 600 between July 6-9, with live interviews.  Other than it being a weekend sample, that's pretty standard.

Newsmax.com reporting:

Mary Matalin, former counselor to Vice President Dick Cheney, is joining likely presidential candidate Fred Thompson’s team and will serve as an unpaid adviser.

That pretty much settles it, doesn't it?  He can't lose now :-)

This polling data bodes well for Rudy:

Forty-four percent of social conservatives in the Pew analysis believe that the former New York mayor has the "best chance" of becoming president in 2008. Less than half that figure, 19 percent, regard Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) as the most viable, despite twice as many social conservatives stating that McCain “comes closest” to their view on abortion. All other Republican candidates lagged far behind.

These calculations about electability are helping propel Giuliani over McCain among social conservatives, even though the Arizonan shares the opposition of most of these voters to abortion rights.

Giuliani is winning 30 percent of the social conservative bloc, compared to 22 percent for McCain. Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney captured just 8 percent — a figure that puts Romney in fourth place, behind former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who is currently not a declared candidate.

Emphasis added. 

Read the whole thing:  there's also a spiteful rant from Mike Huckabee.

I'm hopeful that more and more social conservatives will realize that John McCain and Mitt Romney are incapable of winning in November 2008, and that getting Giuliani, even though he's not perfect on every social conservative issue, is much, much better for than getting Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. 

Of course, if Fred Thompson or any other viable socially conservative candidate jumps into the race, this "pragmatism" dynamic will change quickly.

It's time for this month's GOP Straw Poll.  As always, if anyone knows where I can find a Democratic version of this thing, please let me know, and I'll post it as well.