Ron Paul in the Polls
Jim Babka on Jan 1st 2008
The media was in full attack mode towards Ron Paul, right up through December 26.
Rumors
The untrue and retracted (at least by respectable writers) accusations by Bill White, that Paul and staff were regulars at Tara Thai restaurant White Supremacist meetings, hurt Paul, especially because they followed the Don Black donation non-story (interesting/ironic names for white supremacists) and because Tara Thai shows up as an expense on the FEC filings by the campaign. As it turns out,
- Tara Thai is practically on the same block as the campaign headquarters, making it convenient for carry out.
- The dates reported for meetings don’t match Bill White’s claim.
- The Bill White claim came long after the FEC report was published. It was easy for him to invent a claim that the campaign came to Tara Thai (what kind of white racist group would schedule a meeting at a place called Tara Thai? …by the way, White has also referred to the meeting place as Sala Thai).
- Bill White has, in the past, been accused by his fellow racists to be a lying publicity hound. His fellow haters hate him (see comments where Bill White posted the accusation). Qui Bono?… Was he successful in getting publicity?
Yet people really believe (mistakenly), that Ron must be somehow sympathetic to racists. In fact, some have made a faith-based commitment to the idea. They write about every rumor of Ron Paul’s alleged racism with excitement. They don’t wait to see where the evidence leads. And when the charges are refuted, they’re too busy writing about some other anti-Paul rumor to bother retracting the original claim.
But at least one major media outlet confessed that in the rush to publish the story they failed to do their due diligence — the New York Times.
“So long as they spell my name right…”
But now, the mainstream media is largely back to ignoring Paul. And Fox News has set up a candidate forum two days before the New Hampshire primary, and left Paul off the invitation list.
Folks, that might tell us more than any poll can. Perhaps they no longer fear Ron Paul can score an upset. But are the polls reliable?
My AOL Fantasy
AOL has been doing a national “straw” poll. You can only vote once. It has a CAPTCHA and requires you to designate your state. Both functions, plus an IP block for those who’ve already voted, protect the poll from bots and make multiple voting much more difficult. I realize these polls are self-selecting and “unscientific” (as if they telephone polls are scientific). That’s not a terrible flaw at this point because caucuses and primaries are self-selecting too.
And what this online straw poll lacks in precision, it makes up for, somewhat, in method: People can choose the candidates from either party’s field — something no telephone polling firm does.
Moreover, the prominence of the poll — it’s AOL — means every campaign can drive their supporters there, and looking at the numbers, there is at least the appearance that the various campaigns or their grassroots leaders have sent their people there.
What I find interesting is that ALL of the other candidates are showing up at roughly the same percentages the big name polls are reporting, and in the very same order, state-by-state, except Ron Paul.
In this poll Ron Paul is the winner — leading in most states. But he isn’t “off-the-charts.”
First, he’s not winning every state. For example, Rudy Giuliani is winning New York and New Jersey — just like you’d expect. Mitt Romney is winning Massachusetts — just like you’d expect. Mike Huckabee is winning some southern states — like Arkansas — just like you’d expect. These polls really do have a “ring of truth” to them (they seem to resonate with reality).
Second, where Paul is winning, his lead is generally narrow, and he’s leading the alleged front runner (according to nationally reported polls), by one, two, or three points. He’s second in every state that he’s not leading. I don’t believe Ron is going to win Iowa or New Hampshire… but if he were to do so, he’s not going to squash his opponents by 20% or more.
I wish this poll was the reality.
However, even if it was, it’s still probably not enough for Paul to win the nomination because the party will unite against him, behind whichever candidate emerges. And who might that be?
National Power Ranking
1 Romney
2 McCain (up one place)
3 Huckabee (down one place)
4 Paul
5 Giuliani
6 Thompson
Comment: Now, I know I have Romney listed as the front runner in my national power rankings. That’s because of his war chest and present polling position — leading or contending for the lead in Iowa and New Hampshire. But I really believe that McCain is now the front runner. Thanks to independents, he’s going to do better than expected in Iowa, and with that momentum, he’ll win New Hampshire.
I contend that John McCain has been everyone’s second choice, all along. Romney, who spent early and spent a ton, can’t put the game away. And McCain’s campaign is now claiming their fundraising has improved dramatically over the last few weeks.
Iowa
1 Huckabee 27 (+2) & Romney 27 (+7)
3 McCain 15 (-1)
4 Paul 12 (-2)
5 Thompson 10 (+4)
6 Giuliani 7 (-4)
Comment: The weather is actually looking decent for Iowa: Mostly sunny, high of 29, low 22, with only a 20% chance of precipitation. I’d be willing to roll the dice and predict Paul would do much better if there was a blizzard or ice storm in the works. That doesn’t appear to be in the cards. If the pollsters are close to correct, Ron Paul is likely to get fourth place.
New Hampshire
1 Romney 31 (same as last week)
2 McCain 29 (+4 from last week)
3 Paul 13 (+2)
4 Huckabee 11 (+1)
5 Giuliani 9 (-5)
6 Thompson 3 (same)
Comment: Right now, I think McCain is going to win.
Remember, Howard Dean fell 30 points when you compare pre-Iowa caucus polling of New Hampshire voters and the actual result of the New Hampshire primaries, all because he fell to third place in the Iowa caucus. So Iowa could make things particularly volatile.
Other Polls
Not really relevant this week. Iowa and New Hampshire set the tone for what’s to come.
Filed in The Bureau
The only fiction going on here is the fiction (if you want to call it that) that you are shoveling. Those untruths you are spouting about are facts and this is one of two things either you don’t know what you are talking about or you are just a liar. But I have seen the documentation with my own eyes and unless you have seen it you don’t know what you are talking about.
By all logic, and in light of his Lincoln comments, shouldn’t Ron Paul advocate reparations for African-Americans, who had their property rights violated due to slavery? The same logic would apply to Native Americans as well.
How much would this cost?
Listen where there’s smoke there’s fire. MSM knows that Ron Paul is a racist or if he isnt a racist he is supported by them. http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/12/26/85617/090
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2007/5/15/124912/740
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.african.american/msg/c8668bd3662b0fa5
I, for one, am shocked to hear White Supremacists admitting to such ongoing support for furriners and their furrin Thai food! I say EAT AMERICAN!
Speaking of Nazis and Arlington, the latter is my hometown (in fact, I grew up about a quarter mile from the Tara Thai in question) and, as it happens, the Nazis have a long and odd history in Arlington. During much of their George Lincoln Rockwell days, their “National Headquarters” (a little house in a fairly shabby neighborhood) was only a few blocks from there, too. In my late childhood / early adolescence they were a favorite place for us to visit on Halloween because they wrapped an unusually generous amount of candy inside various racist and anti-Semitic propaganda screeds. Moreover, the candy aside, the best part was being ushered into the “public anteroom” where a large portrait of Hitler on one side and an equally large portrait of George Washington on the other side bookended a huge portrait of Rockwell. It has to be one of the unintentionally funniest things I’ve ever seen.
On a more serious note, one of the psychological barriers to greater public acceptance of libertarianism is the fact that it would permit all sorts of private discrimination that is, under current law, illegal. Personally, I believe that the cost of private discrimination to the discriminator in a minimal-state government where, of course, public discrimination was illegal would suffice to minimize its social and economic impact. Still, any libertarian running for public office must sooner or later deal with this problem, so it’s no wonder Paul’s campaign is plagued with such guilt-by-association attacks.
DA, I could go two ways with this…
1) Darn. I was too young and geographically misplaced to participate in that Halloween fun. A truly haunted house!
2) I hope by now you feel sufficiently bad about taking those confections and that you’re planning on returning that tainted candy — or at least donating it to the Simon Wiesenthal center. I don’t want to hear that line about giving that candy back to racists for them to do bad things with it either.
Happy New Year.
[...] Yesterday, I predicted, based on a proprietary and statistically acceptable analysis of the work of the professional pollsters, that Ron Paul would get 12%. Looking at it in dollars and cents, even that percentage, higher than any “respectable” poll, feels low. [...]
Dear Vicki, You need to be more specific. It appears you’ve assumed the rest of us were in your head and knew exactly what you meant to write.
“Fiction shoveling.” Please pass this nice mixed metaphor on to Thomas Friedman (NY Times writer) — unless he’s already used it.
All of the information that I have is documented and can be found on the internet. What I would like to know is where you fit into the puzzle Mr. Babka? And believe me I will figure it out before everything is all said and done. Like you don’t know where The Vnn Forum’s web address is:http://www.vanguardnewsnetwork.com/ and just scroll down and click on Ron Pauls name and read for yourself. I believe that you of all people probably know your way around this website since you seem to know so much about what Ron Paul hasn’t done. I am not interested in anything he has done or hasn’t done all that I care about is that this neo-Nazi white supremacist doesn’t wind up as my President and I intend on doing everything in my power to make sure that thta doesn’t happen. I know that the August 11th Iowa Strawpoll was sponsored by the council of conservative citizens:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HXkVJtz0bNI
and you know as well as I do that they are white supremacists as well and that Mr Paul attended as well as accepted money via contributions. As far as the Tara Thai restaurant that is a hangout of Bill White of VNN Forum as well as Ron Paul and the restaurant ties to this orginization were originally started according to Bill White by Pat Buchanan. There are also witnesses that say tha they have visited Ron paul at his Washington D.C. I bet you know him also huh? I am going to include his address also because he has a few honorable mentions of Ron Paul as well:http://www.buchanan.org/blog/ and I am sure there are more sites that I have’not found yet but I will.I have a lovely picture that I am sure you are familiar with that you are welcomed to view at http://colecurtis-colecurtis.blogspot.com. i have wrote nothing rthat is not documented Mr. Babka
I think it’s really strange that Ron Paul isn’t being covered in the media any more. I see all this news about Obama, and Clinton, and Huckabee, and McCain, but where is Ron Paul? Why is it that the Media has almost copmpletely shut out all coverage about Ron Paul? I’m not very political, but when I see a candidate expressing some of the views that I hear comming from Ron Paul, I’m all for him. I think the way our country is going right now, Government has gotten way too big, and the constitution is nearly completely different from the way it was originally intended to be. Taxation without representation! I might sound like a political dummy, but I’m smart enough to know that any of these other candidates are going to be those catering to the lobbyist, the oil companies, the big corporations, and the like. This nation was supposed to be the land of the free…not the land of the Corporations. My 2 Cents.