quinnipiac – Moe Lane

Quinnipiac: Joe Biden compares favorably to Hillary Clinton in swing states.

Vice President Biden matches up as well or better than Hillary Clinton against top 2016 Republicans in three swing states, according to a Quinnipiac poll released Thursday morning that’s certain to fuel speculation of the former six-term senator entering the White House race.

Former Secretary of State Clinton is still the front-runner for Democratic primary voters in Florida, Ohio and Pennsylvania, and real estate mogul Donald Trump leads among the GOP, the survey says, but they have the worst favorability ratings and trustworthiness scores of the featured candidates.

Continue reading Quinnipiac: Joe Biden compares favorably to Hillary Clinton in swing states.

What today’s Q-Poll showing Democrats losing in key states does and does not mean.

It is not the beginning of the end; but it the end of the beginning.

You’ve probably read about this Quinnipiac poll already. The short version, for those who haven’t: Biden, Clinton, and Sanders all lose to Bush, Rubio, and Walker in Colorado, Iowa, and Virginia. Virginia is the toughest nut for Republicans, but there isn’t a single combination above where any Democrat leads any Republican. So, Game Over, then?

Hardly. The election’s not tomorrow, and this poll will not reflect the final results except by sheer accident. Never use a poll to predict an election that will not be held for another year. Never. Even if your favored candidate is doing so. But what you can do is look at it and use it to try to get a feel for the current situation – and when I do that here I’m left with three major conclusions: Continue reading What today’s Q-Poll showing Democrats losing in key states does and does not mean.

Why this one, single Colorado Q-poll probably scares Democrats unduly.

The poll in question is mostly about pot legalization – which is a subject that the Democrats can’t quite capitalize on, given that Barack Obama and Joe Biden are strongly in favor of the War on Some Drugs – but not entirely. There’s also some polling of the Colorado Senate race. And… oh, boy: “In an early look at the 2016 U.S. Senate race in Colorado, U.S. Rep. Michael Coffman, a Republican, runs better than his wife, State Attorney General Cynthia Coffman, against Democratic incumbent U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet. Matchups show: Michael Coffman gets 43 percent to Bennet’s 40 percent. Bennet leads Cynthia Coffman 44 – 36 percent.” Continue reading Why this one, single Colorado Q-poll probably scares Democrats unduly.

The obligatory “Man, that Q-Poll was pretty bad for Obama, huh?” post.

This is a glass two-thirds full kind of situation, really. Maybe 3/4ths: after all, it annoys some so when I get to chuckle.

President Barack Obama’s approval rating took a hit amid three controversies surrounding his administration, including an investigation into the IRS unfairly targeting conservative groups seeking nonprofit status, a new poll Thursday showed.

Obama has a 45 percent approval rating and a 49 percent disapproval rating — compared with a 48 percent approval, 45 percent disapproval rating from May 1, according to the Quinnipiac University poll.

Continue reading The obligatory “Man, that Q-Poll was pretty bad for Obama, huh?” post.

Gov. Bob McDonnell (R, VA) on short list for VP?

That’s one potential conclusion that you can draw from today’s and yesterday’s Quinnipiac polls looking at Virginia political conditions. Admittedly, they’re just one firm’s polls; also admittedly, anyone likely to be reading this is a hardcore political junky anyway, so we might as well take a look.

Yesterday’s Q-poll looked at Governor McDonnell’s popularity rating*, which is – to be modest about it – practically off of the charts at 61/21. Those numbers represent a 67/17 favorable rating with independents, a barely underwater 39/40 among Democrats… and a 46/32 favorable rating with African-American voters, which presumably should have people perking up at this point – not that it would last long in a hypothetical 2012 Presidential election contest against Obama, of course. Still, ablative armor is still armor, and the unique nature of Virginia’s gubernatorial situation applies here. Bob McDonnell can’t run again for Governor in 2013 any which way anyway; and even an unsuccessful Vice Presidential run would not necessarily stop him from running for Senate in 2014, should Mark Warner (who is also very popular in Virginia) decide that he’d rather run for Governor again in 2013. Or even if Senator Warner decides to stay in the Senate, for that matter. Continue reading Gov. Bob McDonnell (R, VA) on short list for VP?

So, DSCC: which candidate will you abandon…

[UPDATE]: Welcome, Instapundit readers.

…to firewall Connecticut?

Propelled by Connecticut likely voters who say they are “angry” with government, former wrestling executive Linda McMahon, the Republican U.S. Senate candidate, is closing in on Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, the Democrat, and now trails just 49 – 46 percent, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today.

This compares to a 51 – 45 percent Blumenthal lead in a September 14 likely voter survey by the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN-uh-pe-ack) University poll, conducted by live interviewers.

Personally, if I were still a Democrat I would recommend Kentucky and Missouri – actually, if I were still a Democrat I would recommend Nevada, but Reid’s still too powerful in his caucus to make that feasible. Of the other Republican-held Senate seats, New Hampshire’s probably not been dedicated enough money anyway, everybody knows that Ohio’s a lost cause, and the Democrats don’t dare dump Meek in Florida at this point. This is not the year for Democratic gains. Which is fine by me: the Democrats do not deserve gains.

One last note: isn’t it just hysterical that it’s the Democratic party that needs to make hard financial choices in the homestretch? This is why I stopped looking at the cash-on-hand totals; it became irrelevant once it became clear that the Republicans would have enough money to fight on the battlefields of our choosing and that the Democrats wouldn’t have enough money to defend everywhere simultaneously.

Linda McMahon for Senate.

Moe Lane (Crosspost)

PS: The Democrats should also decide whether they’d rather risk losing Connecticut, or Delaware.