Reality catches up with Giuliani

Various polling outfits have been asking voters about their 2008 presidential preferences since, believe it or not, 2005. And in every national poll for more than two years, former mayor Rudy Giuliani has led the Republican field, often by quite a bit. It led the political world to give Giuliani an awkward title: frontrunner.

It was awkward, of course, in large part because it didn’t make any sense. Giuliani had extremely high name recognition, which buoyed his national standing, but in the early primary/caucus states, his support has been somewhere between bad and awful since the summer. Giuliani’s campaign has clung to the notion that he could suffer huge defeats in all of the early contests and still win the nomination thanks to the support reflected in the national polls.

Except, as it turns out, that support was very wide, extremely thin, and now completely gone.

Two weeks before the Iowa caucus, the race for president, while tightening among Democrats, is wide open on the Republican side, highlighting the unusual fluidity of the first campaign for the White House in over a half-century that doesn’t include an incumbent president or vice president. A new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll shows that Rudy Giuliani has lost his national lead in the Republican field after a flurry of negative publicity about his personal and business activities, setting the stage for what could be the party’s most competitive nomination fight in decades.

Last March, the same poll found that 58% of Republicans had a favorable view of Giuliani. That number now stands at 37%. In other words, GOP voters aren’t just shifting their allegiances as the race gets more competitive, they’re also looking at Giuliani more, and are increasingly unimpressed. Josh asks, “Is there any rationale for still calling him the frontrunner?” I think not.

One other noteworthy trend in Republican polls is the growing distinction between faith-based voters and everyone else.



A new ABC/WaPo poll in Iowa shows a two-man race between Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney, which is consistent with everything we’ve seen in recent weeks, but highlights the key factor driving the Iowa contest: religion.

Religion is driving the Republican presidential race in Iowa, with Mike Huckabee taking the lead on the strength of overwhelming support from evangelical voters — and Mitt Romney falling behind over concerns about his Mormon faith. Huckabee, who jumped into contention in Iowa a month ago, has soared further among his key groups — weekly churchgoers, abortion opponents, conservatives and, above all, evangelical Protestants, who account for nearly four in 10 likely caucus-goers. They now favor Huckabee over Romney by a 3-1 margin, 57 percent to 19 percent. Romney, for his part, holds a slight lead among the nearly eight in 10 Iowa Republicans who say his religion doesn’t matter in their vote.

That’s probably a predictable result, but it’s still striking. It’s been obvious for a while that Huckabee’s ability to rally evangelicals is the key to his support, but it’s unusual to see this kind of stark contrast — those driven by matters of faith are backing the former Baptist preacher, everyone else is gravitating towards the more policy-focused governor/businessman.

Welcome to the GOP’s Intra-Party Culture War of 2007.