It's time for another presidential preference poll. The big winners last time were Wesley Clark and Barbara Boxer. Clark won my last poll with 30% of the vote and at least three times as much support as the other candidates. Barbara Boxer went from not even being considered in January to getting 9% this time.
Supposed front-runner John Kerry took a big beating from Kossacks over his criticism of the Massachusetts party's adoption of gay marriage into their platform. And the other supposed front-runner Hillary Clinton consistently polls in single digits here. We are more informed than the average voter on the candidates. So this could mean that Kerry and Clinton's support could sour as people become better informed about them.
Evan Bayh and Bill Richardson will be dropped from this poll due to a lack of interest in their candidacies. In their place, I will add Pennsylvania governor Ed Rendell and Tennessee governor Phil Bredesen. There was a lot of interest in their candidacies when I diaried them a few weeks ago.
Wesley Clark:
Clark opposes Bush base closings
Clark has done nothing to hurt his chances here. He has gone on the offensive against Bush's planned military base closings. He said the closings would isolate the military from the public, saying the public needed to feel a connection with their armed forces. He feared the military would be seen as an elitist organization rather than part of the community.
Clark also won Calculusman's March Madness poll by beating Al Gore 2:1.
Russ Feingold:
Feingold calls Bolton a "loose cannon"
Feingold investigates Iraq
Feingold's support was hurt here after his divorce caused people to doubt his electability. His support dropped from 25% to 11%. However, he continues to serve effectively in the Senate. He has shown a willingness to learn from criticism, as evidenced by his votes against Gonzalez and Bolton, calling Bolton a "loose cannon." Previously, he had alienated a few progressives by supporting John Ashcroft and saying that presidents should be allowed to pick whoever they wanted to.
Feingold has been the source of much of the information about the corruption in Iraq. He said the US was risking creating a "culture of corruption" in Iraq and blasted a Special Inspector General of the Reconstruction of Iraq report which suggested otherwise.
Al Gore:
Gore blasts Nuclear Option
Al Gore continues to cement his new image as a Democratic firebrand. He has blasted the attempts to kill the filibuster. Here are some of his remarks:
"What makes it so dangerous for our country is their willingness to do serious damage to our American democracy in order to satisfy their lust for one-party domination of all three branches of government," Gore said of Republican Senators in his speech to about 700 Democratic activists. "They seek nothing less than absolute power."
"I am genuinely dismayed and deeply concerned by the recent actions of some Republican leaders to undermine the rule of law by demanding the Senate be stripped of its right to unlimited debate where the confirmation of judges is concerned, and even to engage in outright threats and intimidation against federal judges with who they philosophically disagree," Gore said.
Here, Gore challenges the patriotism of the anti-filibuster crowd:
"Long before our founders met in Philadelphia, their forebears and ours first came to these shores to escape oppression at the hands of despots in the Old World who mixed religion with politics and claimed dominion over bother their pocketbooks and their souls," Gore said. "This aggressive new strain of right wing zealotry is actually a throwback to the intolerance that led to the creation of America in the first place."
Barbara Boxer:
Boxer went from no votes at all during January to 9% last month. She has done nothing to stop her rise; placing a hold on Bolton's nomination. This is a smart move. This means Bill Frist cannot call the Nuclear Option because the democrats would then shut down the Senate, delaying the Bolton nomination indefinitely.
She has incurred the wrath of the right wing, with Red State calling her "Queen Barbara" and complaining about "tyranny by the minority."
Mark Warner:
Warner approval ratings
Warner continues to be popular, with 55% of Virginians approving of his job performance. He even has approval among Republicans, with 44% approving and 43% disapproving of his job performance. Only 29% of Hispanics approve of his job performance. This would give him major problems trying to win the West, including states like Colorado, New Mexico, and Arizona if these numbers hold up in a larger sample. However, this is a small sample size.
John Edwards:
Edwards Oklahoma trip
Center on Poverty, Work and Opportunity
Community Action Partnership
Senator Edwards is attempting to revive Lyndon Johnson's War on Poverty by setting up a think tank dedicated to the elimination of rural poverty (2nd link). One of his partners (3rd link) is Community Action Partnership, one of the largest charities in the country dedicated to eliminating poverty nationwide.
However, Edwards is not sure whether or not he will run for president in 2008. In the article, he said his first priority was to help Elizabeth recover from breast cancer.
Edwards has recast himself as a Washington outsider. Regarding his anti-poverty efforts, he said:
"That's really the cause of my life right now, in addition to getting my wife well," he said.
In a recent speech in Oklahoma, Edwards said local people know how to solve problems better than federal officials:
"I think it's important for the Democrats to quit having things run out of Washington, D.C., and instead build this party ... from the ground up," he said. "A lot of folks out here in the world, whether it's in Oklahoma or North Carolina, know better what needs to be done in their state than people out of Washington."
"I think the key for the Democratic Party nationally is to stand up for our core convictions and things that we believe in, which means standing up for people who struggle and work hard for a living, making clear to folks that we're going to fight for them and stand up for them," he said.
Edwards' anti-poverty efforts could help him win in places like Missouri, Iowa, Arkansas, and Ohio. And yet, his compelling life story did not win his ticket votes in rural counties back in November. However, Edwards' defenders will say that was because Kerry had him fly under the radar too much. And if Elizabeth recovers from breast cancer, this could be a heartwarming story in 2008.
Hillary Clinton:
Brendan Nyhan
Hillary Clinton is in the same position as Joe Lieberman in the last election cycle. Lieberman was the front-runner on name recognition. However, Lieberman was unable to capitalize on it and wound up an angry and embittered man. In the same way, Hillary is the front-runner in the SCLM polls. However, first, she must get reelected in New York.
Clinton would defeat all challengers to her Senate seat by 2:1. However, 60% of New York voters, including 65% of Democrats want her to pledge to serve out her term. And 51% of New York voters don't want her to run for president. In the controversial diary by dino, people didn't want her to run by a 70%-30% margin. And one commenter said he only voted yes because she deserved her fair shot like everyone else.
And if Clinton does run, Brendan Nyhan worries about the possible narrative that Republicans will weave through the SCLM:
But even if she gets away without making a pledge, two years of slippery rhetoric and question-dodging will reinforce the meta-narrative that she is a dishonest, opportunistic politician like her husband, particularly as the media picks up on the parallels to him breaking his pledge to serve out his final term as governor of Arkansas. And if that meta-narrative shapes media coverage in 2007-2008, she has no chance in the general election.
He concludes with the question: What's the point of running for reelection for Senate if you want to run for President in 2008?
John Kerry:
John Kerry was hammered here repeatedly for his criticism of the Massachusetts Party's adoption of gay marriage into the state party platform. A devout Catholic, Kerry faces the difficulty of reconciling the church's anti-abortion and anti-gay stance with his pro-choice and same-sex fence-sitting ways. Kerry supports civil unions, but would not support gay marriage. However, to be fair, during the campaign, he refused a suggestion from Bill Clinton to publicly support anti-gay initiatives. Other critics say that he's had his chance and that it's time to move on to a different candidate.
Dennis Kucinich:
Kucinich was also hammered here recently. He publicly called out Howard Dean for changing his stance on Iraq. However, as many angry posters pointed out, Howard has always opposed an immediate pullout. Kucinich favors an immediate pullout.
The difference is not in Dean's stances on the issues. In fact, before I voted in the primaries last election, I reviewed all the candidates positions on Iraq and found Dean to support continued involvement in Iraq. Kucinich favored an immediate pullout, which led to me voting for him.
The difference is in how Dean tailored his message. Before the election, Dean attempted to appeal to anti-war voters. His reputation as an anti-war candidate was one of the factors driving his rise in the polls. However, now, he is tailoring his message to the whole party, not the anti-war people.
Phil Bredesen:
Bredesen diary
Bredesen's standing here has gone up and down. After the last election, he was mentioned as an alternative to Mark Warner should he decide not to run. However, his standing took a nosedive in January, as he gutted TennCare, formerly THE top healthcare program in the country. However, this issue is not as black and white as it seems at first glance.
The Bush administration made a massive funding cut to the program, a decision which was beyond his control. Bredesen has a dilemma: He could raise taxes to make up the shortfall, he could gut education funding to make up the costs, or he could do what he did. Raising taxes was impossible because of the Republican-controlled Senate. His top priority is education, especially early childhood education. Therefore, he will eliminate 300,000 people from the TennCare program while leaving its childhood coverage intact. TennCare will still be one of the better programs in the country.
Many people here saw through this dilemma; over 66% of people here said they would consider voting for him in the primary.
Bredesen is more Conservative than many people here. He supports the death penalty and opposes gun control, which will turn off some voters on the left.
Ed Rendell:
Rendell diary
Rendell, on the other hand, has just added 115,000 people to his perscription drug benefit program. He has also spearheaded an environmental initiative, expected to pass, which would clean up waste sites around Pennsylvania and which would tax polluters to do it. He has a massive array of programs to help businesses get started.
However, he may be too pro-business, pro-gambling, and anti-union for some people. But like Bredesen, his stance on unions is defensible. When he was mayor of Philadelphia, he was dealing with a major budget crisis. Union benefits were so high that they were creating a major hole in the budget; Rendell cut them to put them in line with what other workers were making.