Herman Cain and Mitt Romney are in a three-way tie with undecided (Scott Audette/Reuters)
Gallup. 11/2-6. Republicans. MoE ±4 (10/7, 9/18, 8/21, 7/24):
Despite three separate allegations of sexual harassment against Herman Cain (remember this poll was taken before Sharon Bialek went public), Mitt Romney still isn't the GOP's clearcut first choice. It could be worse for Romney, however: At least he's tied for the lead with Cain and "undecided." And he's surely pleased that Rick Perry has seemingly joined the ranks of Michele Bachmann, Donald Trump, Sarah Palin, Mike Huckabee and Chris Christie as would-be conservative standard bearers.
But even as Cain's troubles mount, Romney has to be worried about the fact that Newt Gingrich's steady rebound continues. Despite resigning his speakership in disgrace over an ethics scandal and going on to marry a staffer with whom he was having an affair while in office, Gingrich is now within shouting distance of the top spot. In fact, he is polling just two points lower than John McCain was at this point in 2007—and he's trending up, instead of down. Check out where things were back then:
So, does Newt have a shot? Dare we dream the impossible dream? I mean, just based on these numbers, it doesn't seem like an outrageous idea. Purely looking at the numbers, you have both John McCain and Newt Gingrich trailing two flawed frontrunners (though Newt must also battle undecided), both of them barely entering into double-digit territory, both of their campaigns nearly penniless, and both of them all but written off (including by yours truly).
Now, just to be clear, I'm not predicting Gingrich as the next front-runner ... but that's only because I have no idea what the hell is going on inside the collective mind of the Republican primary electorate. Then again, with less than two months to go before voting begins, neither do they.