This morning, Chuck Todd and the rest of the gang at MSNBC's First Read sounded a very interesting alarm:
There are some increasing signs -- though all of it anecdotal for now -- that Newt Gingrich is gaining some momentum three days before the South Carolina primary.
First was his strong debate performance on Monday, from which his campaign cut a new TV ad. Second, the Romney campaign today is holding a conference call (featuring former Sen. Jim Talent and former Rep. Susan Molinari) with the sole purpose of hitting Gingrich, and we haven’t seen one of those from the Romney camp since Iowa. And third, Sarah Palin sort of endorsed Gingrich last night, saying per NBC’s Alex Moe: “If I had to vote in South Carolina, in order to keep this thing going, I’d vote for Newt and I would want this to continue.”
Within hours, as if prompted by the invisible hand of the Peacock, polling data began to surface, on a national level, to buttress the point of Todd and company:
NATIONAL (CBS News): Romney 28, Gingrich 21, Santorum 16, Paul 15, Perry 7, Huntsman 2
NATIONAL (Gallup): Romney 33, Gingrich 16, Santorum 14, Paul 12, Perry 7
NATIONAL (Pew): Romney 31, Gingrich 16, Paul 15, Santorum 14, Perry 5, Huntsman 2
NATIONAL (Rasmussen): Romney 30, Gingrich 27, Santorum 15, Paul 13, Perry 4
FLORIDA (CNN/Opinion Research): Romney 43, Santorum 19, Gingrich 18, Paul 9, Perry 2
NEW JERSEY (Quinnipiac): Romney 40, Gingrich 14, Santorum 14, Paul 12, Huntsman 4, Perry 2
OHIO (Quinnipiac): Romney 27, Santorum 18, Gingrich 17, Paul 10, Perry 4, Huntsman 2
SOUTH CAROLINA (CNN/Opinion Research): Romney 33, Gingrich 23, Santorum 16, Paul 13, Perry 6
The general election numbers, which could take on more significance if Mitt Romney is able to close the deal on Saturday, portend a toss-up, but a race where Mitt Romney may well be losing some of his luster as a candidate with the general electorate:
NATIONAL (Pew): Obama d. Romney (50-45); Obama d. Romney and Ron Paul (44-32-18)
NEW JERSEY (Quinnipiac): Obama d. Romney (48-38)
OHIO (Quinnipiac): Obama d. Romney (44-42); Obama d. Paul (48-39); Obama d. Santorum (48-37); Obama d. Gingrich (52-38)
Some thoughts about "Newtmentum II: The Sequel" past the jump.
Rarely will you hear me say this, but the item that I am most interested in the polling released on Wednesday may well be that Rasmussen poll. I am not a sudden convert to the House of Ras (their 2010 performance, as it happens, makes me a bit of a skeptic for life), but the fact that theirs is a one-day sample caught my attention.
Because theirs is the only poll that was conducted entirely in the wake of Monday's debate, where Mitt Romney took some sharp and legitimate incoming fire, they'd be better suited than the others to note any Romney fade or Gingrich surge, the likes of which were alluded to by the First Read gang on Wednesday morning.
Contrast that to the CNN/ORC poll out of South Carolina, where it appears that all is reasonably well in the House of Romney, with Mitt still up by double digits. However, then consider that only ONE day of the five days the CNN/ORC poll was in the field came after the Monday night debate, and you see where some of that information is already a bit dusty. Even at that, it is worth noting that Gingrich had already halved Romney's lead from the previous CNN poll, taken about two weeks ago.
However, there is a clear note of caution from interpreting the Rasmussen numbers. The inherent risk in reading too much into one-day samples is a tendency to make too much out of what are, essentially, ephemeral "bounces" in the data. Gingrich might have surged within the margin yesterday, but will he sustain it today, when the pundits and the political talkers have moved onto the next debate or event?
If we see sustained movement in advance of South Carolina, then perhaps the House of Ras can take a bow for being the first one to sound the alarms. But, if Romney still easily disposes of Gingrich and the rest of the GOP peanut gallery on Saturday, then we can simply conclude that the Ras-sies took their snapshot at a unique point in time, not to be sustained or repeated.
Meanwhile, Romney might find himself more concerned with the new numbers out today from Pew, which had two findings that ought to fire off the sirens in the Mitt camp. It is not just the five-point deficit to the president that ought to concern them (though that poll does confirm PPP's finding from yesterday), but the number that really had to get them worried is 33/47. That is Romney's fav/unfav spread in the latest Pew poll, and it is markedly worse than his numbers just eight weeks ago, when his fav/unfav was a net of negative 7 percent. To put it another way, his net negatives have doubled since the campaign began in earnest.
With that in mind, one has to wonder if the argument on the left that Mitt Romney does not wear well with the American electorate the longer they know him might actually be true. Not only is that the second consecutive national poll to show him with quite lousy favorability numbers, but it is also the second consecutive poll to show (a) that his favorabilities are getting steadily worse and (b) that Barack Obama is pulling out to a modest lead.
These are only two polls, of course (though Quinnipiac also shows a three-point swing in Obama's favor since their last polling). But if Romney starts to take on water as he tries to nail down the Republican nomination, the work of Msrs. Gingrich, Santorum and the like may well increase exponentially the chances that Barack Obama will earn a second term.