Call it counterintuitive Tuesday. The data that dropped into our hands on Tuesday the 13th put a sledgehammer to ... well ... some of the other data that dropped into our hands Tuesday.
Based on which poll you were perusing, Newt Gingrich is either still on his swift and meteoric rise to the top of the heap, or on the decline. Based on which poll you wanted to cite for evidence, Newt Gingrich is either making serious electability inroads against the president, or Barack Obama looks poised to smoke his ass in eleven months. Based on your poll of choice, Mitt Romney can make a strong electability argument, or he cannot make much of an argument at all.
So, with that in mind, let's digest the numbers in one of the least decisive days of polling we have seen in some time. It's "draw your own conclusions" Tuesday, starting with the GOP primary nums:
NATIONAL (Gallup): Gingrich 31, Romney 22, Paul 8, Perry 7, Bachmann 6, Santorum 4, Huntsman 2
NATIONAL (NBC/WSJ): Gingrich 40, Romney 23, Paul 9, Bachmann 8, Perry 6, Huntsman 5, Santorum 3
NATIONAL (Pew): Gingrich 33, Romney 21, Paul 8, Bachmann 6, Perry 4, Huntsman 3, Santorum 3
IOWA (Insider Advantage): Gingrich 27, Paul 17, Perry 13, Romney 12, Bachmann 10, Santorum 7, Huntsman 4
IOWA (PPP): Gingrich 22, Paul 21, Romney 16, Bachmann 11, Perry 9, Santorum 8, Huntsman 5
NEW HAMPSHIRE (Insider Advantage): Romney 29, Gingrich 24, Paul 21, Huntsman 11, Bachmann 4, Santorum 2, Perry 1
NEW HAMPSHIRE (Rasmussen): Romney 33, Gingrich 22, Paul 18, Huntsman 10, Bachmann 3, Perry 3, Santorum 3
VIRGINIA (PPP): Gingrich 41, Romney 15, Bachmann 8, Perry 8, Paul 6, Santorum 6, Huntsman 3
And, now, those general election numbers, which are more than a little strange.
NATIONAL (NBC News): Obama d. Romney (47-45); Obama d. Gingrich (51-40); Obama d. Paul (50-37)
NATIONAL (Rasmussen): Obama d. Paul (43-35)
NATIONAL (USA Today/Gallup): Obama d. Romney (47-46); Obama d. Gingrich (50-44)
Head past the jump for a couple of key takeaways from today's numbers.
TAKEAWAY #1: Ron Paul probably deserves more attention than he is getting, if Tuesday's numbers are legitimate.
I am well aware that the "serious people" have already concluded that Ron Paul cannot get the nomination of the Republican Party. And while I tend to agree, the numbers are where they are. Today's data shows a legitimate boomlet in support for the iconoclastic veteran Texas pol. Not only did today's weekly tracking poll by PPP in Iowa put Paul a single point behind Newt Gingrich (raising the prospect of a Ron Paul caucus win), but the two polls out of New Hampshire have Paul launching into a very legitimate third place position, within striking distance of second place. All of which raises a valid question--can the media really treat this as a Romney-Gingrich heads up contest if there is a third guy that wins Iowa and comes in second in New Hampshire?
TAKEAWAY #2: That USA Today/Gallup poll is more than a bit strange.
The national trial heat numbers that show Barack Obama with a scant one-point edge over Mitt Romney, and a six-point lead over Newt Gingrich, are in line with most other pollsters. Where this poll gets strange is that it also offered a subset of data in what it called the "swing states". This was a set of a dozen battleground states, all of which were carried by the president in 2008. Why do I claim the poll is a bit strange. Because it claims that Barack Obama is losing the swing states to Mitt Romney by five points, and is losing them to Newt Gingrich by three points. Which begs an obvious query--how is the president leading Romney, and leading Gingrich by a fairly decent margin, if he is losing in an amalgamation of states which includes New Mexico, Iowa, Pennsylvania, and Colorado. These are all states where, even in this tougher cycle, the president has polled respectably against Romney, and has had pretty comfortable leads over Gingrich. Indeed, looking at all twelve of the battleground states, it is hard to find any of them where state polling has shown a Gingrich lead over Barack Obama. So, is the USAT/Gallup poll ahead of the curve, or off the mark?
TAKEAWAY #3: Gingrich might have hit his peak already.
There are less-than-stellar signs for Team Gingrich in today's numbers. His standing in the daily Gallup tracking poll of the GOP primary has shown continuous erosion in Newt's support for several days now. Once solidly in the lead with 37% of the vote, he dropped today to 31% of the vote, and found himself no longer with a double digit edge over Mitt Romney. Gingrich's only saving grace, judging from the Gallup tracker, is that any slippage on his part is not equating to a reconsideration of Mitt Romney: his support has still remained, as it has pretty much all year, locked in the low 20s. There was also cause for alarm in the Iowa tracking poll being conducted by PPP. Not only did Gingrich's lead in the weekly tracking poll drop to a single point, but Tom Jensen of PPP found that Gingrich's net favorability figures really plummeted this week. Newt is going to get a lot more light on him as the presumptive frontrunner. Time will tell how well he will handle it.
TAKEAWAY #4: Romney can still make an electability argument
Three national polls now in the past several days have found at least a five percent swing between how Mitt Romney would fare in a national poll versus how Newt Gingrich would fare in a national poll. Now, team Newt can point to that swing states poll by USAT/Gallup (where, in critical states, the gap was only two points, plus both men held leads). But the bottom line is that Rasmussen had the electability gap at seven points, USAT/Gallup had it at five points, and NBC had it at nine points. That might explain why we are still seeing a multitude of voices in the GOP community taking shots at Newt's kneecaps in the press.
Of course, the unspoken takeaway in Tuesday's data is a frustrating one for guys like me: this shit seems to be changing on a daily basis. Which means, alas, that tomorrow is another day. Come back and see what we learn from Wednesday's data, where for all we know, the lessons may be 180 degrees from what they are now. The only predictable thing about this cycle has been a total lack of predictability. There is no reason to suspect that is going to change.