Presidential Poll Positions

As mentioned in this morning’s ‘BushWhack’ing, a new CNN/Opinion Research Corporation poll is showing something interesting.

Granted, I don’t usually trust polls… but the more I think about this one, the more I think it might actually be pertinent to the campaign as a whole.

The poll (1,002 adult Americans conducted by telephone by on December 6-9, 2007 with a margin of error +/- 3%) pit the top 3 Democratic candidates – Clinton, Edwards, Obama – against the top 4 republican candidates – Giuliani, Huckabee, McCain, Romney – in a head-to-head mash-up.

(Aside; notice who is conspicuously absent? The man called the second-coming of Ronal Reagan, Fred Thompson. Once heralded as the savior of the republican party, his campaign has disintegrated and all’s that’s left now is a couple of endorsements and little else…anyway; back to our post…)

In the poll, the Democrats swept the republicans out the door faster than Rush Limbaugh going through a bottle of OxyContin, well, anything really...

The numbers, as the saying goes, don't lie:

Against Guiliani:
Clinton 51% to Giuliani’s 45%
Obama 52% to Giuliani’s 45%
Edwards 53% to Giuliani’s 45%

No large deficits there, but it’s still interesting… and about to get more interesting…

Against Romney:
Clinton 54 % to Romney’s 43% (11 point deficit)
Obama 54% to Romney’s 41% (13 point deficit)
Edwards 59% to Romney’s 37% (22 point deficit)

A pattern starts to emerge…

Against McCain:
Clinton 48% to McCain’s 50% (statistical tie)
Obama 48% to McCain’s 48% (statistical tie)
Edwards 52% to McCain’s 44% (8 point deficit)

Against current gop-darling Huckabee:
Clinton 54% to Huckabee’s 44% (10 point deficit)
Obama 55% to Huckabee’s 40% (an incredible 15 point deficit)
Edwards 60% to Huckabee’s 35% (a staggeringly large - and smug - 25 point deficit)

At first blush we realize a few things about this poll; John Edwards runs stronger against ALL of the republicans in the survey and John McCain is the strongest republican candidate.

So in simpler words; anyone the Democrats run will beat the republicans…

Let’s just hope we, and by we I mean ALL DEMOCRATS, don’t do something stupid and screw this up…