Since a post on some difficult long-term trends facing Rudy Giuliani's campaign some interesting things have happened:
His campaign has begun the overdue process of staffing up to the level needed of a national campaign, plus his campaign operation is running with more efficiency. Jonathan Martin at the Politico offers a good summary of both points.
Also, Giuliani's campaign is now sending mail and running radio ads in early primary states. He's actually doing retail campaigning in Iowa rather than just the short, in-and-out stops that do ok in garnering press but don't do the job getting a buzz going on the ground. New Hampshire is getting more attention from Rudy, Inc. too.
Often one of the most important things to watch as an election contest unfolds is which campaign organizations mature more rapidly. They all go through growing pains of a sort given the fluid, ad hoc nature of their structures. But everything else being equal, whichever campaign in a competitive race finds its operational groove quicker and finds a way to make the least number of mistakes often heads into election day with a notable advantage.
Looks like Team Rudy is getting its act together on the ground. Whether his message sells is another issue, but at least his campaign now seems to be doing what it needs to do in a competitive race.
Posted by Eric Earling at July 29, 2007 02:12 PM | Email ThisAs for McCain (my preferred candidate behind FDT), the media used the recent staff shakeup and layoffs to get in their licks. The whole talk of "implosion" is only that -- talk. McCain's been back on the trail, doing what he does best: retail politics. Rudy can't match the buzz and electricity that the Straight Talk Express generates just by pulling into town.
Posted by: Patrick on July 29, 2007 02:32 PMI'm no die-hard fan of Giuliani, but I think the Politico article I cited above and the news of the campaigns radio and mail expenditures in Iowa and New Hampshire dispute your notion that he's not spending money. Prior to the last few weeks that may have been fair to a degree (and Lord knows he'll need a ton of money in the bank if he's serious about a February 5th-heavy strategy), but I don't think current facts support it.
Also, let's not kid ourselves and think McCain is rolling into campaign stops with a lot of enthusiasm on the ground. The New Hampshire discussion in this Politico compilation hardly paints an upbeat picture of McCain on the trail.
McCain is an admirable man but it simply isn't clicking for him this election cycle, and I have yet to see any reason to believe why his candidacy can turn that around. Iraq is killing him with independents and immigration is wrecking him with the Republican base. Where is he going to get the support to change the current campaign dynamic, let alone win the nomination? Running against three other solid competitors is tough enough, even if your campaign doesn't have its own problems.
Posted by: Eric Earling on July 29, 2007 02:45 PM"If the 2008 Republican presidential primary were held today...
Rudy Giuliani 36
Fred Thompson 21"
Call me crazy but one poll with a laughably small sample size of 128 isn't a marker I'd want to rely on in pushing a candidate. Yes, Rudy is leading national polls for that they're worth, but he has a sustained negative trend line in national polls, and isn't doing any better in Iowa, New Hampshire. He only recently had a blip up in what looks like a real scrum in South Carolina, but is also trending down in Florida.
Yes, Giuliani is a strong candidate. But his supporters who ignore the fact his campaign has until recently had nothing but negative momentum in polls of all sorts aren't being realistic. Moreover, if his latest efforts described in the post above don't start having an impact, that broader trend is going to become a serious problem for his campaign.
Posted by: Eric Earling on July 29, 2007 04:45 PMThe real clear politics poll, combined with more long term polls, show Rudy hoving at around 27% for most of the past two years (as a presumed candidate), spiking for a period following his announcement, and falling down to his prior 27% where he has fluxuated back and forth ever since. His decline from the earlier heights corresponds to Thompson's announced interest in the race. It isn't surprising that conservatives wary of the non-Thompson pygmies (both as candidates and as unknowns without national stature -- Romney being the latter) would bank their votes with Rudy until a credible conservative came on the scene.
Now that a credible conservative is in the race, one has to wonder how long before Romney and Gingrich supporters migrate to Thompson, assuming as I do, that Romney will continue flat for awhile before declining (due to diminished enthusiasm for a long-shot campaign) and that Gingrich is facing a similar fate (only occurring in a shorter time frame). As McCain flounders his supporters will also look for a new horse, will it be Rudy or Thompson?
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/charts/?poll_id=192
Posted by: Not Declining on July 29, 2007 06:12 PMRCP provides a snapshot average of the most recent polls. The pollster.com charts show the long-term trend. Your explanation of the trend really isn't credible given that Giuliani's decline has been unfolding for almost half a year now, and has occurred in all the early primary states as well as the national polls.
Posted by: Eric Earling on July 29, 2007 07:01 PMIt was a correction, meaning the addition of another potential candidate, not a trend line, that is shown. With the publicity Thompson has received and his popularity with the Republican base, my guess is that the correction will have finished in the next month or so, then a new trend could be established from there.
From the point in time that Thompson began to be a credible candidate McCain has lost 9 pts, Gingrich 4 pts, and Rudy 7 pts, while Thompson has gained 17 pts and Romney has gained 3 pts. Assuming Thompson made his gain equally amongst all candidates (for statistical comparisons), then Romney should have lost 1.7 pts but he gained 3 pts - that is an upward trend. Gingrich should have lost 2.2 pts and McCain should have lost 5.7 pts. Each of those candidates almost doubled their losses, meaning that if you took the correction out of the equation those two have a downward trend. Rudy should have lost 7.4 pts, yet he lost 7 pts, that means if you took the correction factor out, his trendline has been STABLE and not in decline.
Posted by: Doug on July 29, 2007 08:52 PMEric, above, seeks to dismiss the unhelpful-to-his-theories RCP poll averages (which cover six months) with the aside that they are mere "snapshots." Well, if one is making contentions about long term trends, and relying on a poll averaging site (pollster.com) where the supposed trend downward took place largely within that same six months then one should be more upfront about the fact that the RPC average is in conflict with the Pollster average on that score. (it would also be helpful to point out that Rudy remains only a couple of points from his pre-surge levels on the Pollster chart, which is hardly evidence of a long-term downward trend.
The RCP chart shows Rudy within one point of his average on May 1st. The Pollster site shows a steeper decline over the same period. For Eric's purposes (which seems to be to downplay Rudy's and inflate Romney's chances) only the Pollster site provides anything even remotely supporting his contentions, which probably explains his inaccurate description of the conflicting RCP chart.
Eric may believe the Pollster average is preferable to the RCP average, but he shouldn't dismiss the conflict in charts by using characterizations of the RCP averages not relevant to the analysis at hand: how has Rudy performed over the past six months.
It is also interesting that Romney's performance over the past six months on the RCP charts has been stable, not upward as urged by Eric and suggested (only very slightly) by the Pollster chart.
Either way, the history of early states is that a long-shot like Romney often surges early only to drop down before the primary (Dean) and is shortly out of the race. This is less the case with the early national front-runner who, with fluxuations, tends to ride the lead to victory.
At this point there is insufficient evidence of a Giuliani "long-term downward trend" in either chart.
Posted by: No Declining Trend on July 29, 2007 10:51 PMJulie-Annie is a NY liberal at heart.
A cross dresser/gay-friendly kind of guy.
Just what a Seattle Republican would vote for.
He quit once against Clinton and I want to know he wouldn't quit again.
Posted by: swatter on July 30, 2007 07:11 AMWe're simply going to have to agree to disagree then. I like both the RCP and pollster.com averages. Because of the different ways they are put together they provide different levels of information. One would think because of those differences that the RCP average is better for a short-term understanding of where the race is at since it is a rolling, short-term average, while pollster tries to extrapolate broader trend lines.
Where I do agree with Doug is that we will probably have a new trend line for the race, which is likely to emerge sometime in the fall. I'm not even sure what that will look like given the fluidity of the race, but based on events of the past few months the structure of the race has certainly changed.
Regardless who may actually win the nomination, however, or who each of us may prefer to do so, to say Giuliani doesn't have downward momentum the last several months is really quite amazing. The kind of blips you gentlemen are explaining away would be statistical noise if they over the course of a month, but half a year worth of a trend in a political race shouldn't be so quickly ignored.
Posted by: Eric Earling on July 30, 2007 07:47 AMSo isn't it unfair to blame Giuliani for being pro choice and gay friendly? You would have to be those things to win in New York City.
And calling him a cross dresser is a low blow. He isn't really, he just put on a wig and make up to be in "drag" for some kind of funny social event. All in good fun. What, you have no funny bone?
I don't quite get it -- RCP polls show he is by far the strongest GOP candidate. Wouldn't the righties want to hold their noses and elect a gay friendly pro choice candidate in order to win? He is in line with the conservative view on security issues. What's the big deal with being friendly to gay people -- he isn't gay himself, you know -- or personally being pro choice? You can't have everything in a candidate if you want to win.
Maybe you all are just prejudiced against the New York City lifestyle that is tolerant of reproductive choice and gay folks?
Just what a Seattle Republican would vote for.
Posted by Independent Voter at July 30, 2007 05:12 AM
Why can't a true blue Republican (after seeing the mess in the Democrat talent pool) say matter-of-factly they would vote R no matter the choice for president? Mind-boggling that some can't
Gonna lose for certain.
Posted by: swatter on July 30, 2007 10:12 AMIt's not just that Rudy is being cautious--the man is seemingly on-guard every where he goes. And, for those of us not in the early primary states, there's nary a trace of him online -- other than an occasional news report here, fact sheet there. I know you're a Mitt guy, so your defense of Rudy is all the more interesting to me. I began as a fan of Rudy, but I prefer a maverick war hero over a self-appointed national security maven.
See this WaPo article for more details on Rudy's non-existent cyber-campaign. The fact that he's "debating" whether to appear at the CNN/YouTube debate is another strike against him -- again, it says "overly cautious" and too calculating for my tastes.
Posted by: Patrick on July 30, 2007 12:29 PMI don't dispute your main point about Giuliani's bubble. I'm really not enamored with how his campaign has unfolded, but I do believe in calling it like I see it, regardless of my personal preference. Accordingly, it's proper to note Giuliani's campaign has made some smart moves recently...especially in contrast to Thompson.
Posted by: Eric Earling on July 30, 2007 09:07 PMHe actually CHOOSE to put the citys emergency reponse center in a KNOWN terrorist target. What kind of leader is that?
After that debate Ron Paul became my candidate and Guilliani went to the dustbin of has bins. I want a anti war candidate and all the dems had to offer was a bunch of socialized medicine candidates. Ron Paul will give us less government and get us out of Iraq. Like it or not A pro war candidate will not win in 08 so hopefully the GOP is smart enough to chose Ron Paul in the primary.
Posted by: Travis Pahl on July 30, 2007 09:35 PMA straight, white man has no candidates.
Seattle Wepuwicans will vote for Wudy the Fwuity.
They deserve her.
Posted by: Independent Voter on July 31, 2007 05:03 PM