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SooperAnalysis: GOP Candidate Poll Results

click to see realtime results

Yesterday, after Sarah Palin’s announcement, I ran a very simple poll of my twitter followers and conservative hashtags. I’d like to do an analysis of the results, make predictions on future polls, and assess how accurate a very non-scientific twitter poll is of conservative attitudes and perceptions. So let’s take 3 well respected polls before Palin dropped out:

Results from a poll from CBS News and The New York Times:

  • Mitt Romney — 17% (16% two weeks ago)
  • Herman Cain — 17% (5% two weeks ago)
  • Rick Perry — 12% (23% two weeks ago)
  • Newt Gingrich — 8% (7% two weeks ago)
  • Ron Paul — 7% (5% two weeks ago)
  • Michele Bachmann — 4% (7% two weeks ago)
  • Rick Santorum — 3% (1% two weeks ago)
  • Jon Huntsman — 2% (1% two weeks ago)
  • Undecided — 18% (22% two weeks ago)

and a Quinnipiac poll:

  • Mitt Romney — 22%
  • Herman Cain — 17%
  • Rick Perry — 14%
  • Newt Gingrich — 8%
  • Ron Paul — 6%
  • Michele Bachmann — 3%
  • Rick Santorum — 3%
  • Jon Huntsman — 1%
  • Undecided — 18%

and a PPP poll:

North Carolina:

  • Cain 27
  • Romney 17
  • Gingrich 17
  • Perry 15
  • Ron Paul 15
  • Bachmann 6
  • Santorum 2
  • Huntsman 2

Nebraska:

  • Cain 30,
  • Gingrich 16
  • Romney 13
  • Bachmann 10
  • Perry 10
  • Ron Paul 5
  • Santorum 4
  • Huntsman 2

West Virginia:

  • Cain 24
  • Gingrich 18
  • Romney 16
  • Perry 15
  • Bachmann 8
  • Paul 6
  • Santorum 3
  • Huntsman 1

Now taken together as an average, we have the following from the 3 polls:

Average from 3 different polling sources

Now, let’s take the results from my pseudo-scientific polling as of this morning:

Taking the HIGHEST poll numbers Palin received recently, her share of votes would be about 16%. If we divide that influence according to the polling I took, we arrive at the following:

Forecast of GOP candidate results from SOOPER-ANALYSIS

Here, we clearly see an enormous bump for Herman Cain, who gets the majority of Sarah Palin’s supporters. They even know that his name isn’t ‘Herb’! (maybe I shoulda ran “Herb Cain” also…)

Romney loses 2 points, Perry only gains one, but comes within striking distance of Mitt. If he can improve his debate performance, maybe he’ll take the number two slot. Gingrich moves down part of a percentage point, and Michelle Bachmann sees a small loss in support.

The big question is the character of the undecided voters. That only 6% in my poll said it was too soon is significant because it means that 94% were ready to hop onto another campaign.

Of course, none of this is scientific in any way, and no statistical rigor was used in producing these results! Also, this depends on Sarah having 16% of the GOP vote – if she has less, then Herb’s bump is less…

thanks to those who participated in my poll!