I like to dive in to numbers sometimes. This poll is tighter than the slew of other polls I have seen lately – so I decided to have a look.
First off – Quoting the Field Poll:
Carly – 37 / Campbell – 22 / DeVore – 19. (The Race for 2nd Place is tightening)
I wanted to take a deeper look and a couple of quotes were astounding:
Statewide 38% of the Republican primary electorate identify a lot with the Tea Party populist movement. Among this segment of voters Fiorina is preferred with 42%, followed by DeVore at 25% and Campbell at 17%.
Carly is the Tea Party Candidate!
Among strong conservatives Fiorina is supported by 43%, with DeVore running second at 23% and Campbell trailing at 16%. Among voters who identify as moderately conservative, Fiorina’s lead narrows to twelve points. By contrast, among the nearly one in three GOP primary voters who are either middle-of-the-road or liberal in politics, Campbell leads Fiorina narrowly (32% to 30%).
Carly is the conservative Candidate! (The other point is the liberals now know Tom Campbell is the Liberal)
And the all-important Popularity Contest:
(69%) said they had an opinion of Fiorina and their views divided 57% favorable to 12% unfavorable.
(64%) can now express an opinion of him, and they divide 45% positive and 19% negative
DeVore is still the least known of the GOP senatorial candidates, with 51% of likely GOP primary voters unable to offer an opinion of him.
DeVore did score 41-8 on his fav/unfav (I am proud to be part of the 8%) – but my favorite quote of the entire survey follows:
Just 12% of the GOP primary voters believe DeVore has the best chance against Boxer. Even among those who are supporting DeVore in his primary election bid, less than half (42%) think he has the best chance of winning in the fall, while nearly as many (33%) think Fiorina does.
Yet, DeVore continues to attack Carly. Does he want Boxer to win? His own voters seem to know the truth.