Earlier today, the GOP Bloggers GOP Straw Poll for May went live. Yes, it’s a little late, but it still beats the Pajamas Media poll, especially for including Candidate Acceptability, sorting by voters’ inbound link and offering lefty trolls a chance to identify themselves. (It’s modeled after the old Ruffini poll, which explains a lot.) I still think unscientific web polls should be taken with a pinch of salt, but if you’re going to offer one, this is the way to do it.
In recent polls, Gingrich and Giuliani duked it out for the lead for a few months, only to be decisively overtaken once Fred Thompson was added to the mix. Now for the first time, Ron Paul is being tested against the field. Gee, what do you think will happen?
Here’s what the top tier looked like early this afternoon, after the first thousand or so votes (when I was still on my PC at work):
And here’s what it looks like this evening, about 9 hours later (from my temporary iBook):
The Ron Paul online effort may be effective, but it does take them a few hours to get organized. And they still face an uphill fight against Fred Thompson’s (presumably more organic) fanbase. But organized they are, so don’t count them out yet.
For my next post: the Ron Paul Machine at work.
StrawPoll (halfway down the page)
race42008 . com
(remove the spaces in the url)
I was afraid one of you wouldn’t show up to help make my point again, but thanks for going the distance, Torchbearer.
I’m not sure Paul’s support is any less “organic” than Dean’s was in 2004. Although, frankly, I place the likelihood of Paul getting the nomination even lower than Dean’s was and the probability of Paul ending up RNC chair at exactly 0.
I don’t understand why Fred Thompson’s results are taken so seriously in an online poll, and Ron Paul’s aren’t.
How many of his “Organic” fan base are simply LawandOrder fans who aren’t Republicans, and probably won’t be voting in the primary? The biggest factor in winning a “real” poll is simply name recognition.
On the other hand, 20,000 people signed a petition at petitiononline.com to keep Ron Paul in the debates. Were they phantom spammers? The RNC’s phones were ringing off the hook and getting 100 phonecalls at a time. when Dr. Paul’s supporters thought he was going to be excluded. I suppose that was spam also.
And how, exactly, does one stuff a text-message vote like FNC’s post debate poll don’t they use caller id to make sure you vote only once? Sean Hannity’s suggestion that moveon.org organzied a bunch of lefty trolls to vote misses the point that many of them will be able to cross-over and vote in the Republican primary as well.
Yes, there are a lot of here in cyberspace searching every blog, and news story for a mention of a poll in which Ron Paul is even included. That doesn’t make us spammers, it makes us supporters.
Everyone says Dr. Paul does poorly in “real” (read: telephone) polls. But how many small government, pro-privacy, crypto-Libertarian Ron Paul supporters are going to have a listed telephone number, and not have that number on the do-not-call list? I don’t even have a traditional land line. I have a VOIP, and a cell phone. how else am I supposed to have my voice heard?
Gallup hasn’t even released a new poll since prior to the second debate. Meanwhile Rasmussen polling shows Dr. Paul with THREE TIMES the support of Tommy Thompson, Hagel, Huckabee, Tancredo, Brownback, et. alia. (OK, it’s 3% for Paul, and 1% for everyone else except Rudy McRomney, but still.)
Dr. Paul’s “scientific” poll numbers are steadily climbing. He is number 4 out of 10 (Fred Thompson isn’t running yet. Dr. Paul is 5 out of 11 if you include F. Thompson.) his negatives are way lower than the big three (27% for Paul, 44% unfav for McCain, 38% for Giuliani, 38% for Romney)according to Rasmussenreports . com/publiccontent/politics/favorables/election2008republicancandidatesrunningin2008presidential_election
The reason it takes Ron Paul supporters a few hours to find a poll, and push Rep. Paul to the top, is that we DON’T have some central commander telling us where to vote.
I am as solid a Ron Paul supporter as there is, but I get NO emails telling me where and when to vote. I search for the polls myself, and then I vote in them.
I am online, hear me roar.
Kevin Houston May 25th, 2007 at 3:06 pm:
“The reason it takes Ron Paul supporters a few hours to find a poll, and push Rep. Paul to the top, is that we DON’T have some central commander telling us where to vote.”
You don’t have a central commander telling you where to vote? Then please explain the wikipedia page that supports ron paul and has a listing of ALL of the polls where he is listed as well as all of the petitions?
And going down the list you can see that the person who compiled the list has made comments beside which polls where ron paul needs help, etc.
I’d put the link up but I refuse to remotely help those who support that loser.
Jeff,
First I have to correct a few things from my earlier post.
1) It’s a zogby poll that has Ron Paul at 4th out of 10 declared candidates in NH, not Rasmussen.
2) The petition to keep ron Paul in the debates at petitiononline is at 17,000 not 20,000.
Sorry for those, I should have checked my facts a bit more carefully before I posted. Mmmmmm shoe leather tastes good. ;)
Ok – on to my reply.
1) What I said is “I get NO emails telling me where and when to vote. I search for the polls myself, and then I vote in them.” The existance of a Wiki listing the polls is not the same as receiving marching orders from someone. I go there, and I decide which links to follow.
2) Since when is being organized the same as spamming? Spamming in this case (online polling) would seem to imply some sort of deliberately underhanded ballot stuffing (scripts, multiple voting.) Did I misunderstand you? Are you actually complaining that Ron Paul supporters are talking to each other and pointing out the existance of other online polls?
You may not like it, but there are a lot of us online here that support Ron Paul. The numbers (17 thousand based on the above mentioned online petition) are at least 2 orders of magnitude above what any other GOP candidate currently has. It may only be online, but it is still very early in the campaign. Who are you (or anyuone for that matter) to say that Ron Paul has no chance? You may not like him, but he has exactly the same chance as any other candidate at this point.
I have posted a more extensive rebuttal of the spamming charge at both GOPBloggers and your “Inside the Ron Paul Machine II” entry showing a multitude of sources that indicate Ron Paul has a lot of support.
More importantly, it shows that none of the other GOP candidates has anywhere near this level of support online.
I already know all about the wiki you are referring to. I will respect your desire not to offer links to Ron Paul supporters, but it’s clearly linked from Ron Paul’s myspace account, so it’s hardly a secret.
That wiki is the source of my confusion about GOPstrawPolls being a once-a-day poll. It was actually PresidentPolls2008 (my bad – guess I’d better get myself to a hospital to have my foot surgically removed from my mouth.)
Looks like I’m your spammer after all, I voted twice in the GOPstrawPoll (once each of the last 2 days) Since I don’t clear cookies, and I haven’t changed my IP lately, I doubt my second vote was counted. If GOPstrawPolls does not filter by IP or cookie, then I will request they remove my second vote.
But on to my main point. I can’t speak for other Ron Paul supporters, but I am a registered Republican who is finding out about these polls myself (yes, part of that “finding out” is to look at lists compiled by someone else.) I support Dr. Paul because he supports much, much, more of the GOP platform than any of the top 3.
Giuliani is a political cross-dresser (that is, he is a Democrat in Republican clothing) I am not trying to smear him cause he marched in a parade, or wore a dress; I don’t care about that. What anyone does in their private life should be none of the government’s business.
I am trying to smear Giuliani because he’s a RINO.
Never mind the dress, listen to his words in this clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lb2y1IM17sM
He is a “Republican playing a Democrat playing a Republican.” – Ugh. Read my lips, “NO MORE RINOS!”
As recently as March 4, 2007 Giuliani said on CNN that he supports PUBLIC FUNDING of abortion. Setting aside the immorality of abortion for just a moment, Rudy tries to justify his position by saying that if it’s a Constitutional right, then the public should pay for it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZe1j4csMq8
HUH?!?
Shall we now have public funding for people who want to own guns but can’t afford to? For people who want to read pornography, but can’t afford to? How about public funding for religious charities – oh wait, we already have that. (brought to us by the GOP – and you wonder why many of us hate this party’s politicians, and actions.)
Also if you look at the Fox news post-SC debate interview with Giuliani, you will see that Rudy gets the oath of office wrong. He says that the president takes an oath of office to “protect the United States.”
BZZZZT. Wrong! The President takes an oath to protect the Constitution of the United States. This is exactly the sort of trading freedom for security that Benjamin Franklin warned about. It is how the Wiemar republic set up Germany for Adolph Hitler.
I’m not trying to say that any of the current GOP candidates are going to be the next Hitler (Dems are another matter) I’m just saying that the main reason you should nto want Governmnet to have to much power, it that one day your political opponent is going to hold that office, and then the power will be used against you.
McCain has joined with Feingold and Kennedy to give us two horrible bills; one on campaign finance, and another on immigration. Long before Ron Paul entered the ring, Conservatives have hated “moderate” McCain.
He’s just another flip-flopper:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ioy90nF2anI
He talks out of one side of his mouth about immigration, but supports the latest “Earned Citizenship” (read: Amnesty) bill. If it looks like a duck, it quacks like a duck, and it swims like a duck, then it’s a duck! Calling it a dove doesn’t change anything.
http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=1775805&page=1
What exactly did they do to “earn” their citizenship? Cross our border illegally and demand that welfare, public education, and free medical care be doled out in spanish too? Oh wait, I see it. They have to pay $5000. Puh-leaz.
I have no problem with immigrants from any country, as long as they follow the law in coming here. I don’t even have a problem with someone who can’t (or even won’t) learn english. I do have a problem with requiring the US government to provide free translation services.
If you want to come to the US and speak some other language, then you should have to pay for your own translator, or rely on a friend or a private charity. It should not be the responsibility of the government. Plenty of immigrants came to this country and relied on friends, family, and fraternal organizations (Sons of Norway, etc.) to help them understand their new language and culture.
Who the heck even knows what Mitt Romney stands for? He flip-flops like a fish. He has supported Abortion in the past.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P_w9pquznG4
But now says he doesn’t. Mitt flips – you decide.
Worse than that, he misrepresents his own religion and tries to say that Mormonism is just the same as every other Christian tradion. Listen to Mitt’s slippery language on the coming of the Messiah.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-nnSe238oUM
He says he believes that the Messiah will come to Jerusalem, but fails to mention that his “Jerusalem” is in America.
I’m not against Mormons, or Mormanism. I have an uncle, and a very good friend who are Mormons (They both support Ron Paul too; which is why I don’t believe in the theory that all Mormons will pull for Mitt, just because he says he’s a Mormon.) I am for everyone being able to worship in the way they see fit (as long as they give that right to others, etc.)
I am, however, deeply opposed to someone who tries to be all things to all people and especially someone who would misrepresent his religion for political gain.
Mitt supports universal health care. (Are we supposed to believe that MittCare will somehow be better than HillaryCare?)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VXUE7VHeaTc
He supports “certain apporpriate benefits” for gay couples (He’s just not willing to call it marriage).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjC4lQ90Sas&NR=1
This policy is actually worse than supporting homosexual unions (civil or otherwise) since it gives all the benfits of a marriage (insurance, survivorship, Social Security, etc.) without actually requiring a long term legally enforcable commitment. So instead of gay marriage, Mitt supports gay cohabitation.
Now compare that with Ron Paul. Love him or hate him, he never wavers.
He is pro-life, pro-free market, pro-free trade, pro-free speech, anti-illegal immigration, anti-undeclared war, anti-IRS, anti-universal health care, anti-UN, anti-North American Union. He stands on a platform of drastically downsizing the federal government, reducing federal taxes, and deploying our military along our own borders, instead of policing the world.
And you call Ron Paul the loser?
It’s Rudy McRomney that’s the loser — loser for the GOP that is. All three are big-government national socialists who play fast and loose with the english language in order to try to hide their beliefs and appeal to everyone. In the end, they will appeal to no one. How anyone in the GOP can support one of these 3 candidates and look themselves in the mirror in the morning is beyond me.
Later…
Re: Kevin Houston’s post: Kevin, You Go!
To add my two cents worth: I don’t know a damn thing about SPAM, EXCEPT, since
I am 61 years old, I remember my mother serving it all of the time for lunch.
I was a drill sgt. during Vietnam. I trained young men to fight there and be killed. The war in Iraq is just a foolish and just as hopless as Vietnam. Our guys are nothing more than targets for the next man or woman with an IED strapped to their body.
I voted for W. I am sick that he was the only option other than Kerry. He is a liar and a moron. I think history will remember him as bigger derelict than Nixon.
I have contributed financially to the Paul campaign. I have offered my time and energy as well. To date, nobody has asked me to join a spam corps to rape and plunder online polls. What a stupid indictment for any thinking person to make. Most importantly because Dr. Paul himself and the people he attracts (young and older like me) find such cheating as reprehensible.
The day will come, likely the New Hampshire Primary when he will eclipse the Republican field of contenders; doing it with little money and tremedous grass roots support. (I have already made up my mind to spend my own $$ to go there and work for him). When that time comes I am sure the small minds of mush that currently accuse Paul’s supporters of spamming online polls will be hurling insults that we somehow rigged the election.
As for me, I am PROUD to be one of the pesky band of supporters who will go to any reasonable and credible length to support RON PAUL. Whores like Giullani, Romney and McCain can only buy the support they get; their positions change like the wind. Paul supporters are inspired by the story and the heart of the man we want to be the next President of the United States.
Eat Your Hearts Out!