Rubio does better against Meek than Crist

That's all I need to know to discredit the GE results for this poll. Meek is mostly unknown, against him Crist is picking up lots of moderate Democrats and independents. I cannot see the unknown Rubio, running his far-right campaign, polling better; that's saying that a generic R is doing better among moderates and conservative Democrats than popular and well known governor is. Once again Rasmussen shows how ridiculous they are. After the unprofessional way they handled the NJ-GOV poll, actually pressuring respondents voting for the third party candidate to pick between one of the others in order to get a more favorable result for the Republican, makes me far more skeptical of Rass than anything else ever has. He's suddenly become the Good News pollster for Republicans, and while news is not good his polls tend to show across the board support for Republicans and conservative values, his voter screening this year has me suspicious and his policy questions tend to be worded in very skewed ways to support the conservative positions.  

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus

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by: ArkDem the Ragin Cajin @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 00:43:29 AM UTC

ArkDem is right, Rasmussen again is a bullshitter......

No credible poll, especially at this early stage and probably at any stage, can show Rubio matching or outperforming Crist in the general against Meek.  And as usual with Rasmussen they show way too few undecideds than what is the reality in the favorable/unfavorable ratings for Rubio and Meek.  Rasmussen has either a flawed sample or flawed calling methodology, or both.

Yet another embarrassing stinker for Rasmussen.

What's sad about Rasmussen is that robocall polling can be just as accurate as live callers.  But Scott Rasmussen is so intent on cooking his numbers that he drags down the entire approach of automated poll calls that Survey USA and PPP do so much better.

43, male, Indian-American, Democrat, VA-10

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by: DCCyclone @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 00:51:46 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

except all probably understate the margin

Democrats get with younger voters who don't use landlines.

Still, no one as bad as Zogby yet. Every cycle he proves to be the worst, it was lovely the prediction they made Lazio would upset Clinton in 2000; Lazio proceeded to lose by a 56-44 margin.

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus

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by: ArkDem the Ragin Cajin @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 01:01:12 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Love this poll

The wingers will grab it like ti is actually good news ("we are only getting our asskicked by 15%!") which will turn this into a high profile race when it doesn't deserve to be (yet at least).  Team Blue could use yet another popular, moderate (more popular with independents than anyone else) being aggressively targeted by extremists.

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by: tommypaine @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 01:27:11 AM UTC

Betty or Kathy Castor, please get the memo

and run.

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus

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by: ArkDem the Ragin Cajin @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 01:31:34 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

????

Meek only 12 behind Crist, while Rubio beats Meek by 15???

What the hell is Rasmussen smoking?

In any case, I hope this bizarre poll encourages more of the conservatives to rally behind Rubio.  "See, he's an even stronger general-election candidate than Crist!"  The one thing I do trust from this poll is that Rubio is proving surprisingly competitive with the governor in the closed, whacked-out GOP primary.  That at least is being confirmed by other polls.

Who would have thought, we might actually have a competitive Senate race this cycle in Florida?

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by: skaje @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 01:48:14 AM UTC

Republican Primary numbers

match spot on. The general election numbers are wildly off.

Something tells me, that you are absolutely right in that Rasmussen's general voter model is wildly skewed to republican/conservative base compared to the Quinnipiac's number.

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by: sulthernao @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 01:55:32 AM UTC

I've ALWAYS thought Meek can beat Rubio!......

I've "rooted" Rubio against Crist right from the start, but never seriously until now since it looked like Rubio was chasing windmills.  I'm actually shocked he's gaining ground because not only did his staying in the race against Crist look quixotic up front, but his first round of fundraising was MAJOR FAIL and he shook up his campaign staff, both signs of tanking hard that are hard to recover from.

I actually think what's really happening is less wingnuts rising than probably the economy finally catching up to Crist.  He's one of the few Governors who seemed politically immune, but no more.

And I've always thought Meek has a realistic path to victory against Rubio that doesn't exist against Crist.  Meek is benefitting more than people realize from his having a clear field (Brown and others have been token opposition he could ignore) and being able to just fundraise and court base Democrats statewide.  It's exactly the quiet grunt work he should be doing right now.  He's going to have the resources to compete next spring and summer post-primary, while Rubio if he pulls off the primary upset will be financially drained in accomplishing it.  The polling then will be close with lots of undecideds, and the quality of the candidates and campaigns take over.  Meek just has to be ready with his positive messaging, opposition research, and attack messaging complete and ready to go.  It's a tough slog, but so far he's quietly doing what's needed.

43, male, Indian-American, Democrat, VA-10

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by: DCCyclone @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 02:36:03 AM UTC

Meek can definitely beat Rubio

it's why I was just a little bit saddened when Crist did surprisingly run for Senate after Martinez announced his retirement.  The consolation was a very good path to the Florida governorship, which means a fair redistricting map in 2012 that alone is probably worth 4-6 Democratic House seats.

I suspect a large part of the reason Meek is raising so much money, despite facing the governor of Florida, is the fact that a lot of Democratic insiders suspect Crist won't be the nominee at all.

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by: skaje @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 02:45:47 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

It'd Be Nice If...

He cracked open that big fundraising for an ad buy or two, established his GE narrative while Crist and Rubio are trying to out-lunatic each other (kinda like McDonell did in VA). Maybe it's still too early for that, but any signs that that will happen?

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by: colbycakes @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 11:43:10 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

I do think it's too early......

Voters don't care right now.  Now is the time to raise and hoard money and court Democratic activists throughout the state.  And, of course, gradually build a campaign infrastructure that's ready to go come next spring...i.e., the exact opposite of the Creigh Deeds approach to campaigning!

43, male, Indian-American, Democrat, VA-10

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by: DCCyclone @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 20:26:23 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

If its a Meek-Rubio race

This will be, hands down, the marquee race of 2010.

Obama will be in Florida quite a bit, every potential GOP contender will be in Florida. On election day this is gonna be the race that everyone will be watchign and will be the closest thing we see to a bellweather.

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by: safi @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 23:53:04 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

I don't know about that, there are bellweathers in...

...Ohio and Missouri that are at least as big a deal as Florida.  Yes Florida will be one of the big ones, no doubt.  But Ohio and Missouri, and maybe even New Hampshire, are important enough bellweathers themselves that Florida won't eclipse them.

43, male, Indian-American, Democrat, VA-10

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by: DCCyclone @ Fri Oct 23, 2009 at 16:50:43 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Crist

should save himself the trouble and run as a Democrat.  Has he done things in Florida to really aliente himself from Democrats?

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by: benjso99 @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 02:45:15 AM UTC

If he has alienated himself from Ds

Perhaps he could come out of the closet and then declare that he's changing parties.

(modest snark)

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by: tietack @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 02:50:59 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Come out of the closet

I see what you did there...

20, Male, Democrat, CA-44 (home) CA-12 (college)

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by: daman09 @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 02:54:57 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Last FL-Sen topic someone said...

"Running on principles is the more electable conservative" or something to that effect.  Now we know why they think that!  Rasmussen gives them polls to drool over and justify their thought process.  

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by: JeremiahTheMessiah @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 03:43:25 AM UTC

The Rubio numbers make me wonder...

...what the crosstabs are for latinos (particularly of course Cubans).  

NY-13, Democrat. Blog @ http://infinitefunction.wordpr...

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by: Taget @ Thu Oct 22, 2009 at 23:19:06 PM UTC