Q&A (part 1)

One benefit of having a small (but extremely dedicated?) readership is that I can actually answer the questions that are posted in the comments section. You all should also feel free to post your answers.

On to the first set of questions. bgill asked:

"Does Thompson's exit help Huckabee, (Huckabee blamed Thompson for taking votes away from him in SC) or Romney more? Huckabee is not going to be campaigning strongly in FL., so the conservatives there could swing towards Romney. Either way, is it safe to say Thompson's exit will surely hurt McCain?"

Great question, and I don't think there is a super clear answer. Certainly, as I've written on this blog before, I think it's clear that Thompson helped McCain win South Carolina by eating into Huckabee's conservative and evangelical support. So I do think that in the south especially, some of Thompson's former supporters will migrate to Huckabee. But, as bgill points out, Huckabee's pulling back in Flordia, which is going to be an absolutely crucial state. Thompson was polling at around 7 or 8% in Florida, so where do those folks go? Well, let's take a look at this graph from pollster.com:

The graph shows all the publicly available Flordia polls from the past year. The graph suggests a few interesting things about where Thompson supporters might go. First off, it seems pretty clear that McCain's rise in Florida comes almost exclusively at the expense of Giuliani. The purple line turns down at almost exactly the same moment that the orange line points up (and at essentially the same angle). Indeed, since about October, Giuliani and McCain combined have consistently drawn about 45% of the vote. It seems to me that those two are battling it out for the same voters.

The other trend that jumps out at me is the similar relationship between Thompson's line and Huckabee's line. At the same time that Thompson hit his peak and began to fall, Huckabee's line begins to rise. So, my guess is that most of those Thompson people would fit most naturally in the Huckabee campe. But, as we already said, Huckabee's not competing fully in the Florida contest and that's already being reflected in the polls. That leaves Romney. His brown line has been creeping steadily upwards for months, ignoring the jumps and dives of the candidates around him. He also has plenty of money to compete in Florida, and my guess is that voters who were once in Thomspon's camp, if faced with the decision between McCain, Giuliani, a fading Huckbee, and Romney, will probably pull the lever for Romney.

It's too early, being six days out, to make a prediction for Florida, but right now trends favor Romney.


UPDATE: There's a new poll out for Florida that, for the first time, excludes Thompson. Who's leading? Mitt Romney.