Thursday, February 10, 2005

More fun with polls

Suffolk University has another poll out with a whole wealth of information on state matters. Here's a sample:


If the Final election was held today and the candidates were [NAME] toward whom would you lean?
ChallengerRomneyUndecided
Chris Gabrieli35%50%15%
Bill Galvin38%45%17%
Deval Patrick28%50%23%
Tom Reilly45%41%14%


Favorability Ratings/Name Recognition:
CandidateNever Heard ofFavorableUnfavorableHeard of Undecided
Mitt Romney1%54%33%13%
Bill Galvin27%37%9%27%
Martha Coakley32%35%10%23%
Joe DeNucci30%31%10%29%
Kerry Healey24%32%23%21%
Tom Reilly15%55%11%18%
Chris Gabrieli47%15%6%32%
Tim Cahill38%24%7%31%
Tom Menino7%64%14%15%
Deval Patrick68%6%5%21%
Michael O'Halloran60%7%5%28%

So, the moral of the story is at this early date, Reilly is the best bet the state Democrats have. Of course, Patrick has a year or so to turn that 68% 'never heard of him' number around. More troubling to me, though, is that half the survey respondents would vote for Romney over Patrick versus remaining undecided -- despite the fact that so few have ever heard of him. I feel like those numbers have a lot of room to change in the next two years, but if he's serious about running, he had better start campaigning today.

It's also interesting how Tom Reilly has the highest favorability rating of any politician in the poll aside from Menino. Expect Mitt and the state GOP to work to hammer that rating down with a negative campaign as we get closer to '06.