Bloodless Coup

He has to do better than fourth, for sure.

Sounds like Gore wasn't an option in this one. I will be very interested to see how his polls evolve as his movie continues to impact.

Doesn't look too good for Gore (48% definitely against in the new CNN poll), or Clinton (47% definitely against) or Kerry (47% definitely against). Of course, Jeb Bush looks worse, but Giuliani had only 30% definitely against and 19% definitely for. Adding together consider voting for and definitely voting for, and he comes out higher than the other candidates listed. The interesting thing is what this may show overall is that while the democrats constant attacks have brought down even Bush's brother's numbers, they certainly haven't helped build any warmth toward the main mudslingers.

Mudslingers? Criticism = mudslinging? Uh-huh.

And last time I checked Senator Clinton was hardly "slinging mud" at the president on a regular basis - and she's been rather supportive of him on the war.

Of course it's also worth noting that the 3 Democrats you mention are among the top 4 scorers on the question "Who would you definitely vote for?" - with all of them scoring higher than John McCain and Jeb Bush. And of course Jeb Bush has higher definitely-won't-vote-for-him scores than any of the Democrats.

And of course as to this thread - this question is asked of all Americans, not just Democrats - and this thread was about the Democratic race in '08.

Finally Giuliani, even though he has the lowest "definitely not vote for" scores of all, is simply a non-starter. A lot of people simply associate him with 9/11 when he seemed very presidential (in stark contrast to the president that day). But there's no way he'll get the GOP nomination - a 1% chance at best. Given his record in New York and his social life - it's just not going to happen.

As to the Democratic race, national polls from early June (of Democrats) - Gallup had Clinton 36 Gore 16 Edwards 12 Kerry 11 Clark 4 Biden 4 with no one else getting even 4 - Cook Political Report had Clinton 31 Gore 18 Kerry 14 Edwards 11 and everyone else at 4 or lower.

i'm not terribly worried about the definitely no vote, because, as with all recent elections, its turnout that matters. that 48% definitely would vote for gore, for example, doesn't necessarily mean he can't win more than 52% of the vote on election day. it just means if people had to vote, that's what they would do. with the looming schism in the GOP between fundies and more nominally progressive northern conservatives, i think they're biggest threat in '08 is going to be in indifference -- all the southern republicans who won't be motivated to vote for giuliania or mccain; all the yankee republicans who won't be able to bring themselves to vote for four more years of thinly veiled zealotry (say Frist).

i'd like there to be an affirmative, landslide victory for the dems, and think it might happen this fall. but for the presidency, i just don't see anything but a close election predicated largely on who can be motivated to show up.

i'm with jacflash. i went into An Inconvenient Truth last night credulous about the underlying arguments but expecting to see an ultimately pedantic political puff piece. to be clear, i'm probably nearly as far left as michael moore, but i couldn't sit still for Farenheit 9/11, generally wishing that Moore wasn't identified with my team. the Limbaughs of the world belong on the other side, and Moore is simply the other side of that utterly useless coin. but An Inconvenient Truth ended up flooring me, both in its substance and in finally revealing the Gore that those of us who have always regarded highly so looked forward to putting into the White House, the informed, compassionate, thoughtful, and moral man who aside from a couple of verbal gaffes over the years has largely had an irreproachable career of public service. really, the movie is special and important, and i think as it goes national it might drown out some of the cynicism about gore and banish the memories of a candidate who ceded too much control of his electoral narrative to political flunkies last time around, a man of substance who lost for failures of image to a man of image who's undermining the country for want of substance.