Democrats Vaguely Lead In Early Governor Polling

       
By Jason Kenney
Published October 29th, 2008  

The Washington Post included a question in their latest federal polling asking Virginians if they prefered a Democrat or Republican governor in 2009:

Of registered voters, 48 percent prefer a Democratic governor vs. 31 percent who want a Republican.

According to the survey, a generic Democratic gubernatorial nominee starts the year with the same coalition of support that led to the election as governor of Mark R. Warner (D) in 2001 and Timothy M. Kaine (D) in 2005.

The survey, which shows voters in Northern Virginia favoring Democrats by 57 percent to 25 percent, sets the stage for another hard-fought political contest in the Old Dominion next year.

There are a lot of reasons to not worry about this poll.  Starters, it’d be interesting to see the split of D/R ID in the poll.  Second is that turnout for statewide compared to federal is nowhere near even.  In a routinely horrible year for Republicans on a federal level you will certainly see a more favorable outlook toward a Democratic governor than Republican, but when it comes to the actual race that trend will mellow out.

Interesting that the WaPo snuck this question in there, though.

Comments

2 Responses to “Democrats Vaguely Lead In Early Governor Polling”

  1. LittleDavidNo Gravatar on October 29th, 2008 at 7:56 pm

    Yeah, we might still prefer a Democrat. Just as long as the Democrat isn’t Kaine.

  2. Jeremy HintonNo Gravatar on October 30th, 2008 at 12:08 am

    That has to be the first time i’ve a 17 point polling difference described as “vaguely lead”. Or does the vaguely apply to the generic party nature of the poll and not to the word lead?

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