How About Walker-Rubio 2016?

by JASmius



That's what the latest Bloomberg Politics/Des Moines Register Iowa Poll is presaging:

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker has expanded his early lead in Iowa, while former Florida Governor Jeb Bush continues to face headwinds and Senator Marco Rubio of Florida shows upside potential in the state that hosts the first 2016 presidential nomination balloting.

Walker front-runs with 17%, followed by Rand Paul and Ben Carson at 10% each.  The rest of the blundering herd is in single digits.

All the caveats apply, of course: Ballots won't be cast for another seven months, caucuses are more difficult to poll than primaries, and Iowa hasn't been a bellwether on who the eventual nominee will be in, like, forever.

That being said, the survey has some intriguing details:

[M]ore than a third of likely Republican caucus participants say they would never vote for [Jeb] Bush—one factor in a new index to assess candidate strength in such a crowded field. Forty-three percent view him favorably, compared to 45% who view him unfavorably.

Helps explain why Jeb isn't bothering with the August Iowa straw poll.  But then, so is pretty much everybody else, as it's a large expenditure on a retail politicking exercise of dubious predictive value.  If the Iowa GOP wants to restore the straw poll's relevance, they should move the Iowa State Fair to mid-December, when snow cones would be much less expensive.

The latest poll shows Rubio is the most popular second choice at 12%, an indication of potential strength. Among first-choice preferences, the junior senator from Florida doubled his showing since the Iowa Poll in January.

When first and second choices are combined, Rubio ranks second to Walker, 18% to 27%. “That may foreshadow growing stature,” Selzer said of Rubio.

It also may foreshadow the two individuals standing on the confetti- and balloon-buried stage at Gund Arena (I'm assuming) next summer: the proven, experienced, tested, accomplished, yet youthful everyman executive at the top of the ticket, and his youthful, charismatic, and, yes, Hispanic running mate, whom I think we can safely assume will do nothing to assist the media with its attempts to lampoon him as the twenty-first century Dan Quayle.

Walker-Rubio '16.  We could do one helluva lot worse than that.

Incidentally, in case you were wondering who would make the Fox News debate cut from this poll, the lineup would be: Walker, Paul, Ben Carson, Bush III, Mike Huckabee, Rubio, Rick Santorum, Ted Cruz, Donald Trump <sigh>,  and Chris Christie.

Exit quote:

Unprompted, poll participant John Accola, 69, a retired federal employee from suburban Des Moines, said he likes Walker partly because the governor doesn't have a college degree.

"It would be refreshing to have a non-university graduate running the country," said Accola, adding that he himself finished college. "There is a difference between education and intelligence and wisdom.”