A phenomenal showing by Perry, who has done nothing more than announce his candidacy and press the flesh in three venues. The impending battle for Tea Party support between Perry and Bachmann may already be over. Romney has been running for four years and is hardly any better off than he was when he left the race in 2008. Who is going to beat this guy?

I know that there is a long way to go, and Perry’s campaign is far from a polished operation at this point. He doesn’t even have a headquarters. Still, you could hardly imagine a better start.

I noticed this comment in Rasmussen’s writeup on the poll: “Governor Perry is enjoying a bounce from entering the race at precisely the right time”, said Scott Rasmussen. That is Perry’s trademark. He has made a career out of being in precisely the right place at precisely the right time.

It’s useful to remember that the election is still fifteen months away.

Tagged: Michele Bachmann, presidential polls, rasmussen, rick perry

The gist of the piece is that Perry ignored what presidential candidates are supposed to do — participate in the Iowa straw poll, for example — and stiffed Iowa (not to mention his home state press) by planning to announce his candidacy in South Carolina on the day of the poll, and then proceed on to New Hampshire.

Dear Time: Welcome to our world. This is what Perry has always done — exactly what he wants to do. Since he will not officially be a candidate on the day of the poll (depending upon when he announces), and because he had no chance to win the poll, he just bypassed Iowa altogether. As Time‘s Amy Sullivan described it, Perry threw the media into a tizzy because they didn’t know whether to stay in Iowa or go to South Carolina. The Republican field is about to learn another thing about Perry. When he does something outrageous, like “The Response,” injecting, by his very presence, politics into a religious event, it won’t stick. He broke the rules and got away with it. Perry is Teflon. Don’t ask me why. I don’t know. He just is. Nothing sticks to him. I think “The Response” was terrible. It was classic Perry: a divider, not a uniter. Perry exploited religion in the most pandering way. And he got away with it, even though one aspect of the event was a failure: He invited all of his fellow governors and not one showed up. He is going to drive the rest of the wannabes crazy, just as he drove Hutchison and Bill White crazy. Everybody is waiting for the national media to go after Perry. You watch: he’ll drive them crazy too.

Perry was smart to skip Iowa. His absence effectively renders the straw poll meaningless–not that it wasn’t meaningless already. (Bachmann is the heavy favorite). He has six months to build an organization there. There may be something of a backlash against him for not showing up at the straw poll, but the western side of the state is evangelical country. He can mine it for votes.

Perry’s next major event is a speech at the National Conference of State Legislatures in San Antonio on Friday.

Tagged: iowa straw poll, presidential polls, rick perry, the response

The July ARG poll is based on 600 telephone interviews conducted July 18-24. MOE +/-4.

JULY POLL

Perry 16%

Bachmann 15%

Romney 15%

Palin 13%

Cain 11%

Giuliani 7%

Paul 4%

Gingrich 3%

Pawlenty 1%

Huntsman 1%

Santorum 1%

Undecided 12%

MAY POLL

Romney 26%

Huckabee 14%

Gingrich 11%

Palin 9%

Trmup 7%

Giuliani 6%

Bachmann 5%

Cain 4%

Daniels 3%

Paul !%

Pawlenty 1%

Santorum 1%

Undecided 11%

* * * * *

Perry’s name was listed on the May poll, but he did not receive a measurable percentage of votes.

Posting problem: ARG lists candidates in alphabetical order, not in the order of candidates that receive the most votes. I made several posting errors in an earlier version. My apologies to readers.

Tagged: presidential polls, rick perry

When I got to my computer this morning, I didn’t expect to be posting about two presidential polls today. The first one, already posted, was about New Hampshire. This one is about Iowa. Here is the basic information about the poll:

Voter/Consumer Research conducted the poll by telephone interviews between the dates of June 26th and June 30th.  It has a sample size of 500 likely caucus goers, and has a margin of error of ± 4.4 percent. Dr. Jan van Lohuizen, an expert in the field of public policy and public opinion research, founded Voter/Consumer Research.  Dr. van Lohuizen was President George W. Bush’s primary pollster and has provided his services to a number of political candidates, corporations, and various think tanks.  This is the third Iowa poll Dr. van Lohuizen has conducted for TheIowaRepublican.com.

The results:

Bachmann 25%

Romney 21%

Pawlenty 9%

Cain 8%

Paul 6%

Santorum 2%

Hunstman 1%

Favorable/Unfavorable:

Bachman 65/11

Romney 62/25

Pawlenty 60/12

Cain 54/12

Paul 49/37

Gingrich 38/52

Santorum 45/13

Huntsman 14/26

* * * *

As many readers know, Bachmann is a native Iowan. It is not suprising that she is in the lead. Romney has already decided to skip the Iowa straw poll.

Tagged: Michele Bachmann, presidential polls