Weekend Poll Favors Giuliani in New Hampshire

A recent poll by University of New Hampshire says New Hampshire residents likely to vote in the Republican primary think more highly of former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani than any of his rivals.

This long before an election, political professionals pay more attention to favorability ratings than voters' choices if they had to vote today. While McCain and Giuliani were essentially tied at about 27 percent on that question among likely GOP primary voters, Giuliani's net favorability - the proportion of people viewing him favorably minus the proportion viewing him unfavorably - rating was 56 percent, well ahead of either Mccain or Romney (32 percent and 26 percent, respectively)

The poll was conducted over the telephone, 311 likely GOP voters where questioned.

On the Democratic side Sen.(D-NY) Hillary Clinton and Sen.(D-IL) Barack Obama had net favorability ratings of 61 percent and 55 percent. Given a 5.2 error of margin these numbers are too close to be statistically significant.

When asked for whom they would vote, 35 percent of likely Democratic voters picked Clinton, 21 percent Obama and 15 percent Sen John Edwards. Eight percent chose former Vice President Al Gore, who is not running.

The Democratic portion of the phone poll reached 353 likely voters.

Among Independents (who may vote in either primary), 68 percent indicated they planned to vote on the Democratic primary compared to 32 percent leaning toward the GOP contest.

The poll was commissioned by WMUR-TV in Manchester, and performed by the University of New Hampshire over a four day period.

(sources - AP, WMRU.com)