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I've long maintained that if Fred Thompson gets in, he pops to around 20 in the polls, and (for now at least) all bets are off.
Well, it looks like that's happening:
Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) remains on top, but his support has slipped to 23%. That’s down two points from a week ago and is his lowest level of support all year. Earlier, Giuliani had consistently enjoyed support in the mid-30s. That was before Thompson’s name was added to the mix and before Giuliani stumbled on the abortion issue in the first GOP debate of the season.
Thompson, who just formed an exploratory committee and is the newest face in the race, immediately moved into second place. With 17% support, he is within six points of the frontrunner. That’s closer than anybody has been to Giuliani in 20 consecutive weekly polls. Thompson is also competitive in a variety of general election match-ups with potential Democratic nominees.
This showing was presaged by some very encouraging state polls for Thompson. He's at 21% in California, tied with McCain and just seven points shy of Rudy. A Public Policy Poll of Iowa and South Carolina shows Fred surging to 15% in Iowa, second only to Romney, and to an outright lead in South Carolina with 27%. I'm a little suspicious, since this poll is drastically at odds with the others, but it would be natural to expect Thompson to be strong in South Carolina, since he is the only Southerner among the major candidates.
Nationally, the state of play for the Big Four remains Rudy ahead 7-9% and the other three very tightly bunched in the teens. The silver lining for Rudy is that he's the only one who's shown the capacity of reaching 40%, the traditional threshold for a prohibitive frontrunner. That may help him as the field narrows. I'd also say this is very bad news for McCain. When Rudy announced, he popped. When Fred announces, he pops. McCain announces and relaunches his campaign for the third time, and still remains stuck in the high teens, low-20s.
I used to think Fred hurt Mitt the most. Now I think he kills McCain.
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