MEMO from Obama for America
TO:
Interested
Parties
FROM: Joel Benenson
RE:
The
Announcement without a Bounce: Romney’s Choice of Ryan Falls
Flat
DATE: August 16,
2012
Ø
Mitt
Romney’s choice of Paul Ryan as the Republican vice presidential
nominee is viewed less favorably and has had less positive impact than
nearly any nomination in a quarter century.
ü
Initial metrics place Romney’s choice on a par with the selections of
Sarah Palin and Dan Quayle.
Ø
The announcement of a nominee’s running-mate has typically led to a
measurable bump for a ticket.
ü
Since 1996, Republicans have received an average 4.7 point gain in the
polls, according to Gallup.
Ø
In
contrast, initial polls show that Ryan has had virtually no impact on
Romney’s position in the polls, even in polls that have been shown to
have a Republican-leaning “house effect.”
ü
In Gallup’s daily tracking poll, Romney has picked up only 1 point of
support since the pick.
ü
In
Rasmussen’s daily tracker, Romney has lost a point from his
pre-announcement standing, going from a 46-44 lead over the President
to a 45-44 lead today.
ü
According
to the Economist’s YouGov poll, the President has extended his lead
from 46-45 in early August to 47-44 in the three days after the choice
of Ryan.
Ø
Analysts
often over-estimate the influence of a running-mate on a presidential
campaign. Studies regularly show that voters base their choice on their
opinions of those at the top
of the tickets.
Ø
Where
the choice of a running mate matters, though, is in what it says about
the decision-making ability and priorities of the presidential nominee.
Ø
On this score, Romney seems to have failed a key test.
Ø
Only 39% view Romney’s choice as “excellent” or “good,” while 42% say
Ryan was an “only fair” or “poor” choice.
ü
These are the lowest marks since Gallup began asking the question, 5
points lower than George H.W. Bush’s choice of Dan Quayle.
Ø
Meanwhile, only 48% believe Ryan is qualified to be president, also
near the bottom in the past quarter century.
ü
Only Quayle (32%) and Sarah Palin (39%) were seen as less qualified.
Ø
Defenders
of the Ryan selection have pointed to Ryan’s low level of familiarity
as the reason for these poor ratings and the negligible effect on the
race dynamic.
Ø
But historical data casts into doubt this analysis.
Ø
In its first post-pick poll, Gallup finds 39% saying they had never
heard of Ryan.
ü
By comparison, Sarah Palin was unknown to 51%, and yet her choice was
still viewed more favorably initially.
ü
In
1996, Jack Kemp was unknown to 55% of voters. Nonetheless, his choice
led to a 9-point bump in Bob Dole’s position in the horserace against
President Bill Clinton.
Ø
A
more likely explanation is that for his running-mate, Romney has chosen
a leader from the most extreme wing of the the least popular
institution in America, Congressional Republicans.
ü
In
the most recent Gallup poll, only 10% approved of the job Congress was
doing, the lowest rating Gallup has ever measured for Congress.
ü
A recent PPP poll found that 60% agreed that “this is the worst
Congress ever.”
Ø
In
this way, the coverage of Ryan emphasizing his position as the
“intellectual leader” of the Republican Congress and the author of its
agenda only serves to weaken the Romney-Ryan
ticket.
ü
Voters’
reaction to Romney’s choice of Ryan suggests a high level of concern
that with his selection of running-mate, Romney has explicitly aligned
himself with the leadership, the
agenda and the extreme ideology of the least popular Congress in
history.
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