The conventional wisdom about Jeb Bush, at least in some circles, is that he'd be an extremely strong candidate for Republicans in 2016 ... if only it weren't for that darn surname. He'd be a shoo-in if he weren't a Bush!
Well, a new Washington Post/ABC poll -- the second part of a survey in which, as we learned yesterday, President Obama gets low marks -- tells us not only that Hillary Clinton would beat Jeb by double digits if the 2016 presidential election were held today, she wouldn't win because he's a Bush:
In a hypothetical matchup, Clinton leads former Florida governor Jeb Bush -- seen by many GOP establishment figures as the party's strongest general-election candidate -- 53 percent to 41 percent.So there goes the lie that Jeb is the guy we really want as president, but we foolishly refuse to vote for him because we hold the actions of his relatives against him. We don't -- we just don't want him.
Clinton's commanding position is fueled by large leads over Bush with female, non-white and young voters. The poll found that neither Clinton nor Bush appears to be weighed down by a dynastic family name. Sixty-six percent of all Americans say they view the Clinton family favorably, while 54 percent have a favorable opinion of the Bushes.
Or at least the Democratic coalition doesn't, by a considerable margin:
Non-white voters overwhelmingly favor Clinton, 74 percent to 20 percent. Clinton also holds substantial leads among women (59 percent to 36 percent) and among voters between ages 18 and 39 (61 percent to 33 percent).So much for the notion that the coalition is turning away from Democrats because of Obama.
Oh, and Jeb, in order to win the nomination, would probably have to overcorrect for previous moderate positions, and pick an unpalatable extremist as a running mate -- y'know, just like McCain and Romney. So I feel pretty good about this matchup.
*****
There's a lot in this poll about the race for the 2016 GOP nomination. (Short summary: the race is really wide open.) What amuses me is the huge gender gap in Rand Paul's support:
Paul is 7 points ahead of the rest of the field among men -- and tied for fourth, 8 points behind the leader, among women.
This isn't the first time there's been a big gender gap in his polling numbers. As the site Prez16 noted last April:
In this month's Public Policy Polling survey of national GOP primary voters, Paul win 22% of men (tied for first place) but only 12% of women (fifth place).Prez16 noted that the gender gap appeared only after Paul's drone filibuster. But that was a long time ago, and it's still in place.
The story was the same in last month's Quinnipiac University poll of national GOP primary voters. Paul nabbed 18% of men (2nd place) but only 11% of women.
In limited state polling, we're seeing the same thing. For example, in PPP's poll of Pennsylvania, Paul won, once again, 22% of men, but only 11% of women.
In PPP's survey of Wisconsin, he took 12% of men and only 5% of women.
So Rand Paul really is a dude phenomenon. (Dudebro phenomenon?) Yeah, shocking, I know.
