Polling

Our friends over at Public Policy Polling are out with their latest tracking poll and a couple of things jump out at me.

First, it's obvious Fred Thompson is the buzz in Republican circles right now, but I have a feeling this is a temporary bump from being something new.  He's doing a masterful job of being a candidate but not doing candidate-like things like make appearances and participate in debates.  Odds are good this is his peak, and he will begin to come back down from this.

Second, something is off with the survey of Democrats.  You're telling me that 34% of Democrat voters have picked a Lieutenant Governor candidate when only 44% of Republican voters have picked a Gubernatorial candidate?  No offense to Pat Smathers, Don Besse, Walter Dalton or Hampton Dellinger, but I cannot possibly believe that anyone outside of their own constituency knows who they are, much less have 8-9% statewide support.

Also on the Democrats, 0% believe immigration is an important issue?  Seriously, 0%?
I will definitely concede that there is a highly partisan gap between Democrats and Republicans over whether this is the most important issue, but our polling has consistently shown somewhere in the mid-teens of Democrats think immigration is the most important issue facing the state.
(One thing to point out here, PPP asks "Which is the most important issue to you" where our poll asks "what is the most important issue facing the state" thus we don't include Iraq)

Our poll goes into the field next week, so we'll see if we match Thompson's level of support and we'll have full results at our poll release luncheon on Wednesday, June 20.