Mitt Romney is running virtually even with President Obama in most national surveys lately. But polling data shows he's still a remarkably unpopular candidate, one Democratic pollster reminded viewers on The Melissa Harris-Perry Show Sunday.
Cornell Belcher, who is polling for President Obama's campaign, put Romney's recent slight polling uptick in context. He noted that most recent major-party nominees challenging an incumbent have at some point led in the polls.
"Dole took a lead on Clinton. Kerry took a lead on Bush," Belcher said. "In none of these polls have we seen [Romney] taking a statistically significant lead in most of the pubic polling."
Host Melissa Harris-Perry seized on those remarks. "Say that again, in case folks missed that," she asked Belcher.
In response, Belcher broke things down in a bit more detail.
"Especially when the primary season starts to wrap up, and the base of their party starts to rally around them, you've seen them take a lead," he said, referring again to post challengers like Dole and Kerry. "Romney has never sort of taken a significnat lead in any of the polls. And even in NBC's polling, or CNN's polling right now, he's still down a couple points."
Belcher added that the underlying problem for Romney is not reflected in the head-to-head numbers, but rather in his personal favorability ratings.
"He's what we call underwater right now," Belcher said. "Meaning his [unfavorables] are higher than his favorables right now, and actually at a historic level. So he goes into the convention as one of the most unpopular nominees in modern political history, which is a real problem."
Indeed, an NBC News poll (pdf) released this week found 38% of respondents with a favorable view of Romney, and 44% with an unfavorable view.
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I've never seen anything like it, and I've been watching elections since Eisenhower.
so basically what we have is the Republicans throwing the least popular candidate of all time up against what some (not me) are calling the worst President of all time.....
..this is what a race to the bottom looks like. America is screwed. bon chance
Why would anyone trust Romney with the US economy? he's never contributed a thing to it, has he? He offshored jobs, losing salaries and their attendant taxes for the US, he offshored his own profits so that he evaded taxes or paid only the minimum to the US. What did he do for the US economy except be part of the mass exodus of good paying jobs that we are still suffering from? He claims that he only 'buys American', specifying his televisions. How could he? There are no televisions made in America. And besides what would even several televisions per each of his houses contribute all that much to the US economy.
Romney's answer for the US is to get rid of all job security, offshore even more jobs that fatten corporate bottom lines which profits then get invested and banked abroad. Then he wants to dismantle our safety nets so those left jobless start to die off...What's to like?
And how could anyone say that Obama is 'the worst president' ever? He's done a wonderful, remarkable and epoch making job, reversing the Reagan Revolution's trends and giving a lot of people hope that we will never return to the failed policies of the GOP.
Romney gives me the same feeling I have for Rick Scott. He's shady, and so ill at ease in the public eye that you just know he's hiding his real self. He's all front.
I concur with the pollster. There's more to Romney's shortcomings than his view of the eonomy. No US President can fix the ills besetting this nation singlehandedly. Why did the authors of the US Constitution establish three branches of government? Simply stated, it demands/requires all three functioning in harmony to achieve results for the American citizens. For those who place the entire blame at the front door of the White House of a sitting President is ludicrous if not totally insane. The President can only propose suggestions/recommendations; he cannot nor does not legislate them. Additionally, Romney's so-called birther joke was nothing more than coded pandering to his pack. Remember, the wolf is in the pack and the pack is in the wolf.
The Republican Party does not like Romney; and they think that mainstream America should like him. Sorry, if Republicans do not want or like Romney, mainstream America does not want or like him as well. Rick Santorum said it all "Romney is the worst Republican ever." Gov Rick Perry of Texas said "Romney business practice was not capitalism but vulture capitalism. Romney has not done himself any favors by refusing to release his tax returns. This gives pause to many people that he is hiding something; and it is so bad that he rather take the heat for it. I cannot see how the American people will vote for this man. In addition, this man lies and distorts the truth. He is not fit to be trusted with the economic future of Americans.
That's why I don't understand the polls. How can Obama be that close in the polls to garbage...
Hey Jill Dotson, my guess why your "garbage" is so close is that people are starting to see just how much Obama hates America.
@Nathan What a load of cr*p! Hates America! He is trying nine ways to Sunday to repair the damages wrought by the corrupt GOP and then being met by their lockstep obstructionism. America see's that. Thinking America, that is.
don't take @nathan's bait.that comment is not serious and is not only not worthy of reply,it is contemptable.
Try not to beleive what AKIN had said for a second. The reason Obama is so close is simpple. Americans are wise enough to understand the Party of "No Science" which the GOP now stands for, were responsible for the whole mess that the country is gradually digging itself out of. They understand it takes a while to return the economy to normalcy given the head wind from Europe and the rest of the world and they also understand that Republican Party's presidential standard bearer, Mitt Romney is a joke and a tax evader, which remind them of President Herbert Hoover, who was a successful business man before becoming the 31st President of the United States, but failed to turn the economy around. Equally, Romney, has also shown through his governorship in Massachusetts that he couldn't run a state talkless a country. Talking about tax evassion, Romney has done nothing to put to rest the known facts that he indulged in tax avoidance, using safe haven acounts in Barmuda, Switzerland etc., even though his tax rates is abnormally lower than an Average American. All these affects his likeability rate in the poll and will ultimately affects the outcome of the election when voters walked into the voting booth to cast their votes.
Romney is evasive and calculating. In a Parade article when asked, "Should the party change? There has been a lot of talk that it's gotten a little far to the right. He answered, "I can't speak for something as big as 100-some-odd million people. The party is much bigger than any one person." --- Now, if he can't speak for his own political party, how can we expect him to speak for some 314 million Americans? Between his vulture capitalism, un-American tax evading, stand against women's rights in health and finance, support of tax relief for the ubber rich plutocracy, his flip-flopping, and his cagy coy answers, even if he might know how to create jobs I have no reason to trust that he would. I keep looking for something to like or that I can relate to in Romney. I haven't found a thing. I'm a middle class Mom with a Masters Degree.
If Romney is truly that unpopular, just think how far Obama would be behind if someone "popular" was nominated.
Those that loves Romney are those who believes RAPE don't cause pregnancy.
Try not to beleive what AKIN had said for a second. The reason Obama is so close is simpple. Americans are wise enough to understand the Party of "No Science" which the GOP now stands for, were responsible for the whole mess that the country is gradually digging itself out of. They understand it takes a while to return the economy to normalcy given the head wind from Europe and the rest of the world and they also understand that Republican Party's presidential standard bearer, Mitt Romney is a joke and a tax evader, which remind them of President Herbert Hoover, who was a successful business man before becoming the 31st President of the United States, but failed to turn the economy around. Equally, Romney, has also shown through his governorship in Massachusetts that he couldn't run a state talkless a country. Talking about tax evassion, Romney has done nothing to put to rest the known facts that he indulged in tax avoidance, using safe haven acounts in Barmuda, Switzerland etc., even though his tax rates is abnormally lower than an Average American. All these affects his likeability rate in the poll and will ultimately affects the outcome of the election when voters walked into the voting booth to cast their votes.
There is one thing that I really don't understand: Romney had all summer to deliver several economic policy statements and speeches. The most he did was offer the policies of the last republican administration or be as vague as possible or talk about what President Obama allegedly does not know about the US and global economies and business, like when he said, in order to run a business, the owner had to know when to offshore jobs.
It is very suspicious that a person who has been running for President as long as Romney has is so uncomfortable presenting substantive policy statements. For an election that is supposed to be about the economy, how Romney and his campaign are so easily distracted is quite striking. This causes me to wonder if he really knows what he is talking about when it comes to economics.
Remember Bush-Gore? It's about the Electoral College now, gang. What's the state-by-state breakdown?
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You know what gets me is that neither one has addressed the homelessness in this country. Especially our Vets. Romney the only thing he is interested in is being elected on lies that does nothing for the country. I know President Obama has mentioned it slightly but there has not been any real talking points. These are our Vets that have gone to war that Bush put them in and then when they are done in the military they have no job. no home, and no where to go. How about debating that Romney instead of Akin's and the rest of the GOP's view on women's reproductive system and this so called legitimate rape and things that have nothing to with fixing the issues in this country.
With the lies he's allowing to go out in his name, he doesn't deserve to run this country let alone work as a dog catcher, no diss on dog catchers at least they are respectable people.