Blue Mass Group

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Reilly leads in new poll

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A New Suffolk University Poll will be released tommorrow.

“While Mihos shows some potential, the race for Governor appears to be Attorney General Tom Reilly’s to lose. When asked, who respondents would lean toward if the election were held today, 34% chose Tom Reilly, 25% selected Lieutenant Governor Kerry Healey and 15% voted for Christy Mihos. A total of 27% of respondents were undecided.

In the Democratic primary, the 7NEWS/Suffolk University poll showed Reilly leading corporate executive Deval Patrick, 36% to 28%, with 33% undecided. However, when venture capitalist Chris Gabrieli was added to the Democratic hopefuls, the race tightened further with Reilly securing 27% of the vote, followed by Patrick (21%) and Gabrieli (15%), with 37% undecided.”

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  2. When asked, do you support banning hand-held cell phones to improve driver’s safety, a whopping 80% indicated “yes,” while only 16% said “no.”

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    Well, I’m in the comfortable, tyrannical majority.

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  3. However you slice it, it’s a close-ish race between Reilly and Patrick, 6-8%, with 33%-37% undecided. At this early stage that could go either direction, and in any event Gabrieli will have a lot to prove.

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  4. Pollster hype:

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    When respondents were read the statement, “I’d like to see an independent candidate elected Governor for a change,” 52% either strongly agreed or agreed with that statement, while just 24% disagreed or strongly disagreed. A total of 24% of respondents were undecided.

    “This poll tells us that the stars have begun to align for an independent candidate,” said David Paleologos, Director of the Suffolk University Political Research Center. “The outstanding question is whether Christy Mihos (independent businessman) is the right candidate at the right time.”

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    Well sure, all things being equal, I’d rather have someone who wasn’t part of the machines. But it so rarely turns out to be “the right candidate at the right time”, doesn’t it? So for now, call me a Mihoskeptic.

  5. I just want to ask a (perhaps silly) question re: “I’d like to see an independent candidate elected Governor for a change.”

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    Was that big I or little i independent? I’d like an independent governor for a change — somebody who is not beholden to a party line, a union, a corporation, an interest group. I would not like to see an Independent governor for a change — I want a Democrat to take the corner office. I know this is really minute, but do you think that changed the outcome of that answer?

  6. Always helps the wording of the questions to hire Lou DiNatale’s best friend as campaign staff!

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    BTW – you can’t HEAR a capital or lower case ‘i’…in independent

      • based on some limited experience with political polling, I would guess that there was no clarification on what they meant by “independent.” Usually it’s left to the respondant to interpret how they will.

    • You’re right, clearly the pollster was trying to make a point.  I got to tell you I don’t think Mihos is the guy but I’d love to see the emergence of some strong independents in this state.  Challenging the two dominant party power structures is not a bad thing.  I’m a democrat and I’m bought into the change from within but sometimes I think what people need is a reality check from the outside.

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      Clearly though, the fact that Gabrielli’s name rec is so good and he polls so well (relative to patrick) out of the gate show that when he jumps in it’s going to be a lot more interesting.

      • Not so.  Gabrieli’s name recognition is indisinguishable from Deval Patrick’s and both are only slightly better than Christy Mihos’.

        • …that somedem was making?  Patrick’s been doing this for more than a year and Gabrieli steps in with the same level of name recgonition?  Sure Gabrieli is riding on name rec from $10 million (ish) in past advertising, the to point still holds that a “new comer” has the same name rec as a candidate who’s been running for 15 months.

          • Gabrieli has run for office twice previously, and is hardly a newcomer.  One could just as easily say that Gabrieli only has the same name recognition as someone who’s never run for anything in Massachusetts, despite having been on the ticket just four years ago.

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            Anyway, it seems to me that this is a distinction without a difference.  It is unlikely that those who have heard of Patrick have not heard of Gabrieli and vice versa.  If you know one of them, it’s safe to assume that you’ve been following the governor’s race.  If you’ve been following the governor’s race, you probably know who the candidates are.

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            Winter just ended a few days ago.  Name recognition numbers before the first TV ad airs are mostly meaningless in terms of predictive ability.

      • He now leads Patrick by 6-8 points. This is slightly down from the 9 point lead he held in the first poll after the St. Fleur debacle, and is down from the 12 point lead of two or three more recent polls.

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        In fact, read together, all these polls say about the same thing:

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        that a two-term AG has only about a third of Democratic voters right now;

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        that he has seen his lead shrink from 40 points six months ago to 10 or so now;

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        against a guy who is still only known by about half the voters.

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        Could you imagine such a set of polling data if there was a challenge to a truly popular Democratic offic holder like Kennedy or Kerry or even Galvin?

  8. 68% of respondents either haven’t heard of (33%) or haven’t formed an opinion about (35%) Deval Patrick.

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    34% haven’t heard of (9%) or haven’t formed an opinion about (25%) Tom Reilly.

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    For Patrick to be only 8% down with that kind of name recognition gap says to me that if his campaign can reach the voters who aren’t paying attention yet then he’s going to be the strongest candidate in the field.

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    (Yes, I’m a Deval volunteer and supporter, but this ain’t just wishful thinking on my part.)

    • That’s what I pretty much took away from the poll, as well. While Reilly has led in every poll to date his numbers have been trending downward…that’s indisputable. That said, I think we all knew this rate would tighten up some just not at the rate it has.

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      I wonder if Patrick will be able to raise the sufficient amount of money it will take to ensure his message gets out. That is so critical as I have yet to meet a person who after listening to Deval or interacting with his campaign has not come away very impressed.

      • I say this as a Deval supporter: I have met people who were undecided, and after seeing him speak and learning more about him, decided to support Reilly (or Gabrielli).  They’re rare, but they do exist.  And yes, I was surprised, too 🙂

  9. Chris Gabrieli can be “The Real Thing” (no pun intended re: Deval’s past employment) in this race. Hitting the street at 15% is quite impressive. Mihos will self-destruct in time. There’s “no meat on the bone” in any of his proposals and even if there were, he can’t articulate them. If media people like Keller, Eagan, Curtis and others keep serving up puff balls during his interviews he’ll hang in there but if they start demanding more than one-word answers from him, he’ll become unhinged as Deval observed the other day.

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