Here’s an interesting take on the 2012 head to head numbers from Tom Jensen at PPP. This is looking at a new poll of theirs which just came out. Obama continues to lead all the big GOP contenders — Huckabee, Romney, etc. On their face, Obama’s spreads are pretty good. The closest anyone gets is Huckabee, at 5 points behind Obama.
By historical standards that’s not bad at all — certainly in a climate where unemployment remains at historically high levels.
But Jensen notes this point: in each match up, the vast majority of the undecideds disapprove of Obama’s performance. And it’s very reasonable to assume that those will break strongly against the president. As he notes, a decent part of Obama’s strength right now is the abysmal GOP field, where few if any of the candidates seem to pass the plausibility test for a national campaign. And the ones who do, like Romney, have what could well prove debilitating liabilities.
