America’s Presidential Idol: Rudy Obama?

The experience and gun factors
If there was a weakness in the group for Obama, it is that while the group saw a lot of promise in the candidate, the experience issue seemed to bother them as the night went on. When Hart put them through an exercise that included picking from a list of descriptions of what kind of POTUS Obama would be, the group had a hard time picking any of the choices to describe an Obama presidency. At that moment in the group, you could sense doubt creeping in about him.

As for Edwards, three years ago he was in the position of Obama when one observed a focus group like this. I went to one in Dayton, Ohio, just after Edwards was picked as John Kerry’s running mate, and Edwards had universal appeal and trust among the entire ideological spectrum of focus group participants. Fast-forward three years and Edwards has gone from a "fresh face" to a "pretty boy." One of the participants had even seen the now-infamous YouTube parody of Edwards fixing his hair to the tune of "I feel pretty."

As for the GOP candidates, as noted up top, Giuliani fared very well with these folks. In fact, when asked, regardless of their personal choice who they THOUGHT would be the next POTUS, half of the group said Giuliani, four picked Obama and one person each picked Clinton and Edwards. On the adjective question, Giuliani received mostly positive responses, with the two negative comments coming from members of the group who claimed to know what Giuliani was like as New York mayor. The only other red flag on Rudy seemed to be his stance on guns, not abortion. Remember, the first FIVE states on the calendar are basically pro-gun states (Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Nevada and Florida).

McCain faired both well and mediocre at the same, if that’s possible. In many ways, McCain felt like an after-thought during the 90 minutes I observed this group. When his name was brought up, he received solid support but there wasn’t a passion to the support. It was very matter-of-fact.  Two answers given during the adjective portion of the focus group would trouble me if I were working for McCain - "old school" and "history."  Also, eight of the 12 members said McCain’s Iraq position was a non-starter for them, i.e. a disqualifier.  Of course, most of those 8 were NOT Republican primary voters.

Neither Romney nor Fred Thompson was dismissed by the group, but neither Republican was familiar enough to these voters to elicit deep thoughts. Overall, the 12 had strongest opinions about Clinton, Obama, Giuliani, McCain and Edwards.  That said, Romney ought to be very wary about one thing: his reputation that he flip-flops on issues. When informed that Romney has been accused of flip-flopping on a number of issues, it caused serious problems for a number of the focus groupers.

Beward the focus groups
And now a few caveats. As many readers know, I teased this column and the focus group findings in today’s "First Read ." The tease prompted one very smart and veteran Democratic pollster to email me a slew of clips from Oct. ’99 of a similar focus group. The group indicated how potent of a threat Bill Bradley was to Al Gore.  What’s the message in that? The campaign has only just begun.  We’ve seen nominees past blow by these "fresh face" candidates by simply winning ugly. 

Here’s a snapshot of the 12 people in the focus group:

•       5 Democrats
•       4 Republicans
•       3 independents
•       6 Bush voters, 6 Kerry voters
•       6 men, 6 women
•       5 self-described "conservatives"
•       6 self-described "moderates"
•       1 self-described "liberal"
•       7 are college grads, 5 had "some college"
•       9 are married, 1 is divorced, 2 are single
•       6 had children under 18 at home, 6 did not
•       The 12 occupations: systems analyst (liberal, female, Kerry voter, age 53), retired biologist (moderate, male, Bush voter, age 64), car salesman (conservative, male, Bush voter, age 56), dental hygienist (conservative, female, Bush voter, age 42), insurance broker (conservative, male, Bush voter, age 52), securities analyst (moderate, male, Kerry voter, age 27), loan officer (moderate, female, Kerry voter, age 37), minister (conservative, male, Kerry voter, age 36), college senior (moderate, male, Kerry voter, age 23), homemaker (conservative, female, Bush voter, age 43), security analyst (moderate, female, Kerry voter, age 72) and a legal assistant (moderate, female, Bush voter, age 61).

Picking the president — the candidates Click a name below to visit that candidate’s MSNBC page • Joe Biden                 • Sam Brownback     • Hillary Clinton          • Chris Dodd • John Edwards         • Rudy Giuliani           • Mike Gravel              • Duncan Hunter • Mike Huckabee        • Dennis Kucinich     • John McCain           • Barack Obama • Ron Paul                    • Bill Richardson      • Mitt Romney            • Tom Tancredo • Fred Thompson To subscribe to a candidate page RSS feed, click here.

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