Talk about hand-writing on the wall.
In what can be termed as nothing less than "big", the latest poll of the Republican candidates in the Florida Senate primary has House Speaker Marco Rubio ahead of incumben Governor Charlie Crist by 32 points.
Via Public Policy Polling [2]:
Rubio now leads Crist 60-28, including a staggering 71-17 lead with conservatives. Crist has a 49-36 advantage with party moderates, but they account for just 31% of likely primary voters compared to 65% who describe themselves as conservative.
Rubio is benefiting from a widely held sentiment among Florida GOP voters that Congressional Republicans are too liberal and that Crist would add to the problem. 41% of them think that the party leadership in Washington is too liberal, and with those folks Rubio holds an 83-10 lead. 50% think that Crist himself is too liberal and with those voters Rubio’s advantage expands even wider to 90-5.
Wow. And, believe it or not, it gets worse for Crist.
It also looks like it’s too late for Crist to audible and make another run for Governor. GOP voters say they’d prefer likely nominee Bill McCollum over Crist by a 49-35 margin. In fact Republicans generally just want Crist to go away- 56% say they’d like him out of office a year from now to 19% who’d like to see him continue as Governor and only 14% who want him in the Senate.
Again, wow. As Ed Morrissey [3] over at Hot Air suggests, it's probably fatal for Crist. One more instance of the radioactivity of Obama's "stimulus" bill.
Exit question: Will this put to bed any of the recent blather about the Tea Parties not having an impact? [4] I personally doubt it (for now anyway)...but we can all just wait until November to gloat.
