Just out of curiosity, this morning I checked the Real Clear Politics Average on the eve of the 2008 Iowa caucus. Here are the stats:
Candidate | RCP Average | Final Result |
Mike Huckabee | 29.7% | 34.4% |
Mitt Romney | 26.7% | 25.2% |
John McCain | 11.8% | 13% |
Fred Thompson | 11.7% | 13.4% |
Ron Paul | 7.3% | 9.9% |
Rudy Giuliani | 6% | 3.4% |
Let's compare that with the current RCP Average:
Candidate | RCP Average |
Mitt Romney | 21.6% |
Ron Paul | 21.2% |
Rick Santorum | 14% |
Newt Gingrich | 14% |
Rick Perry | 11.8% |
Michelle Bachmann | 8.6% |
Jon Huntsman | 2.6% |
Amazing. After campaigning for six years; spending millions in negative ads against his opponents; being declared the winner of nearly all debates by the pundits; Mitt Romney is still stuck at 25% when margin of error is taken into account. Simply amazing.