I’m in Washington, D.C. and just attended a briefing of American Conservative Union board members by national pollster Tony Fabrizio of Fabrizio, MacLaughlin, on his firm’s recent national in-depth survey of Republicans. This was a detailed and extensive study, involving 2,000 interviews in the polling sample, nationwide. It was not prepared for any candidate. The poll results are available on their site at: http://www.fabmac.com/releases.html.
Among the interesting findings of this survey, which tracked changing attitudes of Republicans, is the emergence of an identifiable new subgroup of Republican voters that Tony calls, "Dennis Miller Republicans." These types of Republicans have emerged in the last 10 years. They share a lot of the positions of "libertarian" Republicans, but they are not exactly libertarian. While Tony finds that libertarians in the Republican party (about 10% of them) remain essentially identifiable by their profound philosophical opposition to government authority, the Dennis Miller Republicans are ones who "just don’t like government," and generally oppose hand-outs because they "have to work for a living." They are generally against illegal immigration, while libertarians are not quite so strong on the topic. The difference between "Dennis Miller Republicans" and libertarians is a not so subtle distinction when you read the poll.
There is plenty more of interest. You probably have heard that the Republican party is getting older and it has become more southern. But did you know that the Republican party is 93% white; half of Republicans go to church at least once a week, and most Republicans are Protestant or a variation; while 25% are Catholic?
Currently, the strongest issues uniting Republicans are the war in Iraq, and opposition to taxes and deficits. Issues that divide Republicans markedly are health care, immigration, and gay-marriage. The pro-life position is represented by about 2/3rds of Republicans, and pro-choice 1/3.
However, Tony found that among those who oppose abortion in the Republican party, the largest subgroup is one he dubed, the "moralists." Regarding the Presidential election, Tony asked in his poll if Republicans were more likely to vote for a candidate for President who shared their views, or one who exemplified strong leadership qualities. An interesting 25% of the Republican moralist subgroup said leadership mattered more than agreeing with shared values. In this regard, Tony stated that this subgroup may be open to a Giuliani candidacy, and that if Giuliani can get this subgroup to support him, regardless of his pro-choice stance, he will be the winner on primary day across the country and in states like California on February 6, 2008.
Finally, Tony stated today that Giuliani was leading in all categories of this poll with Republicans by varying degrees, and that he will be the biggest beneficiary of the expected implosion of the McCain campaign, because the overwhelming majority of McCain backers pick Giuliani as their second choice for President.
[Publisher’s Note: Jim clearly intended to share with FR readers that he is an enthusiastic endorser of Rudy Giuliani for President, but was so anxious to get this post up that he left that out! – Flash]