Apropos of my Friday piece on Sarah Palin, a new Washington Post poll finds her drawing somewhat stronger support among Republicans than the Gallup poll I mentioned. Full data seems not to be available to the public yet, but Post pollster Jon Cohen writes that “among Republicans, her positive rating soars to 76 percent.”
Of course, the poll also find that 52 percent of all respondents had an unfavorable opinion of Palin, 34 percent of them strongly so—a result that’s essentially unchanged since July. In addition, 53 percent of those polled said they “definitely would not” vote for her in 2012, and 60 percent said she “is not qualified” to serve as president. Those figures lead to Cohen’s conclusion: if Palin intends her book tour as the start of a presidential campaign, “she faces a steep uphill climb.”
Greg Marx is an associate editor at CJR. Follow him on Twitter @gregamarx.