ABC News/Washington Post poll:
Romney takes strength from the perception he’s best able to beat Obama. Gingrich comes back on experience, and, perhaps surprisingly, with a broad advantage over Romney as better fit to command the armed forces. (Neither has military service.)There's a lot more to the poll.
Gingrich, though, is not well-ranked on honesty and trustworthiness, and both Romney and Gingrich suffer from tepid ratings for saying what they really believe; just 51 and 52 percent, respectively, say this describes them. Bragging rights on that attribute belong to Paul – 65 percent believe they can rely on him to say what he really thinks.
Those soft ratings on forthrightness for the two leading candidates may be dampening overall satisfaction with the field. A less-than-ideal 59 percent of leaning Republicans say they’re satisfied with the GOP candidates, and a mere 11 percent are “very” satisfied. In late 2007, by contrast, 69 percent of leaning Republicans were satisfied with their choices – as were, on the other side, 81 percent of leaning Democrats, whose candidate ultimately won.
Notably, a broad 64 percent of potential Republican voters say there’s still a chance they could change their minds about which candidate to support – leaving vast room for further movement as the GOP race continues to unfold. And a Romney-Gingrich duel, if that’s how it develops, could be a long one. Asked which of these two comes closest to them on the issues, leaning Republicans divide almost exactly evenly, 46-45 percent.
