Home Cookin' Favors Obama, Clinton

(CBS)  By CBSNews.com's Joel Roberts

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Do voters in the home states of some of the potential 2008 White House contenders think their favorite sons or daughters would make a good president?

The CBS News exit poll put that question to voters in selected states on Election Day, and the results include good news for some of those thinking about becoming candidates and troubling news for others.

Among the top tier of 2008 wannabes, Sens. Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and John McCain got a thumbs-up from home state voters, while Rudolph Giuliani got a mild rebuke.

Obama, the freshman Democrat, received the highest positive rating of any potential candidate. Sixty-four percent of all Illinois voters said he'd make a good president, while just 29 percent said he would not. Among Democrats, he got a positive rating from 81 percent.

Clinton fared next best, with 57 percent of all voters in her home state of New York saying she'd make a good president, including 80 percent of Democrats.

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Read more: Looking Ahead to 2008 — The Contenders

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Forty-eight percent of voters in McCain's home state of Arizona said the Republican senator would be a good president, while 41 percent said he would not be.

By 51 percent to 47 percent, New Yorkers said Giuliani would not be a good president. But he did get a 76 percent positive rating from Republicans in his state, the highest in the GOP field.

In keeping with the general mood of the electorate on Nov. 7, the Democratic contenders fared much better than their GOP counterparts. None of the eight Republicans included in the questioning (McCain, Giuliani, Nebraska Sen. Chuck Hagel, Tennessee Sen. Bill Frist, Virginia Sen. George Allen, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and New York Gov. George Pataki) were rated as good presidential timber by a majority of voters in their home states. And only McCain had a plurality that said he'd make a good president.

Home state appeal can be a critical indicator in a presidential race, given that only three times since 1804 has a president been elected without carrying his home state. (For those keeping score, they were James Polk in 1844, Woodrow Wilson in 1916 and Richard Nixon in 1968. Al Gore also won the popular vote in 2000, while losing his home state of Tennessee.)

But how important are these findings so early in the campaign, with most of the candidates still undeclared?

"The useful thing about this exercise is that citizens from the home state presumably know more about the candidate than most other Americans this early in the race," said David R. Jones, an associate professor of political science at Baruch College, City University of New York.

Jones says the key indicator may be whether "your home state is a state that a candidate from your party would normally expect to win in a presidential race."

Thus, Giuliani, with nearly 50 percent saying he'd be a good president in solidly Democratic New York, appears to be in less trouble than fellow Republicans from more GOP-friendly states.

"Hagel, Frist, Allen and Gingrich clearly fail the test," Jones says. "They all come from states that like Republican presidential candidates, but voters in their own state don't like them."

While among the Democrats, "Obama does slightly better than Hillary in a state that is less Democratic leaning, so that may bode well for him."

The other Democrats included in the exit polling were New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, who was seen as a good potential president by 50 percent of voters in his home state; and Sen. Russ Feingold of Wisconsin, who got a positive rating from just 35 percent in his home state. Feingold has since announced he would not make a run for president.

At the bottom of the barrel in home-state appeal were Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry and New York Gov. George Pataki. Just 25 percent of voters in Kerry's state said the 2004 Democratic presidential candidate would make a good president, while 71 percent said he would not.

The worst rating of all went to Pataki. Only 15 percent of New Yorkers said the Republican would be a good president, while 82 percent said he would not.
By Joel Roberts

[akarsno]

YOU know what you guys in America don't see a great president in making when it is infront of you! I think Hillary Clinton would do justice if she was president. Despite what happened in the past, it is she that will remake the change America needs for the world to see what America is about! I think she would do a good job at it and it is about time America has a female president who is bright and smart and knows how to run a country! After all the Democrates have always pulled the country out of the slump like before when it is run by Republican who always turn it upside down!

[kwch]

Not sure what you mean janem but thought I would post something just in case:
Edwards quote:
"If we can do the work that we can do in this country -- the work we will do when John Kerry is president -- people like Christopher Reeve are going to walk. Get up out of that wheelchair and walk again". The quote was later misquoted on the Drudge Report as: "When John Kerry is president, people like Christopher Reeve are going to walk".

To imply that Christopher Reeve was kept in the wheelchair because of the policies of the Bush administration on stem cells is ridiculous and insulting." Progressive research and information center Media Matters have argued that when the entire quote is used "Edwards was premising 'people like Christopher Reeve' 'walking again' on the outcome of research that a Kerry administration would support."

To imply that Edwards is against stem cell research tells me that you may be one of those "propaganda swallowing idiots" I spoke of in an earlier post.

[kwch]

You may babble all you want about Obama and Hillary but if you nominate one of them, you may well find that McCain is your next president.

[kwch]

To those who say he made his money driving health care costs up by suing hospitals I have little response other than you are propaganda swallowing idiots. John Edwards represented individuals in a court of law (your laws by the way) and he did a dam good job of it. Just like he would the next president!

[kwch]

Now that our nations reputation has been destroyed by the current idiot in charge, I see one of the major jobs for the next president is to begin fixing it. This will be no simple task as he or she will have to intelligently speak and discuss issues with world leaders of European, Islamic and Eastern countries not to mention a host of others (with all the associated cultures that go with them). Now in these discussions, would you like the person speaking for you to be an up and coming pure democrat with little to no business savy and really no experience dealing with world affairs or would you rather have a woman who has risen on her husbands coattails and will NOT be as respected in a number of cultures, (although not mine I hope). Or would you rather have an individual that has a proven ability to be sharp, witty and convincing in times when things can be totally unpredictable as in a courtroom in front of a jury (and be VERY good at it). This not to mention one who has experience in Washington as a senator and truly understands the plight of middle class America.

To those of you with $500,000 salaries and that much again in the stock market John Edwards is not your guy, but if you find yourself in a situation something less than that, you would be foolish voting for anyone else.

[usawatchman]

did anyone look at those pictures...
are those two doing what it looks like they are doing...?

[tibu987]

Uh oh!
I am going to have a problem because I do not feel that I can vote for Hillary or Obama. I feel that both are unqualified for that office. Obama's relationship to corrupt and despotic Chicago's Stroger family and relationship with indicted politcally money man Tony Rezko and Rod
"not business as usual" Blogojevich, yeah, right, Illinois Governor, has ruled him out as far as I am concerned.
Hillary, well, words alone cannot speak for this untalented person, I would have to also wave my arms about. I hope that she does not become a candidate, I cannot vote for either.

[btesar1]

Interesting that someone would say they won't vote for Obama or HClinton because they aren't "qualified." Who, pray tell, is qualified? So many of the last half-dozen or more presidents were governors, some of less-than-impressive states (Georgia, Arkansas, Texas, for example). Yet they were elected. You'd think that Senators, who are involved in international politics, as well as national, might have some experience that would "qualify" them as much as Jimmy Carter or George W. Bush.

[kwch]

I am neither republican nor democrat but can easily see myself voting for whoever is running against McCain if he is the republican candidate.

That is unless the democrats are foolish enough to nominate either Obama or Hillary. Then I guess I would opt for the lesser of three evils and vote McCain. Come on America, please don't be as stupid as you have been the last two presidential elections. I really would like to vote for, rather than against, someone.

[edjohn66]

I am a Democrat and refuse to vote for a candidate that has proven to be pro-war, pro-tax cuts for the rich, and anti-civil liberties (pro-Patriot Act).

Therefore, I will not support Hillary Clinton.

Obama 2008!