Just another quick point about that Washington Post/ABC poll out yesterday, which shows John McCain up seven points since late September. It's telling, I think, that white evangelicals are at the forefront of the McCain resurgence.
Here's how the GOP candidates are doing among evangelicals (this is not actually posted online):
11/1/07 9/30/07 9/7/07 7/21/07 6/1/07 4/15/07
Rudy Giuliani 24 23 25 30 32 34
John McCain 23 13 19 14 17 19
Fred Thompson 22 22 29 22 15 15
Mitt Romney 7 8 6 5 9 13
Mike Huckabee 13 9 8 4 4 3
And here's how the GOP candidates are doing overall:
11/1/07 9/30/07 9/7/07 7/21/07 6/1/07 4/15/07
Rudy Giuliani 33 34 28 37 34 35
John McCain 19 12 18 16 20 22
Fred Thompson 16 17 19 15 13 10
Mitt Romney 11 11 10 8 10 10
Mike Huckabee 9 8 5 2 2 1
A couple of things to note: 1.) McCain's movement among evangelicals since late September is substantially larger than his movement among Republicans overall (10 points versus 7 points). 2.) McCain is up 4* points among evangelicals since April, when he was still considered a front-runner, even though he's down 3 points overall since then.
My sense is that a lot of evangelicals have given Giuliani and Thompson (and to some extent Romney, though he's far less well known) a look, didn't like what they saw on abortion and gay marriage, and are increasingly deciding that McCain is their best bet. Could it be a sign of things to come?
*I'd originally written 14 here.
--Noam Scheiber