The 'pre-campaign' for the 2012 Republican Presidential nominee has had such a small impact on average voters that fewer people have an opinion about Mike Huckabee, Sarah Palin, and Mitt Romney than did last April.
When we started our monthly 2012 polling 76% of voters had an opinion about Huckabee. Now only 61% do. 75% had one about Romney. Now just 65% do. For Palin the change has been less dramatic- 91% did last spring and now 88% do.
It's a good reminder that only the most avid of politics watchers are paying much attention to all the jockeying going on right now. For what it's worth Romney seems to have had the best ten months: he's gone from a +5 favorability spread to a +9 one. Huckabee's shifted from +8 to +9 and Palin's dropped from -7 to -10.
And while this is pretty obvious it still merits saying- the fact that the GOP folks are all polling closer to Obama while there's been minimal change in their own numbers is just confirmation that the movement has little to do with them and everything to do with perceptions of the President.
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These numbers indicate that Romney is keeping himself marginally more relevant to people than Huckabee and gaining favorability in the process. That is a very good dynamic for him and supports a continued narrative of viability, and especially that he is being more successful in defining himself and connecting to people than he did in 2008.
A decline of 20% of people who have an opinion of Huck, and virtually no change in favorability, indicates that his FOX gig is not generating a politically accretive benefit to his brand.
Obviously, Palin has had the best year in terms of exposure, but the impact is negative as the more people know about her, the less favorable they are to her. I surmise that this centers around a sense of her qualifications. A situation where she needs to improve people's assessment of her qualifications, but where the more exposure she gets, the worse her numbers are, puts her in a catch 22.
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