Mark Steyn on Rush Limbaugh's show today pointed out that liberals aren't so quick to scrape off their Kerry/Edwards bumper stickers than their Obama stickers, because liberalism is always easier to defend *in theory*.

Instead of being delusional about it, I recognize it: I really like Sarah Palin, but *in theory*. I like what she stands for, but I have no evidence that she could survive a national contest. Being hindered by McCain's staff means she might fare better at the top of the ticket -- *in theory*. Huckabee is less exciting, but has at least been tested by the primary process already. That could be why Huckabee may seem safer to some, thinking they need to support the "safer" candidate. Don't forget, an awful lot of Republicans had to vote for McCain for him to be the nominee last time.

Hmmmmm, now that's interesting.
I would say that that the more you know about Huckabee the less you'll like him and he probably has decent name recognition but not many people know he's a socialist with Christian trappings.

Polls this far out are pretty useless, where was Obama in presidential polls in 2006?
Heck, where was he in late 2007?

I'm not surprised about Sarah Palin.
Nobody I know personally thinks she's anything but an idiot. My family and co-workers and neighbors are mostly leftists, but even the relatively conservative ones think Tina Fey was being accurate.
She has a lot of ground to make up in order to get elected.

The fact that Mitt Romney and Huckabee are always talked about as "leading candidates" scares the crap out of me.
The GOP still doesn't get it.
We want fiscal conservatives, not people who want to spend a little less than the Dems on most of the same stuff.

Except for Palin and Paul, conservatives (and others who tend to vote for Republicans) don't seem to have any kind of unprompted attachment to any of those candidates. When the GOP runs people the party likes more than its voters do, they lose pretty closely (Dole, McCain, second-run Bush I), or, against truly terrible D candidates, win very closely (first-run Bush I, Bush II), essentially by accident.

Obama has about 40% of voters deeply attached to him. That's his zero. He'd win, without even really running, against everyone on that list except Palin, whose zero is similar. (Paul, though loved, isn't loved by many.) But Palin's not going to run, not against Obama. He's the only person she could lose to.

The rest of that list (all interchangeable, electorally) can only win if Obama screws up so badly, in such an undeniable way, that it's a surprise he even runs again, and his voters lose their identification with him. I don't think that's likely. He's their imaginary friend and imagined self, not a guy with a job he's bad at.