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Carly Fiorina has fallen, can she get back up? (Reader Poll)

Carly Fiorina has fallen, can she get back up? (Reader Poll)

A surge, then a fall — does she have another surge in her?

I think we saw this movie before.

It’s called Scott Walker. A near total collapse in polling support in a short period of time with no obvious explanation.

This time it’s happening to Carly Fiorina. She gained a lot of attention after the Fox News undercard debate, making it into the CNN primetime debate. Fiorina was the near unanimous choice for winner of the debate, and she had a surge in the polls into the teens.

Her confrontation with Trump was a winner for her.

That support is gone now:

Carly Fiorina’s time near the top of the Republican polls may have come to an end, as another national CNN/ORC poll out Tuesday suggests. Just 4 percent of Republican or Republican-leaning voters said they would cast their votes for her in a primary election, down from 15 percent in September.

The CNN poll is similar to other polling, as this Real Clear Politics table of all recent polls shows:

RCP Polls Republican Nomination 10-22-2015

Fiorina’s campaign is putting a happy face on the situation, as a CNN reports:

Fiorina’s campaign dismissed the notion that her candidacy may be stalling and the candidate has pointed to early state polls — which show her jockeying for third or fourth place in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina — as a sign she has momentum.

Her fundraising has improved dramatically. Last quarter, Fiorina raised $6.8 million — a wide improvement from the $1.7 million she raised the previous quarter — and a larger sum than many of her Republican opponents.

“We’re really happy with the way things are going,” said Anna Epstein, a campaign spokeswoman, adding that voters are still in the process of getting to know Fiorina. “We’re still introducing her to as many people as we can. That’s definitely not over.”

Why did this collapse happen?

First and foremost, since the CNN debate Fiorina has been out of the news. She gets almost zero earned media, as the Donald and Ben Show rolls on and on. Carly made a name for herself in the primaries by being the fighter – taking on Hillary and then Donald. But we don’t see any of that.

Out of sight, out of mind.

She also doesn’t have a natural constituency unlike the other second-tier contenders — Cruz, Rubio, Jeb — from their prior political activities.

Fiorina has fallen, can she get back up?

Reader Poll open until midnight (Pacific time) on Friday night, October 23, 2015.


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Comments

Attacking Trump while being a GOP RNC establishment candidate is not a way to get elected to anything. She is just Jeb Bush with a va jay jay. Once these things were learned about her was all it took.

Fiorina or is it FioRino, has learned that attacking Trump is an activity NOT an accomplishment.

Sammy Finkelman | October 22, 2015 at 3:05 pm

There was an explanation for Scott Walker. His comments showed him not ready for prime time. He was only at a high level in the polls in the first place because ofthe fight he had led in Wisconsin. He was never able to show he knew anything else.

But Carly Fiorina? There must something going on somwhere maybe. The only explanation I have is tat it was abubble connected to the debate, and nobody ever was really for her. They just liked her to be included in the debates so they names her as a choice.

There’s some negative things being written or said about her tenure in businesses being writen, but surely not that much. And if she’s dropping becaue Ben Carson is rising, she shouldn’t auddenly fall below Bush and Rubio.

    tom swift in reply to Sammy Finkelman. | October 22, 2015 at 9:31 pm

    Unlike Fiorina, Walker has some genuine accomplishments in the political arena. But, as you say, those aren’t really enough to put him in the presidential big leagues.

    There’s some negative things being written or said about her tenure in businesses being writen, but surely not that much.

    Well, I don’t know if it’s being written … but it doesn’t have to be; it’s already well-known.

    The population of the US includes a very large number of persons with serious technical (i.e., physical science and/or engineering) educations. These people have spent their working lives in an environment which—to a degree those not in the fields would find unbelievable—included HP as a vendor, customer, employer, or competitor. For mainly historical reasons, HP had a reach, and therefore influence, far beyond its actual size. And these people know what Fiorina did at—and to—HP, and they consider her not much better than a war criminal. Now of course the technical staff (what in that world are called the “brains”, as opposed to the managers, the “suits”) all think the managers are, without exception, idiots; and too often they’re right. Even so, they recognize that Fiorina’s failures elevate her into a league of her own.

    Can the Fiorina camp overcome this? Unlikely. Spinning the numbers to make it seem that the HP of the Fiorina days was some spectacular success won’t work well. Campaigns know that numbers have the ability to cloud men’s minds; most people don’t grasp them at all, and those who do forget them almost immediately. But the professional techno types live, eat, and breathe numbers. They’re the type of people who read the published results of a poll, calculate the statistical parameters (mentally, of course), think, “there they go again, assuming the respondent can be treated as a Gaussian variable … idiots”. They’ll spot the mathematical sophistries instantly, and won’t be fooled.

    This block of voters would never hire a demonstrated failure like Fiorina for a management position; and, since the Presidency is, to them, just that, they will never vote for a ticket which includes her. Her position seems unsalvageable, at least among this group.

great unknown | October 22, 2015 at 3:39 pm

My opinion is that she’s dropping because she’s as boring as a bad PowerPoint presentation. At this stage of the process, powerful, sweeping, controversial, and entertaining statements by the candidates are critical. The polish can come later.

Reciting a litany of policy will not do it.

Same thing with JEB!, an paradigm of boring. Except that, even worse, he seems to be a teleprompter front-man for the GOPe. And, did I mention boring? It’s a good thing that his ads on You Tube are so short; otherwise, I would fall asleep at the screen before the main feature started.

Carly Fiorina comes across to me as a liberal-esque feminist asshole, thus has a high conservative base unlikability rating, as I see it.

As a liberal Democrat, she would do better with the Liberal base, I surmise.

I was open minded about her until the fireworks after the 2nd debate.

Yikes, what a Snarly Carly… But then, she is a product of the California Political Eco-System; aka Blue State Repub.

You know, it’s interesting.

I’d forgotten that T-rump had attacked the lady, and then lied about it.

It’s good to be reminded that he’s a Hellary Clinton without the va jay jay.

It also calls to mind his lechering after his own daughter to hipster journalists.

Can Fiorina come back? Hard to say, and harder to do.

IF she can cut T-rump’s balls off again in debate, we’ll see.

Henry Hawkins | October 22, 2015 at 6:09 pm

Liberal media: “Holy crap! No way we can put Fiorina stories on the air. She’d steal Hillary’s gender card and beat her to death in a debate. Note to staff: SPIKE ALL FIORINA STORIES! TOTAL BLACKOUT!”

Gotta love the liberal media meme about how Fiorina gelded Trump and “destroys Trump to his face”

Six weeks later, who got destroyed? Fiorina. (Consolation = she wasn’t gelded.)

Liberals/Amnesty shills lose again 🙂

    Ragspierre in reply to DaMav. | October 22, 2015 at 6:19 pm

    As a real conservative observed, she cut his balls off.

    T-rump then ran crying to BIG GOVERNMENT to censor that bad, mean man. Which was doubly stupid, because the FCC doesn’t regulate cable TV.

    But is sure DOES show his inclinations, and his “courage”!

      “she cut his balls off”

      Geez, more delusions. Even when trump goes up and Fiorina goes down, you stick to the anti-trump media generated establishment meme.

        Ragspierre in reply to Barry. | October 22, 2015 at 10:42 pm

        You’re the one with TDS, Barry. Everything I said was true. Especially the part the Duh Donald went whining to the regulators because someone had hurt his narcissistic self-image.

        No “meme”. Just facts.

          The fact is: After Fiorina “cut off” trumps balls, she has gone down in the polls, trump has held steady or risen. Sorta negates that meme. I mean, what good is a nice ball cutting if your gonna lose over it?

          But by all means, continue to insist Fiorina won that round. It establishes your bona fides for all to see.

          Hey you there waving your pompoms around for Anti-Trump. Fixate less on his clanging cajones and more on the actual numbers. Any more “cutting off Trump’s balls” and she’ll be below zero.

          Ragspierre in reply to Ragspierre. | October 23, 2015 at 6:08 am

          Oh, I understand who’s waving the pom-poms…for TrumpBucks. That would be YOU, trying again to divert away from the reality that Duh Donald actually called on a federal agency to silence some who bruised his ego.

          Imagine that creep with real power.

          Strawman.

          Keep trying.

          Ragspierre in reply to Ragspierre. | October 23, 2015 at 10:41 am

          No. And that’s ANOTHER lie your tried in the last few days, Barry.

          A straw man is a pretended position that nobody ever took, with is so extreme as to present an easy and fallacious target.

          T-rump did what he did, and you’re lying about it won’t change it.

          Will it?

          The discussion was about Fiorina cutting off trumps balls.

          You attempt to change the discussion, strawman.

          And once again, you use the word lie to cover for your tactics. A lie in itself.

          Point out ANY lie I have made.

      platypus in reply to Ragspierre. | October 23, 2015 at 2:23 am

      We need to verify the balls-cutting with Joni Ernst. She’d know if it really happened since she’s the expert.

      Ragspierre in reply to Ragspierre. | October 23, 2015 at 11:26 am

      Here’s what I FIRST said…

      “As a real conservative observed, she cut his balls off.

      T-rump then ran crying to BIG GOVERNMENT to censor that bad, mean man. Which was doubly stupid, because the FCC doesn’t regulate cable TV.

      But is sure DOES show his inclinations, and his “courage”!”

      Every word true.

      You apparently aren’t bright enough at this point in the progression of your TDS to look up terms like “straw man”.

      You are APPARENTLY (i.e., obviously) lying, attempting to divert from the subject of my post (above) to another topic of YOUR choice.

      You were better than this just a few days ago.

PS: Need “Hopefully not” as poll option; that’s not the same as “No”.

I’m not anti-Fiorina, as I haven’t placed my chips on anyone yet. But what I struggle with for her candidacy, is that I can’t identify what marketing folks would call the “unique selling proposition” of her brand vs. the others in the primaries. At this point in a field this crowded, if a candidate hasn’t definitively planted 2-3 concepts where they have a strategic advantage over the competition, they’re just noise.

I’ve heard her talk foreign policy, and she comes across as well versed. But from her website (where her policy positions are a slew of 60-90 video answers from appearances), her jobs policy is “big government is bad for small business, which is bad for jobs.” Ooookay. Her tax policy answer is that she wants to simplify the tax code, starting from the perspective of “lowering every rate and closing every loophole…because the federal government spends too much money.” Which is a bit like saying, “Here are my focus group-tested answers that are guaranteed to get applause at every meeting, but mean absolutely nothing.” In comparison, Trump’s tax plan “sounds” nearly scientific, even if it’s held together with the baling wire of most every GOP plan over the last decades that “we will grow our way out of this financial cesspool we’ve been completely complicit in”. Which sounds great, I would love to see a 4-5% sustained GDP growth rate, but I’m not holding my breath for any President to deliver it. I do see Fiorina as a strong/resilient personality, but that’s not the same as leadership. Add in that her HP tenure will first get destroyed by the GOP in the primaries, then the Dems in the general election campaign, and that’s why I voted “No”, she won’t recover in the polls to compete near the top.

    She also has the policy position that she agrees with the Hildebeast and Rubio that we should start world war III with the Russians by shooting down some Russian jets with their insane no fly zone idea for Syria. She’s much more detailed about world war III with the russians than she is with her tax plan as you noted.

    She really is just a higher energy Jeb Bush with a va jay jay but with a pinch of complete recklessness.

    Also she has solid positions in favor of open borders and selling out to the global corporations that won’t even offer her a job any longer.

      Ragspierre in reply to Gary Britt. | October 22, 2015 at 10:46 pm

      There you are, crapping your pants about WWIII, and lying your ass off.

      I guess that will always be the primary truth about you. You’re first and fundamentally a liar.

      If there’s metaphysical justice in the universe, one day you’ll meet Margret Thatcher, and she’ll slap the living shit out of you.

If she has another good debate performance she will bounce up, but I believe she will always drop again.

The truth here is right in front of everyone. Mainstream media is talking about Trump and Carson right now. They’re barely even mentioning Cruz or Bush. But they are purposefully not mentioning Fiorina at all, like never, since that last debate.

It’s not that she’s fallen. It’s that no one will talk about her.

Why? Because most in the media are Dem supporters and they know whether it’s Biden or Hillary, Fiorina will destroy them and make them incredibly dim. They are deathly afraid of Fiorina standing on stage next to Hillary. She will bury Hillary.

When the Dems start talking sexism, it’s just a facade and a pathetic way to cover up their own sexism. They won’t have another woman on stage, knowing their potential female nominee will get curb stomped by her.

    Fiorina would bury Hillary the same way she buried Boxer in 2010. Just no way to recover from a 100 million dollars of ads about her firing HP employees while buying yachts and making 100 million for herself. Rightly or wrongly she would be toast just over that issue alone.

      Sammy Finkelman in reply to Gary Britt. | October 24, 2015 at 10:09 pm

      She doesn’t give good answers about her tenure at Hewlett Packard and you can see it. Saying that they reduced the number of positions when there was a merger doesn’t answer it. Or saying that she could have been prosecuted for not d telling the truth about business prospects.

      What is said is that she fired the wrong people, didn’t understand Hewlett Packard and what she doing to it, didn’t understand what she was doing, her predictions of better business results never happened, and her buying of Compaq mainly served the purposes of empire building. And that she never wss good at any of her CEO positions.

      And you can add her lost race for U.S. Senator in California to the pile of evidence that she doesn’t have a good grasp of the facts, because she didn’t start out thinking it was an almost hopeless cause.

      A

Ahem, as I pointed out weeks ago. A bump up and then flame out. No, she’ll not go anywhere. She just isn’t likable.

Her confrontation with Trump was a winner for her.

Well, maybe the fact that you think so explains why you’re puzzled by the poll results.

I didn’t see a “winner” there. All I saw was yet another wannabee demonstrating, once again, that that sort of political persiflage runs off Trump like sewage off a duck’s back. The Trumpophobes get a little more reinforcement of beliefs they already hold (which is inconsequential—they can’t not vote for him twice just to show how much they hate him), everybody else ignores it, and Fiorina is left with … not much. Net change: zero.

So Fiorina needs an issue to whip up air time. Most recently, she chose Planned Parenthood. That’s not an issue which is going to be decisive in the 2016 election, but as a way to get her in the news, it’s not a bad choice. Unfortunately it’s a horse which seems to have run its course; a dead end. And so back into the shadows goes Fiorina … and the polls show what happens to most candidates when they turn invisible.

A: Carly didn’t cut anyone’s balls off.
B: Carly hasn’t a clue about how she wound up back in single digits
C: Trumps comments resonated and hit the target which is why he could apologize (and she wouldn’t have accepted any apology no matter how heart felt) and move on.
D: She put herself in a spotlight and forgot that this is the age of the internet where what you said and did 10 years ago and what other said and did 10 years ago in the public eye are available for perusal by the common man or woman.
E: Those that did found things that did not sound very appealing and certainly some were outright turnoffs.

Hoist. Petard. Some assembly required.

She has a shot at the VP spot. A good shot at it.

That’s pretty much what she started out looking for, and still may well get it. Especially now that it seems the D’s are insane enough to nominate Hillary. Carly is at her best when attacking Hillary, which will be valuable during the general election.

She hasn’t a prayer at the nomination for POTUS because everyone that thought she was an “ousider” candidate has since figured out that she’s a McCain minion, and still a RINO on way too many issues (including the all-important Amnesty).

    Barry in reply to Aarradin. | October 23, 2015 at 10:33 am

    “She has a shot at the VP spot.”

    Why? She adds no voting value to any other candidate. She does add negatives. She cannot even bring California.

    She will not be anyone’s VP selection.

      Ragspierre in reply to Barry. | October 23, 2015 at 10:56 am

      “She cannot even bring California.”

      Now, see THAT is as straw man. No living person could “even bring California” to a Republican ticket.

        “Now, see THAT is as straw man.”

        Your so deranged you have no comprehension. I stated a simple fact, Fiorina adds nothing to any ticket as VP. She cannot bring Cali. I did not say some other candidate could. A number of VP candidates have been picked over the years for strategic reasons, including their ability to swing their home state to the ticket. Stating that FACT is so far from a strawman as to be ridiculous.

        Get serious.

        Explain to us precisely how Fiorina adds to any ticket. Start with Cruz for example. Try not to let your TDS create stupid.

        Ragspierre in reply to Ragspierre. | October 23, 2015 at 11:33 am

        Poor Barry.

        You’re really too far gone to continue with. I’ll just let you wallow in your own TDS. You simply can’t reason or be truthful any longer.

          You’re deranged.

          Make up some more shit.

          Explain for everybody else how pointing out an important consideration for a VP pick is the ability to carry a large state or region, is a “strawman”. That is your contention.

          Poor Rags.

          Ragspierre in reply to Ragspierre. | October 23, 2015 at 12:23 pm

          Poor Barry.

          What was Palin’s contribution to the ticket? Was she bringing in a big, populous state or “region”?

          You raised the extreme bullshit position that the ONLY contribution Carly would make was bringing in here home state, which we all know is an impossibility.

          THAT’s the straw man.

          Bye, bye, poor Barry. You’re not worth my time any longer.

          Poor Rags.

          Palins contribution was to add some conservative bona fides to an ailing ticket headed by a non-conservative.

          You’re a flippin idiot. Anyone that can read for comprehension can understand what I said:

          “Why? She adds no voting value to any other candidate. She does add negatives. She cannot even bring California.”

          Saying she cannot even bring California is hardly saying it is the only contribution she might bring. Or that a VP candidates only value is the state they bring. It is a simple statement of fact.

          Now, point out what she can bring to any candidate of your choice and stop with your delusions. Or admit you cannot.

          “Bye, bye, poor Barry. You’re not worth my time any longer.”

          The last refuge of a loser.

          Ragspierre in reply to Ragspierre. | October 23, 2015 at 1:22 pm

          Poor Barry.