Hillary Clinton versus Rand Paul

[Mr. Morden]

The GOP would be torn apart if Rand Paul won the nomination.  There's a significant number of party elites* who would never be able to stomach his foreign policy views, or his views on certain civil liberties issues.  I know he's trying to be a bridge between his father's paleocon/libertarian fusionism and more "conventional" Republicans, but unless he moves farther in the latter direction, it's going to be a tough sell.

* "Party elites" of course refers not just to elected officials, but Fox News, the major talk radio hosts, etc.

[Mr. Morden]

Since when is the Youth vote against Hillary?

Polls are showing that she's doing better with olds for whatever reason.

She does well among those under 30, but above 30 we don't see the same age gradient with her that we saw with Obama.  With Obama, there was a pretty clear trend with age, where the older age groups were his worst demographic.  With Clinton, many polls have the 30-45 age group as her worst demographic.

Latest PPP national poll for example:

http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/2011/PPP_Release_4313.pdf

fav/unfav spread of HRC by age:
18-29: +39%
30-45: -6%
46-65: +5%
65+: +3%

In the matchups against Republicans though:

Christie vs. Clinton:
18-29: Clinton +32%
30-45: Christie +2%
46-65: Clinton +1%
65+: Christie +4%

Rubio vs. Clinton:
18-29: Clinton +35%
30-45: Clinton +1%
46-65: Clinton +7%
65+: Rubio +6%