Some interesting figures from the Democratic firm Public Policy Polling on the governor’s race in New Jersey. PPP shows Republican challenger Christopher Christie leading Democratic incumbent Jon Corzine by a 50%-36% margin, which is pretty much in line with other firms’ top line results; the realclearpolitics.com average of recent polls is a 51%-39% Christie lead.
The first thing I found interesting is that PPP stratifies its results by area code. The area code lines run pretty close to the county lines, so it’s possible to compare the Corzine-Christie numbers with the actual numbers in the 2005 governor race in which Corzine beat Republican Doug Forester by a 53%-43% margin (which I described in my July 26 Examiner column as “narrow,” a characterization which Corzine’s press secretary politely disagreed in an email; fair point).
I’ve put the results in tabular form, showing the percentages for Forester and Corzine in the first two columns for the counties which roughly correspond with the area codes (with counties after each area code), the percentages for John McCain and Barack Obama in the 2008 presidential race in the third and fourth columns, and the percentages for Christie and Corzine in the PPP poll in the fifth and sixth columns. Keep in mind that 4% of voters voted for minor party candidates in 2005 and 1% in 2008—much less than the 14% not selecting either candidate in the PPP poll.
Area code 2005 2008 2009
