Perry Still Leads In Texas Governor's Race

It's starting to look like all Bill White's efforts to make the governor's race close is coming to naught.   He still is showing no real traction in the race.   White (pictured) still trails the current governor by several percentage points in the latest poll (commissioned by a group of Texas newspapers).   The poll was conducted September 15th through 22nd by the New York-based firm of Blum & Weprin Associates.   Here are the latest numbers:

Rick Perry (Republican)...............45.8%
Bill White (Democrat)...............39.1%
Kathie Glass (Libertarian)...............3.5%
Deb Shafto (Green)...............0.6%
Undecided...............7.7%
Refused...............3.3%

That's more than a 6% lead for Perry -- about the lead he has been maintaining for the last few months.   Some had thought that the fact that Perry has been in office for 10 years would work against him -- especially in this year of anti-incumbancy sentiment.   But that doesn't seem to be the case.   When asked whether that would make a voter more or less likely to vote for Perry, the following response was received:

more likely...............15%
less likely...............33%
no impact...............51%

Another thing that is working in Perry's favor is that 49% of the respondents think Texas is moving in the right direction, while only 36% say the state is on the wrong track.   About 48% also approve of the job that Perry has done, while 38% disapprove and 14% didn't have an opinion.

Election day is only five weeks away (November 2nd) and early voting starts a couple of weeks earlier than that.   Time is starting to run out for White.   It looks like the only real chance for him to win is for Republican voters to think they have the election in the bag and fail to go to the polls to vote, and there's not much chance of that.   The Republican voters are angry and energized (and 57.5% of Texas voters don't approve of President Obama's job performance).   That plays in Perry's favor.