To Drill or Not to Drill, That is the Question in Florida

It wasn't but just a few years ago that if you mentioned off shore drilling to Floridians, you might be met with anything from angry glares to other means of expressing displeasure. With the price of fuel topping $4.00 a gallon, that may have changed.

After conducting a special survey in Florida this week, Rasmussen has released results that would indicate that Floridians have come around and would be largely accepting of drilling for oil off it's coasts. This could play a significant role in the outcome of the November general elections for Florida, as they were told, in the survey, that John McCain favors drilling for off shore oil reserves and his likely opponent Barack Hussein Obama is opposed to the option.

Not surprisingly, 85% of Republicans agreed with McCain’s perspective. However, Democrats were evenly divided—45% of those in Obama’s party agreed with McCain and said offshore drilling was likely to reduce the price of oil and gas. Just 48% of Democrats agree with Obama on this point. Among voters not affiliated with either major party, 51% said drilling was likely to reduce prices and 38% disagreed. These findings help explain why the Obama has responded so aggressively to challenge McCain on this issue over the past couple of days.

Rasmussen Reports will release additional national polling data on energy topics later today. Earlier polling showed strong support for offshore drilling.

McCain currently leads Obama 47% to 39% in Florida, with another 6% saying they will vote for someone else and 8% undecided. Raising the issue of off shore drilling, however, changed the percentages a bit in McCain's favor, however, to 49% for McCain, 38% for Obama, a difference of eleven percent. Not a startling gain of three percent net, but significant in the fact that the issue drew support away from Obama, rather than gaining any support for him. McCain's gains on the issue of off-shore drilling came entirely from male voters.

McCain, prior to his announcement of his support for allowing off-shore drilling, was leading Obama in Florida by as much as ten points prior to Obama's securing the lead as the Democratic prospective nominee. At that point, Obama jumped in the national polls across the board in most states. With McCain's stance on drilling, however, Obama may see a drop off in he gained ground from Hillary Clinton's withdrawal from the race. McCain is currently viewed favorably by a gain of seven percentage points from last month among Florida voters, with Obama garnering a favorability gain of only three points for the same time period.

Rasmussen will continue to conduct polling over the next couple of weeks to track any changes in opinion based upon this issue.

Once and Always, an American Fighting Man

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