Jews prefer Clinton and Giuliani for President

A recent American Jewish Committee poll shows that Jewish voters overwhelmingly prefer Senator Hillary Clinton and former New York Mayor Rudy Guiliani for President during next year's 2008 elections.

U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Rudy Giuliani come in first and second in approval ratings in a poll of American Jews.

Clinton, the front-runner among Democrats, scored 53 percent in this year’s American Jewish Committee poll. Giuliani, the former New York mayor and a front-runner among Republicans, received a 41 percent favorable rating.

Giuliani was ahead -- albeit within the margin of error of 3 percentage points -- of two other Democratic front-runners, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards, who tied at 38 percent.

Such a staunch showing for a Republican is unusual in a community that trends strongly Democratic.

Respondents broke down into 58 percent Democrat, 26 percent independent and 15 percent Republican, diverging from the third-third-third breakdown that is the norm in general population polls. The phone survey of 1,000 Jewish Americans was conducted Nov. 6-25.

Ami Eden examines some of the survey's findings.