Today’s Q poll finds Democratic gubernatorial candidate Andrew Cuomo has widened his lead against his GOP opponent, Carl Paladino, even though many New Yorkers identify with the Buffalo businessman’s mad-as-hell sentiments.

Cuomo is now ahead among likely voters 55-37, compared to 49-43 in a Sept. 22 Q poll conducted one week after Paladino’s surprise landslide win in the GOP primary. Cuomo has gained ground with independent voters, reversing Paladino’s 49-43 lead with this key bloc to creep ahead by five percentage points (47-42).

Forty-five percent of likely voters say they are angry and 42 percent say they are dissatisfied. Paladino’s candidacy has come to be synonymous with anger, and, according to the Q poll, he’s the choice of really pissed off people, leading Cuomo, 50-41, among that subset.

However, Cuomo isn’t far behind. He’s been trying to tap into his own inner angry man, but also portray himself as mature enough to channel that emotion into accomplishment in Albany, reminding voters in a new TV ad that anger is “not a governing strategy.”

“Lots of New Yorkers are fed up with state government,” said Q pollster Mickey Carroll. “Those who say they are angry go for Carl Paladino – but not by all that much.

“Attorney General Andrew Cuomo gets the votes of 41 percent of the angry people. Since Quinnipiac University’s last poll two weeks ago, it’s been a looney-tunes time for Paladino in the news media – one time in a face-to-face fight with a reporter – and it shows.”

“Cuomo moves into a double-digit lead,” Carroll added. “After the dust settled from Paladino’s big primary win, the big switch was in the independent vote – a small edge for Paladino two weeks ago turns into a small edge for Cuomo this time.”

Paladino’s unfavorables outweigh his favorables, 49-33, with just 15 percent saying they don’t know enough anout him to have an opinion. That’s another big drop from the Sept. 22 poll, in which the numbers were on the positive side – 36-31 – with 31 percent saying they hadn’t heard enough yet to say one way or the other.

Voters have a favorable opinion of Cuomo, 53-34, and believe he has the right personality to be governor, 67-24.

“Paladino’s ‘angry man’ style gets a lot of attention, but he comes up negative on the personality test,” Carroll concluded.

“Less than a third of New Yorkers think he’s right for the governor’s job. Two- thirds say Cuomo is ‘Mr. Personality.”

Share|