Shocking poll out of Texas; Is Perry's goose cooked?

Did everyone catch the eye-popping poll out of Texas this morning? It's a must-see. Go check it out right now.

The lede from PPP, the popular IVR outfit, says it all:

Perry trails Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison 56-31 among likely GOP primary voters.

Half of primary voters have favorable opinions of both KBH and Perry, and of those, KBH wins 49% to 33%. That's a big deal. If a voter likes both candidates but he's voting for the other guy, you've gotta re-examine your strategy.

As a campaign pollster, I'd look at these numbers and start digging deep for options for the Governor. These might be the toughest poll numbers for an incumbent -- an unindicted incumbent -- I've seen in ten years.

Perry's sole hope is that this poll uses IVR, a methodology campaign pollsters don't use. But just hoping the poll is bad isn't a happy place to be.

This will be the hottest GOP primary in the country, and KBH is the favorite.

The sample was sizeable: 797 likely primary voters, conducted last week. Full results of the poll are at: http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/pdf/PPP_Release_Texas_224.pdf