Presidential Preferences Poll Delighted with 'Dubya'.

The McCain insurgency notwithstanding, CEOs see George W. Bush as the strongest Presidential hopeful, while AI Gore is viewed with suspicion. Business leaders say character counts--although, perhaps not coincidentally, Bush is viewed as more sympathetic to the problems facing business and industry.

By just under a six-to-one margin, CEOs favor Texas governor George W. Bush to be the next President of the U.S. Almost two-thirds of the 1,228 CEOs and presidents polled by Chief Executive believe Bush will beat Vice President Al Gore in the November 2000 election.

Bush is widely viewed by business leaders as having the best understanding of the problems of business and industry in contrast to Al Gore where only 11 percent of respondents think the Vice President is best. Bush's support is strongest among CEOs of mid-size companies with revenues of $500 million to $1 billion. Gore's support is relatively strongest among CEOs running firms of at least $1 billion in annual revenue--and weakest among small company leaders. Just less than half of all CEOs think Bush is best equipped to handle foreign policy, despite his lack of direct experience in this field, while only 17 percent think Gore is best in this area despite his considerable experience.

One in five CEO respondents were supporters of Arizona Senator John McCain, and a majority of this group tends to think Al Gore is the favorite in November despite throwing their support behind Bush. McCain support is highest among those who regard foreign policy as a key issue.

Of the 1,228 readers who responded to our questionnaire this past spring, 49 percent represented manufacturing, 16 percent came from business services, 12 percent hailed from finance, with an equal share coming from telecommunications, technology, and information. The remainder represent respondents from distribution, consumer products, health care, and energy industries.

CE asked readers to rank each of the six candidates then in contention for their party's nomination according to six attributes. Bush is widely seen as the most honest, capable, and likeable, but readers see Bush and McCain as equally strong. Almost half of all respondents see Gore as the most unscrupulous candidate of the group, with former Senator Bill Bradley as the most na[ddot{i}]ve. Among Republicans, Alan Keyes is seen as the most na[ddot{i}]ve.

Asked to rank 16 possible issues that might dominate this year's election, CEO respondents put personal values and character well ahead, followed by taxes and education. This contrasts with several opinion polls, which rank education and Social Security at the top. Despite extensive coverage in the press and in TV news, campaign finance reform ranked 10th in importance, and does not appear to be a driving issue even among McCain adherents. (Mote than 42 percent of all respondents report having made a financial contribution to the campaign of a 2000 presidential hopeful. Thirty-four percent said they made no contribution. More than one-quarter said they personally had visited a Web site of at least one of the candidates.)

There is also a high degree of contrast in the relative satisfaction with the choice of candidates representing each party. Two-thirds of the total number of respondents were some-what or very dissatisfied with the presumptive Democratic standard bearer, where only one-fourth of the total were somewhat or very dissatisfied with the presumptive Republican leader. Even among CEOs who think Gore best understands the problems of business, most are barely satisfied with Gore as that parry's leader. When asked to name a preference to each parry's presumptive leader, over 125 choices emerged for both parties. Bill Bradley topped the list by a four to one margin over his nearest Democratic challenger, Nebraska Senator Bob Kerry. Kerry was followed closely by former Georgia Senator Sam Nunn, Anyone-but-Gore, and Missouri minority leader Dick Gephardt. Further down the preference list CEOs listed retiring Senator Pat Moynihan, Hillary Clinton and the two Jesses--Ventura and Jackson.

Among Republican alternates, CEO respondents favored John McCain who had a 30 percent following--some 10 points ahead of his closest rival Cohn Powell. Steve Forbes, Alan Keyes, Elizabeth Dole, Jack Kemp, Ohio's Steve Kasich, Christie Whitman, and Bill Bennett trailed McCain and Powell as preferred challengers. (Interestingly, GE's CEO Jack Welch received two votes as a preferred Democratic choice, but none as preferred Republican choice.)

Are CEOs as a group any good at predicting the outcome of U.S. national elections? Chief Executive has been polling readers' presidential preferences since 1980 and while readers did support the winners in that year and in the subsequent two elections, they missed in 1992, favoring George Bush over Bill Clinton. In 1996, CEOs supported Dole but were reconciled to a Clinton win, with two-thirds of those polled four years ago predicting Clinton's re-election. Also four years ago, more than half of the respondents were dissatisfied with the choice of Republican front runner, where barely 25 percent are dissatisfied today.