Erik Hayden writes at National Journal:
Who does the president fare worst against in a head-to-head matchup? On Wednesday, Rasmussen released its latest nationwide early campaign survey. And right now, Barack Obama does well against Mitt Romney (46 to 38 percent) and narrowly leads Perry (43 to 40 percent) and Michele Bachmann (43 to 39 percent).
Which means, if you combine these results with the Rasmussen poll released Tuesday, the GOP candidate doing the best against the president is....Ron Paul? Yesterday's head-to-head poll showed the libertarian trailing the president 39 to 38 percent, by presumably the same methodology. It's not an apples-to-apples comparison (the Paul survey was conducted a week earlier) and a larger percentage of voters would choose the "other" option if Paul was the GOP nominee. But it seems like another indicator, in very early nationwide telephone surveys at least, of Paul's viability.