Republican Gubernatorial Nomination "Moore's for the Taking"?

A Mobile Register-University of South Alabama poll shows that a plurality of Alabamians who are likely to vote in the Republican primary for Governor prefer Roy Moore to Gov. Bob Riley by a margin of 43-35.

This poll is pretty useless as a predictor of how things will turn out when the Republican primary rolls around next year for several reasons:

1. The election is too far in the future for any poll to accurately predict what the sentiments of Republican voters will be on election day.
2. Neither Riley nor Moore have announced their candidacy for Governor yet. As far as I know, no other Republican has, either.
3. The poll included self-identified "likely Republican primary voters." Therefore, it does not take into account the impact of crossover voting from Democrats. It seems likely that an election in which Moore was a participant would be likely to draw a substantial number of crossover votes, not to mention first-time voters with no allegiance to either party.

Even so, the poll shows that Moore's popularity hasn't wavered following the interior decorating dispute between himself and the federal courts that resulted in his removal from office. If anything, Moore is more popular than he would have been had he remained as Chief Justice. That isn't good news for Governor Riley or for the Alabama Republican Party.