The last several days there have been a couple straw polls going around on the GOP presidential nomination for 2008. Although it’s still very early in that election season, candidates have been testing the waters for months.

The first poll was in Memphis, during the Southern Republican Leadership Conference. Frist won only 36% of the vote that vote, even though he was in his home state. However the more curious thing was that Mitt Romney, the governor from Massachusetts who has been making some conservative overtures, came in second at 14%.

Two more straw polls, this time on the internet, strengthened Romney’s place in the field. As of now in the GOP Blogger poll, George Allen is in the lead with 34% net votes, with Rudy at 22% and Mitt Romney in third place with 11.6%. Because the poll is set up to receive negative as well as positive votes Frist and McCain each have the honor of having a net percentage of negative votes.

Town Hall is hosting the third straw poll, and again Allen and Romney are in good places. Allen has 57% and Romney has 38%. Giuliani and McCain are at 1% (Frist has at 0%).

It’s never good to read too much in a couple of straw polls, especially so early in the race. Still, they present a small snapshot of what Republicans (mostly activist Republicans) are thinking, and as such they give us a glimpse into which candidates have inspired the love or hate of the men and women who will be manning the campaigns come election 2008.