Romney Handicap vs. Generic Numbers

Typically in calculating the Romney Handicap I've used Obama's margin over Romney minus his net approval rating in PPP state and national polls. But here's a national AP-Gfk poll that asks, first, whether Obama deserves re-election (he does not, 52% to 43%) and second, whether people would vote for Obama or Romney (Obama 47%, Mitt 46%) and for Obama or Gingrich (Obama 51%, Newt 42%). That's a handicap of ten points for Mitt compared to the generic re-election numbers, and eighteen (!) for Newt. I'm pleased to see this, because those numbers are both very similar to the largest numbers I was getting from the PPP data, but for both candidates the gap has narrowed a wee bit over the past few surveys. In any event, neither of these guys are strong candidates. If the Republicans had a replacement-level candidate (which is admittedly not as low a bar as in baseball), they'd be leading by a whole frickin' lot right now.