Why it’s still Obama’s to lose
The other day when I blogged about the prolonged “silly season” in Republican primary politics, some comments poked at the notion floating out there that anybody can beat President Barack Obama.
The theory here is that he’s so unpopular that even a second tier conservative candidate would serve as a rallying point in an ABO scenario — that is, an Anybody But Obama election year.
After all, the President’s approval numbers are floating in the high thirty-percent range, even in some of the states like Florida that he captured in 2008. Ready to topple, right?
Let me say that there’s no doubt that Democrats will have to fight hard for this one, even if the GOP nominates a clunker, or a figure like Mitt Romney who doesn’t spark a lot of passion.
But my read of the battle map going forward is that it’s still Mr. Obama’s race to lose. Here are the reasons why:
First, the President is still faring fairly well in some key battleground states. In Pennsylvania, he’s at 44% approval compared with 47% disapproval, according to the most recent Magellan Strategies poll.
Those aren’t great numbers, but they’re competitive, especially for an incumbent with a big war chest.
Secondly, a lot of Mr. Obama’s “sag” over the last year has come among Democrats, who’ve dropped from the low 80% approval range into the mid-70% range.
A lot of those people will drift back, especially if there’s no Democratic primary — and really especially if Republicans nominate a true-blue conservative for president or vice president.
(Another Sarah Palin run would really fire up the Democratic base, right?)
Thirdly, Republicans have a lot of ground to make up. People forget that Mr. Obama won by a 365-173 margin in the electoral college over John McCain with Palin at his side.
This go-round, the President can lose Florida, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, New Hampshire and Iowa…all states he claimed in 2008…and STILL squeak by to win a second term.
Finally, the GOP has to overcome all these obstacles against a sitting Commander In Chief with a huge campaign war chest and a unified party.
Jimmy Carter, by contrast, was crippled first by a fierce primary challenge from Ted Kennedy and then by a third-party presidential candidate John Anderson, whose campaign attracted support from a lot of progressives.
(And Carter, remember, was running against Ronald Reagan, one of the greatest on-the-stump politicians of the last century.)
Does all this mean that President Barack Obama is guaranteed a second term? Heck, no.
But despite what you hear in conservative echo chambers, he is still a sitting president with strong personal appeal in much of the country.
Without the right candidate, denying President Obama another four years will be very, very difficult indeed.
Tags: election12, politics
I totally agree. With the way things are I can’t understand it in the least. I guess that he still has a lot of supporters that don’t feel he is at all responsible for what is going on all around him. I don’t think that presidents in past situations similar to this would have a snowballs chance. But here we are. It is really a credit to the loyalty of his supporters. Seems like lemmings of the cliff to me but to each his own.
The problem for the Republicans is the Republicans and how they let themselves be oppressed by the Tea Party.
Anyone but Obama could just as easily become Anyone but a Republican.
Even conservative Republicans are under attack by the Tea Party.
Time to call the Tea Party the Nonothings.
The Republicans will beat each other up so bad, the eventual conference winner won’t have much left in the tank to go up against Pres. Obama’s well-funded war chest. Additionally, through the playoffs all of the Republicans’ soft spots will be exposed giving plenty of ammo to the Dems. President Obama is a tremendous orator and with the talking points supplied in advance, his faithful followers will fall right back into lockstep. It may be a tighter race, but Pres. Obama will have his second term. He can always fall back on the, “I’m not George Bush” line.
My conspiracy theory of the day…
The media knows that covering the Tea Party stuff damages the Republicans chances in the election. That is why the show up to a rally with almost nobody in attendance and cover the event??
I saw a great New Yorker cartoon in the latest issue it has a pie chart describing the use of blogs. One third about stories about crap that somebody cooked knitted or sewed. One third self promotion (they had examples of folks saying buy my book or buy my painting). One third conspiracy theories (this guy on a laptop typing “Obama…Big Phrama…The Vatican…Eisenhower…the number 49…the myans…. and only I can see the connection!!”.
As an incumbent he has the advantage but the very fact that we are having this conversation suggests a problem for him. I do not agree that the party is unified. Many on the left are prepared to sit this one out. Even Maxine Waters is not thrilled with his performance. His big problem is not that he has governed badly but that he has failed to govern at all. Following his election to office he basically went on a speaking tour and entrusted his agenda to Reid & Pelosi who managed to alienate everyone to the right of themselves. That covers alot of territory. When O’Bama was questioned on this his answer was “we won”. He is in serious trouble both on the center and in some quarters on the left.
Bob, Much of the president’s agenda was passed under the super-majority. He has a long list of results. The main problem is that none of it has had a positive effect in the eyes of many independents.
Tea Party, circa 2009 – The media won’t cover us because of liberal bias!
Tea Party, circa 2011 – The media covers us because of liberal bias!
Swing voters (that 20% of the population that is “up for grabs” and usually decides elections) will ask themselves two questions on election day:
Is the country better of than it was 4 years ago?
Many will likely say no (assuming there isnt substantial job growth).
Which leads to the second question:
Is the Republican candidate a plausible alternative?
Romney probably would meet that minimum threshold while Perry would struggle to do so.
Also the President has the basic electoral map in his favor. He went in with a huge electoral lead, he can suffer quite a bit of damage and still win as Brian points out.
Perry is not Reagan and Romney is pretty boring.
I think the best Republicans are not in the race maybe they will still join? I really think a lot depends on what this country looks like next summer. If we are still at 9% plus unemployment I think all bets are off, people might vote for someone they would not normally vote for.
A little paranoid? I wouldn’t say there is overconfidence in the conservative base. I think there is some optimism.
I love this opinion of yours, “The theory here is that he’s so unpopular that even a second tier conservative candidate would serve as a rallying point”
We have a second-tier president.
We have a guy, who absent from the media hype, is nothing. His only plan is to spend $500B two years after spending $800B, and even that isn’t working.
Unless something wonderful happens with the economy, in spite of government’s attempt to leach it to death, Obama is toast.
We often complain about the long campaign season, basically because it gets on our nerves. However this time I think we see real destructive results on real people. From what I can tell all governing is essentially now over until after November of 2012. From this point forward its just one big campaign without any real solutions.
“From what I can tell all governing is essentially now over until after November of 2012. From this point forward its just one big campaign without any real solutions.”
Maybe true, do you see a change in that after 2012 if the president is re-elected?
“Tea Party, circa 2009 – The media won’t cover us because of liberal bias!
Tea Party, circa 2011 – The media covers us because of liberal bias!”
verplank, I like it! It is all part of the conspiracy. What’s next???
Much of the dissatisfaction with Obama among progressives is that he isn’t liberal enough. Barring a third party progressive candidate those folks are not going to vote for any conservative alternative. The biggest danger is that they might stay home on election day and his campaign is already working to see that that doesn’t happen.
The real problem that the Republicans have at this point is that they don’t seem to have a coherent platform except that everything that is wrong in the country is Obama’s fault. They are proposing any credible solutions. ‘Elect us and we’ll go back to the policies that made this mess’ isn’t a way forward.
“The real problem that the Republicans have at this point is that they don’t seem to have a coherent platform except that everything that is wrong in the country is Obama’s fault.”
Jim this platform has worked well for the president when he last ran and he is still using it today. None of what is going on is his fault.
But I agree Jim, it probably won’t work well for the republicans. Their supporters want more than that.
If you think about it, there is absolutely no news out there today.
The Jackson trial out in California? Who cares?
The woman over in Italy trial? Who cares?
Mosequtoes? Who cares?
Chris Christi, Bill Clinton, the stock market? Who cares.
Nothing!
This is some sad news (I am glad they nailed the guy):
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/hockey/nhl/story/2011-09-28/man-charged-with-tossing-banana/50589530/1
This kind of racism and this particular activity is rampant in parts of Europe.