The reckless radicalism of the Republican Congress and presidential field is already turning off the American people:
This former Republican activist explains why Obama will win hands down:
Even Republicans are conceding that Obama will win:
Why Obama Will Win in 2012
It might be “the economy, stupid,” but radicalism on the right will doom Republicans’ chances at the presidency.
For starters, Obama is far more popular than he should be under the current conditions. The relationship between presidential approval and unemployment is well established, and with the jobless rate at 9.2 percent, Obama should have approval numbers in the high 30s, on par with George H.W. Bush’s performance in the last year of his term. According to Gallup, however, his job approval for the current quarter (from April to July 19) averages to 47 percent, as does his year-to-date approval rating. Obama maintains high approval ratings among core Democratic constituencies—liberals, African Americans, and the poor—and a plurality of Americans still trust him to do right by the country. On the current budget negotiations, for example, 47 percent say that Obama is “putting the country’s interests first,” compared with 24 percent for Republicans in Congress.
Likewise, a plurality of Americans hold negative views about the Republican Party as a whole, by a margin of 47 percent to 42 percent. This extends to the state level; Republican governors in swing states are deeply unpopular with their constituents. Governor Rick Scott of Florida leads the loser pack with an approval rating of 29 percent—the worst of any governor in the country. Governor John Kasich of Ohio and Governor Tom Corbett of Pennsylvania follow with approval ratings of 33 percent and 39 percent, respectively. This doesn’t guarantee votes for President Obama, but it could drive Democratic turnout in those states if activists use those unpopular governors to mobilize voters and increase turnout...
Obama’s chief Republican competitors aren’t popular with the public, either. As the moderate former governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney is best positioned to challenge Obama in a general election, but in a head-to-head matchup, even he trails Obama. What’s more, if early fundraising is a sign of voter interest and intensity, Obama is far ahead of his Republican competitors. As of last week, the president had raised $85.6 million for his re-election bid—twice as much as the entire Republican field has brought in.
Yes, voters hate the sluggish economy, and they are dissatisfied with the country’s direction. So far, though, that hasn’t translated into personal disdain for the president. Voters are still reluctant to saddle him with responsibility for existing economic conditions. By a 2-to-1 margin, according to a survey released last week by Quinnipiac University, voters still say that President George W. Bush is culpable for the current situation. This also holds true among independent voters—49 percent blame Bush; just 24 percent blame Obama...
At this point in the game, even with poor conditions, I’d call the 2012 election for Obama. I’d do so not because of his personal popularity or his massive campaign operation but because of the Republican Party. The GOP has been captured by its most extreme members, and even the most moderate Republican candidate will be forced to kowtow to the party’s far-right wing to win the nomination. As Obama struggles with slow economic growth, the GOP’s fanaticism could be the thing that saves him. High unemployment aside, if the history of presidential politics shows anything, it’s that when you give voters a choice between the incumbent they know and the radicals they don’t, the former will win.
Why Obama Will Win in 2012
This former Republican activist explains why Obama will win hands down:
President Obama Will Win In An Overwhelming Landslide in 2012 and Will Deserve the Victory
America is a one party state. The Democratic Party is the sole political party in the US now.
The Republican Party is no more. It is not a political party; as David Brooks noted "the Republican Party may no longer be a normal party."
It has become a clearing house for religious fanatics, Ayn Rand groupie weirdos and angry white racists driven literally mad by seeing a black man in the White House, a black man more articulate and intelligent -- not to mention annoyingly even tempered -- than they or their bizarre leaders are.
I was a Republican activist in the 1970s and 80s. My father was a founder of the religious right and I was his sidekick. What he and I did --sadly -- still resonates today.
For instance Michele Bachmann got into politics because of reading my father's work. I escaped -- fled -- in the early 1990s. But I do know the Republicans from the inside and in the past hung around with the likes of the Bush Sr., family, the Fords, Bill Buckley etc. And whatever you may think of those Republicans, they belonged to a normal -- if misguided -- political party.
No more. Roll over in your grave Jack Kemp! Call your office Bill Buckley!
...He will be running against the "party" that in the matter of the debt crisis is happy to take the whole county with them over the cliff of loony and contradictory Bible-based/Ayn Rand-inspired, ideology into economic chaos. None of which any former Republicans, let alone any actual Christians -- i.e., those who try to follow the teachings of Christ -- would recognize.
This folly will not be forgotten. Nor will the insanity of the Rick Perry prayer meeting sponsored by a list of homophobic fanatics...
The disappointment on the left has apparently led some folks to concoct an alternate reality in which -- in a mirror image of the loony embittered far right, not to mention in a mirror image of people like Sarah Palin who have made a profitable career out of being professional Obama haters -- no matter what president Obama does they dismiss it.
In other words some on the left don't just disagree on tactics they act like jilted lovers (and/or opportunistic cynics trolling for the next book advance) and have turned their once too-ardent love into hate.
The president's critics left and right all had one thing in common: impatience laced with little-to-no sense of history.
Meanwhile back in the real world ...
• Health care reform passed
• Bin Laden is dead
• Gay rights in the military took a quantum leap
• The economy began to revive and will again after the President resolves the debt crisis one way or another
• The world loved an American president for the first time in half a century
• The war in Iraq drew down
• America foiled countess terror attacks
• We're drawing down in Afghanistan
And in post-Libya intervention President Obama has in a little noticed historic move -- changed America's arrogant unilateral habit of global intervention perfected by Bush II....
Frank Schaeffer: President Obama Will Win In An Overwhelming Landslide in 2012 and Will Deserve the Victory
Even Republicans are conceding that Obama will win:
Republicans agree: Obama will win in 2012
According to GOP.com, Obama’s last day in office is January 20, 2017. I saw this yesterday and took a screenshot in case they took it down once they noticed it. It’s now received a considerable amount of attention online and yet it’s still up on their website a day later. Oops!
National Review editor: Barack Obama will win in 2012, just as George W. Bush won in 2004
In a column for Bloomberg News, Ramesh Ponnuru casts the future GOP presidential nominee -- whether it's frontrunner Mitt Romney or someone else -- in the hapless role of John Kerry.
Bloomberg, Aug. 8: "The strategic insight of the Bush re-election campaign in 2004 was that times had changed. The U.S. was divided 50-50 between the parties. The number of committed partisans had increased, and the number of true swing voters -- as opposed to voters who say they are independent but reliably vote for one party -- had shrunk. In this newly polarized country, no president could hope to achieve high approval ratings for very long.
It followed, though, that a president could win re-election even with approval ratings that would once have spelled doom. In a 50-50 America, every presidential election was a choice between the incumbent and the challenger and not just a referendum on the incumbent. If voters who didn’t approve of the incumbent could be persuaded to prefer him to the challenger, the incumbent would win.
That was Bush’s game plan. Republicans portrayed Kerry as an effete liberal who would raise taxes and wouldn’t assert the national interest. They didn’t try to persuade Americans that Bush had been a terrific president or even that Kerry was unpresidential. They just made the case that Bush was better than the alternative."
Ponnuru goes on to argue that: "As far as anyone can tell today, perceptions of the economy on Election Day are going to be closer to what they were in 2008 than what they were in 2004."
Obama's numbers have continued to be fair to middling since the debt ceiling showdown, while Tea Party popularity has tanked.
National Review editor: Barack Obama will win in 2012, just as George W. Bush won in 2004 | MLive.com
Last edited:
