Jonah addresses the conventional wisdom that Obama is likely to win reelection in 2012.
I’m manic-depressive about the GOP’s chances in 2012. One day I can come up with some really strong arguments for why Obama looks more like toast than Elvis Patterson; the next day it feels like the wind is at his back and he just has to avoid disasters.
Since much of my audience yearns for optimism, and shudders when they don’t hear it from conservative commentators, some quick reasons to bet against Obama again:
The Economy: Often you’ll see people point to the unemployment rate. Barring some sudden, steep drop in the unemployment rate, the Republican nominee will be able to say that the unemployment rate for every month of the Obama presidency has been higher than every month of George W. Bush’s presidency, every month of Bill Clinton’s presidency, and every month of George H.W. Bush’s presidency. What’s more, the current slow slide in the unemployment rate is driven heavily by Americans leaving the workforce, which is not the way we traditionally like to see people leaving unemployment. We want to see them getting jobs.
Throw in other not-terribly encouraging economic indicators like anemic wage growth and high gas prices, and many Americans will be receptive to the argument that Obama’s presidency has been a four-year recession. To quote the wise philosopher Dee Snider, “if that’s your best, your best won’t do.”
The World: By 2008, many Americans were exhausted with Iraq and tired of large military actions overseas to improve the lives of far-off Muslims who often reacted to our efforts with contempt. By 2012, it doesn’t seem likely that Americans will feel terribly different, except that now Obama is the candidate of overseas wars – er, kinetic military actions, like Libya and Afghanistan – and the Republican is likely to tap into a somewhat isolationist vein, arguing that the days of the U.S. taxpayer financing nation-building are though. This isn’t even accounting for the idea of an attack like the attempted Detroit flight bombing or the attempted Times Square bombing working. Obama might enjoy a rally-around-the-flag effect for a while, but his GOP rival is likely to argue Obama’s policies have made us less safe.
He’s lost his touch: For an allegedly great communicator, most of Obama’s efforts to move public opinion since taking office have fallen flat. He never moved the numbers on health care. He’s no good as a surrogate for Democrats, as Jon Corzine, Creigh Deeds, Martha Coakley, and scores of Democrats learned in the midterms. He and his team can’t resist overpromising; his team put out a laughable chart about how the stimulus would keep unemployment low, and by September 2010, “Recovery Summer” was a punchline.
Jimmy Fallon had one of the first jokes that really hit Obama, just before Christmas 2009: “Michelle Obama’s not that excited about Christmas this year. It seems every year the president makes her this great big promise about how great a present he’ll get her, and then he never delivers.” The joke killed. People began to draw a conclusion about Obama: He always promises the moon and gives you much, much less.
What I'm afraid of is that it will be the mirror image of 2004. Bush was extremely vulnerable, but Kerry couldn't beat him. We had better pay attention to that particular episode in recent history, or we won't be able to beat Obama either.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseObama hasn't lost his touch. He never had a touch. His supposed political skills were never more than a collective fantasy of the left wing elites.
He has never said, written or done anything remotely clever. Off script he makes George W. Bush look like a brilliant extemporaneous speaker. On script he is nasty, dishonest, semi-literate and juvenile. This week's speech about deficit reduction can serve as exhibit A in support of that proposition. So could every other speech the clod has ever given.
Were it not for a bit of magic melanin, Obama would have trouble rising to be a greeter at Wallmart. Lost his touch? I don't think so.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseBush wasn't nearly as vulnerable as Obama. Left wing rage notwithstanding, Bush was in no danger of being seen as a failure in 2004. Iraq was an irritant and the WOT wasn't well explained or focused. Even so things were bumping along reasonably well and the Democrats had no plausible claim that they could make them better. Kerry was a joke, but I very much doubt any Democrat could have come any closer than he did.
Obama, by contrast, is well on his way to becoming a laughingstock. Inflation is lacing on its running shoes, the Fed is going to have to stop monetizing the debt soon and the economy will suffer. Democrats used to like comparing Bush to Herbert Hoover, but Obama is the guy who deserves the comparison. He'll have to face an angry electorate after making a pigs breakfast of everything he touched.
Presidents who fail lose (Hoover, Carter) by healthy margins. They lose even when the opposing party nominates a clueless, crippled dillitante from NY or a far right,lightweight B movie actor from California. When a President fails his reelection campaign isn't about his opponent. The electorate will treat anyone the opposing party nominates as a credible candidate. They won't treat a failed President as a credible candidate and by November of 2012 there will probably be a national consensus that Obama has failed.
Barring a strong third-party candidacy or an even stronger economic recovery, Obama is toast.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseFirst the first time in his career Presentdent Obama will have to run on his record. He won't be able to pull the hope and change wool over independents this time around and when he does promise his grand schemes most Americans (and I'm including most dems) will think he is lying ...
He had one tool to run on in 2008, talk ...
That tool is now tarnished beyond repair ...
He has to DO for the next 2 years ...
Does Presentdent Obama strike anyone as a doer ?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDon't forget Gasoline prices ...
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseVirtually everyone starts with the miguided general proposition that a sitting president is formidable. First, the sample size is too small to reach any general conclusions about the strength of a sitting president.
Second, even if one assumed the past is predictive of the future, it is not evidence that a sitting president is formidable. Since Truman, five sitting presidents have lost (or were forced not to run) and five sitting presidents have won. It is maddening how so many people fail to see the facts and spout the conventional wisdom - sort of like how people used to say (and some still do) that small ball with sacrifice bunts is the way to win baseball games.
Third, unless the economy comes roaring back in 2012, Obama is obviously at risk. His approval ratings are in the 40's, the wrong track number is very high, and unemployment is high.
Fourth, the idea of Obama as a gifted orator is a fascinating issue. He has given some very well delivered speeches. At the same time, starting with his inaugeral [sp?] address, his presidential speeched have been mediocre and have not moved people. [the book Deconstructing Obama has an interesting theory that the inaugeral address was so bad because Obama wrote it - it convincingly argues that Obama did not write his book Dreams (Bill Ayers wrote much of it) and is not a good write.] Yet, he still comes across as likeable when he speaks - I think it has something to do with how the mind views/perceives his appearance and voice.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse"First the first time in his career Presentdent Obama will have to run on his record."
They mystery man of 08 is gone. Non-affiliated voters won't be as undecided in 12. Obama will get his 40% from Dems and has no shot at 40% from Republicans. Folks who don't follow closely (I'd wager a large part of the 20) will vote by how well they're doing in the fall of 2012.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse@Kansas City "Since Truman, five sitting presidents have lost (or were forced not to run) and five sitting presidents have won.":
I think it's four and five, respectively, but the more interesting point is that the four who lost all faced serious primary challengers, and the five who won had not. Since WWII, a serious primary challenge to a sitting president has been the mark of death for him. Let's hope Obama gets a challenge next year.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseUm, political death.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe five losers or forced out are Truman, Johnson, Ford, Carter and Bush I. The five re-election winners are Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan, Clinton and Bush II. But my point is that the past is close to meaningless in determining the strength of Obama. I agree primary challenges are not good for a sitting president, but it is hard to tell cause and effect. Were they likely to lose anyway? Did the challenge really make a difference?
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbusePeople,
The GOP only has to keep the states they won in 2008 and then win North Carolina, Indiana, Virgina, Florida, Ohio, and New Hampshire (oh, and also that lone Nebraska electoral vote) and they'll have 270 - game over. It's really not that hard.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse@Kansas City,
You may be proving Jim's point here. Look at the presidents going back to the beginning of the last century. Every president to lose or not run had the same problem. His own party was divided.
The lone exception is Hoover. All of the other losers either alienated key elements of their own party or faced a divided party, manifested in a primary challenge.
The other issue at play is an externality that was placed at the feet of the president. Hoover had the Depression. Johnson had Vietnam and the boomer revolts.
That last part is where Obama may be vulnerable. But, the GOP will have to nominate a candidate uniquely skilled at exploiting the big issues weighing down Obama.
But, we live in strange times. Despite what the media says, Obama has become offensive personally to a lot of voters. That's a powerful thing. Nixon overcame it, but Obama could not hold a candle to Nixon politically.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThe key is if the Republican opponent wants to win and save the country. If he/she does, Obama is extremely vulnerable. He is doing as well as he is now because the media is covering for him and Republicans aren't hitting him on the things the media ignores. The first factor won't change, but the second could. A competent opponent has more than enough to sink Obama with, including Obamacare, the economy, defense, corruption, his demagogery, his pro-abortion extremism, or for that matter, Jeremiah Wright and Bill Ayers. If a Republican actually wants to project that he/she is correct, and that Obama is dangerously incorrect, that case can still be made to the American people. But if the Republican stays "above the fray," I don't see how Obama can lose.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseI am reminded of the endorsement of Jimmy Carter for reelection by the editors of The New York Times. I simply could not believe that any intellectually honest person could consider Carter's all-inclusive list of failures and recommend to the American people that they should give him four more years to do his damage. Of course, The New York Times editorial board will do the same for the "Anointed One" but I seriously doubt that the American people will take their advice this time.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNow see, this article, in explaining why 2012 won't be a redux of 2008, focuses entirely on Obama.
Problem is . . . it was at least in part the Republicans who lost 2008 by nominating McCain, who is certainly not a conservative.
I've never been to a tea party event, and I actually voted for Bob Dole. But I didn't vote for McCain and don't regret that one bit [I didn't vote for Obama either].
So the feeling of "we are doomed" that I get every morning when I consider the 2012 election has nothing at all to do with Obama and everything to do with my confidence that the numerous non-conservatives in the Republican Party will muff the ball royally again.
I could take practically any action from the Republicans over the past several years -- from the horrendous Bush TARP votes [which demonstrated precisely how many conservatives were actually in the Republican House -- not that many] to so many other actions. But let's just take the recent continuing budget resolution vote.
There are around 316 House Republicans. Of those 316, some 59 voted against the silly continuing resolution touted by Boehner. So we know we have 59 actual conservatives in the House. Just for fun let's pretend as if there were another 50 conservatives in the House who were genuinely torn over the Boehner continuing resolution but -- from a strategic perspective -- decided to move on. So let's pretend as if we have 109 actual genuine conservatives in the Republican portion of the House.
That's around 1/3 of the Republicans in the House who are actual conservatives. And that's simply not enough. The rest are mainstream Republicans who don't really have any principles by which they decide how to vote on fiscal matters. Ask them to articulate free market principles or even small government principles and they flounder. The reason why they have trouble articulating conservative, Constitutional, limited government ideas is because they simply don't believe those ideas.
What this means is that -- even were we to eliminate Obama, and eliminate all the Democrats in the Senate . . . we *still* would merely return to the failed Bush budget days which included the first Tarp bailout and any number of other budgetary monstrosities.
I don't see that we would have made any progress towards actually having a sane budget or sane tax overhaul or sane entitlement reform or really sane anything.
As usual, it's a choice between insanity and psychotic insanity.
Either way, we're all still in the mental asylum.
Just so everybody is clear -- I ain't voting for a McCain for 2012. Not gonna happen. And there are -- as I told my Republican friends back in 2008 when McCain won the nomination and back when they were all confidently predicting that he would beat Obama -- there are a *whole lot* of people just like me out there. The day he won the nomination was the day -- I told my Republican friends -- that Obama won. He would be the next President. The only advantage that my early bleak recognition had over my Republican friends' predictions is that I had a good 9 or so months to accept what would happen, whereas they had, oh, maybe 2-3 weeks. Take any gander at the demographics of who voted in the Presidential campaign and one sees quickly that the Republican Party lost a cool chunk of the base with McCain as the candidate.
That chunk is still out there -- and watching and waiting. I'm one of them. And while I am heartened that we have a few -- [DeMint] -- carrying the conservative load, I recognize that they are still hopelessly outnumbered.
We are doomed.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThanks Rivendell. Your vote (whoever it was for) was as good as a vote for Obama. You may or may not live in a competitive state, but if you do, I hope you lost at least a little sleep knowing that you contributed to Obama's election. However bad McCain was, he was a hell of a lot better than the alternative. I never have understood, and never will understand, the rationale of people who think they are proving a point by petulantly "taking their ball and going home" when their preferred candidate does not win the Republican nomination. All it did in this case was to make Obama's election, and the infliction of the stimulus, ObamaCare, etc. that much easier. I hope you're satisfied.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseAnd Jim, as a Giants fan thanks for the Elvis "Toast" Patterson reference - it caused quite a chuckle in my office!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIn 2008, the republican nominee was running to defend a seat (the presidency) held by a fellow party member (GWB) with an approval rating of about 29%.
With a deadly headwind like that, ANY democrat beats ANY republican, period. Clinton or Obama (doesn't matter which) beats McCain or Romney or Ron Paul or whoever -- even Kucinich could beat Ronald Reagan with numbers like that.
Watch Obama's approval rating -- if he's in the low 40's or lower in Gallup's poll on election day, there is no precedent for an incumbent winning in that situation.
Last I checked he had hit a new low in the Gallup poll: 41% (if the past is precedent, that's an unelectable level -- any reasonable republican candidate ought to be able to beat him.)
Of course a lot can happen between now and Nov 2012 -- a real economic recovery or a "rally around the flag effect" are Obama's only realistic chances. So he might get lucky (but I don't think he's going to win on strategy.)
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseObama has done a lot to doom himself, but I'm afraid of Obama's "ace up the sleeve". That is, I'm terrified that we aren't going to put forward a decent candidate on the GOP side. I'm having a hard time getting excited about anyone this time around, and it seems like a lot of other conservatives are too.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIf I eyeball the situation:
Obama is a two-term president.
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