As we approach the end of our orgy of poll-watching, let’s step back and look at what this election really is all about. Will the country vote to reelect a man who was manifestly unqualified for the highest office in the land in 2008, and who has done absolutely nothing over the past four years to indicate that he’s learned anything on the job? Or will it replace him with a man who’s probably the most qualified to handle the economic calamity that has befallen us in part thanks to the policies of the current administration?
Despite the president’s best efforts, this election must and will be a referendum on the incumbent, and with Mitt Romney having passed the plausibility test via the debates, the choice will .not be between Barack Obama and Romney but between the threat or promise of more Obama vs. the reality of first-term Obama. Last time out, the country took a national flyer on the freshman senator from Illinois, for which it’s paid handsomely with high unemployment, trillion-dollar deficits, a debased currency, and the shame of Benghazi, which will have repercussions well into any second Obama term. This time, it’s not a flier; it’s a suicide mission.