Contrary to Michael Tomasky, any political prognosticator worth his salt knows that Obama is likely to finish with about 330 electoral votes. There are still some things that will change (at least, temporarily) the presidential contest. Romney will announce his running mate, and he’ll probably get a bump in the polls out of it. Then they’ll have the Republican Convention, which should give Romney another bump. If Romney is going to have any chance, he needs to be leading in the polls by the time the Democrats convene in Charlotte. You may remember that McCain did briefly break into the lead in the aftermath of his selection of Palin and their convention in Minneapolis.
But, this year, the Democratic Convention follows the Republican one. It should basically cancel out whatever the GOP was able to accomplish. Then we’ll have the debates. In my experience, the debates matter very little, and they are generally “won” by whomever is more likable. I see the prospect of Romney changing the game in his favor at the debates to be highly unlikely. If Gore and Kerry couldn’t do it against Bush, then it probably cannot be done.
I don’t see anything really changing the dynamics of the race that we see right now. Nate Silver has Obama winning at a 71% probability. He’s still projecting that 330 votes is the (by far) most likely outcome.
Personally, I think there is a much better chance for the election’s dynamics to turn against Mitt, rather then toward him. It’s much easier to screw up the choice of running mate than to make it work for you. It’s much more likely that GOP enthusiasm will evaporate as Romney fails to break through than that the GOP base will get more fired up to vote. It’s more likely that something damaging will emerge about the secretive Romney than that we’ll learn anything new about the president. It’s more likely that Romney will come off as a dick during the debates than that he will charm the pants off undecided voters.
It’s more likely that Obama will win Missouri or Arizona or Montana than it is that Romney will win Michigan or Wisconsin or Pennsylvania.
Maybe some liberals don’t want to jinx things. But I don’t care. My job, as I see it, it to tell people what is going to happen. Obama is going to kick Mitt Romney’s ass.
Wasn’t Tomasky making similar points?
Yes, basically. It isn’t really a big secret, though.
And my job is to translate media-speak…leftiness media as well, sometimes…into real information.
Translation follows:
Yup.
Accuracy of translation?
110%
At least.
Some translations are better than the originals.
Bet on that as well.
AG
So, all these billionaires are aligned against the PermaGov? How did that happen?
What billionaires?
More importantly…which billionaires?
And in the company of trillion-dollar interests, how important is a rogue/stupid billionaire or two or three?
These motherfuckers use millionaires as maitre d’s, fer crissake!!!
PLEASE!!!
AG
Your view of the PermaGov and mine are different.
I tend to think of the characters in the book Running the World: The Inside Story of the National Security Council and the Architects of American Power.
That would make Henry Kissinger the most influential member of the PermaGov in my lifetime, and perhaps yours, too. Although, someone like Omar Bradley might have a claim on anyone old enough to have lived pre-Kissinger.
But, the thing is, Kissinger and his many disciples in both parties really don’t get involved too much in domestic elections. They’re kind of above that, and have arranged things so that they’re in power regardless of who wins.
You know Nixon had a whole set of other CREEPs he used to fix elections here in the United States. And those are some motherfuckers. David Morales, E. Howard Hunt, G. Gordon Liddy, and a bunch of other ruthless Cubans. Poppy Bush knew those guys, too. He just used them for less radicall purposes.
Personally, I think what we’re seeing now with people like Dick Lugar getting defeated in primaries is that the PermaGov has basically lost it’s grip. It can’t get the right under control. And there people out there like the Koch Brothers who not on board with the way American has been run for the last seventy years. Unfortunately, they just want to take our flaws and make them worse.
Old news.
Publication Date: July 11, 2006
Old news.
Nixon?
Liddy?
Kissinger?
Hunt?
Poppy Bush?
Please.
Primitives.
Carpet-bombers.
Assassinators.
Enemies listers.
Now?
It’s corporate now.
International, too.
It’s another world.
Semi-faceless financial bureaucrats.
Geithners
Dimons
Immelts
And hundreds more.
Pulling levers we are not sure even exist.
Mind-control levers.
Bet on it.
The only nationally visible American who advocated resistance to this group?
Ron Paul.
Non-personed by their media before he even got out of the gate. And you co-operated.
Wake the fuck up.
The only possible resistance?
Total disbelief in their media.
Total.
All else?
Useless.
Bet on it.
AG
You shouldn’t dismiss something because it is seven years old.
The same cats who ran the JM/Wave CIA station in Miami in 1960-63 were running Saigon in 1965 and Laos in 1970-75 and the Shah’s military contract in 1975-79 and the Contra War after that. Look up Ted Shackley for some info on consistency over time. Some of them were rooting around Azerbaiajan and Bosnia in the early 1990’s, and working with folks like Zawahiri. Those guys have been nothing if not persistent.
And they’re not the PermaGov. Not really. They’re more like soldiers who fight for a particularly awful form of right-wing America.
And remember, a guy like Richard Armitage, who was hip deep in the heroin trade in the 1970s wound up being both the “moderate” in Bush’s foreign policy team and the operator who outed Valerie Plame and pinned it on Cheney. Sweet move, there, with Bob Woodward, no less.
This shit is deep, Arthur. You’ve got that part right. But it ain’t working according to plan. Not anymore. Bush ran the whole ship aground, and the Dem royal family lost, the GOP royal family is in tatters, and the PermaGov can’t even pay its bills or reelect a guy like Dick Lugar who knows how to steer this fucking thing.
It is indeed working according to plan.
A better plan.
A kinder, gentler plan.
A more efficient plan.
No more blood in the streets.
No more heroin-dealing Armitages or CIA-asset Woodwards.
No more of any of that messy shit.
No.
It’s right to the source, now.
Control the minds of a majority of the population and you can do any goddamned thing you want to do.
Media control.
Mind control.
Bottom line.
Check it out.
I am.
AG
Arthur’s thought process:
I know there are magnets under this floor.
Throw a bucket of pennies in the air.
Find where there are clusters of them.
Draw a circle around each cluster.
There, I proved their were magnets in the floor.
But Arthur, magnets don’t attract pennies.
Wake the fuck up! That’s what they want you to believe.
Why did Armitage out Valerie Plame and why pin it on Dick Cheney?
Who knows?
There was some pretty deep stuff going on within the Bush administration. The State Department was being run by Poppy’s guys, who happened to have ties to some of the shadiest stuff our country has ever been involved in, but who also had a pretty orthodox view of America’s role in the world.
Meanwhile, the vice-president and the Pentagon were being run by neo-conservatives who were totally at odds with the Powell-Wilkerson-Armitage crew.
And then the CIA was being run a Clinton appointee who just wanted to fit in. But the Agency was actually completely different than it had been when run by Poppy’s folks, or even by Woolsey.
Armitage might have just let something slip, and he isn’t responsible for what Scooter Libby or Karl Rove or Ari Fleischer did. But Armitage’s leak wound up weakening Cheney, and that was something the State Department and Poppy’s crew desperately wanted to do.
So, speculate away.
fascinating. In the end didn’t Cheney [somewhat] lose control of Bush jr.? [I’m thinking the Libby pardon issue]
By the end, it seemed Cheney had lost his influence.
I started to respond to this post Booman, but the response grew rapidly.
Now it’s a post.
The American Empire and “The Shady Stuff”
Later…
AG
So the makeup of the “PermaGov” has completely changed in seven years? I. Don’t. Think. So.
The same MOTUs playing rigged roulette games with other people’s money in 2005 are still doing so in 2012, unimpeded by having crashed the world economy in the interim. They’d be happier with Romney, but they’re just fine with Obama (public protestations of hurt fee-fees notwithstanding).
Ron Paul, the original (pre-coopted) Tea Party, and the Occupy movement were all responses of populist disgust to this business as usual. That disgust hasn’t gone away. That’s why there’s a lot less interest in 2012 than 2008 or 2004, even though Romney would by most measures (and assuming a Romney win also means R control of Congress) be the most radical presidency in most of our lifetimes.
That’s what’s keeping the MOTUs interested in this election. They benefit with Obama. It’s less stable with Romney, but it also means they get the keys to everything. No wonder there’s schisms at the top. Discount them – and their fear of populist backlash – at your peril.
It has changed at least as much as has the internet itself.
Think back to 2006.
How commercial was the internet then?
How many unavoidable ads?
How much email spam?
How muchad tracking by major corps?
More by a factor of 12, at least.
Plus..
Nixon?
Liddy?
Kissinger?
Hunt?
Poppy Bush?
That’s not “seven years.”
That’s as much as 40 plus years.
More if you consider the JFK assassination/Hunt/Liddy/CIA connections.
Going on 50 years.
They’re driving a brand new, almost totally digitized BMW while you think they’re driving a gas-guzzling V8 Cadillac. They have GPS on your very soul while you’re still navigating with an outdated U.S. Atlas from 1962. And you wonder why they’re doing so well?
Shit, man.
Wake the fuck up!!!
AG
The same MOTUs playing rigged roulette games with other people’s money in 2005 are still doing so in 2012, unimpeded by having crashed the world economy in the interim. They’d be happier with Romney, but they’re just fine with Obama (public protestations of hurt fee-fees notwithstanding).
You’re right not to pay attention to their public statements. Instead, look at what they do with their money:
http://www.slate.com/blogs/trending/2012/06/13/romney_crushing_obama_in_donations_from_wall_street.h
tml
http://www.forbes.com/sites/clareoconnor/2012/06/13/sheldon-adelson-tops-romney-donor-list-that-now-
includes-32-billionaires/&sa=U&ei=zLEeUIbcIJO26QGqtoG4AQ&ved=0CBEQFjAA&usg=AFQjCNEYg
p6rY5ptUzKRjEDDbolO_KtP8g
Money talks. Your not liking Obama isn’t the same thing as Wall Street or the financial elites being fine with him.
What’s particularly dramatic about those Wall Street fundraising numbers is the long history Wall Street has of hedging its bets, and donating to both sides in order to make sure they have at least some good will with the eventual winner.
But not this time. This time they’ve very clearly, to an extreme degree, thrown in with Romney and against Obama – and to make the lesson even more unavoidable, they’ve broken with their history and lined up so powerfully against a candidate who is very likely to win.
That is unheard of, and speaks volumes about how they feel about President Obama.
Yes. It’s quite scary. And obviously Obama’s biggest mistake, whether he wins or loses, was to try to play to the middle and placate Wall Street.
He could have taken an entirely different tack. TARP phase 2 came out of Congress with very few legal constraints. HAMP was intended to help homeowners who had been put into upside-down positions on their mortgages through no fault of their own. Obama could have instructed his team to adopt a pro-homeowner, pro-average investor interpretation of those laws.
But instead he allowed – either intentionally or by appointing people who were Pro-Wall Street and neglecting their work – these two laws to be interpreted in the most pro-Wall Street manner possible. TARP fund oversight was like DoD oversight of US contractors in Iraq – completely non-existent and very one-sided. HAMP was used not to help homeowners but to assist the bankers by stringing out the foreclosures over a multi-year period.
For all his pro-Wall Street efforts he is basically hated there. He couldn’t be more hated than if he had done what they imagined he did – used his power to help the middle class and the poor people. So, all that cow-towing has been utterly useless for his re-election.
OTOH, if he’d actually used TARP and HAMP to help the average people there is an excellent chance unemployment would be a lot lower and the economy a lot better.
But, I know, I shouldn’t criticize him because Romney is worse and he signed the Lilly Ledbetter Act, or something. Well, sorry, yes Romney is worse, and yes I’m voting for him again, but that doesn’t change the reality that he’s been a below average President and mediocre administrator.
Wall Street doesn’t agree with you that he has been placating them.
Not getting what you want isn’t the same thing as Wall Street getting what they want.
I realize this is slightly inappropriate, but I think I’m starting to fall in love with you.
I can use all the love I can get, Steggies.
It tends to counteract the stupid, at the very least.
Thank you…
AG
I’ve long thought and argued the BHO would come close to meeting if not exceeding his numbers last time, so 330 would be acceptable.
What I disagree with, and despite the various studies pro and con on the value of the pres debates in the age of mass communication. is that this years will have a negligible effect.
When was the last time an incumbent or not, ever went into one armed with what BHO will this time? Not only does BHO have his ass cooked on his support for the Ryan Plan, his own tax/econ policies, but also quite the list of personal integrity issues (of the deficit kind) he can weave around he who has done little but try to decieve.
If BHO does his homework as we can surely expect him to, we can expect something akin to a Perry Mason v Boss Hogg match.
How what should be a through ass-stomping won’t have more of an effect than has historically been the case when things were less clear cut as factual matters (the efficacy of trickle down, a lengthy record of shameless, easily demonstratable lying, etc, as opposed to the speculative like “lock boxes” or things like the Iraq War in the early days of the occupations, etc, where it’s all a bit speculative as to outcomes) will have to remain a mystery to me, but I suppose it can be revisited after the fact if things unfold in them in the way I expect them to.
As with many progressives, you’re assuming, wrongly, that facts win debates. They often just get in the way. Gore had way more facts than Bush, and the Village “analysts” decided they’d rather have a beer with Bush. American politics are just that inane, and the rot starts with the media, who have a vested interest in a close race. Assume nothing.
Facts that validate feelings win debates, and most people viscerally dislike Romney. Obama will crush Romney in the debates by enticing him to be true to his nature – Romney is a jerk (phallus, sphincter, etc.) and that is why people hate him. Obama will give Romney every opportunity to show just how big of a jerk he is and that will be that for that.
do you mean the ones you didn’t/can’t cite that would even come close numerically to those BHO can shred the Mutt’s tax/econ plans alone with? Hell, if not for Lewinsky, Gore woulda been part of Clinton’s SS privatization plans.
the Gore “facts” musta been as devastating as your hollow declaration, or entirely offset by Bush’s fake southern charm.
Facts do win debates, even those held in the court of public opinion as opposed to the adversarial setting of a court of law. That’s why winners are declared afterward. In this case, my argument is that they’ll be little doubt as to who the winner is, or how badly the loser was stomped, and over issues that have a meaningful impact on the observers of it.
What I won’t “assume”, is that the so-called “liberal” media will be able provide sufficient care in the political ER after the fact should this scenario unfold, to avoid a Schiavo-like condition for their patient.
What I don’t have to assume about you — the one who thinks it can designate my political persuasions, and that can simply declare Gore was armed with incontrovertible facts germane to fairly broad spectrum of substantive issues both foreign and domestic, that did rival what BHO can employ, as opposed to then speculative matters — is that you have nothing but assumptions, and are relying upon the ability of a “liberal” media to clean up after the Mutt, no matter how many turds he’s forced to eat.
Sure, after BHO paints his from head to toe as “Bush on steroids”, the “in the tank for BHO” liberal media will once again argue despite the Mutt’s unfavorability ratings as they’ll surely exist when this occurs, will make him a better beer drinking bud.
Why do I “assume” this about you? Well, because like with the rest of your fact-free assertions and assumptions, you appear to be wholly incapable of making a case for how the liberal media will clean up after the Mutt, you simply “assume” they will. Surely the ways and means of their accomplishing that cleanup are limited, so a pixelworld genius like you should be able to come up with some convincing and compelling speculations, no, like mine you’ve failed miserably to undermine here?
All you’ve done is provided and highlighted another reason why the Mutt is likely to stumble and fall in his own turds to the observers, and those debates are likely to be a bit more determinative than has historically been the case — the defendent is a well known asshole the jury is not inclined to give the benefit of a doubt, unlike Bush.
well done whatever you are ideologically speaking.
what will you do for an encore?
I have trouble believing that facts have anything to do with modern debates. Oh, Ford did pay a political price for his mental brain-fart about Poland not being in the Soviet sphere, but today whatever GOP dumbshit is running this year could make the same mistake and the press would be talking about how the Democrat sighed too much, or looked at his watch, or said something mean.
Don’t think so? Remember the last Kerry-Bush debate. Kerry correctly pointed out that Bush had said he didn’t care about bin Laden. Bush, falling into his true nasty character, said, “that’s an EX – AG – GER -A – SHUN”.
For about 30 minutes after the debates some of the networks showed Bush saying that, followed by the various video quotes of Bush saying exactly that he didn’t care about bin Laden.
Then apparently the powers in charge put a quick stop to that. Suddenly the whole issue was dropped for a much more important issue – how Kerry had insulted Cheney’s gay daughter by praising Cheney’s publically-supportive attitude toward her – including a statement made that month at the VP debate.
And the “insult” dominated the news cycle for the next couple days while Bush’s moronic and false response to a key issue was forgotten.
No, you can’t convince me that facts matter. What was the one fact Obama hit again and again in his debates – his tax cut for the bottom 95%. What did he do in his first month – sign a bill that did just that. But polls taken at the time of the 2010 election showed 75% of Americans thought their taxes had gone up.
and I have very little interest in doing so as well
If you wanna continue believing that there’s no substantive diff between or that the reaction to a thorough ass stomping won’t be different from what has been seen in the past, be my guest.
What Kerry said about Bush/OBL was already widely known, so the issue wasn’t whether it was a fact or not, but whether or not Bush was correct or not in his exaggeration charge, based on what the real intent and meaning of that particular comment on his part was or wasn’t, which only he could clarify. He clearly could have simply meant (at least that’s what his suporters would believe) that he was an impotent figurehead at best hiding in a cave somewhere as a result of his prior efforts. In other words, why would he be obsessed with or consumed by not getting someone he had effectively neutered?
In the case of BHO/Mutt, you have a pathological and chronic liar http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2012/08/03/13106907-chronicling-mitts-mendacity-vol-xxviii?lite that’s likely to repeat some of that garbage in the course of the debates, and whose econ/domestic proposals have been found wanting, and on the foreign policy end of things, is tackling the guy who got OBL.
There are limitations as to how much of a mess the so-called “liberal” media can clean up, and if the Mutt has shown expertise at anything, it’s making a mess outta things.
He’s not dealing with another rightwingnut trying to out wingnut them, he’s dealing with someone who has the support poll-wise on just about everything he’s proposing, from taxes to job creation. The Mutt lying about the fictional BHO and his policies and their work product may have worked with the rubes, but he’ll get sliced and diced if he tries that in the pres debates.
His “trickle down 2.0” garbage is gonna be impossible to defend given the Bush experience.
I think the debates will matter this time, actually. While they’re not Obama’s strongest forte, he did destroy them at their getaway during the health care episode. Plus, it’s one of Romney’s weaker areas (LOL, as if he had any strong suits?)
There’s simply too much material to use, with such a gifted and intelligent man such as Obama for it to have no impact. What stood out in the Republican primaries? To me, besides their dumb Republican “gaffes” in the audience, it was Mitt Romney. From touching Rick Perry’s shoulder, to betting 10 g’s, to “I don’t hire illegals no more!”…the man’s a moron. He might even have medical problems.
I agree. I think the debates will have a not-insignificant effect in Obama’s favor. If only because Romney will look so uninformed and oafish next to the Prez that it will swing some of the undecideds towards the Dem column.
Even people who don’t like Obama’s policies find him steadier and more constant than Mitt. That counts for something. Don’t throw away your biggest vote on the unknown.
And Romney keeps stoking the sense that he’s unknown. No platform, no programs, proposals, policies: nothing. I doubt if even immersed pundits can describe one thing Romney will do, besides lower taxes on the rich.
Oddly enough, the core parts of both their personalities are coming out. Obama may not be perfect but we know who he is and can predict what he’ll do. Romney? He conceals himself to preserve his options, and so we don’t trust him. Only those who hate Obama for stuff he has no control over (his racial heritage) can feel more comfortable with Romney. And if you’re a racist, Romney doesn’t feel quite like you, because he’s probably not one. He’s just a rich asshole.
Well put.
He’ll do an excellent portrayal of someone who’s very, very white. He’s running on the assumption that that, and money, are all he needs.
The one issue I don’t know Obama’s core convictions is climate change and associated energy issues. He’s been all over the map, and I can’t tell whether it was for political reasons or not.
He makes a lot more sense on climate change if you realize that he is trying to cull the coal industry from the rest of the pack, isolate it, and kill it, without the rest of the energy industry defending it.
He’s going along with the oil industry, and actively supporting the natural gas industry, while killing coal.
Very interesting. He also believes in science – recall the parade at his inauguration? Abraham Lincoln founded the National Academy of Sciences
Right, and the science says that the coal-fired commercial power industry is the lowest-hanging fruit among major carbon emitters. There is a lot of bang for the political buck in putting the effort there.
It’s similar to what Obama did during the ACA fight, culling out the health insurance industry while being solicitous towards the doctors, drug makers, hospitals, and device makers. Except that was only about regulation that industry, whereas Lisa Jackson is going to kill this one off.
very very interesting.
as someone who doesn’t believe in jinxes (or blessings either for that matter), you have my approval to tell it like it is.
Ever since I thought Bush couldn’t possibly win (twice), I’ve been leery of making predictions, as I realize I have no head for this sort of thing. Still I can’t disagree with you. Not only is Obama objectively a better choice, but Romney is an unbelievably bad politician. Between now and the election I expect him to make more and more gaffes. I suppose in theory he could find his humanity and communicate to the electorate why he wants the job, but I just can’t imagine it.
GWB didn’t win in 2000. What I learned from that year — even if “the fix” Jeb! orchestrated was insufficient and astonishingly the SCOTUS stepped in and installed the loser — was to factor in such election fraud. Not enough states this year that rethuglicans can fix and fix by enough for Mitt to win.
That it was even close for GWB in 2000 and 2004 was surprising – and scary.
Considering that Gore lagged GWB from the earliest polls until the Democratic convention, not sure why anyone would be surprised that it was close.
It was scary to me for three reasons:
Up against the Rove machine, Gore’s campaign looked crappy. It was merely mediocre as most campaigns are. Plus, even though Gore never seemed to receive or hear the message, he was supposed to lose.
Not being worth my salt, I put it closer to 300 than to 330. This country is still a great deal more polarized even than it was even in 2008, and just a few I-voted-Democrat-for-the-first-time-in-my-life voters coming home to the GOP flips Florida, North Carolina, and maybe Ohio.
My prediction for a long time has been that Obama will win with a smaller margin – both EVs and popular vote % – than last time, so 330 would fit that.
I don’t know why but I have a semi-good feeling about Ohio. As far as Florida is concerned all bets are off. The one optimistic feeling I have about it is that at least the Rick Scott election was pretty close. Closer probably than any other teabag governor who got elected in 2010.
Excellent reminder. It was really close: 48.9% to 47.7%. Gotta love how GOP pols that barely squeak through an election go on to behave as if they have a huge mandate. OTOH, Democrats that win big bow to the demands of the minority right than the large majority that elected them.
Gentlemen, don’t forget the ladies. With the war on women that has been waged by Republicans, I think women are going be voting to show the Republicans how dumb it is to make an enemy of American women.
Bonnie, didn’t you hear top Republican politicians insist, time after time, that what they’re doing is not a war on women?
It’s a war on people with uteruses. Totally different.
Obama is going to kick Mitt Romney’s ass
Best thing that I read in awhile. rock on Booman
It’s probably not terribly wise, but I’ve come to pretty much assume that PBHO will win in November, although I don’t see the landslide you predict. Basically Obama hatred, coupled with the culture wars cranked to 11, is going to be a major driver of GOP voters.
On the flip side, I haven’t seen anything approaching the enthusiasm from the Dems in ‘008. No matter how personally wrapped up in the optimistic euphoria you may or may not have been, it was a unique moment in US politics, or at least in my lifetime. I was too young to remember Jimmy Carter walking to the White House; maybe that was comparable, I don’t know.
Anyway, Romney just keeps getting worse. I don’t see him winning the Presidency in any realistic scenario. What I worry about is the Senate. We really can’t afford 2 more years of inaction and compromises that do as much harm as good.
There was no enthusiasm for Carter in 1976. He didn’t even represent one of the major power bases for Democrats of that time. In some ways as the lead Democrat that year, he was like Romney today only less so. While never completely absent from US politics, religion had played a more silent and minor role for decades. Until Carter. He really was bad news for the Democratic Party.
I’m more concerned about the GOP’s Jim Crow voter purges than jinxes – that could be a game-changer.
Personally, I think there is a much better chance for the election’s dynamics to turn against Mitt, rather then toward him. It’s much easier to screw up the choice of running mate than to make it work for you.
Sad to say the oft-repeated notion that VPs make no difference to the results appears to be true. You can even pick a disastrous VP (Agnew, Quayle, Palin) and get the same numbers.
It’s much more likely that GOP enthusiasm will evaporate as Romney fails to break through than that the GOP base will get more fired up to vote.
Nope. This is a base motivated by intense hatred of Obama. If you don’t get this you need to spend some time with them. I occasionally visit my local coffee shop to do work while waiting for car maintenance. It’s a very popular meeting place here in Wingnut country – a town so far to the right that if you are white everyone assumes you agree with them, and they speak openly. The conversations I’ve overheard from very ordinary looking people are shocking – they hate Obama the way they used to hate the Soviet Union. It’s no wonder they believe all those obviously false things about him.
There is nothing Romney can do or not do that will diminish their enthusiasm for voting against Obama. Nor is there any law the GOP may break in their anti-Obama effort that the base would not consider justified, given that they believe everything Obama has done is illegal, unconstitutional, and immoral.
It’s more likely that something damaging will emerge about the secretive Romney than that we’ll learn anything new about the president.
True. Obama is fully known, most people are just getting to know Romney. A cute anecdote is that a nice group of moderate Republican older ladies I know (not locally) – the type who don’t pay close attention to politics so can still maintain the belief that there are still moderate Republicans – have all very recently decided to vote against Romney because they learned of the dog-on-the-roof-of-the-car incident. They are all dog lovers, you see – it’s their raison d’etre as a group – and they evaluate people primarily on how they treat animals.
It’s more likely that Romney will come off as a dick during the debates than that he will charm the pants off undecided voters.
Romney will not charm anyone who isn’t pre-disposed to like him. Someone as fake as him can win a state election because even governors don’t get much of a share of TV time or personal exposure, so their images are usually just caricatures. I don’t even know if I’d recognize Governor Hickenlooper if I met him in person, for example. But not a chance as President.
I agree, though, that Obama is heading for a 330 +/- electoral victory. The final outcome may change depending on 3 things: