POWERLINE
| Why Is This Election Close?
(John Hinderaker) For a long time I have been predicting that Mitt Romney would get the Republican nomination, and that he would then win the general election. I have said that the election will be reasonably close–demographic realities dictate that all national elections will be reasonably close, for the foreseeable future–but not a squeaker; more like 2004 than 2000. Given President Obama’s dismal record, that seemed like a safe prediction. But it now appears that the election will be very close after all, and that Obama might even win it. It will require a few more days to assess the effects (if any) of the parties’ two conventions, but for now it looks as though the Democrats emerged with at least a draw, despite a convention that was in some ways a fiasco. In today’s Rasmussen survey, Obama has regained a two point lead over Romney, 46%-44%. Scott Rasmussen writes:
So the Democrats’ red meat, over-the-top attacks on Republicans apparently worked at least as well as the Republicans’ more positive, low-key approach. On paper, given Obama’s record, this election should be a cakewalk for the Republicans. Why isn’t it? I am afraid the answer may be that the country is closer to the point of no return than most of us believed. With over 100 million Americans receiving federal welfare benefits, millions more going on Social Security disability, and many millions on top of that living on entitlement programs–not to mention enormous numbers of public employees–we may have gotten to the point where the government economy is more important, in the short term, than the real economy. My father, the least cynical of men, used to quote a political philosopher to the effect that democracy will work until people figure out they can vote themselves money. I fear that time may have come. At National Review, Andy McCarthy poses the same question–why isn’t this election a landslide?–and posits a somewhat different explanation. Andy faults today’s Republicans for not being principled enough, or conservative enough:
Like Andy, I would love to see a radical down-sizing and reorienting of the federal government that would tame, if not abolish, the welfare state at the federal level. But is that really a practical suggestion for this year’s campaign? Would a “phase out Medicare” platform really carry the Romney-Ryan ticket to victory? I don’t think so. Further, I don’t think the problem in this year’s race is “elite opinion,” which, as Andy says, conservatives have been able to overcome rather consistently in the past, and is probably in more disrepute today than ever. I am afraid the problem in this year’s race is economic self-interest: we are perilously close to the point where 50% of our population cares more about the money it gets (or expects to get) from government than about the well-being of the nation as a whole. Throw in a few confused students, pro-abortion fanatics, etc., and you have a Democratic majority. Maybe this anxiety is misplaced. President Obama has never been able to rise above 47% support in the polls, and perhaps when November comes undecided voters will break against the incumbent, as the conventional wisdom has it. Maybe the election won’t be so close after all. We’d all better hope so. Because, given the rate at which Democrats are frantically adding to the dependency state, another four years of Obama may be enough to tip the balance between the private sector and government dependence once and for all. |
@ Vinnie:
As I’ve said elsewhere (on multiple occasions), I’ve never believed that the autoveto was ever in danger even with the present administration — at least as to matters of settlement legality specifically. For any US arm or agency to venture such an ‘illegality’ declaration would be to run up against the Anglo-American Convention of 1924 (to say nothing of the principle of estoppel, the Acquired Rights Doctrine, etc) — and to invite a legal challenge to such a declaration in US Federal Court: with all kinds of implications for other matters ALSO related to USA policy in re settlements.
Yes. Agree.
Yes. Infuriating.
To say nothing of heavy bombers. . . .
Not sure I’d want him to be, Vinnie, if it’s to be only as a ‘humanitarian’ gesture — which ends up validating the claim that he was ‘wrong’ (a notion I’ve never bought into)
— without ever taking to task the parties who PUT him into an impossible position in the first place, that left him impaled on the tines of Morton’s Fork.
Nor would I want those responsible for apparently double-crossing him — over his plea bargain — to get away with it after all either.
This is hard to write about — because I want his agony to be relieved YESTERDAY; God knows.
Yet I sense that even if he were released ASAP STAT!, if it were to be without his honor intact (quaint expression, I know; forgive me), his post-confinement existence would prove short and broken.
He relinquished his 6th Amdt right to a fair & open trial, and spilled his guts as an earnest of good faith — in return for a promise of imprecise leniency. He kept his word to deliver the intel. Once he’d satisfied the prosecutors (with numerous polygraph tests) that he’d given them all he had, they reneged on the deal. They broke their word.
The man is entitled to his trial. If they won’t (or can’t) give it to him now — then he is entitled to not only his freedom, but also a reversal of his conviction (which the prosecutors obtained ONLY by cheating him in the name of the People of the United States of America). There’s a stink about that which will never go away if that double-cross is not made right.
I agree.
OTOH, don’t count on Iran to leave the USA out of the picture, if GOI attacks. . . .
Hezbollah’s had stateside sleepers for at least a decade, I’ve no doubt. (In Tehran’s shoes, I surely would.) The Persians invented chess. . . .
Agree. Someday our prince will come; but this one aint him.
Sadly, no. Knowledge is easy — a matter of simple acquisition, study, applying oneself.
Guts, however, is a issue of character (when it’s not stupid bravado or sheer pathology).
Mine either. Not that it mattered. By the time Calif. got ’round to holding her primary [June 5], everybody EXCEPT Romney had already withdrawn (though their names remained on-ballot).
Ah, yes, there’s always that, isn’t there?
Az egmor b’shir mizmor chanukat hamizbeach.
“And Thy word broke their sword
— when our own strength failed us.”
@ dweller:
Yeah, that’s why I’m not expecting some sort of dramatic improvement in U.S.-Israeli relations even if Romney wins. There will be some improvement within certain limits, but that is all.
What will return, if Romney wins, are the two rock bottom requirements that Israel expects of the U.S. in order to be considered something like an ally. First, as was the case pre-Obama, if some obnoxious anti-Israel vote is looming on the UNSC, we won’t have to wonder anymore whether or not the president will veto it. The “automatic” U.S. veto will return. Second, Israel will be able to obtain major weapons platforms again, as it did under Bush #43 with the F-16I, for example. Under Obama, Israel has been under a virtual arms embargo with respect to platforms that have offensive capability (e.g., tactical fighters and attack helicopters), an embargo the likes of which has not been seen since the Kennedy administration.
That’s it. In general, it will be back to “duplicity as usual”. Pollard will not be released. The U.S.embassy will not be moved to Jerusalem. Not only that, don’t count on a President Romney to take overt action against Iran’s nuke program. He won’t. He’ll back Israel, but it will be Israel that has to get the job done anyway, as was the case with Iraq, as was the case with Syria.
Rommey will not clean out the State Department bureaucracy. He does not have the knowledge or the guts (which is why he did not get my vote in the primaries). He also does not have the inclination: His major focus will be on the economy, and understandably so.
The only ones running that would have dealt with Foggy Bottom in a positive way from our point of view would have been Bachmann, Santorum, or Gingrich, or MAYBE Cain. That’s it.
One major area of improvement I DO expect from Romney, however: Foggy Bottom or no, I don’t expect him to show much patience with the PA and certainly not Hamas. He’ll make a superficial effort to re-start Israeli-Palestinian negotiations just to placate the Foggy Bottom folks and the Saudis, but I really do expect that he’ll demand concessions from the Palis, he won’t get them, and then he’ll back Israel vis-a-vis the Palestinians. This won’t bring a final closure to the problem, but it will put the ball back in the Palis’ court, and I expect that knowing that Washington under Romney backs Israel, they’ll behave themselves, and the “status quo” such as it is will be maintained for a while, unless somebody opposing Israel does something really stupid. Which is always possible.
@ Laura:
Hang in there, lady. Don’t lose your nerve. Don’t lose your edge. Stay on target.
The MSM — which is nothing more than a cheering section for the DNC — knows that BHO can’t run on his record. His record is a train wreck. And that Hope’n’change thing won’t play in Peoria this time ’round; the bloom is off the rose & there’s too much Buyer’s Remorse out there.
So they’re trying — consciously & deliberately trying — to depress & dispirit his opposition.
That’s us.
Don’t let them do that to you. Don’t play into their hands, Laura. Your depression is their last gasp — that’s all they’ve got.
These kinds of stories are to be expected at this point.
The lamestream media still wield enormous influence, and a lot of that influence spills over even onto the alternative media. So it’s hardly a surprise that conservative pundits are occasionally affected also.
The establishment Repubs are responsible for this as well. Those selfish creeps have got to go.
The real problem for the anti-Obama campaign (it’s not a ‘Romney campaign,’ but an anti-Obama referendum campaign; but that’s not so terrible) — the real problem showed up at precisely the point when the RNC platform committee pulled that stunt over the rules.
That’s where the real dispiriting began.
The establishment Repub leadership is scared spitless of a hostile takeover of the GOP by the Tea Party.
And they SHOULD be scared. The Tea Party should take them over (the Tea Party is the only element in the GOP that’s still worth a tinker’s cuss). The GOP “Old Guard” fear, quite rightly, that if that happens, they will lose their positions of prominence — as well they should.
So the GOP establishment is trying to crowd out the Tea Party with those Mickey Mouse changes to the rules. More than anything else, that was what set the stage for the present uncertainty of the anti-Obama campaign.
Shake it off, Laura, and stay FOCUSED.
Let’s see how long that lasts.
As I recall, at this same stage in the ’88 campaign, Michael Dukakis was up something like 17 points.
— (Michael WHO?)
chazak v’ematz
@ Gunny G:
Well, of course. He was president at the time.
If Elmer T. Fudd had been president at the time, HE would have done the same
— regardless of whether there was a “D” or an “R” after his name.
Where matters of foreign policy are concerned (and the St Louis was VIEWED as a foreign policy matter)
— the entrenched State Department bureaucracy sets policy
and has done so pretty much since the Wilson Administration.
Presidents come
— and presidents go.
But the State Dept bureaucracy is forever.
Until some president comes along who has the cojones to appoint a Secretary of State well enough organized & sufficiently determined to clean out Foggy Bottom from top to bottom
— this isn’t going to change.
When Hercules cleaned out the stables of King Augeus, he had to divert the course of two mighty rivers & direct them to CONVERGE on the stables, to get the job done. The place hadn’t been shoveled out for thirty years — and the work had been “piling up” all that time.
It’s been a lot longer than that since the Wilson Administration.
I wouldn’t count Romney out, though.
He’s got more money to spend in these last two months. And back in ’80, Carter was leading Reagan – whom the talking heads of that time also said had no real chance – until very late in the campaign.
We’ll see what happens, I guess.
Yes, this is very depressing. As long as Iran is dealt with, it is hardly the end of the world for Israel, though. She’ll just align with China.
That will make things very uncomfortable for pro-Israel Jews here. At that point, the “dual loyalty” charge will have legs.
I guess if Obama gets in for four more years, we better learn Chinese and make aliya, so we can get good jobs when we get over there.
I wish that American Jews would stop voting for Democrats, who hate them. It was FDR who turned away German Jews aboard the SS St Louis.
I also add that if Obama is re-elected, then the only was to save part of America is via secession and civil war. Red State America will have to secede, and likely take most of the armed forces with them.
@ Laura:
Yes, and based on the Democratic Convention, our becoming Europe will include hating Israel and beating the sh*t out of Jews on the streets.
This is depressing. It appears we are going to become Europe.
The ‘slaves’ who again vote for Obama, for more government hand-outs, for more of doing nothing because “the President will pay my gas bill” will further ruin America for years to come if he is re-elected.Mitt Romney is the better candidate when it comes to the economy but Obama’s ‘slaves’ have no job prospects, no enthusiasm, no skills and not enough intelligence to realise that the Democrats only want their vote so that they can stay in power.God help us all if Obama is re-elected.