Eh, "A WIN IS A WIN". They are treating this like football. It's a statistical tie but I guess those extra 6 votes are like kicking the field goal... stupid Americans. Romney should not be running around and saying he made history because it's really not valid.Technically he didn't win Iowa
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US PoliGAF 2012 | The Romney VeepStakes: Waiting for Chris Christie to Sing
- Thread starter Invisible_Insane
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...because they want 4 more years of Obama vs. moving the needle slightly in their direction with Romney? This logic never makes sense to me.
BotoxAgent
Member
yeah, true. But logic rarely applies to evangelicals and tea partiers. A lot of them are blinded by pure irrational paranoia.
Summer months has always been shitty for Democrats for some reason. I don't expect 2012 to be any different.
el retorno
Member
motivation. they might just think it doesn't matter. they don't think romney is going to fight for them, they think obama won't either so why even choose?
teruterubozu
Member
Republicans will vote. It's the Dems that seem to need motivation this time around.
RustyNails
Member
You see the liberals going "I'm not voting for Obama"? Same thing.
The Librarian
Banned
How can you say this after the low-turnout of Iowa and New Hampshire?
Hispanics both turning away from the GOP due to this kind of stuff, combined with their greater importance in what had previously been swing states, is goig to make life rough for Romney. It's one of the reasons that despite all of Obama's considerable headwinds, I'm still cautiously optimistic about his chances.
We also have some polling data showing lower enthusiasm among Republican voters, and data showing reliable Dem voters among the most energized. Still early, but it certainly adds up.
el retorno
Member
This seems stupid because it doesn't seem the immigration issue is even really a big issue in this election.
Romney's in it to win it. He doesn't believe in anything but himself.
That said I feel a bit bad for these veteran Republicans. In the last ten years their party has completely changed from under them and they have had to re-invent themselves just to keep their jobs. It's lie or die for the Republican old guard.
That said I feel a bit bad for these veteran Republicans. In the last ten years their party has completely changed from under them and they have had to re-invent themselves just to keep their jobs. It's lie or die for the Republican old guard.
Bulbo Urethral Baggins
Banned
Romney easily took the tea party and evangelical vote in New Hampshire. What's the problem?
teruterubozu
Member
That's typical for an incumbent year though, because there is no competing Dem primaries. In fact, the New Hampshire numbers for Republicans are skewed because many switched to Independent. Come Nov. 4th, the Republicans will line up.
Well when you let Fox News, and the likes of Rush, Beck, and Hannity dictate the party line, shit happens. Those people get paid to come up with the craziest far right talking points they can think of, and the rub is they're neither politicians nor Republican leadership. They don't have to worry about political repercussions, re-election, etc.
el retorno
Member
The ones that didn't vote for him. They might not back him.
True, but those forces help tremendously in winning elections and setting the tone for debates. Dealing with the occasional crazy antics/comments of the Becks and Hannitys of the world seems a small price to pay.
Bulbo Urethral Baggins
Banned
Possibly, but like Kosmo said, when they consider the alternative, I'm sure they'll change their minds. Being so politically involved, I doubt they stay home on election day.
RustyNails
Member
They aren't that motivated...The polls and crowd enthusiasm say so. I'd say GOP enthusiasm is somewhat below Kerry enthusiasm from 2004.
PhoenixDark
Banned
This is reaching Hillary PUMA levels of nonsense. Romney will most likely pick a VP that satisfies movement conservatives, and more importantly he represents the right's best chance at stopping Obama, Obamacare, Dodd-Frank, etc.
Primary turnout may be low because of the lack of choices, and I'm not sure it demonstrates that republican turnout will be low in November
cagelessrat
Member
Well, the delegates are elected by the people too. That just takes place after the first vote. It's almost like a straw poll to influence which delegates should be elected.
Before you get too excited about that, keep in mind that Obama's name hasn't been on a ballot yet. I imagine that's when their enthusiasm (or rather, pure hatred) kicks in.
el retorno
Member
I'm not saying that its going to happen. Just that it might. It was the Washington Post that wrote the article that said they are really not wanting to vote for Romney. But there also is a difference between the too. Hilary was based on spite that Obama beat her. Not that they didn't support Obama's goal's for government.
Many conservatives don't think they'll get what they want in laws and what not. That's a bit of a difference.
Aaron Strife
Banned
Frank the Great
Banned
republicans will turn out in the end, democrats will turn out in the end, what matters is which way independents go. as usual. if unemployment is steadily improving and obama can sell the message that we are turning a corner he will win independents and win the election. if he can't, independents will go with romney and he will lose.
some of you guys think about this stuff too much, it is pretty simple. elections are rarely decided by either parties' base. republicans will come out for romney.
some of you guys think about this stuff too much, it is pretty simple. elections are rarely decided by either parties' base. republicans will come out for romney.
but it's rasmussen
hydragonwarrior
Member
On the chance that Obama loses and Mitt Romney wins the election, what's the worst that can happen?
I'm saying this because, when I look back 4 years ago, Obama still only won by a few % points with a campaign that was clearly in his favour. And adding to the fact that Bush remained in power for 8 years as well, which I will guess for no other reason other than that either there are overall more Republican voter's out there or that the average Republican is much more passionate about politics and voting than the average Democrat.
I'm saying this because, when I look back 4 years ago, Obama still only won by a few % points with a campaign that was clearly in his favour. And adding to the fact that Bush remained in power for 8 years as well, which I will guess for no other reason other than that either there are overall more Republican voter's out there or that the average Republican is much more passionate about politics and voting than the average Democrat.
PhoenixDark
Banned
I still wonder how different 2010 might have looked if democrats had passed the DREAM Act when they had majorities (and a super majority in the senate). Unfortunately a handful of democrats were against it, and ultimately Obama didn't push the issue.
I'm really optimistic about Obama's chances as well, but even I wouldn't use a Rass poll. A recent Reuters/Ipsos poll has Obama up 48-43 on Romney, though.
Actually people that identify as a Republican is pretty low (27 percent) and those that identify as a Democrat is higher (31 percent).
I think the 'turnout problem' is more related to age than anything else. A Republican is more likely to be older and thus more likely to vote.
RustyNails
Member
Today Obama is gonna give a speech at University of Illinois Chicago. The streets are blocked and traffic is being diverted in downtown. I'm not expecting a Campaign Obama speech, but just a preview of it. But anyways, expectations are high. Tickets are sold out, unsurprisingly.
Invisible_Insane
Member
If Republicans take the Senate and remain in control of the house, I'd expect pretty extensive damage to what remains of the American safety net, and I think it's also likely that we would take on additional hostilities in the middle east. For starters.
IIRC, the enthusiasm polls pretty accurately reflected the results, and on that front the GOP enthusiasm is down from 2010. Which may be a symptom of the point in the cycle we are in, time will tell.
You severely underestimate the ability of the Democrats to be obstructionists. In this tit-for-tat environment that D.C. has become, the past few years have armed the Democrats with a whole lot of payback to dish out.
There's a very real possibility that after 2012 we can have a completely GOP run government. And with how that party currently is, it'll be a disaster. Think 2000-2006, but much worse. No matter how disappointing Obama maybe be, having a GOP run government post tea party is much worse.
Dodd-Frank plays to the GOP establishment, of which Romney is the poster boy. He isn't winning support from evangelicals or tea partiers because he won't look to increase Wall St. regulations.
Obamacare = Romneycare. That direct parallel is easy as hell to draw and you can bet this fall a super PAC on Obama's behalf will carpet bomb this country with an eight figure add campaign to that effect. No one will trust Romney to get Obamacare repealed.
Roe V. Wade. Conservatives already have ZERO faith in Romney actually getting this tore down. He can't do anything to change it because he's been pro-choice publicly before.
Tea Partiers as a whole already see him as another big gub'mint deficit spender. Tea partiers are at heart a nutty group of libertarians. Most liberatirans think political gridlock is glorious. You really think they're going to put a big gov't. spender like Romney in with a rep. congress?
I'm not saying that Romney is somehow going to lose points to Obama on conservatives. But enthusiasm is tragically low for both sides. Obama's is this way because the other option hasn't been shoved in the far left's faces yet. Romney's is low because the far right just flat out doesn't like or trust him. How do you fix that?
The real relevance of this is how the far ends interact with their middle of the road friends. The moral right and small gov't. right will not phone bank for Romney. They won't go door to door for Romney. They won't preach to their co-workers about Romney. All they'll do is rail on Obama as he's getting us out of two wars and the economy is slowly rallying. Then they'll show up Nov. 4th and vote Romney while they hold their noses. That does nothing to win the middle. At the same time the left will push a real get out to vote movement and push to convert friends because Obama will look amazing in comparison to the alternative.
Meanwhile Obama will have a ton more money. His Super PACs will have more money (as they aren't burning it up through a primary). He'll have the power of the current office to minimize his real expenses and give him a larger soap box. He has a GOP controlled congress that makes his weak polling look stellar in comparison.
Most Americans identified with the Occupy Wall St. movement, they just thought the protesters themselves were a bunch of deadbeats. Romney is the exact kind of person the Occupy movement is attacking. That message coupled with slow economic growth will appeal strongly to the middle who will (like all elections) dictate the outcome.
el retorno
Member
Just a nitpick. That's just the popular vote. Obama beat McCain pretty badly in the electoral college.
Joe Shlabotnik
Banned
Voters need to be enthused about a candidate. Rule of thumb is relying on voting against the other guy is a losing proposition.
Plenty of people REALLY wanted to kick Bush out of office in 2004. I mean, you can't get much higher anti-enthusiasm. Still didn't work.
Bulbo Urethral Baggins
Banned
One person's "damage" is another person's "reform". What would you expect to happen specifically?
For sure, I'd expect to see reforms in entitlement programs that would hopefully lead us closer to fiscal solvency, but I don't think any radical changes would happen. I think Americans are pretty hostile to too much change in the "safety nets". And Democrats would do just about anything to block it from happening -including the omg fillibuster.
The wave of Anti-Bushism didn't really hit a crescendo until 2006. It was just beginning at the time of his re-election in November of 2004.
Except in the last decade Democrats have been consistently much less obstructionist than Republicans (who keep setting new huge records in all those filibuster/cloture charts). Obviously they're not angels, but this is one of those cases where Democrats are simply much better than Republicans (or rather, simply much less awful).
In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if the first thing Republicans do is de-fang the filibuster anyway when they get the senate back.
el retorno
Member
Ryan Plan, Privatization of Social Security, repeal of health care bill.
Zero Hero
Member
It's OK if republicans do it. Your party is laughable.
The Democrats of 2000-2006 were worse than the Democrats of 1994-2000. I would anticipate that trend to continue.
It's ok if Republicans do what? Your sentence structure is laughable.
War in Iran, returning forces to Iraq and probably Afghanistan.
Obama's win over McCain is the first time since '88 that a candidate actually broke 50%. His margin of victory was 0.5% less than H.W. Bush's victory over Dukakis, coming off the Reagan era against a pathetically weak candidate.
The entire concept under which Romney even has a shot is based on Obama having a populist movement of middle voters and an aberration in the youth vote to help him last election. If those "middle" voters actually reflected a shift in the political spectrum towards more democratic voters and/or the youth and minority votes weren't an aberration he could very possibly roll Romney.
Wait, this conversation was about Warren Buffett versus Mitt Romney. Why you changing topics now?
Also, yes, it is perfectly fine for a Republican governor to give a state something it wants. Are you saying that Republicans are against state rights now?
Your understanding about what is laughable is laughable.
Aaron Strife
Banned
Probably not that different. The only group it'd really matter to are Hispanics, who turned out in big numbers in Colorado and Nevada to save Reid/Bennet's hides. I don't know if they would have had that same impact elsewhere - maybe save a few House seats, but that's about it.
ed: Oh we wouldn't have Rick Scott probably. So there's that.
Invisible_Insane
Member
It's possible that there won't be enough of them for it to matter, and in any case, I don't expect Democrats to be anywhere near as effective at obstructionism as the Republicans have been. I expect that Democrats would sign onto another EGTRRA like package in 2013 if a President Romney was championing it.
If Americans were hostile to changes in the safety nets, they'd stop electing Republicans. To define "damage": I think some form of premium support plan is going to be passed in 2013 if the Republicans are in a position to do it, which will be reforming health care/insurance in precisely the wrong direction; cuts to Medicaid; raising the retirement age in a way that will probably disadvantage the poor predominantly; cuts to housing and food stamps, etc. Relatedly, I'd expect a significant paring back of the expected cuts in military spending.
Zero Hero
Member
My first post was. Then I responded to your response. I know you aren't that dense.
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