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PoliGAF 2012 |OT3| If it's not a legitimate OT the mods have ways to shut it down

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Even over at FreeRepublic, they swear up and down that Romney's the favorite. I don't really get it. Did we on the left look like that in 2004 when we were backing Kerry?

A lot of people felt Kerry was going to win, even on election day. But if you look at the map, it basically came down to Ohio. It was a tightly contested satte, that if Kerry had won he would have been president. I don't think there will be a one-state swing this time like it was in '04. If Obama wins he will win by a good 80-100 EVs.
 

RDreamer

Member
http://www.forbes.com/sites/peterferrara/2012/09/02/obamas-accelerating-downward-spiral-for-america/

My mom posted this article on Facebook. I had to grind my teeth to dust to avoid getting into a big thing, but man, what a terrible article.

What an odd article. He uses some of the same evidence the left would use in order to push their policies and reverse some of those trends, but then comes to wildly different, nearly crazy conclusions based on them.
 
A lot of people felt Kerry was going to win, even on election day. But if you look at the map, it basically came down to Ohio. It was a tightly contested satte, that if Kerry had won he would have been president. I don't think there will be a one-state swing this time like it was in '04. If Obama wins he will win by a good 80-100 EVs.
Yeah, I see either a small victory for Romney by sweeping the swing states, or a large win for Obama. His electoral college advantage boosts him enough that just his safe states put him near 270 already.
 

Jackson50

Member
There's a difference between "giving up" and thinking you could lose. Romney's camp gave up on PA for instance; they literally stopped spending money, visiting, etc. They have not done that in Ohio and have no plans to. The race is very close there and Romney can win simply due to white non-college workers there. Romney has to run up the score with that demographic, which is not an impossible feat

Iowa remains a lot closer than many assume. And then there is Wisconsin, plus Floridia remains close. This is far from over
It seems to be baseless conjecture. There's no impetus for Romney to withdraw from Ohio. The potential benefit of winning is too great. His campaign's hardly destitute. And his position in the polls is comparable to many of the posited alternatives.
Have they done a presidential prediction?
Yes. And his performance is comparable, if not marginally superior, to Silver's. It's important to note it's a rudimentary estimate using the generic Congressional ballot. And he acknowledges the possibility of a significant revision.
 
Yes. And his performance is comparable, if not marginally superior, to Silver's. It's important to note it's a rudimentary estimate using the generic Congressional ballot. And he acknowledges the possibility of a significant revision.
He did get the House make-up in 2008 right on the nose. But yeah, the Congressional ballot's a little bouncy. The national House race in particular tends to not take shape until close to election day.
 

RDreamer

Member
Obama has quite a ground game advantage

GT1jk.png
 

Wilsongt

Member
Romney launches GOP response at Dem convention

GREENVILLE, N.C. (AP) — Mitt Romney's presidential campaign is launching an aggressive Republican response at the site of the Democratic National Convention aimed at stealing attention and driving new questions about President Barack Obama's leadership on the eve of his nomination for a second term.

So basically the GOP is going to be going "LOOK AT US! LOOK AT US! HEY, DON'T FOCUS ON THAT GUY! PAY ATTENTION TO MEEEEEEEEEEEEE." during the DNC.

Did the Democrats do something similar? I wasn't paying attention.

Edit: Other than sending Biden down there.
 

Wilsongt

Member
I assume had Obama said "You didn't build that alone." The GOP wouldn't be taking such a silly phrase and running with it like it's the Holy Grail of gaffes.
 

reilo

learning some important life lessons from magical Negroes
Perhaps the reason there's not been a Gallup bounce.

Both lows in the polling history.
No Signs of GOP Convention Bounce Yet said:
We have been monitoring the potential impact of the Republican convention on the presidential race on a day-by-day basis. So far, we don’t see an impact. We report a seven-day rolling average of registered voters each day, each of which is based on more than 3,000 interviews. This reporting period is a very purposeful decision on our part -- even if a bit more “sluggish” than if we reported a three- or four-day average. The longer average dampens down short-term changes, and puts more of an emphasis on sustained changes.

The seven-day average has been at 47% Obama, 46% Romney for the last five days.
At this point, as noted, there is no consistent change in the pattern of vote intentions within our Daily tracking. Each of the two candidates has been up at some point over the last week in the individual nightly numbers, but that’s normal. Romney so far has not been able to generate a sustained “bounce” from his convention over the last week.

http://pollingmatters.gallup.com/2012/09/no-signs-of-gop-convention-bounce-yet.html

Gallup is saying that they are finding NO GOP Convention Bounce.
 

RDreamer

Member
toddstarnes @toddstarnes

Republicans are handing out boxes of Legos at DNC pic.twitter.com/1ApXpadQ


A14h0RHCEAAt4CF.jpg


So crazy. I wish somebody would give me some free Legos. :(

Ok, is any of this "You didn't build that" crap actually getting to independents? I really can't see someone who's independent really feeling all that confident with such a juvenile campaign, and being swayed to to vote for Romney. I can only picture most of them rolling their eyes whenever it comes up.
 

Clevinger

Member
I assume had Obama said "You didn't build that alone." The GOP wouldn't be taking such a silly phrase and running with it like it's the Holy Grail of gaffes.

Why not? It's already grossly out of context, so they surely wouldn't have a problem with taking out the "alone." The only difference is the media would be slightly more likely to call bullshit on them. But I would never rely on the media for anything, as the GOP smartly doesn't as well.
 

Zabka

Member
Ok, is any of this "You didn't build that" crap actually getting to independents? I really can't see someone who's independent really feeling all that confident with such a juvenile campaign, and being swayed to to vote for Romney. I can only picture most of them rolling their eyes whenever it comes up.

It won't catch because not even the crazies of the party believe it, they just have nothing else to latch onto.
 

pigeon

Banned
The blogger isn't sure what's up with Indiana, and thinks it might be a record keeping error on the Romney campaign's part. Romney can't actually have zero field offices in Indiana can he?

Why not? There's zero chance of him winning Indiana. Why spend anything?
 

reilo

learning some important life lessons from magical Negroes
I dunno, they've got focus groups and such just like the Obama campaign. I imagine if "you didn't build that" really wasn't sticking, they would've dropped it by now. Let alone making it the centerpiece of their convention...

"You didn't build that" is sticking, but not with the group that they need to swing the election in their favor. It's just a "rile the base" slogan that alienates everybody else.
 

PantherLotus

Professional Schmuck
There's a difference between "giving up" and thinking you could lose. Romney's camp gave up on PA for instance; they literally stopped spending money, visiting, etc. They have not done that in Ohio and have no plans to. The race is very close there and Romney can win simply due to white non-college workers there. Romney has to run up the score with that demographic, which is not an impossible feat

Iowa remains a lot closer than many assume. And then there is Wisconsin, plus Floridia remains close. This is far from over

Is anybody debating any of the above? Sounds more like you're trying to convince yourself.
 

Drakeon

Member
I assume had Obama said "You didn't build that alone." The GOP wouldn't be taking such a silly phrase and running with it like it's the Holy Grail of gaffes.

I wish the dems would push back with "I like firing people" from Mitt Romney. It's worse then what Obama said and they're both taken out of context.
 

PantherLotus

Professional Schmuck
TPM, Ezra Klein/Wonkblog, The Atlantic, The New Republic, Paul Krugman, Andrew Sullivan, Jonathan Chait, Rolling Stone/Matt Taibi, 538.
 
Is anybody debating any of the above? Sounds more like you're trying to convince yourself.

I'm merely pushing back against Chuck Todd's stupidity, and GAF's habit of believing nonsense when it benefits The Narrative.

There is almost no path for Romney without Ohio. He is currently spending tons of money there, and polls are tight. Are their internals showing that Obama has the advantage? Probably, but it's too early to simply declare it will go blue again. Obama has a problem with white, non-college voters (speaking of which, remember when Greg Sargent spent months denying this?). They don't like Romney, but if the economy gets worse they'll have no choice.

We get a jobs report in a few days. If it's bad, Romney will continue to gain momentum. Now that he can spend his money, I expect Romney to start pulling away with 2-4 point leads.
 
They're trying to turn this into a thing? Best to just hope it goes away.
The same people who think talking about what defines rape is a winning strategy.

PhoenixDark said:
I'm merely pushing back against Chuck Todd's stupidity, and GAF's habit of believing nonsense when it benefits The Narrative.

There is almost no path for Romney without Ohio. He is currently spending tons of money there, and polls are tight. Are their internals showing that Obama has the advantage? Probably, but it's too early to simply declare it will go blue again. Obama has a problem with white, non-college voters (speaking of which, remember when Greg Sargent spent months denying this?). They don't like Romney, but if the economy gets worse they'll have no choice.

We get a jobs report in a few days. If it's bad, Romney will continue to gain momentum. Now that he can spend his money, I expect Romney to start pulling away with 2-4 point leads.
You'll still be saying Romney can win on November 7th.

Also, "continue" to gain momentum? Because he picked up so much at the RNC.
 
http://www.forbes.com/sites/peterferrara/2012/09/02/obamas-accelerating-downward-spiral-for-america/

My mom posted this article on Facebook. I had to grind my teeth to dust to avoid getting into a big thing, but man, what a terrible article.
What a garbage article. :lol
Wow at that guy's other articles. What a joke.
I don't know, it sounds pretty coherent. The statistics look bad for Obama when you put it like that. What do you guys disagree with exactly?
 

reilo

learning some important life lessons from magical Negroes
We get a jobs report in a few days. If it's bad, Romney will continue to gain momentum. Now that he can spend his money, I expect Romney to start pulling away with 2-4 point leads.

What momentum? lmao
 

PantherLotus

Professional Schmuck
I'm merely pushing back against Chuck Todd's stupidity, and GAF's habit of believing nonsense when it benefits The Narrative.

There is almost no path for Romney without Ohio. He is currently spending tons of money there, and polls are tight. Are their internals showing that Obama has the advantage? Probably, but it's too early to simply declare it will go blue again. Obama has a problem with white, non-college voters (speaking of which, remember when Greg Sargent spent months denying this?). They don't like Romney, but if the economy gets worse they'll have no choice.

We get a jobs report in a few days. If it's bad, Romney will continue to gain momentum. Now that he can spend his money, I expect Romney to start pulling away with 2-4 point leads.

You forgot the part where making sound strategic (and tactical) decisions has been somewhat impossible for the Romney campaign to do. It's fine if you want to say it doesn't make sense, but I don't see any refutation that his team is above this kinda stupidity.

I think you said it earlier anyway -- there is a difference between projecting a loss (and "quietly giving up on Ohio") and "quietly giving up on Ohio" and redistributing his resources. The former, if true, would be further evidence that they see what everyone else can see as well as helping to explain some of the sillier decisions they've been making. The latter wouldn't just be giving up on Ohio. It would be giving up on the election.
 

pigeon

Banned

Yeah, derp. Read Indiana, thought Illinois.

Which other blogs and websites do you (and anyone else in this thread) recommend for both political news and discourse?

Honestly, you could do worse than to just follow the Daily Dish, click all Andy's links for a week and then follow all the ones you like. Personally, I also read David Frum, Matt Yglesias, and the TPM feed, and periodically page through everything at The New Republic. Whoever you do follow, just keep their idiosyncrasies in mind -- for example, Yglesias is basically a hipster utopian technocrat, so he won't shut up about things like how hairdresser licensing is strangling the American economy, but on more general economic questions he's pretty good.

Following a lot of people is actually an interesting way to watch stories move through the blogosphere, because they tend to all link to each other. This is how I realized that TPM really does just drop stories if they can't figure out how to spin them.
 
You forgot the part where making sound strategic (and tactical) decisions has been somewhat impossible for the Romney campaign to do. It's fine if you want to say it doesn't make sense, but I don't see any refutation that his team is above this kinda stupidity.

I think you said it earlier anyway -- there is a difference between projecting a loss (and "quietly giving up on Ohio") and "quietly giving up on Ohio" and redistributing his resources. The former, if true, would be further evidence that they see what everyone else can see as well as helping to explain some of the sillier decisions they've been making. The latter wouldn't just be giving up on Ohio. It would be giving up on the election.
Hey now. They got Clint Eastwood to speak at the RNC. That should swing a few votes!

Todd saying Romney's "giving up" on Ohio is probably hyperbole, but it wouldn't surprise me if there was a nugget of truth to it. Romney can't make the argument of "It's cool guys, we can win without Ohio" because a lot of things would have to go his way on election night to pull that off. This, specifically: http://www.270towin.com/2012_election_predictions.php?mapid=vxD
 
You forgot the part where making sound strategic (and tactical) decisions has been somewhat impossible for the Romney campaign to do. It's fine if you want to say it doesn't make sense, but I don't see any refutation that his team is above this kinda stupidity.

I think you said it earlier anyway -- there is a difference between projecting a loss (and "quietly giving up on Ohio") and "quietly giving up on Ohio" and redistributing his resources. The former, if true, would be further evidence that they see what everyone else can see as well as helping to explain some of the sillier decisions they've been making. The latter wouldn't just be giving up on Ohio. It would be giving up on the election.

And yet they're only running 1-3 points behind Obama. That tells me more about Obama's weakness than Romney's

There is NO evidence they are giving up on Ohio, quietly or otherwise. Chuck Todd has been wrong numerous times this year yet you decide to herald this nonsense? Nearly all of Obama's swing state leads are within MoE, Ryan has no hurt the ticket as expected, and Romney is doing measurable damage with limited ad time that will now increase due to him being the official nominee.
 
And yet they're only running 1-3 points behind Obama. That tells me more about Obama's weakness than Romney's

There is NO evidence they are giving up on Ohio, quietly or otherwise. Chuck Todd has been wrong numerous times this year yet you decide to herald this nonsense? Nearly all of Obama's swing state leads are within MoE, Ryan has no hurt the ticket as expected, and Romney is doing measurable damage with limited ad time that will now increase due to him being the official nominee.
Exactly how much more can Romney hit Obama? Obama's a known quantity in US politics, everyone has an opinion of him one way or the other. Did they finally find the "whitey" tapes?

The funny thing is, with a recession this bad and a recovery this slow, you would expect the incumbent to be in trouble, the fact that Obama's still got the lead is telling of 1) that Obama's still got mojo and 2) Romney's a shitty candidate.
 

Clevinger

Member
You forgot the part where making sound strategic (and tactical) decisions has been somewhat impossible for the Romney campaign to do.

Quitting on Ohio is the campaign equivalent of eating paint. It's not going to happen. Even Romney's campaign isn't that dumb.

Chuck Todd is a fucking moron and no one should listen to a word he says unless it's in numerics.
 

PantherLotus

Professional Schmuck
And yet they're only running 1-3 points behind Obama. That tells me more about Obama's weakness than Romney's

There is NO evidence they are giving up on Ohio, quietly or otherwise. Chuck Todd has been wrong numerous times this year yet you decide to herald this nonsense? Nearly all of Obama's swing state leads are within MoE, Ryan has no hurt the ticket as expected, and Romney is doing measurable damage with limited ad time that will now increase due to him being the official nominee.

The bolded trope is insanely hilarious. I mean, I know this is you here, that Romney is down to Obama in this economy says nothing of Obama's weakness and everything about the state of the Republican party. C'mon man.

The latter doesn't apply to me.
 

Zabka

Member
I dunno, they've got focus groups and such just like the Obama campaign. I imagine if "you didn't build that" really wasn't sticking, they would've dropped it by now. Let alone making it the centerpiece of their convention...

Hopefully it isn't the same focus groups that told them to run on secret policies to fix the economy that they can't reveal.
 
Exactly how much more can Romney hit Obama? Obama's a known quantity in US politics, everyone has an opinion of him one way or the other. Did they finally find the "whitey" tapes?

The funny thing is, with a recession this bad and a recovery this slow, you would expect the incumbent to be in trouble, the fact that Obama's still got the lead is telling of 1) that Obama's still got mojo and 2) Romney's a shitty candidate.

Romney can spend a near infinite amount of money in October. That's going to have an impact regardless of Obama being a known entity.

I was down on Romney's chances for awhile, but not anymore
 

Measley

Junior Member
I don't know, it sounds pretty coherent. The statistics look bad for Obama when you put it like that. What do you guys disagree with exactly?

Numerous things. However, the main thing that leaps out on the page to me is when some idiot says that Obama made the recession worse. Not only is that a Romney talking point, but it's also factually incorrect.
 

pigeon

Banned
I don't know, it sounds pretty coherent. The statistics look bad for Obama when you put it like that. What do you guys disagree with exactly?

He criticizes Bush for weakening the dollar, but doesn't note that the value of the dollar has been trending upwards since before Obama took office. (Unsurprisingly, since China wants to export to us much more than we want to export to them.) This is not surprising, since we're in a liquidity trap -- which is caused by fear of deflation, not inflation -- and our inflation rate is below the Fed's target. All the money the Fed "printed" went right under people's mattresses, affecting the value of our currency not at all. The abnormally low yields on US treasury bonds relate to this -- if buying a treasury bond is a worse investment than filling in the Gulf of Mexico, then why are people buying them? They must either have an interest in the dollar (China), or fear devaluation of any real asset investment -- in other words, deflation (which, looked at a certain way, is just a devaluation of everything in the world except the dollar). Thus his inflation fearmongering is simply nonsense. If he were accurate, people would be rushing to invest in American assets right now, since our inflation rate is 1.5%.

Similarly, the reason he says it's not economic magic that cutting investment taxes will spur investment is because there's no actual economic evidence that this is true. The stuff about Bush tax cuts is concern trolling, since Obama's plan essentially extends them for everybody -- the top bracket increases aren't that meaningful in any practical sense, it's just ideology. The stuff about raising taxes on small businesses is simply false.

All the stuff about how the economy is still fucked is pretty much accurate, but there are no actual logical threads connecting that information to his argument -- it's just kind of there, and then he asserts that it's Obama's fault, and sidesteps to the worthless inflation/capital gains arguments. Most people would agree that the economy is in a poor state (although it's growing at a normal rate, it's just below the trendline), but the solution to that is more stimulus -- the "dark cloud of reemerging Keynesian influence" he cites.

chart.jpg


Here's a comparison between American economic growth and the UK and European Union, both of which have adopted more austerity measures (the tax and spending cuts he advocates).

unemployment_graph-thumb-452x321-24201.png


Here's the CBO's projection on the effectiveness of the stimulus. We just need more.
 

GhaleonEB

Member
I assume had Obama said "You didn't build that alone." The GOP wouldn't be taking such a silly phrase and running with it like it's the Holy Grail of gaffes.

The "that" in the line referred to infrastructure such as bridges. Same message as you were saying, and something Romney has actually spoken about in similar terms; government investments help private businesses. It's kind of a derp, no kidding kind of statement, but given the GOP attack on all things government it's one Obama has to make.

Romney's entire campaign is based on lies.
 
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