Romney's Scattered Campaign Message Baffles Strategists

The Washington Post/Standard.net ^ | Sat, 09/15/2012 - 7:48 | By Karen Tumulty

[drewh]

Coming at a moment of international crisis, as U.S. embassies in the Middle East were beset by anti-American protests, the interview brought shudders from some Republicans who fear the Romney campaign is running aground in its final stretch.

"Deaver is turning over in his grave," said one prominent Republican strategist, referring to Michael Deaver, the late image-maker for Ronald Reagan. The Republican asked for anonymity, because he did not want to go public with his growing despair over the GOP ticket’s prospects for winning this fall.

"I can’t get my head around this," said John Weaver, a former strategist on Republican John McCain’s presidential campaigns. "What is their message? What is going on here? This is not a complicated race against Obama. This is about having a detailed plan to move this economy forward and don’t make any unforced errors and be disciplined and focused. They’re anything but that."

Romney also declined to attack Obama over his characterization of Egypt as not being an ally, something his advisers have done. He pointed out that the country is, officially, a non-NATO ally, but explained what the president seemed to mean.

"The president’s saying ’they are not’ may reflect the fact that there’s been a change in government and a change in relationship as a result of that," Romney said. "And what their status will be going forward in terms of the relationship with our nation is something which I’m sure will be developing over time."

Before an audience of campaign donors, however, Romney sharply condemned Obama for not making time to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later this month at the U.N. General Assembly.

"I thought the president’s decision not to meet with Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu was an extraordinarily confusing and troubling decision,"

[hinckley buzzard]

Tumulty is a career run-o-the-mill liberal media whore. LATimes, TIME Magazine, WaPo. Miscellaneous other crime scenes. Smeared McCain as a racist in 2008. Tells you about all you need to know.

[paudio]

Not true. Obama has been off message all summer, throwing everything to Romney. His ship is still afloat because the media carries it for him. What message that Obama send out?

[meadsjn]

Anyone know the author?

Karen Tumulty, (The Washington Post), is obviously a commie suck-wad of the worst sort.

Her title is misleading. The details in the article showed Romney correctly described our official relationship with Egypt, and correctly chastised the Kenyan muslim commie for not making time to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The author has no complaint; she just needs to write something critical of Romney, and it doesn't have to make sense.

The commies are in meltdown desperation mode, and the whole country is ready to dump Obama. Only the media hardcore are pretending to support the Kenyan. Liberals out in fly-over country are shocked into silence, hurriedly yanking up their yard signs, and scraping the idiot stickers off their bumpers.

[sushiman]

You think the press/media ganged up on him the other day ? Wait until the debates ! They will crucify him .

[Ken H]

I’d love to see Romney’s internal polling.

Is internal polling more accurate than Rasmussen?

If so, what methodology do they use that Rasmussen doesn't, and why doesn't Rasmussen adopt these more accurate methods?

[upchuck]

Don’t know the answers to your questions. Seems like internal polls are much closer to reality. Don’t know why.

[brightright]

Romney can’t hit them with ObamaCare because of his RomneyCare. He just said how proud he was of it. His claim that they are different because his plan has less pages would make him sound foolish. Besides he first said he would give waivers to the States, then he said he would repeal it, the latest is he would repeal and replace it. This is an issue best not brought to voters attention.

[patriotspride]

Good listing/categorization.

The MSM plays off this with their use of “ some & many” to press there
Latest issue.

It’s the classic lib ploy, cry wolf, then retreat to another argument and alleged representative group when exposed.

Being too touchy , feely has lead to all of this.

[geologist]

John McCain lost because he intended to lose. Sarah could have won that election, they shut her down continually. Romney seems to also want/intend to lose.

Despairing truth. Why? He couldn't be bought off surely. What wedge could force him into such a position? Is it possible the powerful people behind the scenes are controlling things, somehow they are draining America of all its power, money, and abandoning everything else?

America has accepted too many unconstitutional Judicial, actions, decisions, for years and years, that wer/are against America and America's way of life. We paid little or no attention. God help America.

Are we to be under the power of Babylon, or men wanting to break America? The war between Christians, Mohammedanism, and atheists, are all over the place? We seem to have our hands tied behind our back and we are wearing blindfolds and have turned up the music so loud we can hear nothing else., Islam has a group that desire to destroy America and our way of life.

Are we really going to allow this to happen? It is half way there now! Heavenly Father, we bow before thee asking for help for America. Allow not the evil plans intended against America to succeed. Remove them and the ones seeking to destroy America. Return America to our former values and faith. Father, we love thee and honor thee, and praise thee and look to thee for our good, We thank thee LORD for the many blessings showered upon America daily, day after day,forgive us our wayward sins, COME TO OUR AID, In Jesus name, amen.

[iacovatx]

“I’d disagree. There are probably at least dozens of categories of voters. Three is way too few. For simplicity’s sake, I’d say there are at least four big groups of voters: (1) economic and social conservatives (white southerners, white evangelical Christians), (2) economic and social liberals (single white women, Obama, Carter, Kerry, Pelosi), (3) economic liberals and social conservatives (blacks, Hispanics, Catholics, Huckabee) and (4) economic conservatives and social liberals (Huntsman, Schwarzenegger, Giuliani, Wall Street). “

Yes, I agree that several categories of voters can be identified but I try to create the simplest model possible that explains the majority of the outcome I am trying to predict. My argument is that I can predict a lot of voting behavior using only three categories. It comes down to an empirical question and whether I can predict most voting by identifying people as one of my three categories. Undoubtedly, your category model would be a better predicting model but I suggest that fewer categories might also do a pretty good job of predicting.

On another note, I found it interesting that socialists criticize conservatives for their interest in social issues but when the socialists hold their convention, social issues are front-and-center while the conservatives are emphasizing the economy.