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Posted on 10/28/2012 2:27:03 PM PDT by markomalley
Lately a simple question has been coming to mind: just how did Mitt Romney get elected governor of heavily Democratic Massachusetts ten years ago? Romney could have run for governor of Utah instead, which would have been not only easier but would have spared us the egregious Jon Huntsman. Saying that he ran as a moderate, pro-choice Republican is not a fully adequate explanation. Nor is a weak Democratic opponent (Shannon O’Brien), or the strange fact that Democratic Massachusetts had elected three Republicans in a row before Romney. If anything that made it an even harder race to win.
Now, you can paw through the record of that campaign, where among other things early Democratic mistakes in their attacks on Romney backfired (sound familiar?). Romney still trailed in the polls throughout October, but ended up winning by five points. How come?
At the end of the day enough independent voters and Democrats found Romney appealing, just as independent voters and many Democrats always found Ronald Reagan appealing in his governor’s races in California. Reagan usually ran ahead of his polls, too. Both Reagan and Romney are what common sense observes might call “voting booth” candidates—people that you end up being comfortable voting for when you walk into the booth still slightly doubtful about the choices. I expect that Romney will win any state where good polls show him running even with Obama over the last weekend.
When journalist and historians look back over this campaign, they will surely point to the first debate on October 3 as the major turning point, which is correct, though it is going to upend all the conventional wisdom of academic political science that debates don’t matter much or affect the results much. I’m sure there will be lots of fancy and mostly unreadable journal articles “proving” Romney’s debate didn’t really make any difference. But that’s why no one pays much attention to academic political scientists
Of more interest might be this late August story by Major Garrett in National Journal about how the Obama campaign thought they had it in the bag. It’s a remarkable study in hubris:
Every campaign, of course, believes it’s going to win. Obama’s team, however, conveys such a visceral sense of self-confidence that even protestations to the contrary take on air of comically profane absurdity. . .
“They didn’t give people anything to grab on to, and they allowed us to define him before he could define himself,” Axelrod says of Romney. “And now they are playing catch-up. And now they are running bio ads. The summer is when candidates and races get defined. That’s why we made a strategic decision that it was better to muscle up in the summer. I can’t think of a presidential race determined by paid media after Labor Day.”
That’s Axelrod’s understated way of saying—feet-up-on-the-desk protestations notwithstanding—that he thinks the election is already over. . .
“Those guys over there love to talk about 1980, which I think is delusional for a whole range of reasons,” Axelrod said. “Obama is not Carter, and Romney is not Reagan.”
But this is the sentence that will end Axelrod’s career as a leading political sage:
“They have this fantasy that the debates will come and the dam will break like it did in 1980,” Axelrod said. “I think they are delusional.”
And here’s the Benghazi coda:
In Chicago, talk of unexpected events toppling Obama’s path to reelection are largely cursory. This nonchalance, by the way, is said to perturb the Windy City’s mayor, and former Obama chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, who frequently warns that the president’s popularity is “defying gravity” and that the campaign must ward against its tendency toward all-knowing arrogance.
Rahm ought to know.
“and that the campaign must ward against its tendency toward all-knowing arrogance.”
Funny as “arrogance” is one of the terms I was thinking of when reading this article.
Romney will win because too many “intelligent” 2008 Obama voters are completely upset with what he did and didn’t do. As long as the R is not incompetent, the R wins.
Could this be why the coward isn’t doing as well as they expected with their usual voter fruad?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gf8lHz_7R_Y
Why Romney will win? Because America has woken up to the marxist-in-chief and his plan to destroy our country.
Fire Obama on November 6. Save the Republic!
Just voted with some friends around tbe kitchen table.
One got downright indignant when she learned I had changed my mind and voted RR, instead of writing in a candidate as I said I would.(besides, if you knew my name the whole RR thing is kind of appealing)
Started calling me liar and blah, blah, effing blah....blah, blah.
Couldn’t get her to take a breath long enough so I could explain my change of mind and I just laughingly blurted out:
“Your guy will not! Be making two Supreme Court Justice nominations in these next four years....bottom line!”.
Most of the other issues were about raising taxes and I blithly checked off NO.
Told them they need to drop their ballots in the mail on the 7th but if they couldn’t make it to be sure and drop them off on the 8th @ the county regristrar’s office
Benghazi is what pushed me over the edge. I do not believe anyone should leave our guys to die, abandoned.
You can’t blame him for that..../s
He won becuse of his success at the SLC Olympics,and Shannon O’Brien WAS a tool. Romney was recruited to run here because of the bad performance of our acting Gov., Republican Jane Swift. Had she run, she would have surely been defeated.
I think that BengaziGate will influence a great number of voters...
Some good ideas, but it needs some proofreading.
Tu as raison ici....
Et, je dois te remercier. J’etais vraiment bette l’autre nuit!
J’avais bu... mais au moment meme, Crowley avait l’aire juste! Le lendemain, j’ai tellement regrete... c’etait si evident! Mais j’etais sincere, et j’a apprecie ton soutien.
Sarah
De Nada!
I never use the words “friend” and 0bama voter in the same sentence.
“I expect that Romney will win any state where good polls show him running even with Obama over the last weekend.”
Undecideds break for the challenger.
Polling ties suggest Romney is ahead by the margin.
If this plays out, and I suspect it will, we can thank Kasich for purging the dead wood off the rolls.
I’ve read elsewhere on this site that Cuyahoga got the most thorough high colonic, which bodes very well for Romney.
Wait! were you there that night when I was like totally in awe of Candy Crowley? Reacting ‘real time’ I thought she was amazing. The next day, I was in Shock at her bias.
Anyway. Toda Raba!
Shavu’a Tov,
Sarah
Obama vainly tries to appeal to voters recounting a laundry list of things he “says” he did (or thinks he did).
Trouble is the America Obama talks about is not the America struggling unemployed/underpaid Americans are living.
Obama lives in a dream world——thinks he can make it happen just by saying it’s happening.
Weird.
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