Romney has a chance, but he must make the sale
E. Thomas McClanahanWhat a gift for the Obama campaign — a poll last week showing the president up by 7 points: He’s over 50 percent in a head-to-head matchup against putative Republican nominee Mitt Romney.
And look at Romney’s showing among women. Wow! President Obama is crushing Romney 57-38. As the poll story dryly put it, “Romney’s personal profile needs work.”
Boy, that’s an understatement. On the subject of who’s more friendly and likeable, the poll had Obama leading by 64-26. Looks like the people have smoked out Romney as a bloodless, calculated rich guy.
Not so fast.
Romney wouldn’t be the ideal candidate in any Republican scenario. His ability to whack Obama on health care is hobbled by his role in erecting an Obamacare prototype in Massachusetts. He seems unable to strike the mysterious chords by which candidates connect with voters. He sometimes seems robotic. He says things that, shorn of context, sound outlandishly dumb, as when he said he likes being able to fire people, or when he said he doesn’t care about the very poor. Actually, the latter sounded dumb even in context.
Yet this flawed candidate has a real chance, as a closer look at that ABC/Washington Post poll will illustrate.
Start with the survey’s sample of 1,003 adults. Thirty-four percent of the respondents were Democrats, 23 percent were Republicans — proportions not even close to the makeup of the electorate, in which the parties are more evenly matched.
The Weekly Standard’s Jay Cost made the telling point that Obama’s edge in the poll was less than the Democratic edge in the survey sample. Even with a sample skewed toward Dems, Obama did poorly on two critical issues.
On the economy he was underwater by 54-44 and on gasoline prices the level of disapproval was huge — 62 percent. An overwhelming majority — 76 percent — believe the economy is still in recession.
Obama edged Romney 49-39 on “protecting the middle class,” but on several key economic and fiscal issues, Romney was very close or ahead — again, in a polling sample overweighted with Democrats.
After months of watching Republican candidates pound each other, we tend to forget that Obama has his own liabilities. He can’t run on his record. The economy remains sluggish. His main “achievement” is Obamacare, which he would prefer not to mention. And he would rather not discuss the stimulus because that evokes dicey topics such as the spending explosion, the skyrocketing national debt, his failure to propose a credible budget and his failure to propose a plan for entitlement reform.
Instead, he will run a campaign of negativity, class warfare and “fairness.” He took this package on a test drive late last year in Osawatomie, Kan., where he condemned “breathtaking greed” and voiced his familiar regret that millionaires and billionaires are somehow allowed to exist.
This may seem like a winning pitch amid a lousy recovery, but it has a very bad track record as a strategy. Banging the class-warfare drum didn’t work for Al Gore or John Edwards. Americans have always been less interested in punishing success than in broadening the pie for all.
If Romney can keep the focus on Obama’s record and offer a clearly articulated economic and fiscal program, he has a very good chance of unseating this president.
To reach E. Thomas McClanahan, call 816-234-4480 or send email to mcclanahan@kcstar.com.
George Hunsucker
Northland
1 year, 1 month agoAll Romney has to do is ask people if they are better-off today then they were 3+ years ago. The answer is a resounding NO.
As you say ET, the big 0 cannot run on his miserable record, which most Presidents do. He has been a miserable failure which everyone except the Kool-aid drinkers admit. It has certainly not been “change we can believe in”…..
Yanwen Xia
Overland Park
1 year, 1 month agoHi George, what percentage of population are as gullible as Jim Jones congregation’s Kool-Aid drinkers, who, as some reader implies, will buy into whatever is said by others, without their own thought process, without having facts to support what’s been said? Or who are the “water carriers” who blindly follow what others have said, without going through fact checking?
Mark Hastert
1 year, 1 month ago“All Romney has to do is ask people if they are better-off today then they were 3+ years ago.
Read more here: http://voices.kansascity.com/entries/romney-has-chance-he-must-make-sale/#storylink=cpy
Well actually George, by most measures we are. Certainly not where we wish we were but given that half of the government is working against us….
Phil Cardarella
1 year, 1 month agoInteresting that the Right thinks the problem is the salesman, not the product.
Fact is, Mitt Romney, Moderate Governor of Massachusetts probably could beat Obama among independent voters. Problem Mitt has is that he is being asked to sell a product — Tea Party Theocratic Tax Breaks for the Rich & Corporate — that most Americans don’t want to buy.
There are only so many Eskimo in the market for ice, and only so many chickens who can be conned into voting for Col Sanders.
And, Mitt may not be a good enough con artist to make those sales.
George Hunsucker
Northland
1 year, 1 month agothe big 0 starts his plummet to 35%, the Kool-Aid imbibbers…
http://www.gallup.com/poll/150743/Obama-Romney.aspx
Are you better off today then you were 3+ years ago????