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NationofChange / Op-Ed
Published: Saturday 21 April 2012
“Only last month the same poll was showing Obama with a modest lead, as Romney slugged his way through the last round of primaries.”
Romney Could Turn a Tie Into a Lead
A medium-sized thunderbolt has crashed down amid the somewhat torpid early stages of the presidential campaign. A New York Times/CBS poll of registered voters, released Wednesday, shows President Obama and the assured Republican nominee Mitt Romney running neck and neck, at 46 percent each.
Only last month the same poll was showing Obama with a modest lead, as Romney slugged his way through the last round of primaries. The dead-heat news demolishes the house wisdom of the political commentariat, which was that his battles with Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich for the right-wing vote in the contest for the Republican nomination had damaged Romney's standing with the broad mass of independents who will actually decide the outcome of the election next November and that it would take him some months to restore his mainstream credibility.
The poll suggests that people were not too bothered by Romney's gyrations. Now that Romney is the assured nominee, awaiting only the formality of coronation at the party convention in Tampa, Fla., at the end of the summer, they're viewing him in exactly the contours that so dismayed his right-wing foes: as a mainstream Republican candidate.
Indeed the poll shows that conservative Republicans — Tea Partiers and Evangelicals — still nourish deep suspicions of the Mormon millionaire. As the pollsters report: 33 percent say they will enthusiastically support Romney if he is the nominee, compared to 28 percent in January and 18 percent last October. Still, more have reservations about him (40 percent) than enthusiastically back him. If Evangelicals — to whom Mormonism is akin to Satan worship — decide to sit the election out, that could be a problem for Romney.
The Obama campaign had no doubt calculated that Romney would reposition himself towards what passes for the "center" of the American political spectrum, but they thought they had time to lengthen Obama's lead.
No longer.
The poll was conducted amid a slanging match between Ann Romney - Mrs. Mitt — and a Democratic talking head — Hilary Rosen — who ridiculed Mitt Romney saying he relied on Ann to keep him abreast of women's concerns when "his wife has actually never worked a day in her life."
Ann Romney blasted away with her tweet gun. "I made a choice to stay home and raise five boys. Believe me, it was hard work."
Terror-stricken at the folly of ridiculing a mother of five, furthermore one who has battled multiple sclerosis, Democrats rose as one to vilify Rosen's characterization. That may have affected the poll.
The all-too-visible national economic stagnation is a more serious long-term factor for the White House. So far as America's top corporations are concerned, life looks good. They're flush with cash and have successfully recalibrated after the 2008 crash, laying off workers and shifting more production overseas.
But small town America is hurting. The jobs aren't coming back; the customers have no money. If the economy doesn't improve, Romney could soon turn that dead-heat into a lead.
Copyright Creators.com
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ABOUT Alexander Cockburn
Alexander Cockburn is co-editor with Jeffrey St. Clair of the muckraking newsletter CounterPunch. He is also co-author of the new book "Dime's Worth of Difference: Beyond the Lesser of Two Evils," available through www.counterpunch.com. To find out more about Alexander Cockburn and read features by other columnists and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.
Top Stories
By Tara Culp- Ressler
11 comments on "Romney Could Turn a Tie Into a Lead"
April 23, 2012 7:18am
DWDALLAM:
Those capital letters you complained about were in quotes to emphasize our shouting back that phrase at those who are pushing the currently unworkable bipartisan system. For those who haven't read the Constitution, it established a bicameral legislation, but has become what it is thanks to corporate media.
Please read and comprehend what people say before whining and name-calling in lieu of sensible debate. My writings are so nice, one must read them twice.
We, the people, may only win with a properly educated populus, not the vitriole spewed by those who were dumbed down by Ronnie Raygun's budget cuts and turned the majority of Americans into feeble-minded corporate shills, not good citizens.
Thank you, Dee-Dubyuh!
April 22, 2012 6:09pm
If Romney becomes the president, then the American people deserve what they get. I'm not saying Obama is the answer. He's proven himself an apt corporatist and totally pissed off his base. But choice is limited, and a Romney win tells me what the American people want, and so they should get it.
It's kind of ironic that after talking to a regular working class person in a gas station about soaring gas prices, the clerk remarked (this was back during the Bush Gore campaign in 2000), that if Gore became president gas prices would go even higher. Well, Gore did not become president, and gas prices soared to knew highs. My question is: How's that thinking process working out for you?
Like I said, you get what you deserve America. If Romney becomes president, I don't want to hear any crying when you're SSI payments go down, your medicare becomes less, and you cannot qualify for unemployment. No whiners, right?
April 22, 2012 5:55pm
Deleted comment
April 22, 2012 10:56am
Romney will lose in Nov. This is what independents think of him:
*You can fool some of the people some of the time and Romney is a great speechifier but he won’t fool me.
*With 1% Romney, expect cuts in your Social Security checks and Medicare to pay for his tax-cuts for the rich.
*As Governor, flip-flop Romney was for Romneycare and pro-choice. Now he is anti-health and anti all abortions. If President, what will he be for?
*Windshield-wiper Romney will be for anything as long as he’ll make money. Pro or anti-abortion, pro or anti-Health Plan. Typical opportunist-politician.
*Thanks to the Bush’s tax cuts for the rich, Romney’s profited $100 extra billion. That’s why he wants to extend them forever.
*By Freedom for America, Romney means more freedom for his billionaire pals that they can make more money.
*By Less Regulation, Romney means zero or less taxes for the rich 1%.
*Watch Romney go from liberal as governor to conservative in the primaries to centrist as candidate to whoknowswhat if President.
*I wouldn’t buy a used car from Mr Romney.
April 22, 2012 8:12am
We, the people, need a media blitzkrieg of our own. Those of us who still pay taxes need to point out to the constitutionally ignorant electorate that this is the right time for a new 3rd party victory.
We need to put up billboards everywhere, then stalk both conventions, with this one potential campaign-winning phrase:
"COMMON SENSE TELLS US THAT THE LESSER OF TWO EVILS IS STILL EVIL, SO JUST SAY NO TO BIG BAD MONEY !!!"
April 22, 2012 5:56pm
Writing in CAPITALS (Screaming) DOES NOT MAKE YOUR ARGUMENT STRONGER. IT ONLY MAKES YOU SEEM LIKE AN IDIOT!
April 21, 2012 7:55pm
Your point about Dr. Paul is interesting but, you lost all of your credibility when you talk papers.
April 21, 2012 7:33pm
This disregards the other 9 current polls where Obama is leading with larger samples. This is the type of garbage I expect from FOX or ABC, not my sources. Seems Nation of Change is not for the type of change I want (with all this Ron Paul worship, this is the last straw.) Farewell nation of change. Readers: Check out the current polls at www.realclearpolitics.com
April 21, 2012 3:52pm
I can not believe that Obama is even allowed to run for POTUS anymore. Where the hell are his 'papers'? He needs to prove his citizenship, once and for all, lest it just goes to show that our Constitution truly has become obsolete. As far as Romney goes ... just another CFR Puppet, steering American into first the NAU, then the NWO...watch and see, if he gets elected. If we really wanted to save America, we'd put Ron Paul in the White House. Dr. Paul is the only one that is not tied to Foreign Organizations and won't follow their agenda to erase America's borders and (what' left of) our Constitution.
April 22, 2012 5:57pm
It's already been proven. Where have you been, Fox News?
April 21, 2012 12:30pm
It makes not a twit what the far right wing person thinks of Romney. If they think he is a satan worshiper, a voodoo chief, a witch/warlock, or the devil himself they are going to vote for him. Absolutely.
Because they live in a confirmatory bias. Every one they talk to at their churches agree with them and everything they listen to (think American Family Radio) and watch (think FOX) agrees with them. And they are consumed by their disguised hatred (think homophobia).
It is not only the fundamentalist, the followers and fans of other hateful thinking such as Ted Nugent will vote for Romney because they hate Obama so. Sad but true.
There are about 25% of the population that is irretrievable, think Limbaugh and Tony Perkins and Kokes.
"We" need to be communicating with the reasonable people Who are willing to listen to the arguments that the humane solutions are better met by exactly the opposite of what the Republican party is offering them.
The cable media, virtually all of it, does a great job of not dealing with substance of serious issues, they are making killings in the political ad revenues and wasting our time with constant repetition of inconsequential issues like the prostitution scandal in Colombia or continual denigration of personalities.
It is imperative that "we" reach these reasonable people directly. Preaching only to the choir gets no converts.