Which, some people say, might have something to do with the fact that all the current campaigners are a little “off”. Also too, President Obama has a preternatural gift for drawing the least competent opponents of any political figure in my lifetime. Dan Balz at the Washington Post, in its capacity as the official paper of the company town whose industry is national politics, lays out “five factors that make this year different”:
This is one of the latest-starting, slowest-developing and most changeable nomination battles in modern memory. In the previous campaign, John McCain filed his papers with the Federal Election Commission days after the 2006 midterms. At least two Democrats held formal announcements before the end of the year. Mitt Romney was in shortly after New Year’s Day 2007. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton were up and running in January 2007 and never slowed a step…
__
Romney didn’t file his papers until spring. Newt Gingrich had made several false starts toward filing by then but did not finally become a candidate until later in the spring. Herman Cain formally joined in May, Michele Bachmann and Jon Huntsman in June. Perry didn’t announce until August.
__
That hesitancy fed the second difference between campaign 2012 and others. This year’s contest has also been notable for the number of prominent Republicans who talked about running, and in some cases were urged to run, but who ultimately chose not to. They include former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, businessman Donald Trump, Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels, Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, former Florida governor Jeb Bush, former Alaska governor Sarah Palin and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie…
__
That illustrates the third big difference. In this nomination battle, there really hasn’t been a dominant front-runner, as there has been in the past. Romney is generally described as the front-runner and has been from the start. But some months ago, the Gallup organization described him as one of the weakest front-runners in the modern history of Republican races, given that he has been stuck or stable in the polls at about 25 percent.
__
More telling, perhaps, is the fact that seven people have had a share of the lead in the Republican race at some point this year in one or more polls. Seven! They are: Romney; Huckabee; Trump; Palin; former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani; Perry; and Cain. Has there ever been a more fluid race or a more unpredictable GOP electorate?
__
The fourth big difference is in the way candidates are running their campaigns, based on traditional measurements of activity. Start with fundraising. At the end of the third quarter in 2007, Republican candidates collectively had raised about $230 million. This year, the field has raised just $85 million. Everyone says fundraising is more difficult this year. There is the proof…
__
That brings us to the fifth and most important difference. Republicans are engaged in a national campaign, one that has played out less in living rooms in Iowa or town halls in New Hampshire and more on debate stages in those and other states, on prime time and Sunday morning shows on Fox News and through cable commentary, blog posts and tweets. Debates have shaped and reshaped the field and are likely to produce more changes before the New Year arrives and the primaries and caucuses begin. GOP candidates can get their message out to activists by appearing on Fox as often as they’re welcome. (Note that Romney has been the least visible here.) Social media may be playing more of a role than anyone knows in organizing efforts, but no one can tell that yet.
So… nobody important wanted to lead the parade, the “favorite” candidate has very few fans, and whatever bets are being made aren’t being made at the racetrack window or the OTB parlors either. How much of this is horserace-handicapping, how much statistical gamesmanship, and how much a preparatory GOP Whinge Chorus of Our guy was nursing an injury/bad bounce/lost it in the sun/hoocoodanode/outspent by evil Yankee-style opponents who elevate mere winning over the Sacred Values of America’s Pastime?
(As for the mixed metaphors, I never claimed to know from sports, and I think the politics-as-sports framing is destructive in any event. But isn’t a year out from the actual election a tad early for the Rethugs to start making excuses?)
David Koch
Hillary was incompetent? I didn’t know that.
Villago Delenda Est
With the possible exception of Huntsman (and he’s been making crazy noises so not to stand out too much from the rest of the crowd) they’re all batshit insane, more or less. Some more (Bachmann, Paul, Perry, Cain, Santorum) some slightly less (Romney, Newt). Some are invisible (Roemer). Hmmm, did I forget someone? I may have. When you have all those bozos bouncing around a debate stage, it’s hard to keep count.
On edit: Yeah, forgot about Johnson. Can you blame me?
RalfW
A bit O/T, but Digby linked to a piece today that gives a little more insight into why the GOP is so eager to slash certain government departments:
(Here in MN, the Repubs tried to cut our Dept of Human Rights 65%, but the Gov kept the cut to 5%)
Linda Featheringill
Only the smart ones. Those who realize that the current candidates couldn’t fight their way out of a paper bag.
Southern Beale
I thought Leonard Pitts’ column on the right’s sudden pious indignation over racism very well done:
Ouch.
Anne Laurie
@David Koch:
I was an Edwards supporter, and we all know how that one ended. But even the most hardcore Hillary defenders of my acquaintance admit that her “trusted” campaign staff couldn’t have done worse if they were trying to lose it for her. If he had an iota of shame, Mark Penn would’ve committed seppuku on national television.
Gravenstone
@David Koch: Would you argue that her campaign’s incomprehensible decision to largely cede the early caucus states to the Obama camp was anything but a mark of abject stupidity
dmsilev
@David Koch: Hillary herself is very competent, but during that campaign, she seemed to have an unerring instinct towards choosing the worst possible advisors. See: Penn, Mark.
Litlebritdifrnt2
@David Koch:
Hillary wasn’t incompetent, her campaign manager however WAS, and why anyone even bothers to listen to that asshole is beyond me. The Hillary campaign is still in debt to Mark Penn to the tune of 100s of thousands, in debt to a moron who didn’t know how the fucking delegate system worked.
General Stuck
None of them white wingnuts want to end up like John Mccain, the guy that lost to the smartypants nigger. So instead, they seem to be trying their best to lose in the most stylish way possible. The Mittster changing positions with the lunar cycles – Perry doing whackjob standup, probly shit faced. Except for Cain, of course, who might just end up with the bouquet when the dancing stops. For which he will auction it off on Ebay, soon as possible.
There is just all kinds of juicy Freudian shit going on. And then there is Mitt, who wants to be presnit in the worst way, but he is the sociopath with no soul. None, nada, zilch. And it’s too late to grow one of those at this stage of the game.
(another) Josh
The Clintons have now and then underestimated their opponents.
Villago Delenda Est
@Anne Laurie:
That would be one more iota than Dick Morris has even dreamed of ever having.
RossInDetroit
I’m still amazed at what’s happened to the GOP. Where’s the old system where they just teed up the guy whose turn it was an proceeded in single file to the Convention to crown him.
To me, that’s the big story of this primary cycle. The old GOP has lost its hold.
Snowball
The fourth big difference is in the way candidates are running their campaigns, based on traditional measurements of activity. Start with fundraising. At the end of the third quarter in 2007, Republican candidates collectively had raised about $230 million. This year, the field has raised just $85 million. Everyone says fundraising is more difficult this year. There is the proof…
Isn’t it actually the opposite? With Citizens United, the Republicans will actually have tons more to spend, not less.
boss bitch
@David Koch:
what they all said.
RossInDetroit
@Snowball:
My understanding is that CU spending is all outside the campaigns. It’s not counted in the candidates’ haul. It may offset a lot of the low direct fundraising by financing advertising that the candidate doesn’t have to pay for directly.
Amir Khalid
@Litlebritdifrnt2:
True enough about Mark Penn. But that Hillary hired him, losing track record and all, was hardly a positive sign about her own executive ability. Obama’s own smooth-running and very effective campaign org, which outsmarted and outfought everyone else’s, took him from little-known freshman senator to the White House. It was by far the best one in 2008, and one of the main reasons I thought him the best candidate that year.
Brian R.
@David Koch:
Not her particularly, but she did rely on Mark Penn for advice.
ETA: I see I’m not the first to mention Penn. But that guy can’t be mocked enough. I want him nowhere near a Democratic candidate ever again.
Thoroughly Pizzled
I’m becoming convinced that Huntsman is a Democratic mole on a mission to destroy Mitt Romney.
MonkeyBoy
The GOP primaries seem so much like a clown circus I sometimes worry that they are just meant to be a distraction.
A distraction from what nefarious ongoing plot I can’t figure out.
RossInDetroit
@Thoroughly Pizzled:
Simply by standing near him and appearing sane as a contrast. That works on all the rest of them as well.
sherifffruitfly
“Also too, President Obama has a preternatural gift for drawing the least competent opponents”
Yah… I don’t do the white liberal “Obama is lucky” bullshit.
NOBODY GOOD WANTS TO RUN AGAINST HIM you stupid sack of shit.
Baud
I just hope the clown show continues into the general election. I don’t care about winning pretty — just winning.
Linda Featheringill
@Amir Khalid:
During 2008, there were some business management seminars that were using the Obama campaign as a model of good management. Even before they realized how effective it would be.
AkaDad
To be fair, she competently dodged sniper fire in Bosnia.
Suffern ACE
I can’t believe that this campaign started later than it did in 2008. It seems like the press has been reporting on these candidates and running the horse race since 2005 at this point.
JWL
For no good reason, at least that I could possibly explain, I believe the GOP will nominate a dark horse at their convention.
rikyrah
For black Americans, government employment is a crucial means of upward mobility. The federal work force is 18.6 percent African-American, compared with 10.9 percent in the private sector. The percentages of African-Americans are highest in just those agencies that are most actively targeted for cuts by Republicans: the Department of Housing and Urban Development, 38.3 percent; the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, 42.4 percent; and the Education Department, 36.6 percent.
Which is why the GOP went after Government workers in the states. Most people don’t know that the Black Middle Class was built through public sector jobs, because:
1. You more than likely had to take a test for them
2. They were UNIONIZED, so the rules were set out.
So, when they talk about Black unemployment going higher, OF COURSE IT WENT HIGHER -THE FUCKING GOP WAS CUTTING GOVERNMENT POSITIONS, which hit Black workers harder.
DUH.
Then, we had that bullshyt about the President and Black unemployment, like Black unemployment was so peachy keen before January 20, 2009.
WHY do you think the GOP is after the USPS?
One out of every five workers in the USPS is Black.
duh
Baud
@JWL: It’s happened before, but it would be odd in this day and age to go with someone brand new.
askew
@David Koch:
Hillary is a mediocre politician. Without the Bill Clinton machine behind her, she would have been out of the primary race by the end of February after she lost 11 straight states to Obama.
I do get sick of this constant need for the media/left to try to explain away Obama’s political wins as luck, instead of acknowledging Obama is a once in a generation politician. He’s by far the best politician I’ve seen in my lifetiem.
Rome Again
@Thoroughly Pizzled:
How so? For him to succeed, he would actually have to be significant. He’s NOT!
xian
@David Koch: well, you don’t know much. It was Hillary’s race to lose. She hired incompetents who didn’t even game out how the delegates are selected. They signed up for a victory lap and lost to a team of scrappers.
But of course the real incompetents have been unelectable opponents such as Keyes.
Amir Khalid
Further to my point in #17, I think the US media would do well to look at presidential candidates’ campaign organizations, and how each candidate interacts with his own org. How he sets its tone, what kind of people he brings in, how he manages it, how effective its outreach is, etc. That would tell American voters (and the world) a lot about what kind of president they’d be getting. It would certainly be more valuable than the coverage they’re doing now — all about polling and verbal lapses, recording the noise rather than the substance of what’s going on.
Sly
@JWL:
I don’t think modern conventions allow for that possibility. The last time a “dark horse” won a nomination, I believe, was Wendell Willkie in 1940.
Rome Again
@Amir Khalid:
b-b-b-but, that would just be about how they are at ORGANIZING! :P
MikeJ
@Amir Khalid: I just wrote a long comment about checking the number of precinct captains each candidate has. You’re right. Iowa is won on organization, which means either the most money or the bestest pep rallies for school spirit. Obama had both last time. Everybody hates all of the Republicans, but Romney has money. Bet on Romney to win.
Nutella
@Rome Again:
Community organizing!
David Koch
Obama is genetically lucky. To paraphrase eminent anthropologist Jimmy the Greek, Obama was bred to be lucky.
Why a skinny black guy with a funny moooslim name beating the most famous woman in the world was like taking candy from a firebagger.
moonbat
@askew: Seconded.
The entire national media apparatus was in the bag for Hillary to win the nomination in a cakewalk, the rest of the field were supposed to be feel-good tokens. She was the anointed frontrunner before the first vote was cast, which is why I think her staff thought they could afford to be so lazy. Penn thought he was backing the natural winner and then when he realized he’d actually have to work for it, everything fell apart.
WereBear (itouch)
Would make a heckuva Pay Per View!
And yes, I agree. I actually felt HRC stumbled badly, there.
dmsilev
@Amir Khalid: It’s an important point. Cain, to take a prominent current example, has a horrendous campaign organization, at least as far as we can tell so far. His schedule is completely weird (he should be focusing on the early tetrad of states and on fundraising, but instead is more or less on a random walk), and the campaign’s crisis management skills appear to be textbook examples of what not to do.
SiubhanDuinne
@Amir Khalid:
Didn’t the NYT or someone do this kind of story about Cain and his team recently (but before the sexual harassment rumours surfaced)? He sounded like a bullying jerk according to some of the anecdotes.
dmsilev
@askew:
Obama is a damn good politician, but he’s also been lucky in his opponents. In the IL 2004 Senate race, his main opponent in the primary imploded a few weeks before the election. In that same primary, the Republicans picked Jack Ryan, who subsequently experienced one of the most surreal sex scandals in modern political history (if you’re not familiar with it, Google ‘Ryan Paris sex club’). He withdrew, and to replace him, the state GOP selected professional crazy person Alan Keyes. Obama was probably going to win that election anyway (outside of Republican wave years, Illinois is pretty blue), but he had some damn good luck in his opponents.
Omnes Omnibus
Never mind.
RossInDetroit
Four years ago I was paying more attention to the media than to the candidates. I was pretty sure we’d be looking at a HRC/Rudy race. The actual mechanics of the nominating process produced considerably different results than the MSM’s perfunctory popularity contest.
I won’t make that mistake again, but it looks like the MSM haven’t learned anything.
Maude
@AkaDad:
But it was a close call.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
@askew:
He’s certainly one of the best, though I’d put Clinton up there with him.
However, it is also true that his opponents have been comedically inept. You can’t attribute the implosion of both the best primary and general election candidates against him in 2004 to anything but good fortune on his part. I suspect that he’d have won the general anyway, but I doubt that he’d have made it through the primary.
Then again, most of the great generals in history have built their reputation’s against sheer incompetents. Napoleon did. Lee, whatever you think of his merits, got to tee off on McClellan, Burnside and Hooker. The German General Staff made its name fighting multiple iterations of bad French leadership, from Mac-Mahon to Plan XVII to Gamelin. My pick for greatest WWII general is Slim, but his biggest victory was the result of successfully predicting that the Japanese would starve themselves to death if he gave them the opportunity.
There’s nothing wrong with being in the company of guys like Napoleon and Slim.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
@RossInDetroit: I called the 2008 Democratic nomination three years ahead of time, except that I just picked Not Clinton to win. I got the dynamics right of Clinton stumbling badly once the field was down to just her and one other person.
I read the Republican field properly only in the sense that I called that it wouldn’t be Rudy. As late as that January, I said, “None of these guys can win, but even though one of them has to, it won’t be McCain.”
For whatever it’s worth, I’m feeling the same way about Romney. I just don’t see enough of the people currently picking someone else changing to him. I’d bet that his ceiling of support among Republican primary voters is under 40%. I really think that that’s why we’re seeing Cain last longer in opposition to him than anyone else has to date: too much of the base just hates Mitt. I’m not terribly confident about this prediction anymore, though. I’m just at the “None of these clowns can possibly win the nomination” stage.
agrippa
I don’t nuthin’ about politics.
But, the GOP field looks like a bunch of cowboys with no cattle and no hat.
I do not know why that is. Maybe no one worth anything actually wants the job? Won’t be the first time that happened.
RossInDetroit
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
Not sufficiently appreciated. Part of winning is not blowing it. Whatever you think of what Obama did right, there’s a great deal that he didn’t do WRONG as well. The primary race was long and had numerous pitfalls that had to be avoided. A good organization minimizes the unforced errors and lets you hang on to your gains. Obama should get credit for that.
agrippa
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
Got it in one.
jheartney
The media have a supernatural talent for focusing on irrelevancy. It isn’t so much incompetence as it is that their actual aim (stir up enough pseudo-suspense to attract eyeballs) has next to nothing to do with traditional journalism.
In the Obama lucky vs. good controversy, he’s been plenty of both. Never go up against
a SicilianObama whendeathpolitical victory is on the line.Jesse Ewiak
Yeah, if you go in the comments sections of site like K-Lo’s House of Crazy, especially on any stories that are in any way positive toward ole’ Mitt, the vitriol toward him is kind of a amazing. These people are so certain Obama is doomed and that anybody could beat him.
It’s a little less on more sane sites like RRH (a spinoff of the Republican’s that commented on Swing State Project), but they just think Romney will win with 320 EV’s and the large majorities in Congress made up of Tea Partiers will keep him in line. But, they don’t trust him either.
Abby
There may be a little something going on here, as Michael Moore said, “maybe the Republicans don’t need a candidate, maybe their man is already in the White House”.
Yutsano
@Abby: Michael Moore can STFU. Or get his ass elected somewhere and see how politics really works.
Omnes Omnibus
@Abby: Uh huh. Right. Yeah. Anything you say.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@sherifffruitfly: I think Obama has been very good at running and his job, I do think that he’s also been lucky to be running against this group of clowns with Confederate flags painted on their faces. And yes, the smart Republicans have realized that they don’t want to be “the Republican that loses to a Kenyan,” which leaves us with what we have.
A point: If you want to point out that someone is making a racist statement, you don’t conclude it with “you stupid sack of shit” if you want the other person to consider it. Anne isn’t trolling.
Baud
@Abby: Ha! The other day on BJ I was criticized for saying I heard MM was not on our side. Thanks for vindicating me.
Omnes Omnibus
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN): Speaking of Napoleon, he is alleged to have asked of his aides, “Is he lucky?” when they recommended an officer to him for promotion.
MikeJ
@Jesse Ewiak:
What’s particularly funny about it is that in this morning’s Times Mag, Silver says the only Republican with a better chance than Romney is Huntsman. Huntsman doesn’t even show up as a figure of hate since he worked for the Kenyan usurper dealing with the chicoms.
Suffern ACE
@Abby: Well, he’s had months to find a vanity candidate to primary Obama and test that with Democratic voters. How did that work out?
Calouste
@RossInDetroit:
Four years ago most of the MSM didn’t even realize that the Democratic primaries were not winner-takes-all until fairly close to the convention.
Lolis
@Abby:
OMG, talk to any Republican, from the richest to the poorest, and none would agree with that. Michael Moore is a loon.
SRW1
@JWL:
The Cain campaign would like to thank you for that endorsement.
suzanne
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
This is where I’m at, too. I can’t see Mitt winning because they all hate him so much. But none of these other douchebags seems likely to win, either. The logical end of my prediction is no one wins and they all just decide to sit this election out.
Obviously, I know that isn’t going to happen. But I really can’t see Romney bringing together a large enough coalition. I predict a surprise.
rikyrah
so very true.
so very true.
loses to a Kenyan?
no.
how about loses to ‘that Nigger’.
plain and simple.
xian
@dmsilev: “…the state GOP selected professional crazy person Alan Keyes…”
Don’t you mean professional Black ultraconservative and crazy person Alan Keyes? One mistake Republicans keep making is assuming tokenism and then mirroring it. It also explains Steele and to some extent Cain.
MikeJ
@suzanne:
All of the same people that hate hate hate Mitt could not stand McCain last time around, and you saw how well they did stopping the person who was next in line.
priscianusjr
@David Koch:
dmsilev
@xian: Well, I’m sure that Keyes’s skin color was one reason that the state GOP imported him. Another part that is rumored was that there were some pretty nasty power struggles inside the state party at the time and supposedly one faction suggested Keyes as a way of discrediting the party leadership (i.e. they knew what a loon he was, and figured that the backsplatter from his selection would discredit the leadership).
xian
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN): I remember riding the T back from a night at the Democratic National Convention in Boston in ’04 (I was one of the accredited bloggers there) with some African-American delegates and we were all aglow about the amazing speech this fellow Obama had made. We all agreed he’d be president “someday.”
Chris
@MikeJ:
The last time, I think the reason McCain won was that as hated as he was, the people to his right was split into factions that couldn’t agree on a candidate (Romney for big business, Huckabee for the religious right, Paul for the libertarians, Tancredo for the anti-immigrant racists). So McCain ended up winning by default.
The funny thing is that the same sort of dynamic seems to be happening this time, but without the factionalism. There are no factions on the hard right this time around, it’s sort of just fused together into one big ill-defined mess (the teabaggers), and the crazy candidates (Bachmann, Perry, Cain) are all just vying for that same vote. We’ll see how that turns out…
Anoniminous
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
IMO Erich von Manstein was the best in WW 2. He was also responsible for the development of the StuG-III, arguably the best all-round armored vehicle of the war.
ETA: I agree with you re: Obama
xian
@dmsilev: interesting! I didn’t know that and it does help explain the bizarre choice. I figured it was something of a desperation move as well.
Funny thing is, one of the PUMA complaints about Obama is that “he doesn’t wait his turn.”
Hal
I don’t think Hillary was incompetent. I just think she assumed she was going to be the one and didn’t prepare for a long, drawn out fight. Clearly she wasn’t upset at not having the Michigan and Florida votes counted until Obama kept winning, either. She was all prepared to be the one right after Iowa, and when she wasn’t she seemed to rely far too much on Mark Penn, her husband, and all of her old Clinton advisers.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@rikyrah: I totally agree. When Republican’s use “Kenyan” it’s spelled N-I-G-G-E-R. No difference other than what makes them comfortable. Kind of like Herman Cain.
suzanne
@MikeJ:
Not to the same degree. The Tea Party wasn’t the organized force it is today, and McCain had the war hero thing going on. And he wasn’t a Mormon. So while they might fall in line, I see a lot more of them potentially staying home this time around.
Matt Salmon, who was a popular Arizona congresscritter before losing the race for governor to Janet Napolitano, attributes his loss to anti-Mormon sentiment. Apparently there was a large number (more than the margin of victory) of straight-ticket Republican ballots that omitted a vote for governor only. And this was in Arizona, where there’s Mormons all over the place and they’re a powerful voting bloc. So I think that in places where Mormons are less populous, Romney will fare even worse.
G
@(another) Josh:
Bill in ’92 had to run against a pretty decent field in the primary.
in ’96 the GOP trotted out DOle and Kemp because they expected to lose.
As for 2008,and 2012, the GOP with the purity purges has really given itself a hard time in picking an electable nominee. To make a candidate acceptable to the Koch moneybags _ and the Christian fundis at the same time means you’ve got to get some cognitive dissonance in your voters.
I mean 2012 in any historical sense would be an election that a credible GOP candidate would have a shot at. But they really seem hell bent on avoiding Romney, Huntsman and the already done Pawlenty. The rest are also rans, though perry, if he had managed to not screw it up…
It boils down to 2012, I just don’t get it. 2008 was St John of Hanoi’s turn. the economy just plain stinks in 2012, there’s blood in the water. And they can’t find a credible front person for their show.
either their “A team” is waiting to face a non-incumbent in 2016, or they think they can’t win in 2012.
Phoenician in a time of Romans
@RossInDetroit:
To me, that’s the big story of this primary cycle. The old GOP has lost its hold.
Wouldn’t be the first time the Establishment Right encouraged a bunch of wingnut yahoos in a time of economic crisis, only to find the tail wagging the dog…
catclub
As a possible data point, the Iowa Elections market has Romney at about 75% nominated. not Romney and Perry are tied around 15%, Cain is only included as none of the others.
I do not know what the market was four years ago, either on the Democratic or GOP sides.
MikeJ
@G:
Their A team are all unelectable in a Republican primary.
@catclub: I remember the IA market having Dean as a lock until minutes after Kerry trounced him. Not a particularly good predictor, but very good at reflecting the CW. The CW sometimes matches up with what voters actually think, but that’s a coin toss.
Phoenician in a time of Romans
@dmsilev:
Obama is a damn good politician, but he’s also been lucky in his opponents. In the IL 2004 Senate race, his main opponent in the primary imploded a few weeks before the election. In that same primary, the Republicans picked Jack Ryan, who subsequently experienced one of the most surreal sex scandals in modern political history (if you’re not familiar with it, Google ‘Ryan Paris sex club’). He withdrew, and to replace him, the state GOP selected professional crazy person Alan Keyes. Obama was probably going to win that election anyway (outside of Republican wave years, Illinois is pretty blue), but he had some damn good luck in his opponents.
Personally, I put it down to Borg time-travellers sabotaging his opponents in order to bring him to power for their own nefarious reasons…
Chris
@G:
Part of me’s thought for a while that the Republican Party either thinks it can’t win or doesn’t want to win, because if it did, it would inherit the worst economy out there and have no freaking clue how to fix it. Despite the “I hope he fails” mantra, I wonder if some of their campaign strategists aren’t secretly praying he succeeds, so that their next President can inherit a prosperous and happy America like Bush did.
catclub
As a followup, I checked and found that as far as the Iowa market is concerned, Romney is already nominated. In December, 2007 Giuliani was still the frontrunner, but with about 40% share.
From those electronic market’s perspective, 2012 is just like all the other ‘GOP selects the number two guy from last time’ years, and Romney is it.
Anya
@David Koch: LOL.
I love how on the left it’s “Obama has been lucky in his opponents,” and on the right it’s “Obama was elected because he is black.”
Yes, Allen Keys was a nutcase who had no chance at winning, but he defeated the Clinton machine and and the darling of the Village. Luck had nothing to do with neither of those wins.
Phoenician in a time of Romans
@suzanne:
Obviously, I know that isn’t going to happen. But I really can’t see Romney bringing together a large enough coalition. I predict a surprise.
Er, why not simply Cain with Romney as VP?
Man, I’d hate to be the Secret Service guy in charge of keeping President Cain safe whenever Romney was in town…
suzanne
@Phoenician in a time of Romans:
I’ve heard Gingrich proposed as a Cain running mate. That seems more plausible to me. Cain, with no Washington experience, would pick an insider.
Cacti
@Phoenician in a time of Romans:
Romneybot 2012’s ego-chip won’t let that happen.
At 64 years old, he knows this is his last shot at the White House.
Redshift
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
I wouldn’t be too sure. Jonathan Bernstein posted about a recent poll that showed the “would never vote for” for Romney down to 10%. (Can’t find the link, unfortunately, so I’m not sure what the details of the poll were.)
AxelFoley
@Abby:
Damn, does this site attract loons, or what? Somewhere, a bridge is missing its troll.
amk
@askew: This.
The fucking beltway media never wanted to give him any credit for his wins and the fucking blogs like this that just parrot the bw media talking points.
amk
@Abby: yeah, mm, the pity porn peddler, is the all knowing gnome.
JGabriel
Anne Laurie @ Top:
I think it’s more that Obama has a gift that makes other people look more incompetent in comparison. Think about it, would Mitt look quite as goofy next to Kerry or Hillary as he does next to Obama?
Probably not. Granted, Alan Keyes looks crazy next to anyone not in an asylum, but, again, would McCain have looked quite so old and befuddled next to Hillary, John Edwards, Joe Biden, Bill Richardson, or any of the other 2008 primary candidates?
It’s not just that Obama draws out incompetent opponents, something in his demeanor — black, intelligent, unflappable — brings out the worst in their campaigning skills.
.
Kathleen
@rikyrah: Thank you! I totally agree.
xian
@JGabriel:
This!
boss bitch
@dmsilev:
It is not luck when your opponent fucks up. Obama kept his shit together. Kept his hands clean and was ready for anything and everything. Winning the lotto is lucky. Working your ass off and keeping your nose clean isn’t. Its discipline and persistence.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
“Chance favors the prepared mind.”
There’s nothing wrong with pointing out that Obama has been something of a perfect storm of luck and preparation and intelligence.
That’s not to say that it’s been all luck. Look at Romney. He’s been incredibly lucky in his opponents in this primary, but he’s been unable to take advantage of it.
amk
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: Bingo.
Fuck all this luck talk.
RossInDetroit
@xian:
I heard that speech on the radio while driving. Had only the faintest idea who Obama was. I turned to my wife and said “That guy could be President”. Just an impression based on the speech. If you go back and listen to it, it’s an outstanding piece of political oratory.
cleter
@David Koch: Well, yes. No one has gone from being such a prohibitive frontrunner to being an also-ran. She had a 29 point lead over Obama at this point, and she lost. She had a bigger lead than Mondale in 83 or Gore in 99. Historically, it was the worst performance by a Democratic frontrunner in decades, if not ever.
cleter
@G: I have to disagree about Bill in 92. Strong primary field? Tsongas? Jerry Brown? Really? Clinton had a really weak primary field, because a lot of A-list candidates thought Bush was a lock in 91 and opted to wait for 96, when they could run against Quayle. Having an Iowa senator and a New Hampshire neighbor Massachussets senator neutralized the importance of Iowa and New Hampshire, and enhanced the importance of the early Southern states that favored Clinton. Clinton ran a good campaign, sure, but he lucked out that people like Gore and Cuomo bowed out.
Larryb
@Anne Laurie:
This overstates the case, I think. It’s not that the Clinton campaign was so bad. It just never built the movement (“Yes, we can!”) that the brilliant Obama campaign did. It’s cold comfort, but at least I never drank that Kool-aid.
aretino
@MikeJ:
The Repubs’ rules are different this time in a way that hinders Romney from repeating McCain’s success. McCain was able to build up a huge lead over a fragmented field in Florida and the Super Tuesday primaries because of winner-take-all rules. That lead made his nomination so inevitable that the wingnuts had to fall in line. This time the rules compel all but the late (that is April, May, and June) contests to have a stronger proportional element. So Romney will not be able to secure great swathes of delegates while drawing only 25% of the vote against divided opposition.
While several teabagger candidates remain in the running, the rules will stifle Romney’s ability to build a lead. When all but one of the teabaggers has been culled, the winner-take-all rules of the late primaries will allow the last one standing to rack up overwhelming delegate majorities (since very few of the teabagger voters will switch to Romney). It’s very hard to see a way through for Mitt.
sukabi
Anne you should know, over the last decade or so, it’s become increasingly clear that it’s NEVER too early for the R’s to start with the whining excuses… I think it’s a direct result of their refusal to do anything constructive… it’s become part of their DNA and their mantra…. ‘the government can’t do anything right’ has become ‘can’t do anything right’ and has lead to preemptive excuse making and whining….
adding… this is what happens when nepotism trumps merit and ‘class’ trumps all… you get a bunch of wealthy boobs and their ‘yes men’ running rampant, fucking up the works.
Edo
Can anyone say Biden?
Catzmaw
@askew:
Ditto. Couldn’t agree more. Same reason why I get so annoyed at the pompous keyboard commandos at sites from DKos to FDL who prattle about how Obama just “doesn’t understand” and they have to tell him because, you know, he’s just a simple-minded Negro who lucked into the Presidency. The man has an extraordinary gift for figuring out the political winds and tacking toward them, usually against the advice of people who give themselves far too much credit for understanding how to maximize political advantage. Personally I find him to be one of the most clearheaded strategic political thinkers this country has ever seen.
Catzmaw
@sukabi:
Spot on. Having gone from being merely critical of big government (even as its leadership – Reagan – expanded it exponentially) to declaring the government incapable of getting anything right the GOP has been cartoonified into a haven of right wing anti-government ideologues begging to be put in charge of an entity they despise and distrust and which they accept as an article of faith cannot do anything well. No wonder their field of potential candidates is dominated by unelectable idiots.
NRH
@aretino: Excellent analysis. Romney has to pray that everyone falls in line behind him in the end, or that multiple teabaggers stay in the race all spring long and split the vote in those winner-take-all states. Even then I’m not sure he could pull in a majority of votes; presuming two teabaggers splitting votes, they’d probably each win several states, and have a mess at the convention.
NRH
@Snowball: Sort of. Citizens United might mean that more money gets spent, but the big corporate donors who can ladle out the money might be less inclined to actually share it with the campaigns. They’d want to keep a bit of plausible deniability so they don’t face economic backlash for their political advocacy from consumers, which they can’t do if they donate to candidates. So Republicans might actually face a very low-dollar year in terms of money under their direct control, but have a very large amount of corporate cash backing them. Which could also mean an enormous Democratic advantage if the corporate donors decide to pull back and not waste their money at the end, when the Republican candidate would want to be spending every last dime.
xian
@RossInDetroit: I get the same “tingle” about Liz Warren.
belvia
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