Okay....I've been all warm and cuddly..(Smurfy is the word I used to use in the early days of this blog.) for awhile now. It's time to write about something serious again...Politics. It seems as if the Republicans are trying to line up a viable candidate to run against Barrack Obama next year,
Oh and lets not forget that that also ran named Newt Gingrich's entire staff walked out on him last week...I kid you not...I can't make this stuff up..So right now...His quest for the nomination is either in serious limbo or dead in the water......
That said...That brings us to the rest....Other Republican candidates have officially unveiled their campaigns. They’ve pressed the flesh with voters across the country. And they’ve participated in debates and cattle calls.
With about eight months left until the first Republican Party nominating contests, less than half of Republican primary voters — 45 percent — say they are satisfied with their current crop of presidential candidates, according to a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll. That doesn't bode well for the GOP at all!
That number is substantially lower than the 73 percent of Republicans who were satisfied in the summer of 2007 (when the Republican candidates included John McCain, Rudy Giuliani, Mitt"The New Front runner" Romney and Mike Huckabee), as well as the 68 percent who were satisfied in early 1996 (when Bob Dole won the party nomination...(Was that before or after the Viagra ads? I know that has nothing to do with anything, but I just thought I'd bring that up!).
The frustration those likely to vote Republican have with this 2012 GOP group of candidates explains why some Republicans are searching for others — like Texas Gov. Rick Perry, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (who has said he’s “100 percent certain” he’s not running, Thank God for that!) and even former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin — to join the field.(They must be desperate!)
“In retrospect, the 2007-2008 field looks unusually strong compared to the current crop of candidates,” said Republican pollster Bill McInturff, who conducted the survey with Democratic pollster Peter D. Hart and who served as McCain’s pollster in the 2008 election.(This guy still has a job?)
The current crop includes former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, former Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty,(WHO?) Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann,( She makes Sarah Palin look like a Rhodes Scholar) Texas Rep. Ron Paul and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum.(Puh-lease!) Next week, former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman will join that group.
(Again...WHO???)
According to Democratic pollster, Pete Hart- "Republican voters obviously sense that there is something that is weak about this field.” Me too!
I guess I should cheer but in all truth, President Obama is not exactly home free, despite this weak cast of charactors..President Obama has weaknesses of his own — including an American public that’s pessimistic about the nation’s direction and the state of the U.S. economy — that foreshadow a potentially close general election.
According to the poll, 62 percent of the voters think the nation is headed in the wrong direction versus 29 percent who think it’s going in the right direction. What’s more, a plurality of 44 percent believes the U.S. economy is in store for another recession. And a whopping 69 percent say that high gas prices have affected them either “a great deal” or “quite a bit.”
Unless President Obama can steer this economy back to at least a semblance of what it was before 2008...We could very well be talking about President Mitt Romney in 2012 and that wouldn't be funny at all.
But...Remember...there is always a But! Despite the pessimism and current economic headwinds, the president’s overall numbers are holding steady, even though his Osama bin Laden bump is officially over. How soon we forget!
President Obama’s job-approval rating in the poll sits at 49 percent who approve to 46 percent who disapprove, which is down from 52 percent to 41 percent after Osama bin Laden was killed in early May.
In addition though, President Obama still leads Mitt Romney — the early GOP front-runner — by six points in a hypothetical general-election match up, 49 percent to 43 percent. And he’s ahead of Pawlenty(WHO?) by 13 points, 50 percent to 37 percent.
Peter Hart the Democratic pollster, cites three reasons why President Obama is staying afloat. One is his personal popularity and charisma, with this poll showing him with a 49 percent to 37 percent favorable/unfavorable rating. (That’s compared with 27 percent to 26 percent for Mitt Romney, 14 percent to 15 percent for Pawlenty, 24 percent to 54 percent for Palin and a record-setting 16 percent to 48 percent for former House Speaker Gingrich. (Okay...you can stop laughing now.
According to Peter Hart, a second advantage is Congress, whose approval rating in the poll is a dismal 18 percent. This is the Republican controlled -Tea party congress that was going to do sooo much isn't it?
A third reason is that the American public isn’t blaming President Obama for the current economy, with more than six in 10 respondents still saying he inherited the country’s economic problems from his Oval Office predecessor. Well ,I'm glad for that.
I did ask who the Republican Front runner was didn't I? I think you know...It's Mitt Romney...Hasn't his name come up first in the previous paragraphs and polls?
He has the best numbers ,if you can call those numbers the best!
Mitt Romney, however has two hurdles he must leap over..The first is the similarity between his Massachusetts health care law and the federal one President Obama signed into law in 2010.
When told that Mitt Romney opposes the federal law requiring that nearly all Americans have health insurance — but that Romney’s own law continued a similar requirement — 34 percent of GOP primary voters said that those facts diminished their favorable impression of the Republican presidential candidate. Twenty-one percent said it made their impression more favorable, and 42 percent said it made no difference. Just shows once again that Republicans live on one planet and the rest of us live on yet another.
A second hurdle is that just 24 percent of total respondents in the poll have confidence in Romney’s skills and ability to be president. Back in Sept. 2007, Hillary Clinton (46 percent),Rudy Giuliani (36 percent),Barrack Obama (32 percent), John McCain (31 percent) and John Edwards (31 percent) all had higher scores on this question than Romney does now.
But he is the Front Runner...All I can say is...The next few months are going to be very interesting.
1 comment:
Great writing!! Your points are clear and well supported. What a primary season we're going to have! I watched the "debate" if it could be called a debate! Republicans are together in their spewing that the president has falled to lead on jobs, healthcare, and the wars. Their proposals are all about lowering taxes and cutting services. For the past ten years the tax rate has been adjusted to meet Congress's requests and in those same 10 years jobs have evaporated. The wealthy have taken their tax credits and used it for their own benefit. They shut down manufacturing here which paid a family sustaining wage to ship jobs to countries where owners can pay a "slave wage" and keep profits for themselves. Asked where the jobs are that were created by the reduced tax rates and what's the answer? Nothing! They can't lie that fast. On healthcare the main party for personal responsibility is flipflopping. When the president mandates coverage, then it's a problem. Even the "warmongers" oppose action in Libya??!!
Tighten your seatbelt, we're in for a bumpy ride!
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