Many countries with PR solve that problem by establishing a low bar a party has to meet, say 5% of the vote, to get representation. That forces/encourages fringe parties to merge – instead of splitting, which seems to be their natural inclination under a FTTP/SMD system.
I haven’t followed the convention closely but here is my basic take.
The convention needed to do three things :
- “Humanize” Romney and give people a sense of who the man was
- Mount a strong attack on Obama
- Present a persuasive vision of where Romney wants to take the country
My sense is the convention did a reasonable job of the first two but barely attempted the third. Romney hardly talked about his proposals beyond the usual boilerplate. And IMO the third was both the most important and most difficult.
So overall a decent enough convention for Romney but not good enough.
I can see that some sort of limitations would need to be imposed. Other than that, I haven’t looked into it that much.
(Sorry for the late reply. I lost track of this thread.)
You could mention that the two surviving narratives following it are Clint Eastwood and systematic lying, with a backdrop of Katrina Revisited.
I don’t think you’ll find a perceptible bounce at all.
I’m still giving the edge to Obama, but I fear that after the conventions and before the debates we’re going to get into…the motherfuckery.
Romney and Ryan and their surrogates have already shown that they’re beyond shame and they don’t feel constrained by reality, but I can’t shake this feeling that they’re keeping some big powder dry. They’ve got PAC money to carpet-bomb the airwaves, but they’re holding back so far. A loss here would be devastating to the party–it’s bad when an apparatus that big devotes itself to a single four-year goal and can’t pull it off. So I think that in these last two months they’re going to pull out all the stops and leave no chicken unfucked. I foresee dirty tricks, lies, and general mendacity that will make the Swiftboaters look like a glee club.
The two factors that might take the edge off that: 1.) How much shit could they possibly have left to throw at Obama? Not to mention that if they did come up with some new line of attack–even if it were legitimate–it would just get lost in the general pile of horseshit they’ve been slinging all these years. 2.) Obama’s campaign may not be above some motherfuckery of its own if it comes to that.
If there is large-scale motherfuckery planned, I bet we start to see it this week, so that it competes with the DNC. I have no idea what it will look like, but I really do think it’s coming.
There’s a thread titled * Pennsylvania Upholds Voter ID Law* in this forum. In the 2004 close election, Kerry took Pennsylvania by less than 150,000 votes. Pennsylvania’s own government estimates 750,000 voters may be disenfranchised. Romney victory seems like it should be almost impossible, yet Intrade still gives it a 42% chance.
If Romney does win, will right-thinking Americans take it lying down again?
This election will come down to who can win over the rust belt (Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Pennslvania and Michigan).
Not really. Michigan and Penn seem to be comfortable Obama states and I am not sure Romney will seriously contest them. Illinois is obviously Obama. Wisconsin appears to be competitive after the Ryan pick but I am skeptical that Romney will actually win it. Ohio is obviously very important but it isn’t essential for Obama, for example if he wins Florida which seems entirely possible.
That’s the thing for Obama, he has multiple paths to victory involving states with different demographics. Even North Carolina seems competitive now and you could see a scenario where he does relatively poorly with the white working class and loses Ohio but wins North Carolina and Virginia on the back of a strong black turnout.
So, about Ohio.
We all can agree that Romney needs Ohio, right? I mean, not in an absolute sense but in a reasonable path to victory sense?
According to this:
As a former Ohioan, I’m sure that all Ohioans are grateful for this respite from any fraction of political ads. But isn’t this odd?
It indicates they realize they have no chance to win Ohio, but have some calculus that still gets them to 270.
So I went to 270towin.com and played with the interactive map for a while.
This is the only electoral map I was able to come up with that seems like a reasonable path to a Romney victory.
The problem is, it has so many crazy assumptions that I don’t see it as being viable enough for Romney’s campaign to walk away from contesting Ohio.
Does anyone else have any realistic suggestions I’ve missed?
The campaign doesn’t need to air ads in Ohio. There are a dozen PACs doing it for them.
Hmmm, this article says Ohio is one of the swing states they recently started running some ads in. However, Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania are notably missing from the list of states getting the ads. But don’t worry, Jennifer Rubin boldly stenographs that Romney has a secret plan to win those states.
Slate has a pollabout the reaction to the various speeches at the two conventions. It calculates an “enthusiasm rating” by adding up the number who are much more likely and slightly more likely to vote for the candidates as result of each of the speeches. The results:
This suggest that the Democratic convention was more effective than the Republican one and Obama’s speech , despite very mixed pundit reviews, was very effective. I still think it was one of the canniest political speeches in recent years. As a piece of oratory it wasn’t nearly as good as Clinton but in terms of what Obama needed to say to swing voters it was brilliant. All the more so because Obama probably knew about the job numbers the next day which made it even more important to strike a sober tone.
Again what strikes me is the self-discipline. Obama is the finest orator in US politics. He could easily have crafted something far more eloquent. Instead he toned it down knowing fully well that he would be upstaged by Clinton and his wife. That is the kind of smart, disciplined decision which wins close elections.
Actually I meant to post this in the convention thread. Never mind, I think it fits here as well.
Obviously it’s been a good convention for Obama and he is certainly the front-runner as of now. Nate gives him an 80% chance of winning.
Still it will take another few days to get a really clear picture; in particular whether his bounce will endure and whether it translates into better numbers in the swing states. Since the convention I think there have only been a couple of state polls by PPP which have been decent but not spectacular. There are still several swing states, most notably Virginia which haven’t been polled in two weeks.
Perhaps just as important as the poll bounce is the newsthat Obama beat Romney in fundraising in August: $114 million to $112million. A big ad campaign is the one of the last cards Romney has to play and while Romney will still have the advantage, it looks like Obama will be competitive on this front. What’s more, his money is coming through small donations which suggests a surge of enthusiasm in the Democratic base. Not only will this translate into more money after a very successful convention, but also an enthusiastic supply of volunteers as the election nears.