# How Can Romney Possibly Win? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [August 24, 2012, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452 "2012-08-24T03:51:21Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/201 "2012-08-27T15:52:27Z")
How can Romney win? Isaac makes landfall in New Orleans or close and if the emergency response is anything but perfect (or can be spun that way), it’s all Obama’s fault, Obama’s Katrina, and the GOP has a perfect podium this week for pounding on that. ---
**Author:** ![Kolak\_of\_Twilo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kolak_of_twilo/32/73_2.png) [@Kolak\_of\_Twilo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kolak_of_Twilo)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/202 "2012-08-27T15:54:17Z")
> [@Kenm](#): > > The OP asked how Romney could win. I posted a link answering it. And my response was based on the fact the article you linked doesn’t say what you want it to say. The theoretical bankruptcy it talks about isn’t suggested to happen until some time AFTER the election or by the end of a possible Obama second term. How would that get Romney elected in 2012? As I suggested, it would be helpful to actually read what you link to before posting. ---
**Author:** ![Kenm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bc79bd/32.png) [@Kenm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kenm)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/203 "2012-08-27T16:14:28Z")
> [@Kolak\_of\_Twilo](#): > > And my response was based on the fact the article you linked doesn’t say what you want it to say. It don’t _want_ it to say anything. > [@](#): > > As I suggested, it would be helpful to actually read what you link to before posting. Take it to the pit or shut up. ---
**Author:** ![Kolak\_of\_Twilo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kolak_of_twilo/32/73_2.png) [@Kolak\_of\_Twilo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kolak_of_Twilo)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/204 "2012-08-27T16:30:02Z")
> [@Kenm](#): > > It don’t _want_ it to say anything.Take it to the pit or shut up. Really? That sounds far more like language suitable for the pit than anything I’ve said. What you seem to be missing is this - the article you linked talks about GM declaring bankruptcy at some point AFTER the 2012 election, at some point during a hypothetical Obama second term. The first two sentences of the article say: > [@](#): > > President Obama is proud of his bailout of General Motors. That’s good, because, if he wins a second term, he is probably going to have to bail GM out again. It never suggests this is something that will happen between now and November. If this is an event that might happen after election day, how will that help Romney get elected? I think that is fair question. ---
**Author:** ![Jas09](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d07c76/32.png) [@Jas09](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jas09)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/205 "2012-08-27T16:34:18Z")
Maybe **Kenm** thinks it will help him get elected in 2016… ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/206 "2012-08-27T16:48:55Z")
> [@squeegee](#): > > How can Romney win? Isaac makes landfall in New Orleans or close and if the emergency response is anything but perfect (or can be spun that way), it’s all Obama’s fault, Obama’s Katrina, and the GOP has a perfect podium this week for pounding on that. The perfect Republican response to a disaster in New Orleans is to ignore it, so yeah, they will see any response as a waste of taxpayer money. Now if it had been Omaha, Nebraska they would pull out all the stops to rescue right-thinking Republican babies. ---
**Author:** ![Kenm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/bc79bd/32.png) [@Kenm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kenm)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/207 "2012-08-27T17:15:09Z")
> [@Jas09](#): > > Maybe **Kenm** thinks it will help him get elected in 2016… Not only would I not want to, I can’t; I’m Canadian. Anyway, I would be pilloried as a _gasp_ _socialist_. ---
**Author:** ![Jas09](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/d07c76/32.png) [@Jas09](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jas09)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/208 "2012-08-27T17:21:59Z")
The “him” in my post was Mr. Romney, not you. And yes, I’m pretty sure all Canadians are, by definition, socialists on the American political spectrum. ---
**Author:** ![That\_Don\_Guy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/that_don_guy/32/538_2.png) [@That\_Don\_Guy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/That_Don_Guy)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/209 "2012-08-27T18:05:25Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Voter suppression, getting the Supreme Court to declare him the winner Bush style. Obama being assassinated and Biden fumbling the campaign after suddenly becoming the Presidential candidate. You left one out, and IIRC, it “worked” once before; if the Republicans can get 218 House members and 51 Senators in the new Congress, which starts its session three days before Congress counts the electoral votes, all the Republicans have to do is to find enough “close” races won by Obama that would give the election to Romney if the results changed, and challenge all of them - both the House and Senate would then vote to accept the Romney votes as the “valid” ones. Then again, there’s a small problem with this; Obama would still be President until January 20, so the armed forces would probably just stand aside while the people rise up and make sure Romney never takes office - and probably rewrite chunks of the Constitution while they were at it. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Lendervedder](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_lendervedder/32/8488_2.png) [@Happy\_Lendervedder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Lendervedder)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 6:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/210 "2012-08-27T18:53:04Z")
> [@Kenm](#): > > Don’t get your knickers in a knot. The OP asked how Romney could win. I posted a link answering it. Romney also could win if Martians landed on the White House lawn and destroyed the place and the Capitol Building with a disintigrating ray. > > The story exists. Read it or don’t. Discuss its shortcomings and propaganda value or don’t. Rip it apart or don’t. I linked to it. I didn’t write it. Sounds like someone is doing just that-- they’re saying the story is completely irrelevant to the 2012 election between Romney and Obama-- but you apparently don’t like that someone is ripping it apart or discussing its shortcomings, etc. ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/211 "2012-08-27T19:40:22Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > The perfect Republican response to a disaster in New Orleans is to ignore it, so yeah, they will see any response as a waste of taxpayer money. Now if it had been Omaha, Nebraska they would pull out all the stops to rescue right-thinking Republican babies. The important thing isn’t how they feel, but how it’s spun. Some may feel how you describe, but that’s at all not important. If they can spin the Fed’s disaster response as inadequate and screwed up in any way, then they can pin that on Obama and call him and his administration incompetent. You don’t think the GOP wants a do-over of Katrina? Of course they do, and all they have to do is recall the other side’s derision of Bush from that time and push it, word for word, on the Obama administration, then scream about fairness if anyone disagrees. And if they’re really really lucky, they get to do it during the GOP convention, when all the cameras are pointed at them and they can hammer and hammer these points. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 8:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/212 "2012-08-27T20:07:54Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > How about illegal aliens voting? How about felons voting where they are not permitted to? How did those illegal aliens and felons get on the voter rolls? Are they pretending to be someone they are not? How many cases of this sort of thing have we seen in the last 50 years? > [@](#): > > Voter ID is a good tool against that, because while it does not stop the vote from being cast it provides a sufficient evidentiary trail to allow the person who illegally voted to be convicted. If someone is actually voting as themselves, then ineligible voters shouldn’t be on the voter rolls. If they are pretending to be someone else, then what evidentiary trail are you talking about? How do you find them? It seems like you are erecting some significant hurdles to voting in order to address corner cases that don’t really happen. > [@Bricker](#): > > Above all, baffled fury that Bush could win, because none of your friends voted for him. I’ll be honest, I was baffled and furious. How the hell did THAT happen. > [@](#): > > I think Romney’s got a shot, based solely on the economy. But I might be wrong. > > And if I am, and Obama wins a second term… well, he’s a decent man and a decent President, and the country won’t collapse. To be fair, I think Romney is a decent man, I thought McCain was a decent man, I can’t say the same about their right wing running mates or the new version of the Republican party generally. > [@Chronos](#): > > One thing to keep in mind: It’s tempting to look at the list of states Romney must win and say, sure, he might win one or two of them, but what are the odds of him winning _all_ of them? But the mistake in this thinking is that the vote totals in different states are not independent events. Sure, they’re not lockstep: Romney speaking out against the corn industry, for instance, would hurt him in Iowa but probably not in Pennsylvania. But _most_ of the things that will sway one state will sway all of them. If, for instance, he comes out with a detailed tax plan, the country is going to either like it or they won’t. And Ohio will probably feel about the same way about it as Florida does. So, to a large extent, his performance in _all_ of the swing states is going to be correlated. > > In other words, Romney’s task isn’t to sway a whole bunch of separate races each his way; his task is to sway all of them at once, which is considerably easier. It’s obviously hard, but it’s doable. +1 Too many democrats are breathing a sigh of relief because Obama is not trailing in the polls anymore (thank you 2009 tax returns and governor vaginal probe). > [@aceplace57](#): > > It pains me to say it, but its a close tie between Carter and Obama for lack of leadership. We’ve seen it constantly. Remember how close we came to defaulting last summer? There was no leadership to break the deadlock. We got a single golf game between Boehner and Obama. Are you saying that we nearly defaulted because OBAMA refused to do something? You have a different memory of those events than I do. > [@adaher](#): > > The GOP position on tax cuts is nonsense and politically damaging to boot, but it’s not the whole story. It’s also about who is trusted to regulate smarter and run fiscal policy better. Democrats were in a great position to lock down the fiscal responsibility brand. But instead of repeating the Clinton plan, they went back to their old tricks of jacking up spending and regulating everything to death. That doctrine was rejected in 1980 and it hasn’t gained in public acceptance since then. You don’t remember that the first stimulus (and TARP for that matter) were passed under Bush and pressed by a former CEO of Goldman Sachs? Are you under the impression that the stimulus didn’t prevent a larger deeper recession? There is virtual consensus among economists that the stimulus helped. You don’t think there is a broad mandate to regulate the financial industry after the financial crash? You don’t think there was a mandate to regulate offshore drilling after the Horizon oil spill? > [@](#): > > Now it’s up to Republicans to show that they can govern, assuming they get the chance. They’ve had their chance. Their behaviour during the last two years are predlude to their behaviour once they get into power. In what way have they helped get this country back on track? > [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > However as I thought about it some I don’t know that the black vote is especially important in any state, even battleground states. Namely because it has historically been so monolithic, the voters that matter are the ones who can actually be swayed to vote for a certain candidate. Because the black vote is so monolithic, basically every election since 1980 you can assume they’re voting overwhelmingly for the Democrat candidate. > [@Chronos](#): > > Not really. Blacks _haven’t_ overwhelmingly voted for the Democratic candidate. They _have_ overwhelmingly not voted for the Republican candidate, but they also have rather low turnout rates compared to other demographics. Blacks were a significant part of Obama’s 2008 victory not because he appealed to a significantly higher proportion of them, but because he got a higher proportion of them to actually come to the polls. I agree its turnout. Voter participation among blacks exceeded white for the first time in 2008. Especially among young black voters. You have a generation of empowered young black voters who stayed away in 2010 and we lost. If we win in 2012 because of them, we can’t take them for granted anymore. > [@adaher](#): > > Unlikely. Maybe if the election was decided by less than 1000 votes, but in those cases both sides tend to think they got cheated. For every voter kept away with voter ID laws, there will be a felon that did get to vote. The ratio is probably closer to 100,000 :: 1 than 1 :: 1. If you count all the folks that will not vote because the lines get so frikking long that they give up or the folks who dont even bother showing up then I suspect the ratio gets a lot higher. > [@adaher](#): > > If voter ID laws cause longer lines, that’s going to hurt Republicans, since they expect to beat Democrats in turnout this year. cite please? > [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > I love how often liberals on these boards use the “trickle down” argument against me. They just confuse you for the typical conservative. Its like assuming that a relatively liberal poster might believe in evolution, its not true for every last one of them but its true for almost all their fellow travellers. Its the company you keep. > [@adaher](#): > > Plus a lot of the attacks on Ryan’s plan aren’t even his current plan, but the 2011 version. The 2012 version he did with Ron Wyden and which also passed the House is the current plan and it keeps traditional Medicare as an option. Once you keep traditional medicare as an option, you have not really fixed anything. As far as I can tell, its a repackaging of medicare part C and some means testing of medicare benefits. > [@Oakminster](#): > > How can Romney win? [This ABC/Washington Post Poll](http://news.yahoo.com/solid-chances-serious-challenges-greet-romney-convention-040304653--abc-news-politics.html?_esi=1) gives him a “solid chance”, and a 1% lead among registered voters. Dems that think this is going to be a cakewalk are deluding themselves. It could go either way. I think some people are getting giddy about a temporary marginal advantage that Obama seems to have over Romney right now because of his tax returns, the medicare thing with Paul Ryan, and the focus that the “legitimate rape” comment put on the Republican’s stance on birth control and abortion. The only thing that could make this any worse for him is if he starts saying obviously racist things. I don’t see how things could get any worse for him. This might be the low point in his campaign. I mean, what else can go wrong? ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/213 "2012-08-27T21:51:25Z")
> [@Ambivalid](#): > > Right but my question was specifically in regards to such voter obstacles; as in how can Romney possibly win _without_ ‘rigging the game’ somehow. You do realize that Republicans regularly win elections while getting creamed among blacks and losing women and Hispanics by anywhere from a little bit to horribly, right? ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/214 "2012-08-27T23:23:20Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > The perfect Republican response to a disaster in New Orleans is to ignore it, so yeah, they will see any response as a waste of taxpayer money. Now if it had been Omaha, Nebraska they would pull out all the stops to rescue right-thinking Republican babies. If a very similar catastrophe happens and the response is just as slow, then I predict that the new Democratic talking points will be that responding to disasters of that scale is impossible and that Bush wasn’t so bad after all, at least compared to those Tea Partiers. of course, Obama will cover any slow response with a lot of jawboning about what the government is supposedly doing, and his supporters will label that “decisive action.” ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2012, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/215 "2012-08-27T23:29:26Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > If a very similar catastrophe happens and the response is just as slow, then I predict that the new Democratic talking points will be that responding to disasters of that scale is impossible and that Bush wasn’t so bad after all, at least compared to those Tea Partiers. > > of course, Obama will cover any slow response with a lot of jawboning about what the government is supposedly doing, and his supporters will label that “decisive action.” Why would there be a slow response? It’s not like they don’t realize they are under a microscope; they will move heaven and earth, damn the expense, to get it right this time. ---
**Author:** ![Rampant\_Coypu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/439d5e/32.png) [@Rampant\_Coypu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rampant_Coypu)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2012, 2:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/216 "2012-08-29T02:38:30Z")
Obama understands economics. We had the deduction cut for lower income workers followed by the “making work pay” worksheet on the back of the 1040EZ and 1040A tax forms. We had the payroll tax holiday program. During these last four years I was responsible for saving my previous employer money by making sure every new hire had filled out the payroll tax holiday form. This is the most badass form of supply side economics ever. Businesses wanna hire people, give them a year long break from paying a share of the payroll tax. This is the demand support side of supply side economics and I am in favor of it. Hell, I lost my job and got a new job thanks to the fact that my new employer wanted the payroll tax exemption. Obama understands that the problem is weak demand and has shifted tax policy to prop up demand and employment. Romney wants to end all of that and make almost everyone pay more taxes so the richest can pay less. Romney will raise your taxes. Don’t you understand that? I am sure that at least some reader of SDMB is a business owner who got at least a little break from the payroll tax holiday. ---
**Author:** ![Leaper](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/4bbf92/32.png) [@Leaper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leaper)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2012, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/217 "2012-08-29T03:03:51Z")
One prominent conservative blogger [seems to think it’s very possible, even probable](http://www.redstate.com/2012/08/28/the-beginning-of-the-end/) (note that the title is about the campaign in general, not of the Obama administration in particular): > [@Erick Erickson](#): > > Both sides think they can win, but privately, in real and honest assessments, even the base is capable of a reality check. The reality check in Tampa is that momentum is with the GOP. The Democrats, unable to run against the economy, intend to make the election about the female uterus, not an economic recovery. At 8.3% unemployment, people are much more interested in putting food on their tables than over killing kids. > > The mood in Tampa is upbeat and not just in public. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2012, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/218 "2012-08-29T03:06:47Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > Why would there be a slow response? It’s not like they don’t realize they are under a microscope; they will move heaven and earth, damn the expense, to get it right this time. That doesn’t mean they will. Determination is not competence. ---
**Author:** ![gamerunknown](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/6bbea6/32.png) [@gamerunknown](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gamerunknown)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2012, 9:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/219 "2012-08-29T09:29:04Z")
> [@Blogger](#): > > The mood in Tampa is upbeat and not just in public. I thought people were more worried about putting food on the table than killing babies? Why should they be excited for the Republican National Convention? Hell, even with Norwegian levels of unemployment I’d be more worried about a coming hurricane. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [August 29, 2012, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452/220 "2012-08-29T13:29:19Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > You do realize that Republicans regularly win elections while getting creamed among blacks and losing women and Hispanics by anywhere from a little bit to horribly, right? Yes, we also realize that Republicans are doing their damnedest to rig the game via voter suppression measures and that some damn dicey things have happened WRT vote counts in the last couple of elections in places like Ohio and Florida. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-can-romney-possibly-win/632452.md?page=12)