It’s an incredibly anemic campaign at the moment- and I don’t think that this is all my native bias telling me that (though I’ll allow for the possibility). Not many are paying attention now, but if I was a McCain fan, I would be hoping that they get their act together by mid-August.
McCain is enjoying a certain lack of scrutiny that I would not want to rely on forever. To an extent, he has earned some benefit of the doubt, but I think he’s seriously abusing his favored nation status with the press.
The ADA, at least for 2007, disagrees: Obama scored 75%, and Sanders 95%.
And I must say, I think that using “socialism” in place of “communism” is not going to work as well as the Republicans might think. The country is overdue for a swing to the left.
Washington swings like a pendulum do . . . Permanent majority, anyone?
Dseid, upon further research, it turns out I have in fact finally devoped three crinkles on my right side when I smile very broadly. None on my left. So I am now apparently officially half smiling for real.
And now the McCain campaign is making noises about how that straight talker himself might could maybe will announce his veep choice this week.
Not that they’re trying to divert attention from Obama, no, not at all. I’m sure they wouldn’t announce the veep pick right when Obama’s giving that speech in Berlin that’s expected to draw hundreds of thousands of attendees, nope, couldn’t possibly be trying to steal his thunder.
First to samclem: what you say here (in my eyes) skates dangerously close to an “everyone knows” assertion of reality. If we aren’t using the “classic definition,” what are we using as the “new” definition? Is it just when “a lot of people feel like it”?
Something I’ve been kind of confused about: I’ve been seeing a lot of conservative bloggers trying to argue lately that we aren’t in a recession - that we could be very soon, but we’re not in one NOW (see Instapundit’s “Dude, Where’s My Recession?” series of posts, pointing out various economic indicators he sees that are all, apparently, chugging along fine, or more than fine). Why is this suddenly so important to argue? To benefit McCain? For some other reason I can’t fathom?
Best as I can tell, the wingnuts like the Ole Perfesser really do believe they have a better grasp on their fellow citizens’ economic situation than those citizens do. And since the wingnuts in question are generally doing fine, they find it implausible that more than a handful of whiners and slackers aren’t.
If people feel like their personal economic situations are caving in, or are perilously close to doing so, it must be because the Liberal Media fooled them into thinking so. And a good healthy dose of statistics about The Economy (whose disconnect with the statistics about actual, y’know, people, they are apparently unaware of) should take care of that problem.
National polls are meaningless- if they and the Popular vote meant anything Gore would have been our Prez for the last neraly 8 years.
There are certain key swing states- Fla, Mich, Ohio, and a few others. The “solid” states really won’t change the outcome either- there’s little doubt Obama will win CA and McCain TX.
Although Obama has a nice lead, look at how many states are a “toss-up”= 137. Add those to McCain and he wins by a small but significant %.
Nearly every toss-up state went Red in the last two Prez elections, only NH & NM went Blue once each. But even if both those go Obama, McCain stilll wins.
So, yes, Obama is doing well, but it is in no way a “sure thing”. No fork is even close to McCain.
No, DrDeth won’t be denounced for heresy. The only thing any of us has is hope. There’s never absolute certainty in an election. All we can say at this point is that things are looking pretty good, better than they have in a while.
This electoral map at www.pollster.com shows Obama at 284 EV, which is already ahead of the 270 needed to win. I know things can change and it is only July, but this election reminds of 1980, in which President Carter stayed real close to Reagan until the very end, when the crappiness of the economy caused many to say WTF, it can’t get any worse under Reagan. Reagan of course ended up winning in a landslide.
Yup, there is no sure thing here - if McCain can virtually run the table of Michigan, Ohio, Florida, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada, etc … then he can pull it off. It is not impossible. But as Abramowitz, Mann, and Sabato point out, he is currently behind in “11 of the 12 swing states that were decided by a margin of five points or less in 2004 including five of the six that were carried by George Bush.” To visualize this go to the RCP map with no toss-ups. Not written in stone to be sure but it is a tall order. That said there is a lot of battle to come over the next 100 days.
McCain will have to look vibrant and in charge during the debates and Obama will have to make some significant gaffes. The Swiftboats will need to strike the right chords and Obama will have to have no effective prepared response. McCain will have to find his sweet spot where he can appeal to the middle, dull some of Obama’s appeal to Hispanics, and at the same time energize the Conservative base to come out for him. It can happen. But McCain will need a run of three-pointers after having not even having the chance to get many shots off so far.
It can happen.
Totally subjective argument: Obama is setting the rhetorical agenda; everything McCain says and goes is a direct response or an indirect reaction. The “audacity of hopelessness” sound bite from this past week is what solidified this perception for me. It feels like a pretty sharp reversal, but it has no legs, and isn’t going to stick; and more importantly, it’s defensive, a riposte rather than an attack. To win, McCain will need to define himself for the public, rather than put on a display of reflecting his opponent. McCain can’t let this continue; if he keeps trying to throw punches from back on his heels, Obama’s going to push him over, or just let him collapse. But if McCain rediscovers his mojo and begins generating energy of his own that Obama has to respond to, then the landscape will change. But as it is right now, the Big Mo is all Barack’s, and he’s got a shot at running away with it.
