In two short years the political
environment has shifted from strong winds at the back of an energized
conservative movement to head winds buffeting a fragmented and
unfocused Republican presidential primary campaign. The optimism
generated by the capture of Republican control of the House of
Representatives and an increase in Senate membership in 2010, is
rapidly deteriorating. Obama has done little in three years to
justify his reelection but his prospects continue to improve. Part
of the change is the gradual improvement in some of the economic
statistics that affect consumer confidence. The stock market is
slowly improving as are employment numbers in terms of job creation
and declining claims for unemployment assistance. Housing starts are
gradually improving as are existing home sales. These statistics
along with the end of U.S. military involvement in Iraq have had a
predictable effect on Obama's job approval numbers: 12/6/11: 43.2% -
2/15/12: 48.9%.
Still, both the percent of unemployed
and the inventory of unsold existing homes are both high and measures
of consumer confidence show declining optimism from late 2011. Also,
Obama's job approval is still below 50%. What this seems to indicate
is that there should still be a realistic opportunity for a
Republican candidate to defeat Obama in November. But the prospects
are rapidly diminishing, not totally because of the objective
conditions cited above, but by the disgusting deterioration of the
Republican nominating struggle.
The contest has from the beginning been
one of divided loyalties, with no candidate winning a majority in
pre-caucus or primary polls and in only two of the events themselves
(Romney in Nevada; Santorum in Missouri). However, as the field was
reduced by drop-outs, the competition became more intense as issue
positions gave way to personal attacks. Now the debate, eagerly
abetted by an irresponsible and sensationalizing media is a festival
of irrelevancy: Romney's leadership in the 2002 Salt Lake City
Winter Olympics, his personal wealth and where he invests his money;
Gingrich's lobbying, or not, on behalf of the Federal National
Mortgage Association (FNMA) and his three marriages; Santorum's votes
for “ear marks” (federal funding for local projects) while he
served in Congress; and a blizzard of personal insults. The primary
process will eventually produce a candidate but the real winner will
be Obama, at least in terms of the national presidential campaign.
The “seesaw “ dynamic of up and down leaders and reduced voter
participation from the 2008 campaign reflects a general lack of
enthusiasm for any candidate and a growing disgust with the “street
fight” nature of the campaign.
Each of the remaining candidates has
their minority core of devoted supporters. Romney supporters
overlook his uninspiring, technocratic, leadership deficient persona,
and cling to the belief that he is the most electable. Gingrich's
supporters enjoy his combative, anti-everybody who disagrees with
him, take no prisoners style and forgive him his off the wall
comments like his belief that establishing a moon colony is a viable
solution to the nation's ills. Ron Paul's relatively small core of
supporters remain loyal to his anti-all government, no foreign policy
isolationism positions and cast what are essentially protest votes
for a failed candidacy.
So the latest leader is former
Pennsylvania congressman and senator, Rick Santorum who has the
advantage of being the last “anybody but Romney” candidate.
Gingrich could theoretically still rebound out of third place into
the lead with a strong showing in the March Super Tuesday primaries
but Santorum is enjoying his initial surge while Gingrich needs a
more difficult second surge. This promises to make Gingrich's
tactics more desperate and thus more negative. The Romney campaign,
running out of time and behind in the polls, will have to unleash an
expensive negative media campaign against Santorum similar to its
successful Florida campaign against Gingrich. Santorum will have to
respond in kind to both Gingrich and Romney and the whole nominating
effort will continue it's transition into the proverbial “ circular
firing squad” while the Obama campaign celebrates.
The diminished discussion of a broad
vision for the nation's future, effective public policies, and the
attempts to fill the substance vacuum with patriotic bromides, feel
good cliches' and negative advertising, has allowed Santorum to
achieve front runner status with a “values voter”, social issues
campaign.. The social issues, with emphasis on abortion and gay
rights, in combination with underlying evangelical prejudice against
Romney's Mormon religion and his perceived moderate stance on these
issues, worked in religiously conservative Iowa. More recently, it
was successful in Missouri and in Colorado where the Republican party
is heavily evangelical. Since success breeds more success as the
“band wagon” effect, however weak, kicks in, Santorum now leads
in polls for upcoming primaries as well as in national preference
polls of likely Republican voters.
This is more good news for Obama
because Santorum's blatantly fundamentalist appeal to the religious
right is not shared by the broader electorate who will decide the
presidency, and Santorum's emphasis on these issues has, fairly or
unfairly, defined the character of his candidacy. In recent national
polls Santorum leads with 34.3% to Romney's 27.7%, Gingrich's 14.5%
and Paul's 12.3%. (RCP average: 2/8-2/17). But in head to head
polls against Obama among all likely voters, Romney still does better
although Obama is ahead: Obama 49.3, Romney 43.2; Obama 50.2,
Santorum 41.8; Obama 53.0, Gingrich 39.1. It is interesting that in
a contest with a generic Republican, Obama and the unnamed Republican
are tied at 43.3%. This indicates that given the right candidate,
dissatisfaction with Obama could still produce a Republican victory.
However the prospect that Santorum could be that candidate seem
exceedingly unlikely given the aforementioned orientation of his
campaign.
Some simple facts describe his
challenge. Santorum is opposed to abortion at any time in pregnancy
for any reason. He has said that woman who becomes pregnant by rape
should “make the best out of a bad situation.”
The view that abortion should be
generally available or available under stricter limits is supported
by 74% of the nation while just 23% agree with Santorum that is
should never be permitted (CBS/NYT 1/12-1/17).
Santorum, a devout, traditional Catholic
with seven children, is opposed to birth control saying it is a
public policy issue and “harmful to women”, and as president he
“would talk about the the 'dangers of contraception in this
country' “. Essentially he has said that sex outside of a
procreative purpose is immoral. While the President has no specific
authority with respect to birth control, such a position reflects a
19th century mindset with implications for women's health,
career opportunities, and the financial viability of families. In the
year 2012 this extremely outdated personal belief is an even
more bizarre political position. Acknowledging that he had donned a
political suicide vest, Santorum recently partially recanted, saying
that: “My position is birth control can and should be available.”
But he did not change his position on the appropriateness of its
use, and the damage was already done. In fact, birth control in all
its procedures, but especially in pill form, is almost universally
accepted in the U.S. even among the vast majority of Catholic women.
Why do these positions and the related
poll numbers matter? In the 2008 presidential election, 53.7% of
votes cast were by women. In the last four presidential elections
(1996,2000,2004,2008) a “gender gap” was evident in the outcomes.
This is the difference between the percentage of women and the
percentage of men who vote for a particular candidate. In each of
these presidential elections a higher percentage of women than men
voted for the Democratic candidates (7-11%) and in each, the Democrat
actually won a majority of women's votes. This voting pattern
establishes an electoral reality which Republican candidates must
face even without specific gender issues being introduced.
Thus the changed character of the
nominating contest away from substantive issues and into personal
character assassination has produced a severely wounded Mitt Romney
and Newt Gingrich and may have produced an unelectable front runner,
who ironically is also a fiscal conservative but whose chosen path
to the nomination is located far afield from the mainstream
electorate.
No comments:
Post a Comment