US 2012 Presidential Election Polls

Denerick

Amerika wrote: »

I'm a member of the Tea Party. Please enlighten me as to how our ideologies are similar and just as extreme at the Taliban.

I'll go get some popcorn in the meantime.

Fiscal Responsibility!... (Man that must have hurt.)

Its called reactionary populism. The only difference is that you aren't directly using violence to achieve your aims.

Amerika

Denerick wrote: »

Its called reactionary populism. The only difference is that you aren't directly using violence to achieve your aims.

Odd... I looked up "beliefs" and "ideologies," but no where did the term "reactionary populism" come up. I guess you would have to colour me confused.

Mr.Micro

Amerika wrote: »

I'm a member of the Tea Party)

Wow. We would never have guessed.:D

Amerika

Mr.Micro wrote: »

Wow. We would never have guessed.:D

LOL... and this might also come as a shocker, but I’m pretty partisan in my viewpoints. :eek:

Denerick

Amerika wrote: »

Odd... I looked up "beliefs" and "ideologies," but no where did the term "reactionary populism" come up. I guess you would have to colour me confused.

Reactionary = Opposing political or social reform to the point where you actually want to turn back the tide of history to some semi mythologised past. E.g, various Islamic fundamentalist groups, neo nazis, Extreme right wing 'republicanism'.

Populism = Anti intellectualism, hatred of 'elites', the deliberate exploitation of the prejudices of ordinary people. E.g, various Islamic fundamentalist groups, neo nazis, Extreme right wing 'republicanism'.

Hope that was some help!

On a lighter note, I quite like you as a person. Without you we'd just be a forum of people sitting around agreeing with each other and agreeing about how terrible conservatives are. Just thought I'd point that out in case you felt cornered or victimised or whatever...

Memnoch

You can see the youtube video of 'The newsroom' clip linked on the previous page of this thread, it does a great job summarising the similarities between the two.

The main points:

Tea Party and Taliban:

1) Both want to control what women can do with their bodies. No abortion even in cases of rape or where the mother's life is in danger. Forced transvaginal ultrasounds.

2) Homophobia

3) Idealogical hardliners who are not interested in any kind of compromise, willing to hold the entire country hostage in order to further their extreme agenda.

4) Religious fundamentalism. Both want religion to play a prominent role in government but have little tolerance for the religious beliefs of others.

5) Xenophobia.

I think the tea party started out as a broad grass roots movement that tapped into the anger of wall street bailouts and at its inception was probably genuinely populist. But since then it's been largely appropriated by the extreme right of the GOP. It's been taken over by xenophobes, racists and religious fundamentalists. Generally people who are ignorant/clueless and/or brainwashed into believing nonsensical conspiracy theories (like Obama being a foreign born secret Muslim). They've been very cleverly led by the nose by powerful, elitist, mega rich vested interests like the koch brothers who promise financial nirvana but in reality are only interested in furthering their own personal wealth and power.

Amerika

Denerick wrote: »

Reactionary = Opposing political or social reform to the point where you actually want to turn back the tide of history to some semi mythologised past. E.g, various Islamic fundamentalist groups, neo nazis, Extreme right wing 'republicanism'.

Populism = Anti intellectualism, hatred of 'elites', the deliberate exploitation of the prejudices of ordinary people. E.g, various Islamic fundamentalist groups, neo nazis, Extreme right wing 'republicanism'.

Hope that was some help!

Did those definitions come from Merriman-Webster, Wiki or Alinsky? :pac:

On a lighter note, I quite like you as a person. Without you we'd just be a forum of people sitting around agreeing with each other and agreeing about how terrible conservatives are. Just thought I'd point that out in case you felt cornered or victimised or whatever...

Thanks. I have my vices. Obviously a form of masochism is one of them.

Amerika

MadYaker wrote: »

They both encompass extreme right wing nut jobs and other idiots who seek to impose their views on others. They both use religion to justify their bullsh!t. I could go on but since you know how to use the internet and seem well educated I don't believe that you are a member of the tea party, certainly not a grass roots member. And you don't hate romney enough or think that obama is a socialist muslim who was born in kenya.

You’re right that I am not a grassroots member of the Tea Party. I belong to the largest segment of the Tea Party that does not get actively involved in politics for the most part (although I have gotten involved with presidential elections in the past, and do go to presidential and vice presidential candidate speeches when they are local. Sarah Palin was great in person by the way ) The segment of the Tea Party I belong to usually goes down the list of our core beliefs and votes for the candidate whose actions, not words, matches the majority of them (a candidate that has a chance of winning that is)… whether that be Republican or Democrat (but mostly Republican).

I must admit I get way too much email from the Tea Party though, which does turn me off.

Memnoch

Amerika wrote: »

You’re right that I am not a grassroots member of the Tea Party. I belong to the largest segment of the Tea Party that does not get actively involved in politics for the most part (although I have gotten involved with presidential elections in the past, and do go to presidential and vice presidential candidate speeches when they are local. Sarah Palin was great in person by the way ) The segment of the Tea Party I belong to usually goes down the list of our core beliefs and votes for the candidate whose actions, not words, matches the majority of them (a candidate that has a chance of winning that is)… whether that be Republican or Democrat (but mostly Republican).

I must admit I get way too much email from the Tea Party though, which does turn me off.

Then how can you support someone like Mitt Romney who has contradicted himself and flip-flopped on every issue imaginable. Is it because you just want to get rid of Obama at all cost?

Amerika

Memnoch wrote: »

Then how can you support someone like Mitt Romney who has contradicted himself and flip-flopped on every issue imaginable. Is it because you just want to get rid of Obama at all cost?

I posted the Tea Party's core beliefs in another topic recently. I could find it if you wish and you could also match which candidate is better suited to each of them. Going down that list, my choice would have to be Romney over Obama by a landslide.

If you do find it, match it up against your previous post of what you imagine to be the Tea Party to be. You will find none match your list except possibly a small segment of your point #3, as I guess we are idealogical hardliners who are not interested in any kind of compromise - when it contradicts the Constitution that is.

jank

joseph brand wrote: »

Oh no it isn't.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGAvwSp86hY

Ah you got me, posting up a you tube link of a "fictional" TV show... well done. Case closed.

jank

Denerick wrote: »

Its called reactionary populism. The only difference is that you aren't directly using violence to achieve your aims.

TBH, that is a pretty big difference. The tea party may have some people who are extreme in their rhetoric (I am sure I could find some loony's on the left) but has ANYONE been killed or bombed in the past few years by the tea party due to their political belief's? Do they advocate killing or violence to achieve their aims?? No they do not.
Again to say that "they are the exact same as the Taliban BUT....." is idiotic.

It is like saying "FG are the exact same as the Nazi's BUT....."

If you know my posting history you will see that I am a severe critic of the mature form of the Tea Party movement. It has essentially been hijacked but some stupid GOP politicians to just increase their share of the vote but to say they are comparable with the Taliban, well that is fantasy stuff.

jank

Denerick wrote: »

Reactionary = Opposing political or social reform to the point where you actually want to turn back the tide of history to some semi mythologised past. E.g, various Islamic fundamentalist groups, neo nazis, Extreme right wing 'republicanism'.

Why is it that only right leaning groups could be classified as reactionary? Did you miss of groups who popped up declaring the Bush would turn the US into a police state? Its the way of american politics. The dems own the white house, anger on the right is channeled through various groups, the gop own the white hours anger on the left is channeled through various groups, rinse and repeat....

Denerick wrote: »

Populism = Anti intellectualism, hatred of 'elites', the deliberate exploitation of the prejudices of ordinary people. E.g, various Islamic fundamentalist groups, neo nazis, Extreme right wing 'republicanism'.

LOL, is that it? FF and Bertie Ahern engaged in mass populism, by buying off the Public sector and increasing benefits for every other demographic group. Now I am no fan what so ever of Bertie but to compare his populism to that of neo-nazis is a step too far. Labour engaged in mass populism before the last election, Labours way or Frankfurks way.... remember that? We see in government its a very different story. In other words all parties in some form of another engage in populism, even the saintly democratic party and Obama.


The one eyed red tinted glasses of opinion shown here is hilarious. AGAIN if you see my posting history on this forum you will see that I am not in no way a fan of the GOP, Amerika will testify to that. However, I am not going to engage in "populist" rants and finger pointing at one side and blame them for everything that is wrong with American politics that some here are only too quick to do. Comparing the right wing politics of the US to that of the Taliban is ludicrous and cheapens the argument.

jank

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taliban#Human_rights_abuses

Human rights abuses

Massacre campaigns


A Hazara man in Afghanistan. The Sunni Taliban regard the Shia Hazaras as apostates.
According to a 55-page report by the United Nations, the Taliban, while trying to consolidate control over northern and western Afghanistan, committed systematic massacres against civilians.[27][28] UN officials stated that there had been "15 massacres" between 1996 and 2001.[27][28] They also said, that "[t]hese have been highly systematic and they all lead back to the [Taliban] Ministry of Defense or to Mullah Omar himself."[27][28] "These are the same type of war crimes as were committed in Bosnia and should be prosecuted in international courts", one UN official was quoted as saying.[27] The documents also reveal the role of Arab and Pakistani support troops in these killings.[27][28] Bin Laden's so-called 055 Brigade was responsible for mass-killings of Afghan civilians.[22] The report by the United Nations quotes "eyewitnesses in many villages describing Arab fighters carrying long knives used for slitting throats and skinning people".[27][28] The Taliban's former ambassador to Pakistan, Mullah Abdul Salam Zaeef, in late 2011 stated that cruel behaviour under and by the Taliban had been "necessary".[150]
In 1998, the United Nations accused the Taliban of denying emergency food by the UN's World Food Programme to 160,000 hungry and starving people "for political and military reasons".[151] The UN said the Taliban were starving people for their military agenda and using humanitarian assistance as a weapon of war.
On August 8, 1998 the Taliban launched an attack on Mazar-i Sharif. Of 1500 defenders only 100 survived the engagement. Once in control the Taliban began to kill people indiscriminately. At first shooting people in the street, they soon began to target Hazaras. Women were raped, and thousands of people were locked in containers and left to suffocate. This ethnic cleansing left an estimated 5,000 to 6,000 dead.[72][152] At this time ten Iranian diplomats and a journalist were killed. Iran assumed the Taliban had murdered them, and mobilized its army, deploying men along the border with Afghanistan. By the middle of September there were 250,000 Iranian personal stationed on the border. Pakistan mediated and the bodies were returned to Tehran towards the end of the month. The killings of the Diplomats had been carried out by Sipah-e-Sahaba a Pakistani Sunni group with close ties to the ISI.[99][153] They burned orchards, crops and destroyed irrigation systems. And forced more than 100,000 people from their homes with hundreds of men, women and children still unaccounted for.[154]
In a major effort to retake the Shomali plains from the United Front, the Taliban indiscriminately killed civilians, while uprooting and expelling the population. Among others, Kamal Hossein, a special reporter for the UN, reported on these and other war crimes. The city of Istalif i. e. was home to more than 45,000 people. In Istalif the Taliban gave 24 hours notice to the population to leave, then completely razed the town leaving the people destitute.[31][155]
In 1999 the town of Bamian was taken, hundreds of men, women and children were executed. Houses were razed and some were used for forced labor.[156] There was a further massacre at the town of Yakaolang in January 2001. An estimated 300 people were murdered, along with two delegations of Hazara elders who had tried to intercede.[13]
By 1999, the Taliban had forced hundreds of thousands of people from the Shomali Plains and other regions conducting a policy of scorched earth burning homes, farm land and gardens.[31]
Human trafficking
Several Taliban and Al-Qaeda commanders ran a network of human trafficking, abducting women and selling them into sex slavery in Afghanistan and Pakistan.[157] Time Magazine writes: "The Taliban often argued that the brutal restrictions they placed on women were actually a way of revering and protecting the opposite sex. The behavior of the Taliban during the six years they expanded their rule in Afghanistan made a mockery of that claim."[157]
The targets for human trafficking were especially women from the Tajik, Uzbek, Hazara and other ethnic groups in Afghanistan. Some women preferred to commit suicide over slavery, killing themselves. During one Taliban and Al-Qaeda offensive in 1999 in the Shomali Plains alone, more than 600 women were kidnapped.[157] Taliban as well as Arab and Pakistani Al-Qaeda militants forced them into trucks and buses.[157] Time Magazine writes: "The trail of the missing Shomali women leads to Jalalabad, not far from the Pakistan border. There, according to eyewitnesses, the women were penned up inside Sar Shahi camp in the desert. The more desirable among them were selected and taken away. Some were trucked to Peshawar with the apparent complicity of Pakistani border guards. Others were taken to Khost, where bin Laden had several training camps." Officials from relief agencies say, the trail of many of the vanished women leads to Pakistan where they were sold to brothels or into private households to be kept as slaves.[157]
Some local Taliban commanders were opposed to the human trafficking ordered and conducted by their leaders. One Taliban commander, Nuruludah, is quoted as saying that he and his men freed some women which were being abducted by Pakistani members of Al-Qaeda.[157] A few local Taliban in Jalalabad also freed women that were being held by other Taliban and members of Al-Qaeda in a camp.[157]
Oppression of women


Taliban religious police beating a woman in Kabul on August 26, 2001.[158]
To PHR's knowledge, no other regime in the world has methodically and violently forced half of its population into virtual house arrest, prohibiting them on pain of physical punishment.[159]
—Physicians for Human Rights, 1998
The Taliban were condemned internationally for their brutal repression of women.[62][160] In 2001 Laura Bush in a radio address condemned the Taliban's brutality to women.[161][162] In areas they controlled the Taliban issued edicts which forbade women from being educated, girls were forced to leave schools and colleges. Those who wished to leave their home to go shopping had to be accompanied by a male relative, and were required to wear the burqa, a traditional dress covering the entire body except for a small screen to see out of. Those who appeared to disobey were publicly beaten.[163] Sohaila, a young woman who was convicted of walking with a man who was not a relative, was charged with adultery. She was publicly flogged in Ghazi Stadium and received 100 lashes.[164] The religious police routinely carried out inhumane abuse on women.[165] Employment for women was restricted to the medical sector, because male medical personnel were not allowed to treat women and girls. One result of the banning of employment of women by the Taliban was the closing down in places like Kabul of primary schools not only for girls but for boys, because almost all the teachers there were women.[166] Taliban restrictions became more severe after they took control of the capital. In February 1998, religious police forced all women off the streets of Kabul, and issued new regulations ordering people to blacken their windows, so that women would not be visible from the outside.[167]
Terrorism against civilians
According to the United Nations, the Taliban were responsible for 76% of civilian casualties in Afghanistan in 2009, 75% in 2010 and 80% in 2011.[35][168]
According to Human Rights Watch, the Taliban's bombings and other attacks which have led to civilian casualties "sharply escalated in 2006" when "at least 669 Afghan civilians were killed in at least 350 armed attacks, most of which appear to have been intentionally launched at non-combatants."[169][170] By 2008, the Taliban had increased its use of suicide bombers and targeted unarmed civilian aid workers, such as Gayle Williams.[171]
The United Nations reported that the number of civilians killed by both the Taliban and pro-government forces in the war rose nearly 50% between 2007 and 2009.[172] The high number of civilians killed by the Taliban is blamed in part on their increasing use of improvised explosive devices (IEDs), "for instance, 16 IEDs have been planted in girls' schools" by the Taliban.[172]
In 2009, Colonel Richard Kemp, formerly Commander of British forces in Afghanistan and the intelligence coordinator for the British government, drew parallels between the tactics and strategy of Hamas in Gaza to those of the Taliban. Kemp wrote:
Like Hamas in Gaza, the Taliban in southern Afghanistan are masters at shielding themselves behind the civilian population and then melting in among them for protection. Women and children are trained and equipped to fight, collect intelligence, and ferry arms and ammunition between battles. Female suicide bombers are increasingly common. The use of women to shield gunmen as they engage NATO forces is now so normal it is deemed barely worthy of comment. Schools and houses are routinely booby-trapped. Snipers shelter in houses deliberately filled with women and children.[173][174]
—Richard Kemp, Commander of British forces in Afghanistan

Lovely bunch the Taliban are, exactly the same as the Tea Party...:rolleyes::rolleyes:

jank

Memnoch wrote: »

The main points:

Tea Party and Taliban:

1) Both want to control what women can do with their bodies. No abortion even in cases of rape or where the mother's life is in danger. Forced transvaginal ultrasounds.

2) Homophobia

3) Idealogical hardliners who are not interested in any kind of compromise, willing to hold the entire country hostage in order to further their extreme agenda.

4) Religious fundamentalism. Both want religion to play a prominent role in government but have little tolerance for the religious beliefs of others.

5) Xenophobia.

.

There are members of Parliament who could be described as the above here in Australia mostly in the Liberal Party, so does that mean that the Liberal Party who in all likelihood will be in power within the next 12 months engage in the same behavior as the Taliban? Will they turn Australia into a christian fundamental state? Eh, no they wont. You will see that the above could be applied to every single country, even little old Ireland. Having a few nice bullet points and try to compare {insert random party} to [insert extreme ideology] and say one is the same as the other belies real truth.

joseph brand

jank: "Lovely bunch the Taliban are, exactly the same as the Tea Party"

I wouldn't say 'exactly'. Minus the violence, which is severely frowned upon here in The West, they are kindred spirits.

The Taliban ain't afraid to get their hands dirty. The Tea Party outsource.

How does someone admit to admiring Palin? I hate that I've even heard of her.

Be like Nutella

Taliban and Tea Party have nothing whatsoever to do with each other on any level this is a ridiculous extreme crappy argument I'd expect on a daytime Fox program... just saying ; )... but that scene from the fictional program is awesome and the analogy serves a purpose but only on the vaguest surface level and not in any way in reality.... nor was it supposed to be applied to reality by the scriptwriter.. just good TV good drama great soliloquy! Peter Finch would be proud.

back to polls stuff...

Irish Times Today:

"A Fox News poll published yesterday shows Obama seven points ahead of Romney in Ohio and Virginia; five points ahead in Florida. If Romney loses Ohio and Florida, he loses the election. "

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2012/0921/1224324231729.html


Is that really true - Ohio and Florida decides it 100% deffo ?

Duck Soup

Be like Nutella wrote: »

"A Fox News poll published yesterday shows Obama seven points ahead of Romney in Ohio and Virginia; five points ahead in Florida. If Romney loses Ohio and Florida, he loses the election. "

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/world/2012/0921/1224324231729.html


Is that really true - Ohio and Florida decides it 100% deffo ?

Theoretically of course, there are always other paths to 270, but as far as the Daily Kos can make out, no Republican candidate in history has ever won the presidency without winning Ohio.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/07/21/1112453/-The-last-time-a-Republican-won-the-Presidency-without-winning

Duck Soup

Oh and the reason Rasmussen is so far out of whack with other polls is that they use a different weighting for their sampling. In broad terms, reflecting previous voting patterns in elections and what voters have registered as, in a sample a pollster will use roughly one-third Democrats, one-third Republicans and one-third Independents. That's not an arbitrary breakdown, but based on previous data of either party registration or exit polls. That's roughly how the American electorate breaks down.

Then, in the interests of accuracy, the polling organization calculates exactly how many of each bloc of voters should be included in a sample. A lot of pollsters have D+4 - four more Democrats than Republicans in a sample, as that's the average of of declared party registration at the last 3 elections that they've gotten from their exit polling.

Rasmussen weights it - I think R+3 or R+4 - 3 or 4 more registered Republicans in each sample. Each polling organization would tell you why and how they arrived at their weighting, but Rasmussen's weighting is notably different to most other pollsters.

Rasmussen was very good in predicting the final result in the 2008 presidential election, but stank the place out with their predictions for the 2010 mid-terms.

http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/11/04/rasmussen-polls-were-biased-and-inaccurate-quinnipiac-surveyusa-performed-strongly/

Amerika

Hmmm... So Rasmussen's really good in predicting presidential elections... but not so good, in some states, in the mid-term elections, I take it. Good thing we have a presidential election this year.

Duck Soup

Amerika wrote: »

Hmmm... So Rasmussen's really good in predicting presidential elections... but not so good, in some states, in the mid-term elections, I take it. Good thing we have a presidential election this year.

Another way of looking at it would be to say that Rasmussen, asked to forecast one result, got it right and asked to forecast 50 got it wrong an awful lot of the time.

If we're in the business of touting the bestest pollster in the world evah for the 2008 Presidential election, we should in fairness note that Rasmussen were not out on their own, but equal first with Pew Research.

Pew Research's latest poll has Obama on 51% and Romney on 43%. An 8 point lead for Obama, from the people who are really, really good at predicting presidential elections.

There are two things that critics of Rasmussen have pointed to as causing the accuracy of Rasmussen polls to decline. The first is Rasmussen's move to only use robocalls instead of live interviews. This gives a 2% bias in results in favour of Republicans. Democrats apparently have less patience with robocalls.

The second thing, that will cause increasing inaccuracy, is that Rasmussen only calls landlines. With landline usage declining, particularly amongst the Democrat-leaning young, you're going to get an increasing rate of error by excluding them.

jank

joseph brand wrote: »

jank: "Lovely bunch the Taliban are, exactly the same as the Tea Party"

I wouldn't say 'exactly'. Minus the violence, which is severely frowned upon here in The West, they are kindred spirits.

The Taliban ain't afraid to get their hands dirty. The Tea Party outsource.

How does someone admit to admiring Palin? I hate that I've even heard of her.

I don't even know what you are saying here. "They are like each other but not really.."
They outsource? What does that mean? The Tea Party like violence? :rolleyes:

Palin is an idiot who got lucky and is still cashing in on her fame. However much of an idiot she is she has not killed anyone or advocated the killing of [insert random groups].

It is amazing the seeminly intelligent and rational people get so worked up and illogical about a few politicans running their mouths off. Meanwhile stuff like this happens everyday. Perspective please.

jank

**Cough** Back to polls, looks like a lot of the polls have had a big shift towards Obama the last two weeks. So much so that Romney has tried to have a campaign reboot. It is up to him now in the debates to launch a strong comeback.

Obama could land a knockout blow or Romney needs 3 very strong performances to edge it. I still think Obama is a show in.

Black Swan

RCP average for polls conducted 11 to 22 September 2012:

• Obama = 48.3
• Romney = 44.6
• Spread = Obama +3.7
• Obama leading in 7 of 8 polls reported (range +1 to +8)
• Romney not leading in 8 polls reported
• One tie in 8 polls (Rasmussen Tracking)

Romney has not led in the last 22 polls reported by RCP (with only 2 ties). When he did lead 23 polls ago (27 August), it was only by +1.

A bit more than 6 weeks before the election, and the recent trend across polls reported appears to favour Obama winning by a small margin.

Denerick

The debates could change everything of course, as could an October surprise, but there is no doubt that this is Obama's to lose. I bet everyone in Democrat HQ are counting their blessings that such a thoroughly wretched individual as Mitt Romney was their opponent. You couldn't make this stuff up.

Denerick

Why do parties always put up such weak candidates when a President is fighting for his second term? You think of Walter Mondale in 1984, or that guy who ran against Clinton in '96 (His name eludes me as I type) John Kerry in 2004 - a stiff North Eastern liberal... Like that was going to work. Romney is the archetypical bad candidate, the kind of person who will generate book long studies about how not to run a presidential campaign for the next 50 years or so.

joseph brand

jank wrote: »

I don't even know what you are saying here. "They are like each other but not really.."
They outsource? What does that mean? The Tea Party like violence? :rolleyes:

Palin is an idiot who got lucky and is still cashing in on her fame. However much of an idiot she is she has not killed anyone or advocated the killing of [insert random groups].

It is amazing the seeminly intelligent and rational people get so worked up and illogical about a few politicans running their mouths off. Meanwhile stuff like this happens everyday. Perspective please.

Apologies if I was a little nebulous.

Sarah Palin: War in Iraq is "God's Plan"

Palin is obviously a grade A moron, but what's embarrassing is the fact that the GOP supporters warmed to her 'folksy charm'. Would the Rep voters have been happy with her as VP, "You Betcha!"

I don't know what the link you provided has to do with this thread.

When I mentioned outsourcing, I was referring to the fact that when people scream for war, they send others off to fight for them. I didn't really want to go repeating the fact that Romney was spreading crazy fairy tales, like any other con man, in beautiful Paris, and Bush was playing hide-and-seek, to avoid being drafted into Vietnam. It doesn't matter anyway, there's always plenty of poor people to cart off to war zones. Then there's the fact that the rich have far more to lose, under the threat of a Communist invasion, than the poor who fight, in their place. War it seems, is not without a sense of irony*.


*Slightly edited line from The Matrix.

Duck Soup

Denerick wrote: »

Why do parties always put up such weak candidates when a President is fighting for his second term? You think of Walter Mondale in 1984, or that guy who ran against Clinton in '96 (His name eludes me as I type) John Kerry in 2004 - a stiff North Eastern liberal... Like that was going to work. Romney is the archetypical bad candidate, the kind of person who will generate book long studies about how not to run a presidential campaign for the next 50 years or so.

It's usually because there's a popular president and the more credible candidates decide to sit it out to wait for a better opportunity. No one fancied their chances going up against Reagan, no one fancied their chances going up against Clinton and even Dubya shot up in popularity post 9/11.

And the polls bear that out with Obama. Much as though the economy's stuttering and there's a large wingnut element that think he's Satan incarnate, most American voters like him. He's also a proven effective campaigner and a good debater.

So Chris Christie sits this one out, as does Jeb Bush, as does Marco Rubio etc., etc. Then again, even if Obama does serve a 2nd term, the likelihood is that the Republican candidate in 2016 will be campaigning during an economic upturn - most economists forecast 12m new jobs in the next 4 years in America, no matter who's in charge, which is why Romney claims he will 'create' 12m new jobs if elected. And they're likely to be facing Hillary Clinton, who's been very impressive in her job over the past 3 and half years, and who is likely to have both Bill and Obama backing her up.

But I know what you mean about the Republican field this time round. They were so bad it was almost surreal.

Denerick

OK, sitting it out makes sense for a young guy like Rubio but not for older types like Christie. This was the democrats election to lose, the economy is terrible. If a republican won this time round they'd face the electorate four years later with a stronger economy. So I don't think that argument is all that sound. Plus, if Obama is re-elected the democrat in 2012 will be able to claim credit for the economic recovery, and paint the Republicans as the party of no.

southsiderosie

MOD NOTE:

Folks, this thread is about election polls, not the Tea Party. Please stay on topic.