Comments by Danny Ferry

Bottom line:
McCain was a stronger candidate than Romney, as evidenced by McCain beating Romney.
Obama was a stronger candidate than McCain, as evidenced by Obama beating McCain.

Now the transitive property MAY not hold, but Romney is the underdog here, not the clear favorite.

Based on the same method of analysing specific constituencies instead of the national popular vote, I also predict Republicans taking the Senate despite losing the national popular Senatorial vote, based on the specific seats up for grabs. 2006 was a great year for Democrats, and as a result a lot of blue Senators are now facing re-election in very red states.

Sure, and Obama only needs to flip no voters at all. I still don't understand why we're talking about this like it's an easy task for Romney to hold all of McCain's voters while converting half a million Obama supporters, while the prospect of Obama holding most of his voters without converting ANY is akin to cleaning the Augean stables.

If anything, the precipitous decline in Republican popularity amongst Latinos (thanks to recent anti-immigrant laws) combined with the drastic rise of the Hispanic population makes Colorado SAFER for Obama. These are the same demographic shifts putting Arizona on Obama's battleground map.

And that surprises me about Intrade. It's not about the overall national vote (which Democrats still have a slight lead in), it's about the specific seats that are competitive and the constituencies they're located in. As a weird result of the 2010 landslide, in which Democratic turnout was low and seats already occupied by Republicans didn't change hands, the most conservative members of the House (typically Tea Party freshmen) now found themselves in the most moderate districts. If you rank all House members by their approval ratings by their own constituents, the bottom 50 is overwhelmingly Republican, with virtually the entire 2010 Republican freshman class represented. The way I slice the numbers, Democrats could win the overall national House vote by only 2 or 3% (which they're currently polling at, even without the downballot effects a President popular with the base might bring) and yet still capture the 25 seats necessary to take back the House.

True, cherny, but it's not something we say out loud. Saying it out loud sounds very un-Christian, something we very much care about.

Sorry to write a novel. I used this as an opportunity to put my own reasoning down for copy/pasting when my ultra-conservative friends look puzzled that I don't assume Obama can't possibly win re-election.

RR,

I did my homework. If Obama holds every state (and Omaha) he held in 2008 but loses Ohio, Indiana, Florida, Virginia, and North Carolina, the final tally is Obama 273, Romney 265, yes, under the new 2010 apportionment. If Romney wins those states and nothing more, he loses. He could even take New Hampshire on top of everything else for the tie, and throw it to a House that I think likely to be Democratic.

Meanwhile, Romney has to hold Georgia and Arizona, both of which are being targeted by the Obama campaign. Georgia was surprisingly close in 2008, giving McCain only a 5 point margin of victory. In the interim, the black and Hispanic populations have accounted for a majority of the state's population growth, while urban and educated Atlanta accounted for the majority of the white population growth. Favorable demographics for Obama.

I'm not saying Obama will win here, only that he can plausibly campaign and force Romney into an uncomfortable position where he can lean right to drum up the ultra-conservatives but alienate moderates, or play to the middle and risk low Tea Party conservatives, a strategy that could conceivably gain him Ohio and Pennsylvania but lose him Florida and Georgia.

Add to that the extreme likelihood that Obama will simply have more money to contest more states. So far Obama has raised much more than all Republican candidates combined, without campaigning heavily. More telling, Obama's donors are, like last time around, small donors. Something like 90% gave less than $200, meaning he can tap them again and again as the race heats up. On the other hand, two thirds of Romney's donors have already given the maximum for the primary. They can give the maximum again during the general election, but the evidence seems to be that Romney has a ceiling, whereas Obama basically doesn't. He's expected to raise a billion dollars, and while conservative SuperPACs might come close to matching that, what we've been seeing from exit polls so far suggests that money spent by campaigns doing ground organization is more important than money airing negative ads.

Finally, in all the hubbub about how high the President's disapproval rating is, let's remember that Romney is hardly anybody's darling. Obama consistently polls at about 50% favorable, 45% unfavorable. Romney, right now, is at 30% favorable and 45% unfavorable and getting worse. And this is BEFORE facing any significant Democratic criticism. Everything negative you can say about Obama has already been said loudly and repeatedly, and I don't see how the Republicans plan to push down those favorability ratings.

I'm not a Democratic shill. As I said, I voted McCain in 2008. But the media is trying to spin this as a close election when, near as I can tell, every single major fact favors the incumbent. Obama has the power of incumbency itself, a developed organization in every swing state, more money, more donors, more favorable opinions, more effective surrogates, and the electoral college math is clearly in his favor, with about 40 more "safe" Democratic electoral votes than "safe" Republican ones. AND he's got a better singing voice and a prettier wife, to boot. What does Romney have going for him? The biggest rallying cry for Tea Partiers, dismantling ObamaCare, is an issue Mitt may have sidestepped in the primaries but one he will be unable to campaign on in the general. The one advantage Republicans have, the enthusiasm gap, disappears when the Mormon Massachusetts Moderate is the nominee.

I'm not saying Romney CAN'T win. But he's certainly got an uphill fight. He'll have to significantly outperform polling and projections in about two-thirds of swing states, and do it with less money and, probably, fewer volunteers. Not a thrilling prospect.

I voted for McCain and I will vote Obama this election. Remember the #1 weakness the Obama camp had? He was inexperienced and lacked a record. That's no longer an issue.

At any rate, even assuming more people switch parties than in 2008, we have to discuss the size of this switch. In 2008, Obama won by 10 million votes and 192 electoral votes. In 2012, Obama could lose 95 electoral votes and still win. Think about that: Obama could lose Ohio, Indiana, Florida, Virginia, and North Carolina, all states he carried in 2008, AND STILL WIN THE ELECTION.

Democratic turnout might be lower, but, judging by the primary turnouts, Republican turnout will be even worse. Romney barely breaks even against the President in head-to-head match-ups, and the President hasn't started campaigning yet; it's been entirely one-sided. Add to that the steadily improving state of the economy. I don't see how the Republicans pull this one out without some sort of unexpected game-changer.

MS, far from being impregnable, the fortress of the Electoral College is under deadly siege. The National Popular Vote Interstate Compact takes advantage of the right of state legislatures to apportion their electoral votes in whatever manner they choose by passing legislation in individual states binding that state to award all of their electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote, regardless of who won in that particular state. Such legislation takes effect ONLY WHEN states representing a majority of electoral states have passes such legislation. At present, nine states representing 132 electoral votes have passed such legislation, nearly halfway to the necessary 270. Two more states, for a total of 13 electoral votes, have passed the legislation through both houses of the legislature and away gubernatorial signature, while a slew of states representing a further 98 electoral votes have passed the legislation in one house of their legislature.

I would not be so quick to assume that the popular vote is something we must simply reconcile ourselves to lacking.

I bet Tim Pawlenty feels like a real idiot right about now.

You really do seem painfully ill-at-ease writing about America for an American audience. I know you're not American, but neither was Robert Guest and he was fantastic.

My advice? Give up on writing for an American audience. You'll never pass as American, or even very familiar with American political culture, so go with the outside perspective and report American politics to Europeans, as observed by a European. Your column would be better if you copped to how foreign American still feels to you.

You should also keep in touch with what your colleagues over at Democracy in America are saying, it looks bad when you contradict each other. Erica Grieder recently had an excellent blog post arguing that Rick Perry's "demise" is mostly a narrative of the media, since, as you note, he is still at the top of the polls. Being inarticulate has never been a disqualifying attribute to the Republican base. But why draw your conclusions based on what voters think, when you can just adopt the same conclusions your fellow journalists have drawn?

Tonight's debaters will either be Winners, Losers, or Santorum. Being a Loser wouldn't be too bad, but the candidates are all scraping to not be Santorums.

There's one candidate, though, who might not be able to avoid it...

Thank you SOMEONE for mentioning that Reagan had a position on immigration that would be unacceptable for a contemporary Republican.

Maybe Rick Santorum really needs to poop. That would explain why he's sweating, looks so deeply uncomfortable, and can't stand still.

I support Michelle Bachmann, because she'll stand up for my rights to beat and rape my children.

If my children ever allow me to be dragged out in front of national tv at that age, I'm writing them out of my will.

Purple: gas prices dropped from over $4 just before the recession to under $2 during the recession's depths, right when Obama took office. So it's true, yeah, but it's an effect of economic recovery.

The audience has no idea what to make of Jon Huntsman.

Newt Gingrich is still in the race? Why?

Herman Cain's suspicion towards double-digit numbers continues unabated.

Santorum's flop sweat should be sold as a novelty lubricant.