Sunday, May 27, 2012

Why it will be a landslide


What’s New Today

Story #1 tells us what Gallup has learned about the electorate and it isn’t good for the Democrats.  #2 looks at what a preference cascade is as I conjecture that this will be the undoing of BHO in the coming election.  #3 is a new anti-Obama ad.  #4 talks about Obama’s bio.  It seems Barack was the first birther.  #5 asks the question, is a national egg-laying hen standard something worthy of the Senate or should they focus on things like a budget? 

Today’s Thoughts

Richard Furillo stood with his son Matthew at his son’s workplace; a lifelong Democrat, he voted for Obama in 2008 but won’t again. “I don’t know why I did it but I cannot stand any more ‘change,’” he said, referring to the president’s old campaign slogan.

Discrimination has become a nasty word which is used politically by the left. Yet we discriminate extensively within our society and even within the Constitution.  If you are under 18 you cannot vote.  If you are under 21 you cannot drink.  If you are under 35 you can’t be President.  But to discriminate you have to have standards, which is why the left hates it.

As some market watchers have raised the probably of another recession to 100%, the one good thing for Obama in this news is the price of gasoline should drop


1. Gallup:  America self identifies and the election

Americans are more than twice as likely to identify themselves as conservative rather than liberal on economic issues, 46% to 20%. The gap is narrower on social issues, but conservatives still outnumber liberals, 38% to 28%.


Here are a couple of graphs.  The  one shows the breakdown on economic and social issues.  It indicates that Romney is smart to focus on economic issues.  On economic issues only, if Romney secures the economic conservatives he need only win 4+percent of the moderates to win the election.  


 

The second graph is even more interesting.  If you give Obama the social liberals regardless of their economic views (a reasonable thing to do), and the economic liberals Obama stands with 33% of the vote.  Give Romney the Economic conservative less the socially liberal ones and the socially conservative (Obama probably did that with his stance on gay marriage) but economically moderate, Romney has 48% of the vote. This leaves 15% economically moderate and socially moderate who if Obama gets 100% of them he ties Romney 48-48.  My sense is with the economy like it is, the economically moderate will break for Romney 9-6 percent or 8-7, which gives Romney 56-57% and Obama 39-40% of the vote.  Despite what you are hearing, this is going to be a landslide for the Republicans. 



2. The Preference Cascade Begins?

What I believe we are seeing here is the beginning of a “preference cascade,” a term made popular by Glenn Reynolds of Instapundit fame.  It’s a fascinating concept, applied originally to the process by which oppressive governments fall. 

A large population can be dominated by a small group only by persuading all dissenters that they stand alone.  Most of their fellow citizens are portrayed as loyal to the regime, and everyone around the dissident is a potential informer.  A huge dissident population can therefore be suppressed, by making them believe they’re all lonely voices in the wilderness… until the day they begin realizing they are not alone, and most people don’t support the regime.  The process by which dissent becomes seen as commonplace, and eventually overwhelming, is the preference cascade…

….A preference cascade can flow in positive directions as well.  Those who believe they are alone in holding a positive opinion about something are delighted to discover that its fan base is much larger than they believed, and approval quickly snowballs.  Anyone who has watched a “cult” phenomenon go “mainstream” has witnessed this.

That’s what began happening over the past couple of weeks: a large number of people discovered it’s okay to strongly disapprove of Barack Obama.  His popularity has always been buttressed by the conviction – very aggressively pushed by his supporters – that disapproval of his personal or official conduct is immoral.  You’re presumptively “racist” if you disagree with him, or at least a greedy tool of the Evil Rich, or a “Tea Party extremist.”

A negative mirror image of this narrative was installed around Mitt Romney, who is supposedly a fat-cat extremist (and, thanks to the insidious War On Mormons, a religious nut) who nobody likes... even though large numbers of people in many different states voted for him in the primaries.  Of course he has his critics, and I’m not seeking to dismiss the intensity or sincerity of that criticism… but the idea was to make Romney supporters feel isolated going into the general election, particularly the people who don’t really get involved in primary elections

Both of those convergent narratives began crumbling this week: Obama is deeply vulnerable, and his campaign has no real answer to criticism of his record – they’ve even tried floating an outright fraud, the now-infamous Rex Nutting charts that presented Obama as some kind of fiscal hawk.  (Stop laughing – major media figures took this garbage seriously for a couple of days, and Team Obama did push it.)  Major Democrats, beginning with Newark mayor Cory Booker, expressed criticism of the Obama campaign… and the Left reacted with shrieking hysteria and vows of personal destruction for the “traitors.”…


You actually see this happen in a lot of elections.  The “experts” have been trying to convince us that this election will be too close to call.  It has the effect of keeping Obama supporters hopeful and keeping Romney supporters more discouraged than they should be.  This election won’t be close.  History has shown us over and over again economics like we have now is deadly for incumbents.  Look at Europe.  Where has an incumbent been returned to power?  And this preference cascade will happen here and Obama and the Democrats will be swept from the power they currently enjoy. 

3.  New Ad:  What the election will be about


These kinds of ads will beat BHO like a drum. 

4. Obama: Kenyan born according to his own bio

Three possibilities follow the bombshell discovery that Barack Obama was promoted in 1991 through 2007 by his professional agency as an author "born in Kenya and raised in Indonesia and Hawaii."  (1) Obama untruthfully presented himself as Kenya-born.  (2) Obama untruthfully presents himself as Hawaii-born.  (3) Obama had no knowledge that his bio contained the 16-year-old "error" which was corrected in April of 2007, when Obama was gearing up his campaign for the U.S. presidency.
Of the three possibilities, number three may be discarded on its face as absurd.  Everyone in the publishing industry knows that authors write their own bios.  At the very least, authors approve their own bios.  I've written some law review articles, and in the law journal context, author bios are normally brief.  Even so, in every instance, the respective publishers printed only what I approved.

Mr. Obama's Acton & Dystel bio is fairly lengthy and detailed.  To believe that Obama had no knowledge of the born-in-Kenya "error" requires more than just believing he didn't sign off on it.  We would also have to believe that Obama didn't care to read his bio in the 36-page promotional booklet after publication and distribution.  That is also a huge stretch.  Did Obama get a copy?  Of course he did -- that's another publishing standard….

This is an issue of character and with the coming election character will be a very important issue.  People want to know the character of Mitt Romney.  Will he follow through on his promises?  People also want to know the character of Barack Obama.  What did he mean when he told the Russians he will have more “flexibility” after his last election?  Does Obama go even harder left if he gets reelected?  


5. Senate Looks to have National Egg-Laying Hen Standard

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and a half dozen other senators have proposed legislation setting a uniform national standard for the treatment of egg-laying hens, which would ensure egg producers aren't blocked from selling across state lines due to differing state standards.
 
Feinstein said on Thursday that six states already have their own standards, and 18 others could put their own rules in place soon, which could cause problems in the years ahead. She said beginning in 2015, for example, eggs produced in Iowa and Indiana will not be able to ship to California because they will not meet California's standards.

"Different standards in Michigan and Ohio will take effect later, further adding to the patchwork of regulations," she said. "As states with disparate standards continue to protect their own egg producers by banning the sale of eggs from States with lower or no standards, a complicated web of state laws will impair interstate commerce."…


Does this really sound like something the founders had in mind when the created the Senate?  And in view of the Senate not having passed a budget in three years, aren’t there more important things they should be looking into? 

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