Do you think Romney can win this election?

Hahahaha…..err, no.

I think Obama can still lose.

I’ll let you know what I think after the first debate between them. I think Romney made a big screw up in Israel. It especially bothered me that he said something along the lines of Israel being successful because of the hand of providence, or something like that. I try to believe he is pragmatic and logical, but then he throws in some sort of religious thing that makes me wince. I assume he means the providence of God in that statement.

I don’t think so.

I’m on the side that Romney can win, but that it’s unlikely. Pay attention to Pennsylvannia, Illinios, Ohio and Florida, since they’re swing states which offer alot of delegates. Most of the other states are predictable in their voting trends, but pay close attention to those four states.

I really doubt it at this point. Electoral college projections, while obviously subject to change, point very strongly towards Obama as of now. (I’m on my iPhone, otherwise I would link you.) And with all of his gaffes in the past week or so, even Fox News is attacking him. When major, far right media that would side with pretty much any conservative candidate starts to question your competence as the (technically unofficial) Republican candidate candidate, you know you’re screwed.

Probably not. It takes a Super Star (like Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton were) to beat an incumbent . Romney is not a Super Star.

Oh come on, this is the land that elected George W Bush twice. Do you think reality exists here?

As @Adirondackwannabe points out, the U.S. elected GW Bush twice. My complete shock and disappointment in 2004 shows that a) I have no idea who or what the U.S. will elect as president, and b) really? Twice? WTF?

Twice, so true. The second time I was in a depression for a couple weeks I swear. I walked around in a fog of disbelief. How could it be?

Unfortunately, @Adirondackwannabe, you are, I afraid, correct. It does seem as if reality left this country LONG ago. Even worse, many of the US citizens only remember things in small soundbites, and say something often enough they won’t bother to do any investigating to make sure of what is the truth. Mtt has an unbelievable budget, and he can say things many, many times. He doesn’t have to do any actual work.

Romney does not freak me out like Bush did.

I guess I wasn’t looking as I typed! I meant I am afraid!

I certainly hope not, but I think Obama supporters need to be vigilant. Complacency could lose this election to Romney.

Sadly, yes. The polls are tight and I was recently reading where the jobless rate, growth, direction polling, and consumer confidence numbers are all against an incumbent win. To Obama’s advantage he’s currently running ahead in all but three of the battleground states and while his approval isn’t good it has leveled off. But when you ask people who are undecided to make a decision, particularly when they range from unhappy to pissed, you never really know just what’s going to happen. I think if the economy is getting positive press near the election Obama wins, if not Romney has a real chance to edge him out. Here’s hoping for more of Romney’s insulting social commentary and a timely bump in employment and GDP.

I am afraid that Romney might be elected. He has unlimited amounts of money & he is willing to say anything or do anything in order to get elected. His goals are for Power & Money & he is willing to trample all over everything that is important to the average American. He is willing to tell any lie & see that it is repeated often enough so that many American voters will believe it.

I decided to not be so complacent.I just received my voter notification card. It’s a sad fact that this will actually be my first time voting. I have not voted in the past because I was apathetic and didn’t think it mattered, and although I still do to some extent, I feel I should do this to “play my part”.

@Blackberry The first time I registered was Gore v. Bush, panicked Bush might win. I’m 44, so you can do the math that I had not been voting since the age of 18.

@Blackberry Good for you. Informed voters are so friggin important these days.

Not if my vote counts along with I hope many others who have sense. I might’ve actually gone for voting republican this time around if they had anyone worthy. But voting for Romney is like jumping out of the cold frying pan into the fire.

@Blackberry By the way, I still often leave parts of the ballot with a no vote. If I don’t know the people or the issues I don’t vote for that seat.

Yes, I think it’s possible. Obama has really alienated quite a few progressives, and a number of moderate voters who normally vote Republican crossed over in 2008 to vote for him. Many of these voters won’t be back. When you combine this with the efforts of statehouse Republicans to pass “anti-fraud” legislation (primarily in swing states), which seems mostly designed to achieve voter suppression, and with most polls showing a dead heat, then yes, it is very possible Obama loses.

We are still three months out though, which is an eternity and then some in politics. It’s possible Obama pulls it out. But I think if he does so, it will largely be because Romney is such a piss-poor candidate.

Any election can be fixed….(IMHO)

Romney can’t win this election. Unfortunately, Obama can loose it. According to the super-pac literature and propaganda, Obama’s a socialist, Muslim, who is taking your tax money from god’s army and spending it on Kenyan style health and welfare while picking on huge international corporations that are innocent job creators.

@Ron_C And, why would that be more effective this time than last?

It’s Obama’s election to lose right now, but Obama’s so-called party is good at stealing defeat from the jaws of viktory.

The frightening part is, in every election going back to at least 1980, the side that won was the side with the most media discipline. The closest things to exceptions were 2000 and 2004 when Bush won by the skin of his teeth in the electoral college. Obama has a lot of discipline controlling his image, but he is far less effective than other pols at translating his image into political achievement, legislatively or in the press.

A Republikan in Obama’s shoes would have successfully pinned the failing economy on the Dems without question, and the Dems here actually have an advantage in that the Republikans really did cause most of these problems and, even better, are obstructing all attempts to fix it. It’s virtually indisputable and Dems scarcely mention that, of course.

@JLeslie I think that an Obama will also show up as a gain in the House and Senate. With a more co-operative congress many of his changes can be made and a more progressive congress would also limit Obama’s tendency to go to the right militarily and financially.

The sad truth is that he is punished for doing the right things for our country while the republicans are forming strong (and rich) political alliances. Now more than ever the country has much to loose. If the republicans win it will mean that the highest office in the land can be bought and controlled by the richest and most ruthless.

I agree with those who say Romney can’t win, but Obama can still lose. Then again, Romney’s performance lately has me half convinced he could find a way to talk himself out of office even if he won 270 votes in the Electoral College. He’d probably start his victory speech by conceding the race or something.

@Ron_C I’m not sure I understand your answer. What I meant was last election the freaks were out there labeling him Muslim, not American, a socialist, etc, and yet he still won. I kind of think maybe it as Bush in reverse? From my perspective it was impossible for a born again religious man, who started a war in Iraq, who only thinks in black and white, who wants to erode woman’s rights, to be elected again, but poof, he was. So, I figure the Muslim black guy can also surprise people and be reelected again also.

I personally don’t think Obama has done everything right, but I feel it is veru very difficult for me to vote for a republican, unless the republican visibly railed against the religious right crazy people. They do exist, republicans who go on record as saying the right wingers are ridiculous, but Romney seems to be going along with them to win.

I am still hopeful he will surprise us in the debates, but my hope is fading over time I must admit.

@JLeslie what I meant is that a big win for president usually means a big win for other party offices like what happened when Obama won the first time. Many democrats were swept into office on his coattails.

Unfortunately, being democrats they were able to snatch defeat from victory and lost in 2010. There replacements were not only republicans they were far right almost fascist.

Most of us recognize that a person’s race and religion are not the criteria by which a President should be selected. Unfortunately there is a solid 20 to 25 percent of voters that firmly believe that the president is not an American and is a Muslim bent on destroying White America. With the new voter restrictions in most states that have republican governors, many of the people likely to vote for Obama will be declared ineligible to vote. This will come as a surprise to many of those people when they show at the polls only to be turned away and too late to fix the problem.

Sorry for the long winded reply but my point is that with a extremely solid “anti intellectual, christian right-wing” base it won’t take too much effort to get the fringe independents and uneducated to support Romney while turning away likely Obama voters.

This approach is brilliant and disgustingly evil.

@Ron_C I just think the same plan was there last election. Although, I do think Obama might have a little trouble in that the black vote might not come out as strong as four years ago. I wonder which states it really made a difference? New black voters? Enough to move the electoral college from red to blue?

Liberal as I am, I am on board with IDing voters. In TN they have always required ID where I vote. I have no idea if it is the law, or they just do it. I don’t think it should have to be a photo ID, because we don’t give them for free, but at minimum a utility bill sounds good. I think we should give passport cards to every citizen personally instead of social security cards. We would still get SS numbers, but the card is unnecessary if we have a passport card. Green card holders have SS numbers, but they are not allowed to vote.

Are you saying the republicans in congress are going to go against the populus vote for the electoral college?

I really, really hope not, but I’m not betting on it. It’s very important not to get complacent, and for every one of us to vote.

I believe he has a 31% chance of winning the election…

http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/

@JLeslie I don’t know if you’ve been out of the country or what but the Republican (central committee?) have been planning to subvert elections since before they stole two for Bush. If you look at all the states with new Republican governors you will see a uniform effort to dis-enfranchise whole blocks of people. In my State, Pennsylvania, they passed a voter I.D. law despite the fact that there were virtually no cases of voter fraud in the last 50 years. They also tried to mess with the electoral college by splitting votes and reducing Pennsylvania’s influence in the presidential election, the state typically votes democrat for president.

Look at New Jersey, Indiana, and Ohio if you want to see other (successful) efforts to subvert the vote. The republican party does not consider what it good for the country just what is good for the party. The same philosophy brought the Nazi party into power in Germany only now the republicans use Arabs as the race to hate and fear and they’re not too crazy about black people either.

@Ron_C Then I think the dems should work to get everyone proper ID’s. I don’t see how we can argue people should just be able to walk up, say they are so and so, and vote? I am not arguing that disenfranchisement is not a problem. I am arguing that the other way we allow people not legal able to vote to vote. There are many many many people living in America who are here legally and illegally who are not allowed to vote, but I would bet some of them have been.

People can go vote as someone else, a relative they know who won’t be voting, whatever, wthout ID requirements. I guess that can happen anyway with absentee ballots. There are problems either way.

I also see no problem with splitting the electoral college, I hate the electoral college.

@JLeslie I live in a small town and if the person manning the polls doesn’t know you, he knows your neighbor. Regardless, you cannot vote if you don’t have the proper paperwork. Frankly I don’t like the idea of a country where you must carry your “papers” so the “authorities’ can identify you.

Yes you are correct, the goal of the democrats from now to November should be to insure the entire community “has their papers”.

@Ron_C Papers to vote? Are you comparing papers to vote with being legal in the country? It isn’t the same thing. I get the feeling you are trying to put me in a box with the hateful anti-immigration Republicans? You do realize my husband emigrated to this country right? From Mexico of all places. My paternal grandfather from Latvia, and the rest of my great grandparents from Russia and Latvia. Let alone I am Jewish and raised to be grateful America took Jewish people in (although many of us think not enough). Let us in from escaping horrific, oppressive, impovershed conditions a lot of the time. I am not 5th generation, forget where I come from.

I am against the new AZ laws, but my Mexican-American SIL supports them. She supports a country being able to protect its borders. I am against it, because I don’t think local police should have the right to do anything regarding immigration, except in the case that a criminal is convicted of a crime.

Most people I know who aren’t American are shocked that so few Americans have passports. I guess since we have the luxury of being such a large nation a lot of our citizen simply travel within our borders. Not that I am saying people need to carry ID on them all the time, although pretty much that is how I was raised. Not to prove citizenship, not to prove anything, only for ID purposes God forbid anything bad happens.

In TN, this is the first state that consistently requires picture ID be shown when using a credit card. I like it. I like someone can’t easily walk up and use my credit card if my wallet is stolen. I like some obstacles there.

I support giving anyone who passess a driving test a driver’s license, no legal papers required. And, fully support the written/computer part offered in multiple languages.

You live in a small town, well a lot of the country is not small towns.

I really cannot understand why you would be against giving people ID’s? Most people would probably like a free ID.

@JLeslie I see “papers to vote” in the same vein as internal passports, green cards, and other forms of identification to prove you have a “right” to be in this country. I have a similar background, my great grandfathers fled royalist and the oncoming communist oppression to come to this country (almost wrote company) to be work in coal mines and steel mills for pennies an hour. Amazingly they thought they escaped to freedom even when they were working harder and for less than they had in their former country. That is the magic that holds, even in today’s America. The common theme is “it sucks to be here but at least were not in…....”.
I feel that things like voter I.D. and states enforcing immigration law, drug wars, prison corporations, and hospitals for profit are the end of the “American Dream” and the beginning of Ayn Rand’s ideal country. The rich and their children prosper, and occasional commoner is allowed into their ranks for exceptional service and the rest of us just serve.

I know you have a good heart, I just hate to see you support our oppressors. Obama might be bad but Romney is the poster boy for the upper class and vulture capitalists that suck the blood out of us after they have our wealth.

@Ron_C The only people who need to have ID to vote are those who want to vote. That should be no problem for those legal to vote. I just don’t get it? If someone shows up to the polls and is not legal to vote, then they should not be voting. I am not saying card people at the polls to deport them. If they are deportable, they should not be voting. My point is if someone wants to vote, let’s provide ID for them. Only citizens can vote, are you saying there are citizens who don’t want some sort of identification. I think pretty much all citizens have an SS number. Maybe there are a few out there completely under the radar, born on a farm never known to have been born, living off the land, I guess maybe we have some people like that, but very few.

I am disgusted by the greed of big business, the rich getting richer, low wages, abusive employers, our health care system, that being poor means people live unsafely, that people are trying to chip away at our public school system, that higher education is ridiculously expensive in most parts of our country, and I could go on and on. I am not siding with the oppressor because I agree with one of their points, and my intention regarding voter ID is completely different then their end goal, and intention matters. Because the intention can guide to a just answer. I don’t care to be contrary to everything the other “side” says.

@JLeslie “The only people who need to have ID to vote are those who want to vote.” That is part of the right’s strategy, the fewer people that vote the better their chance to win.

” vote are those who want to vote. That should be no problem for those legal to vote. I just don’t get it? If someone shows up to the polls and is not legal to vote, then they should not be voting.” That is what I was saying. Voter fraud is virtually non-existant, its a solution to a non-existant problem but it is a scare tactic. Some people won’t show up just because they’re not sure they have the right identification.

Like I said, your heart is good but you’re supporting the wrong policy. I really like you and want you to do the right thing.

@Ron_C How can they figure out voter fraud if they aren’t asking for ID? They don’t know who is voting. If my sister had showed up to vote for me, they would have no idea.

We can agree to disagree for now. :)

This is what happens when you don’t have voter ID laws.

@JLeslie sure we can disagree, good evening to you. I still like you even when you’re wrong.

I have less of an issue with laws such as having a valid photo ID… and a much larger issue with some of the other ideas Republicans have suggested (and even passed), such as;
-Making your registration invalid if you turn it in more than 48 hours after first receiving the paperwork.
-Making it so you must have lived one continuous year at the same address before you can vote in elections there (even if you moved to the same district).
-Eliminating poll staff and poll locations in high population urban centers.
-Mandating a uniformed police presence at every polling location, beyond just a basic guard, especially in border areas and in urban centers for border areas (attempting to scare minorities who fear they’ll be hassled as immigrants).
-Shortening or outright eliminating early voting options in many states (which are shown to favor Democrats and shorten lines on election day).

I could go on like this. I have no idea why Dems want to focus on the photo ID aspect. I mean it is essentially a poll tax, as many people without a license are now required to pay 40ish dollars (pending state/district/etc) to get a photo ID that they will only use to vote…. But it’s hardly the most egregious thing the Republicans have suggested or done on the matter.

@tedd Some of those are outrageous. I had not seen a list like that before. Especially the one about living in the same place for a year! That rings of what the major one town up from me said on his facebook a few years ago. That we should go back to only giving the vote to land owners.

Are you sure these are being taken seriously at all? Or, are they just one rant of a few loud mouthed people and everyone knows, even Republicans it is ridiculous. I mean no polling in urban areas? It’s absurd.

@JLeslie Everything I listed was at least brought to a vote in a state house somewhere in the country, many of them by multiple state houses. I know the one about having to do the paperwork in 48 hours passed in Florida, many of the poll staff/officers on duty ones have passed nationwide for years. The early voting elimination took place hardcore after the 08 election when the Republicans realized that most of that vote was against them. Here in Ohio it has been shortened pretty drastically. It doesn’t effect me as much cuz I tend to vote day of, but they had pretty strong turn outs for the early voting and it was supposedly keeping the numbers reasonable on election day.

I don’t even understand the 48 hour one? Can you explain it to me better. When I lived in FL I registered, and I was registered. I don’t get it.

If you go and pick up the paperwork, or the paper rather, to fill out to register to vote, you have to return it filled out within 48 hours. Many times you’ll have people who walk around urban areas asking people if they want to register or not, or at concerts or festivals, what have you. If the papers aren’t returned within 48 hours, they are no longer valid and the voter must fill out a new one (in under 48 hours).

That’s ridiculous. What do they have to do? Mark down the date the form was given out? It doesn’t make any sense. People should be able to print the form or pick one up, and fill it out whenever. I can’t believe FL has that law? Are you sure? I am not saying you are making anything up, I just cannot wrap my head around such a ludicrous law.

I looked it up. Here is the FL info about registering off their website. I don’t see anything about 48 hours.

Remember, swing state FL actually has a lot of minorites who are Republicans. It is not like other states. The Hispanic vote generally helps the right in that state. Especially in Dade county.

Florida’s only meaningfully Republikan minority is probably the Cubans, and that probably goes back to the days of their supporting Batista. (Unless you count Italian-American transplants from New York.)

Right the Cubans. Not probably, definitely. Especially the older ones, and the religious Catholics from some of the other Latin American countries. Granted a decent percentage of the younger Cubans are democrats.

The biggest problem the Republicans have in FL is probably the aging population and of course all the Jews down there.

@JLeslie I found a few news articles talking about it. Without reading too much into them cuz I’m about to walk out the door, it looks as though a judge may have put an injunction on it within the last month or two..

http://www.politifact.com/florida/statements/2012/jun/12/chris-matthews/chris-matthews-discusses-48-hour-rule-florida-voti/

http://weblogs.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/dcblog/2012/05/federal_judge_48_hour_voter_re.html

Interesting. Thanks for the link. I’m surprised Matthews was so ignorant about the Friday, Monday point. Almost all legal contract type things are automatically buriness days if the requirement is 3 days or less in FL, I would assume other states too. Before I got to the bottom of the first article I was already thinking he should not be using that example. But, if I understand correctly it is not an individual who has to turn in their application in 48 hours, it is people who are signing others up? Is that right? I don’t mind if there is a reasonable rule about that. Even as short as 72 hours.

Re: voter fraud laws. Just this. We have to consider the source, but we all know that’s what it’s really about.