POLITICS FEBRUARY 16, 2012
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It’s all but official: Survey after survey indicates that President Obama’s reelection prospects have brightened considerably in the past three months. Pundits and campaign professionals have tried to explain this development by focusing on factors such as the White House’s new post-debt ceiling message and the damage the Republican primary process seems to have inflicted on Mitt Romney. But the real causes of this shift are much more fundamental—namely, that Americans now believe their country’s economic health is improving. Obama’s re-election will depend on whether they continue believing so in the nine months until election day.
Despite the recent flurries over social issues, the condition of the economy continues to drive the 2012 election more than in any contest since 1992. As the most recent CBS/NYT survey shows, the public’s assessment of the president’s overall economic management has become much more positive since last fall. As recently as December, it stood at 33 percent approval, 60 percent disapproval. In January, it improved to 40/54, and in February to 44/50. Public assessment of the president as job creator has shifted in the same direction—35/58 in December, 41/52 by February. And so has the evaluation of economic trends. As recently as last month, only 25 percent of the public believed that the economy was getting better, versus 29 percent who thought it was getting worse. By February, the mood had improved considerably: 34 percent now think the economy is getting better, versus only 22 percent who still think it’s deteriorating.
It turns out that the American public is an exquisitely sensitive barometer of real economic developments. Between January and September of 2011, job creation ranged from anemic to imperceptible, the number of unemployed Americans didn’t budge, and neither did the unemployment rate. Since then, the number of employed Americans has risen by 1.5 million, the number of unemployed has declined by more than 1.2 million, and the unemployment rate has declined from 9.0 to 8.3 percent. If these trends continue at this pace for the next nine months, Obama will be sworn in for a second term. (For a roundup of the forecasters who think they won’t, see my column from last week).
Still, as so often happens, the consensus has shifted too abruptly, moving from “Obama’s toast” to “none of these bums can beat him.” Obama’s chances may have improved, but 2012 is still a close race and will remain so unless the economy outperforms most expectations. For a snapshot of where things stand in the general election, one can hardly do better than the most recent Quinnipiac survey of Ohio, the closest thing we have to a microcosm of the country and the most reliably pivotal of all the states. As of now, Obama leads Santorum by 47 to 41 percent. But he leads Romney by only 46 to 44 percent, compared to a 45 to 41 percent edge last October. Last fall, 36 percent of Ohio’s registered voters had a favorable view of Romney, versus 31 percent unfavorable. Today, the favorable assessment is essentially the same—37 percent—while his unfavorable rating has risen to 40 percent—bad but not catastrophic. During this same period, Obama’s personal approval rating remained almost stable—47/46 in November, 49/46 now, and his job approval rose modestly, from 44/50 to 47/48. (It’s also important to keep in mind that this polling comes at a point in the election campaign when primary candidates typically are at their nadir.)
The bottom line: Romney is bloodied but not mortally wounded, while the president is doing better but is not yet out of danger. And despite Santorum’s rapid rise, which could lead to his nomination if he prevails in Michigan, the evidence currently available does not sustain what is becoming the core argument of his primary campaign—that in the industrial Midwest, his alleged blue-collar appeal would make him a stronger general election candidate than Romney against Obama. Romney and Obama as favorites, Santorum as a long-shot: The overall political situation has changed since last fall, but not as much as many people think. In the minds of swing voters, the economy will still be the deciding factor.
William Galston is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a contributing editor at The New Republic.
9 comments
The Obama "Campaign" hasn't really started yet. The only "momentum" it has against the Republicans, is how stupid the Republicans appear to be compared to each other and compared to your average rock. Whenever Romney talks about Obama as someone trying to bring forth a European-Socialist-anti-Capitalist-anti-Christian America, the Republican approval goes backwards and Obama moves forwards -- but that's not the Obama Campaign. That's Republican stupidity. It is nice that some in the American electorate are noticing.
- AllanL5
February 16, 2012 at 9:25am
"...the damage the Republican primary process seems to have inflicted on Mitt Romney. ..." is backwards. Romney has self-inflicted all of the damage to himself - direct correlation between his negative scorched earth destruction and disintegration in his 'favorability' and 'electability' myth. It is now at the point where the question is becoming why Romney is willing to destroy the GOP to further his very personal ambition. Meanwhile, no one is dissecting the fracture in the Democratic Party (where did all the Blue Dogs go?). So, Mr. Galston - take a break and come back in three weeks. Maybe Romney will have suspended HIS campaign by then, which would certainly give all the pundits something new to talk about.
- K2K
February 16, 2012 at 9:38am
Allan and K2K are right. Obama and the Democrats have not so much as laid a glove on Romney yet. Romney has enjoyed a massive spending advantage over his own rivals and is only limping along and when he does not massively overspend, as in the 3 states he recently lost, he loses. I can honestly say for my adult life I have personally liked, if not agreed with, every Republican nominee for President (though I like McCain a lot more than Bush in 2000). I loathe Romney. I actually kind of liked him in 2008, but now I just loathe him. I have never seen a more cynical, unprincipled individual ever run for President that got this far. And unless the economy craters there is no way Santorum stands a change in Nov. if he gets the election. He wants to make contraception illegal because God doesn't like it and Santorum thinks he speaks for God.
- blackton
February 16, 2012 at 10:56am
"...Santorum thinks he speaks for God." Yes, blackton, and God's not that good at politics or economics. G.W. Bush told us that God gave him the go-ahead to invade Iraq, e.g., and that turned out to be a disaster. Since the GOP has been taken over by the Religious Right, Republicans talk like the divine rulers of the past, who claimed that any words out of their mouths were actually God's. I thought America was supposed to be a New World, where that kind of crap no longer held sway. But I guess human nature is like a chicken's: it always comes home to roost.
- magboy47.
February 16, 2012 at 12:33pm
Romney lacks self identity and like a political Zelig, he can only define himself relative to an opponent. Against Kennedy he was a progressive, against Gingrich he was an outsider and against Santorum he became a severe conservative. If the economy is okay and Romney gets the nomination, Romney will have no place to go. He can't attack on foreign policy or domestic policy. He will morph into a self aggrandizing man with a big head and several wives while wearing a sweater vest talking about his big ideas regarding the type of sex that is part of the natural order.
- Nusholtz
February 16, 2012 at 9:56pm
Tell me the unemployment rate and GNP direction in September, and I'll tell you who wins. IF UR is > 9% and GNP stalled or headed south, its ABO time (anybody but Obama). Doesn't matter much if the Repub candidate is Mittens, Rick, or Tinkerbell. If UR is 8% or less and the GNP is improving, BHO wins. .The middle ground is anybody's guess. Be careful in what you wish for. The problem with a BHO win is what happens if the House and Senate go Repub. You may wish the Repub had won.
- drofnats1
February 17, 2012 at 6:56pm
Tell me the unemployment rate and GNP direction in September, and I'll tell you who wins. IF UR is > 9% and GNP stalled or headed south, its ABO time (anybody but Obama). Doesn't matter much if the Repub candidate is Mittens, Rick, or Tinkerbell. If UR is 8% or less and the GNP is improving, BHO wins. .The middle ground is anybody's guess. Be careful in what you wish for. The problem with a BHO win is what happens if the House and Senate go Repub. You may wish the Repub had won.
- drofnats1
February 17, 2012 at 6:56pm
Gallup data suggests unemployment rate may rise in the new March report which will be very bad news, since the recovery such as it is, is based on the expectation that things are getting better. Of course I don't know what the forecasts will be, jobless claims have dropped, so who knows?
- MikeB.
February 17, 2012 at 8:28pm
Gallup data suggests unemployment rate may rise in the new March report which will be very bad news, since the recovery such as it is, is based on the expectation that things are getting better. Of course I don't know what the forecasts will be, jobless claims have dropped, so who knows?
- MikeB.
February 17, 2012 at 8:28pm