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February 11th, 2012 
FAKE NEWS for the Zionist agenda
America is, after all, a centre-Right country. Twice as many people identify
themselves as conservatives as consider themselves liberals. Both Richard
Nixon and Ronald Reagan were re-elected to their second terms with wins in
49 of the 50 states, while Bill Clinton, the only Democratic president to
win re-election since Franklin D Roosevelt, never even reached 50 per cent
of the popular vote.
But the deepest driver of popular opinion is the economy – and even though the
free-fall stopped months after Barack Obama took the oath of office,
unemployment grew for two years in the great recession.
During the last few months, it has dipped down towards eight per cent, but it
still remains higher than when the stimulus spending began. And no president
since Roosevelt has been re-elected while presiding over such a rough
economy.
The president’s saving grace is his personal approval rating – more than 70
per cent of Americans like him personally, even though his job approval
ratings have averaged in the mid-40s for much of the past year. As the
economy has improved, those ratings have risen – we vote with our wallets
here in the USA.
But the biggest boost to the president’s fortunes has been the weakness of the
Republican field and the cage fight mentality that has suffused the primary
process.
The unexpected sweep of three caucus states by Rick Santorum on Tuesday was a
sign of Mitt Romney’s weakness as the presumed Republican nominee.
Grassroots conservatives don’t trust the sincerity of the former
Massachusetts governor’s reversals on social issues ranging from abortion to
gay rights.
In contrast, former Senator Santorum has been a stalwart social conservative
his entire career and recently received the endorsement of over 100
evangelical leaders – an oddity, some might say, given Mr Santorum’s
Catholic faith.
The surest sign of a grassroots enthusiasm gap has been the low turnout in
primary states to date, despite the intense media attention on the
Republican race. Romney’s wins have come after blanketing the respective
state with negative ads attacking whoever his chief rival might be at the
time.
The Romney campaign and its supporters spent more than $15 million to win
Florida, with 93 per cent of the ads in the final week being negative
against Newt Gingrich. This Death Star approach to campaigning does work,
but it turns off many voters in the process.
Romney has compounded his problems with a series of gaffes that have
highlighted his personal wealth and distant demeanour. There was his now
notorious remark, intended to be a pitch to the middle class, “I’m not
concerned about the very poor.”
Combined with previous mis-statements about how “corporations are people”
and the revelation that he pays only 14 per cent tax on investment income
that generates more cash flow in a day than the average American family
makes in a year, and it’s clear what problem he has in the making.
Even his Republican competitors have accused him of indulging in “vulture
capitalism”. Romney increasingly seems less like Mr One Per Cent – the
wealthy Americans targeted by the Occupy Wall Street protesters – than Mr
0.1 per cent.
President Obama’s re-election strategy is focused on portraying himself as the
defender of the forgotten American middle class. There are signs that this
strategy is succeeding, if only in contrast.
The Washington Post/ABC poll found that Obama is seen as a better
champion of that group than Romney by a decisive 55 to 37 per cent. Obama
also has an edge among centrists and independent voters for the first time
in months. Taken together, these two trends are essential – after all,
elections are won in America by whoever best connects with moderates and the
middle class.
Even so, the Obama campaign should not be too confident yet. Even with all the
advantages of a sitting president, he faces a steep climb toward re-election
– and is unlikely to win with the same wide electoral margin he did in 2008.
But the longer the ugly Republican nomination fight goes on, the better he
looks in comparison.
And as the President himself recently joked, “The odds of me being
re-elected are much higher than the odds of me being elected in the first
place.”
John Avlon is senior columnist for Newsweek and The Daily Beast.
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