9/22/11 Meeting

This week's meeting started off with a proposed agenda by fill-in host Rob. The three items on the agenda were a discussion of that evening's upcoming debate in Florida, comments regarding the articles Paul sent via email regarding possible back-lash effects if the Republicans in Pennsylvania indeed change their electoral college allocation system from winner-take-all to a district-based allocation system and an article regarding a possible 3rd party candidacy based on several polls showing a majority of respondents' expressing their desire to see an alternative to the Democrats and Republicans. 

This inspired a brief conversation about whether a moderate 3rd party (Republican) candidate would enter the race should Rick Perry win the nomination. Although the group has discussed on several occasions the opposite scenario (a 3rd party candidacy from a Tea Party Republican like Bachmann or Perry), this new and interesting possibility of a moderate challenge evoked some interesting comments. Despite Perry's current front runner status and momentum, it is not clear that voters in states such as NH, FL, and NV will support Perry over Romney because of Perry's general election electability issues. In fact, a recent CNN poll of Republican voters indicates that despite a large divide on issues like climate change and gay marriage between self-identified Tea Party Republicans and "regular" Republicans, a clear majority of both groups indicated that they plan on engaging in sophisticated voting by supporting a different candidate over their preferred candidate in order to give the party the best chance possible to capture the White House. That Tea Party Republicans indicate that they are willing to settle for less than ideological purity in order to "make Barack Obama a one-term president" is an interesting finding. However, Iowans do not traditionally put electability above ideology and the massive winnowing that usually occurs by the conclusion of the Iowa Caucuses could hinder the ability of later-state R voters to select an acceptable alternative to their first choice.

The meeting then moved on to a discussion about that evening’s upcoming debate in FL and the fact that Perry would need to perform better than he did at the Tea Party debate. Of course, the group anticipated that Perry would be under attack from all sides again, because he is the front-runner. A full discussion of the debate will be the centerpiece of this week’s upcoming meeting, so please feel free to join us as it produced some interesting discussion points.

Off agenda-the group discussed the enthusiasm gaps between Republican and Democratic voters in the 2008 and 2010 elections and whether or not Democratic voters will turn up in the rates they did in ’08 for this presidential election. This led me to raise an interesting question. Does the enthusiasm gap stem almost entirely from supporting the out-of-power party or does it have a policy basis? If the Dems don’t show up at the polls in ’12, and the Republicans do-this will provide some anecdotal evidence that out-of-power status is the key determinant of the enthusiasm gap. If however, the Ds turn out in droves again, and the Rs do as well, this would seem to indicate that there is a policy element to the gap. With the biggest issues in many decades on the table (Ryan’s proposed Medicare changes, Romney’s proposed social security changes, and Obama’s jobs bill which proposes ending the Bush Tax Cuts as well as other revenue-raising aspects, and the debacle in Wisconsin galvanizing unions and other collective-action supporters) it would seem that if rank-and-file voter enthusiasm has a policy element, it should manifest on both sides this election season.

So that’s what you missed at the meeting this week. We hope top see you this Thursday at 2:15pm in room 302 of Baldwin Hall. Bring a friend!

9/15/11 Meeting

The week's meeting opened with a discussion of polling results on RealClearPolitics.com, which have Obama's current average job approval number at 44% nationally. Paul commented that this is relatively close to Bush's approval rating at the same time in the ‘04 cycle, as he was grappling with a slowing economy and an unemployment rate that had jumped up to 4/9%-provoking panic from the Wall St. class and the then completely out-of-power Democrats. RCP's averaged national numbers for the Republican primary contenders was also discussed. Although newcomer Rick Perry is just above 30%, Romney remains competitive with 20%. The most notable change is Bachmann's share of the pie, which has decreased precipitously as foretasted as many of her supporters have jumped ship to Perry's campaign. Of course, these are averaged numbers from national polls. What really matters is how the candidates are faring in the early states such as IA, NH, SC, NV, and Florida. The most recent state polling available on RCP is from August, as does not accurately reflect the field's distribution post-Perry's declared candidacy.

            The second half of the meeting focused on the first ever Tea Party debate. Overall group consensus was that Perry struggled in the debate as he came under attack from both the right (Bachmann/Paul) and the left (Romney/Huntsman) of the conservative spectrum. It was clear that Perry particularly struggled with defending attacks on his executive order that bypassed the Texas legislature to require all Texas girls to receive the HPV vaccine as well as on in-state tuition for children of illegal immigrants. Additionally, the group mostly concurred that Romney performed well, again demonstrating that he is the most seasoned top-tier presidential primary candidate in the GOP field. Perry’s continuing momentum may have done Romney a substantial favor because not many political observers (including this author) would have predicted a Romney victory in the Tea Party debate a month ago. As Romney learned in 08-front- runner status isn’t always what it’s cracked up to be, especially in terms of primary debates. Still, despite the barrage of criticisms Perry largely kept himself on message and didn’t respond to the attacks. He also had high moments, such as when his record of overseeing more than 200 executions since being governor of Texas brought cheers from the crowd.

            As for the other candidates, Paul’s “let em’ die” stance on health insurance and controversial comments about 9/11 that were not well received by the audience, were discussed. Gringrich’s focus on Obama rather than on his Republican competitors was led one group member to wonder whether he was trying to set himself up as a potential vice presidential pick, leading another member to quip that “no one would want Newt as their VP.” Bachmann made impassioned attacks on some aspects of Perry’s record as governor of Texas, but it was not clear that the attacks had enough bite to snare back her former supporters from him.

            The meeting closed with a discussion of proposed changes in Electoral College allocations being proposed by some Republicans legislators in Pennsylvania, as well as in MI and WI.  NPR reports that some Republican legislators in PA want to change PA’s winner-take-all allocation system to a district-based system, which would almost certainly result in a split of the state’s ECs between the Republican nominee and Obama. This is certainly within PAs rights and abilities, as the Constitution only provides the framework of the EC system and leaves the details up to the individual states. Two states already have a proportional allocation system-Nebraska and Maine and the Obama 08 campaign famously capitalized on this by focusing in on the Democratic districts in NE, a deep red state from which their strategy successfully eked out 1 EC vote out of the state’s 5 total. Please see both http://motherjones.com/politics/2011/09/gop-electoral-college-plan-beat-obama-2012  and http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/  for some interesting commentary regarding this and for insights on how such changes could both help or hinder both party's 2012 campaign efforts. 

Next meeting is this Thursday, September 22^nd at 2:15 in room 302 of Baldwin Hall. Hope to see you there!