UGA Presidential Discussion Group – June 6, 2012

UGA Presidential Discussion Group – June 6, 2012

Paul introduced us to the PollyVote website (http://pollyvote.forcastingprinciples.com) which provides a summary of predictive models for the Presidential election. The models at this point give Obama a slight edge (51.9 vs. 48.1), but it appears that it will be a very close election. We noted that it is very early to make conclusions. Campbell indicates that polls in June tend to be off by about 7.5% and that the lead of the frontrunner narrows about 2%. Dick Wirthlin, Ronald Reagan’s pollster, claimed that strategists assume that it will be close election. If it is to be a landslide, there is little that the campaigns can do to change the outcome. Thus, the strategists are looking how to ensure a narrow victory.

We then headed to a website we had visited earlier (www.270towin.com). The site has 217 electoral votes for Obama, 191 for Romney and 120 undecided (PA, NC, NV, FL, VA, OH. NH, CO, WI). We played with the model by coloring NC red and PA blue. That makes FL and OH critical states for Romney. There are few scenarios that give Romney the win without those two states.

We looked at the Gurian model based on past performance by party in federal elections 2000-2008, revised from that described in the May 2 post on this blog. He has 7 states leaning to the Republicans (NC, AZ, MO, VA, FL, OH, CO) and 11 to the Democrats (ME, WA, MI, OR, NM, WI, PA, MN, NH, NV, IA). The states for each party are listed from the most likely to win to the most problematic. The analysis puts CO as the pivot state, meaning it would put Romney over the top for winning the election if each party holds on to the leaners. Any win by Obama in one of the Republican leaners would lead to his victory if he holds on to all of his leaning states. In other words, it looks like an incredibly close Electoral College battle at this point. It is entirely possible that one candidate could win the popular vote and lose the election. Are you listening Al Gore?

Next we talked about the Wisconsin recall election and the implications for the Presidential contest. This morning Chuck Todd indicated on Morning Joe that there was little chance Wisconsin would put Romney over the magic 270, i.e. it would not be the pivotal state as discussed above. If Romney wins Wisconsin, he will win the election. He also suggested that Barrett was a poor candidate in that he allowed the Republicans to rerun the 2010 election and point the finger at the Democrats for being divisive. Another candidate might have been able to paint the Republicans as the divisive party. Another factor in favor of Walker was the money advantage which was not as much as advertised if you consider the labor money, but it was still an advantage. The role of extra money might portend the race in the Fall.    

The rest of the session was devoted to a grab-bag of topics. How much will the fairness/ envy issue play a role in deciding the election? The press is beating up Obama over his ads on Romney at Bain Capital. Many pundits say it is a losing strategy to bring up the wealthy, but attitudes against wealthy athletes, Tea Party resentment of Wall Street and the bailouts seem to suggest something else. Both candidates may be trying to excite their base before going after the Independent/ Swing voters. Also, the press narrative is that the campaign will be a very negative one, and the Obama ads are negative fitting into that narrative. We know who Obama is, but neither campaign to this point has been able to define Romney. We agreed that the Obama campaign has been ineffective to this point, and that Clinton has had both a positive and a negative impact on the Obama effort. The other thing that has been happening is that the negative ads the Obama campaign is running are affecting his likeablity scores. At the same time Romney is becoming more likeable. In this respect, Obama reflects Carter who went negative on Reagan and suffered as a result. Romney, however has been avoiding the mainstream media and seems to be getting away from it. He has not demonstrated Reagan’s ability to come across well when the media spotlight is on him. There was some suggestion that Obama might do better staying in Washington and looking Presidential. This year may not be the best one to be associated with Washington, and apparently Obama gets depressed when sequestered in the White House. He gets pumped up when he is out campaigning.