Women Hold the Keys To Victory!

Fresh off their spirited debate the candidates took to the campaign trail and turned their attention to the latest shiny object…women.

No surprise here.  An AP poll taken prior to the debates found that 8% of all likely voters were undecided women.  Prior to his poor performance in the first debate the president held an 18 point advantage among women voters.  Polls taken after the first debate showed Romney reducing the president’s advantage to within the margin of error.  In what has become a very close election women clearly hold the keys to victory.

Frankly we find this erosion of the gender gap mystifying.  Never in our history has there been such a stark contrast between two candidates on the issues important to women.

Mitt Romney has said that on his first day in office he would repeal “Obamacare” a plan which provides women with free preventative care, removes the worry of having their coverage cancelled due to pre-existing conditions and allows their children to stay on their policy until they are 26 years old.  Mitt Romney has said repeatedly that he would overturn Roe v. Wade and that he would appoint Supreme Court justices who supported his view.  He says that he would defund Planned Parenthood, the primary provider of preventative health care for millions of women.  He supports the Blunt Amendment which gives employers and health insurance companies’ unlimited license to exclude any health service (contraceptives/abortions), no matter how essential, in the health services they cover.  His party’s platform and his running mate support a personhood amendment which would prohibit an abortion even in cases of rape, incest and danger to the health of the woman…essential making an abortion in any case a criminal offense.  His party has supported legislation that would require that women undergo humiliating trans-vaginal ultra sounds and other unnecessary medical procedures before having access to legal medical services.

These are just the social issues.  There are civil rights and equality issues that also demonstrate the stark differences between these candidates.

The first piece of legislation that the president signed upon taking office was the Lillian Ledbetter Equal Pay for Equal Work bill.  Mitt Romney has been asked several times if he supported equal pay for equal work.  It seems like a no brainer to us…but Romney has consistently avoided giving an answer.  He was asked again during the last debate.  He didn’t answer the question.  Instead he went off on some long story about looking through “binders full of women” to fill his various cabinet positions.  The problem here is that he lied…again!  Romney didn’t seek out qualified woman of his own volition.  A women’s organization sent him the “binders of qualified women” and suggested that he might consider any of the enclosed for his cabinet.  To his credit, Romney did hire several women in the binder to fill the posts.  But any suggestion that Romney recognized the need for that diversity is disingenuous.  Romney has also spoken out against any affirmative action movement to add women to the work place.  And during the debate Romney was quite pleased with himself to recount how as governor he offered flex time to his Massachusetts staff so the women could be home in time to fix dinner for their families.  Romney would reduce Pell Grants and cut education funding; areas of importance to women trying to get ahead. 

"Bindergate" has become the rage and Romney's Ward Clever view of a woman’s place in America is startling.

The president has fought for equal rights for women from both a social and civic standpoint.  He correctly notes that contraception, abortion, preventative care, equal pay, Pell Grants and education are not just women’s issues they are economic and family issues.  Because when you eliminate these programs or deny women their equal rights in the workplace you are taking money out of their pocket.  By and large women control the economy and are taking over the position as the bread winner in a majority of households.  So “women’s issues” are an integral part of our economy and our economic recovery.

Given these stark contrasts between the candidates; one has to wonder why has the president’s lead among women has eroded so badly? 

Perhaps it is because many women did not tune into the campaign until the first debate.  There they witnessed a lethargic, disengaged president who failed to even mention women’s concerns one time. More than likely it is because ahead of everything else women want a good job and the opportunity to provide a good future for their families.  The president’s support among women is eroding because he has failed to convince them that he has a plan to make that happen.

If the president wants to win this election he needs to stop talking smack “binders” and address the issues that really matter to those undecided women.

                 

Obama Rebounds!

Democrats can come in off the ledge.  Left leaning bloggers can emerge from their basements and bask in the sunlight.  Barak Obama is back.

The president and his Republican challenger faced off in a spirited debate that was a mirror image of the debate held two weeks ago.  Mitt Romney was once again aggressive in his attacks against the president’s record; at one point offering a very effective litany of the promises candidate Obama failed to keep.  He was also compelling when addressing an audience member who stated that in spite of the president’s rhetoric to the contrary it didn’t feel like the economy was improving. 

The governor’s aggressiveness was at times what pundits refer to as “oft putting.”  There is a fine line between being aggressive and being arrogant.  Many believe that Romney crossed that line.  His condescending attitude toward the sitting president: “I’m still speaking”… you’ll get your turn” or “Let me give you some advice.” …didn’t go over well with many viewers.  And his attempts to bully the moderator were hard to watch.  Romney does not like to be challenged.  And when he is challenged he gets angry and petulant.  Tonight that showed.   

But unlike the first debate, the aggressive Mr. Romney ran into a president who was more than willing to fight back.  The president defended his record; laying out all the difficulties he encountered upon taking office and the steps he took repair them.  The president went after the governor on the accuracy of his attacks and his plans for the future; frequently admonishing the governor: “that’s not true.”  From our prospective the president won the argument on jobs, on taxes, on women’s health issues, on equal pay for equal work, on immigration, on entitlements the deficit and particularly on foreign policy.  But the president failed to lay a clear, concise plan for the future.  He gave us bits and pieces but didn’t do a very good job of pulling it all together.  That may haunt him in the future.

We thought that there were three memorable moments in this debate.

The first came when Romney intimated that the Obama administration may have attempted to cover up the attacks on the Libyan embassy for political purposes.  The president bristled at this notion, turned to face Romney, and with sheer anger in his eyes called Romney’s accusations “offensive.”   

The second was when Romney thought that he had caught the president in a lie regarding the attacks on the Libyan embassy.  The president, while recounting the events of the attack and taking responsibility for the incident, said he went to the Rose Garden the day after and called the event a terrorist attack.  Romney smelled blood in the water.  He believed that the administration had muddled their handling of the incident, covered up the fact that the embassy was a victim of a terrorist attack, and didn’t acknowledge that a terrorist attack had occurred until two weeks later.  Romney honed in on the president believing that he could score political points by catching the president in a lie. But moderator Candy Crowley set Romney back on his heels when she said that the president was in fact telling the truth about his Rose Garden address.

The final and most damaging to Romney came in the final two minutes of the debate.  The candidates were asked to use their final moments to correct any miss-conceptions that people might have about them.  Romney had managed to get through 85 minutes without having to explain his infamous “47% comment.”  Inexplicably Romney opened the door saying that he cared about 100% of the American people.  The president blew through the opening like a freight train.  The last thing people heard was the president using Romney’s own “47%” words to show how he really views about half of the country.  The effect was devastating. 

The president was the clear victor in this contest.  Both the CNN and CBS flash polls taken immediately after the debate show the president winning the debate by 7 points among undecided voters.  The presidents’ strong performance will not return him to the 5-6 point advantage he held before the first debate.  But it will stop the bleeding and energize his supporters.  New polling numbers will be out in 48 hours.  They will tell us what impact if any this evening’s events had on the race.

There is one thing that we don’t need the polls to tell us.  These two men not only do not like each other…they do not respect each other.  The sheer disdain that they have for each other was palpable tonight.  We can only expect that it will get worse as we draw closer to Election Day.    

These two men will meet again next week for one final debate.  The subject will be foreign policy; a topic that has proven to be quite difficult for Governor Romney.

           

What We'll Be Watching For Tonight

While spending the weekend with family and friends we were asked what specifically we’d be looking for in tonight’s presidential debate.

So here goes…

Given the backdrop of a struggling economy and high unemployment, this race will eventually come down to a referendum on the president’s record…with independent and swing voters holding the keys to victory.   Many of those independent and swing voters would have already used the current economic conditions as reason enough to give someone else a chance.  But they needed a plausible alternative.  Mitt Romney gave them that plausible alternative with his performance in the first debate.  Up until the Denver  debate the Romney campaign’s inept performance had left independents cold.  But the polls show that Romney changed their perception with one 90 minute performance.  The race is tightening and Romney has momentum on his side.  Can Romney keep the momentum going? 

We will be watching to see which Romney shows up tonight.  Will the aggressive confident, presidential Romney appear once again?  Or will the stiff, gaff prone, disconnected rich guy show up once more.  Will Romney, who has trouble connecting with people, be able to connect with a live audience of independent voters…some of whom may very well be members of his 47% club?  Will the audience ask him about his sudden shift from severe conservative to reasonable moderate?  And how will he explain he ideological change of course?

Pundits say that the president’s task tonight is much easier.  They say that his previous performance was so bad that all he has to do is look interested to pull off a win.

We disagree.  We think that if the president wants to win re-election he needs a very strong performance tonight. 

Stylistically, we’ll be watching to see if the president acts like he really wants the job…something he failed to do in the first debate. We’ll be watching to see if he passionately defends his record and if he calls out Romney’s factually challenged narrative…something he also failed to do in the first debate.  We’ll be watching to see if he reminds voters of where the country was four years ago and if he explains in detail how far he has taken the country down the road to recovery.  We’ll be watching to see if he defends the core issues that his base has so passionately fought for over the past four years.  Women’s rights, equal pay, contraception, abortion, gay marriage, gays in the military and immigration were barely mentioned in Denver.  Will the president bring them up if the audience does not?

But most importantly, we’ll be watching to see if the president lays out his specific plans for the country’s future.  The Obama campaign has been relentless and effective in defining Mitt Romney.  But they have failed to effectively lay out their vision for the future.  The president has said that his biggest failure was focusing on getting the policy right and not doing a very good job in telling the story.  He is absolutely correct in that assessment.  Tonight he needs to tell that story if expects to win a second term.

There will be 80 independent voters in tonight’s audience.  Millions more will be watching on television.  Each of them will be trying to determine for themselves whether the president deserves a second term or if they should they give someone else a shot. 

Mitt Romney has given independent voters a plausible alternative.  The president sat back and allowed Romney to assume that role and take over the campaign’s momentum.  The question tonight is will Romney continue that momentum or will the president be able to stem the tide and seize the momentum for himself.

We’ll be watching.               

Romney Gets It Wrong Again!

The situation in Syria and the assassination of our ambassador in Libya has given the Romney campaign an opportunity to ramp up its criticism of the president’s foreign policy.  Romney and his surrogates are fond of calling the president “weak” and referring to his strategies as “leading from behind.”  They have taken great pains to lay blame for the ambassador’s death at the president’s feet; alleging that his “apologetic tone” has emboldened our enemies to launch these attacks.  Mr. Romney and his foreign policy buddies, John McCain and Lindsey Graham prefer a more aggressive approach.

Once again let’s look at the facts.

Romney recently gave a self proclaimed major foreign policy address in which he presented his ideas for dealing with our overseas problems.  His intent was to lay out the stark differences between his ideas and those of the president’s.  Ironically, when the dust settled we learned that all the aspects of Romney’s plan had already been put in place by President Obama.

To be fair there are some differences. 

Governor Romney would have us increase our military spending by $2 trillion dollars.  He has listed a host of warships and military aircraft that he would build to add to our arsenal. 

Romney has two problems here.  The first is that the defense department has said that they neither need nor want the new armaments that Romney is proposing.   The second is that his calls for a mammoth increase in military spending fly in the face of his constant complaints about the debt and deficit spending.  Adjusted for inflation, Romney’s  proposed budgetary increase would set our military spending at the highest levels in our history…far exceeding what we spent during the cold war.  Apparently he has no problem borrowing money from China to purchase weapons the defense department doesn’t want.

The other area of disagreement between the governor and the president lies in their willingness to help the rebels fighting in Syria.

 Romney and his pals want us to arm the rebels …now.  He blames the president’s reticence to do so as the primary reason that 25,000 Syrian civilians have perished at the hands of Assad’s military. 

The president has taken a more cautionary approach.  The administration believes that Al Qaeda operatives have infiltrated the less than organized rebel ranks.  They fear that any weapons intended for the over throw of Assad might well end up in the hands of Al Qaeda or the Taliban.

It turns out that the president is correct on this one.  A recent report aired on “60 Minutes” and echoed by several leading newspapers shows how Al Qaeda has in fact wormed its way into the rebellion. Weapons provided by other Middle Eastern countries intent on assisting the rebels are now in the hands of Al Qaeda operatives.  While the administration supports the rebels in their fight and has specifically called for Assad to step down they are unwilling to supply arms to a movement that will cozy up with the likes of Al Qaeda or anyone else offering assistance.

This is not the first time that we have seen Romney’s aggressiveness on foreign policy blow up in his face.  He was so eager to politicize the assassination of Ambassador Stevens that his ill timed/hastily called news conference was short on facts and long on embarrassment.  His decision to use a chance meeting with Glenn Doherty, one of the marines killed in the embassy attack, in a stump speech was met with anger on the part of the young man’s parents.  During the speech Romney recalled how Doherty rushed into the fray to help the embassy staff rather than hunkering down in safety.    “This is what Americans do.” Romney said.  “They (the world) need us.”   (Us!  Who is Romney talking about when he says “us?”  This is the same Romney who marched in SUPPORT of the Vietnam War but took advantage of his deferments to avoid entering the fray himself.)

 Upon learning of Romney’s comments Doherty’s parents reacted in anger.  They called on the governor to stop using their son’s death for political gains.  The Romney campaign ceased repeating the story on subsequent campaign stops.

Romney’s shoot first ask questions later strategy is dangerous.  If you screw up on domestic policy you might cause yourself some embarrassment.  But if you screw up on foreign policy you just might cause a war.

We prefer the president’s more thoughtful approach.                        

    

Biden Takes It To Ryan.

Vice President Joe Biden and Congressman Paul Ryan engaged in their one and only debate this evening.   

Going in most of the pundits said that all the pressure was on the Vice President.  After all he had the job of repairing the damage caused by the president’s poor performance.

We felt that the pressure was on Congressman Ryan.  He had to be the loyal soldier.  He had to set aside policies that he had championed his entire political career in order to publically defend those of Governor Romney.    

The Vice President was prepared, engaged and passionate in his defense of the administration’s policies…all the things his boss was not a week ago.  The Vice President’s task was to stem the bleeding and reenergize the Democratic Party.  Mission accomplished! 

According to the Romney campaign, Congressman Ryan’s charge for the evening was to hold his own and “do no harm”…maintain the bounce that Romney received from last week’s performance.  As expected the congressman was good on the numbers.  But he failed badly on foreign affairs.  And he was noticeably uncomfortable reciting the campaigns position on abortion…a position that differs from his own.

In the end it was a debate that both sides will claim to win.

So who really won?

A CBS flash poll taken among undecided voters immediately following the debate had 51% of those polled calling Biden the winner; 31% said Ryan won and 19% called it a tie.

A similar CNN poll called it 48%-44% in favor of Ryan.

We think Biden won.  He was clearly in command of the stage.  He looked presidential.  And unlike Romney's performance a week ago, Biden not only won on the optics…he won on substance as well.  He answered every question with specifics and deflected every rebuttal with facts.  In fairness, it's hard to debate a guy on foreign affairs who can call the Israeli prime minister by his first name and recounts domestic policy decisions with: "I was in the room when we..."

The Romney campaign agrees with us.  How do we know?  Because in the aftermath all you heard from Romney surrogates were complaints about the vice president’s aggressiveness, his interrupting the congressman and his condescending smile...all the things they cheered Mitt Romney for last week.

When the debate is over and all you can do is criticize your opponents “condescending smile”

…you know you got your ass beat.

 

Battleground State Polls Due Out Thursday Morning

Last week’s presidential debate continues to dominate the airwaves.

Republicans are still euphoric over the new found humanity displayed by the ever robotic Romney.  Democrats continue to run through the streets with their hair on fire over the inexplicable collapse of the chosen one.

To Republicans and Democrats alike we offer this bit of advice.

CHILL!

The recently released PEW and GALLUP polls show that Romney got a nice bump from his performance.  But while PEW shows Romney ahead by 3 points among likely voters it shows Obama up by 5 points among registered voters.  The GALLUP tracking poll is a daily snapshot and as such is subject to drastic daily fluctuations.  And ANY poll that shows ANY candidate losing an 18 point gender gap lead in one 24 hour period must be an outlier.   

Both PEW and GALLUP are national polls.  They don’t dig down to the information that really tells us what’s going on in this race.  They don’t tell us where things stand in the key battleground states of New Hampshire, Virginia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Ohio, Iowa, Colorado, Nevada and Florida.

Thursday morning, reputable polling agencies  such as  ABCNEWS/WASHINTON POST , NBC/WALL STREET JOURNAL, QUINNIPIAC , MARIST  and others will release their  poll findings in these key battleground states.  Then and only then will we have a good understanding of the effects of last week’s debate.

That is, at least for the moment.

All you partisan crazies out there should understand that whatever the results, you can expect these numbers to change after tens of millions of Americans watch Vice President Biden debate Congressman Ryan later that same night.

And don’t forget…there are still two more presidential debates to factor in before the polls open.  Even Republicans expect the president to improve on his comatose performance of last week.

So to all the gloating Republicans and sack cloth wearing Democrats, we suggest that you remember the words of the noted philosopher Yogi Berra who famously said: 

“It ain’t over til' it’s over.”  

There He Goes Again...Romney Flips On Abortion...or does he...

In a recent interview with the editorial board of “The Des Moines Register” Mitt Romney said the following:

“There’s no legislation with regards to abortion that I’m familiar with that would become part of my agenda.”

We hate having to parse a person’s comments to find any hidden meaning.  But given Mitt Romney’s history of being less than truthful on the issues we have no choice.

Mitt Romney is trying to do two things here:  he’s trying to convince women that he’s not the scary anti-abortion candidate that he has been campaigning as for the past several years.  He’s also giving himself an avenue to explain his supposed shift to the middle to his Tea Party base.

Romney says:  “There’s no legislation with regards to abortion…that would become part of my agenda.”  This is the new “moderate” Romney appealing to women.

But the phrase:  “that I’m familiar with” provides him with the wiggle room to appease his base.  “I didn’t say that I wouldn’t pursue an anti-abortion agenda.  I just said that there wasn’t any (current) legislation that I’m familiar with (today) that would become part of my agenda.

This is typical Romney…playing both sides…saying whatever he needs to say to get elected.

Once upon a time Romney was pro-choice.  Then he changed.  If you pull up his website today you will find Romney saying that he would: “end federal funding for abortion advocates like Planned Parenthood.”  On the campaign trail he has said that he supports the Hyde Amendment which bans using federal monies to fund abortions.  He has called Roe v. Wade “one of the darkest moments in Supreme Court history” and vowed to appoint Supreme Court justices to overturn it.  He has said that as president he would sign a bill banning Roe V. Wade if it crosses his desk.  He wrote an opinion piece in ‘The Boston Globe” explaining his opposition to abortion.

Now he would like us to believe that an anti-abortion agenda is the furthest thing from his mind.

The Romney campaign came to the realization that eighteen months of running to the right wasn’t working.  They realized that their only chance of winning was to shift to a more moderate approach.  They correctly assumed that most Americans would not really begin tuning in to the campaign until the debates and therefore would not fully comprehend this hypocritical shift in position.  Armed with this new strategy they directed their candidate to look the president in the eye and in front of 70 million viewers and disavow virtually everything he had said over the past eighteen months.  Given Romney’s lack of core principles and willingness to say anything to win the election…they had the perfect candidate to do the deed.  First time viewers saw a moderate Mitt Romney who doesn’t have a deficit inflating 5$ trillion dollar tax cut, loves teachers, wants to preserve Medicare and Medicaid, proposes no changes in Social Security and wants to be president of 100% of Americans including the poor and those  don’t pay any taxes.     

The shifts to the middle on economic issues complete; Romney now moves to smooth over his rough edges on social issues.  An anti-abortion agenda…where would you ever get that idea?

Romney is betting that he can win this election by lying to the American people.  The move is so transparent it defies belief.  In fact it is the only transparent aspect of Romney’s campaign.