It is a deep field, and the president is on his heels with another round of terrible economic news buffeting his poll ratings which ought to be soaring into the 60 percent approval territory after the killing of bin laden.
But tune into to most network news and cable coverage and all you hear is doom and gloom about the prospects of the GOP prospects.
Mitt Romney is “weak frontrunner” burdened by “Romneycare” which birthed Obamacare. Pawlenty is boring and was for cap and trade. Huntsman is unknown and burdened not just by past support for cap and trade but also by having been Obama’s ambassador to China. Newt has crumbled, Santorum tangled with John McCain on torture and Palin and Bachmann are competing against each other for a small and shrinking slice of the electoral pie.
All of these canards reflect the Manhattan-Beltway media elite’s obsessive need to talk down the Republican Party and its agenda while striving mightily to prop up a failed presidency.
That’s “failed presidency,” not “failing presidency.” The employment cake is already baked for 2012, and the country will still be near or at the 8% unemployment mark --or even higher!-- 18 months from now, and even if home prices stage a modest rebound in the next year they can’t recover to anywhere near 2008 values by the time the votes are cast. The high-flying IPOs are making new billionaires but America’s middle class is staring at flat wages and higher health insurance premiums and the many promises of Obamacare haven’t materialized.
President Obama’s three signature laws—the “stimulus,” Obamacare, and the banking “reform” have all failed to do anything except burden America with an astonishing and dangerous debt that is growing like a lethal malignancy. While the president ordered the killing of bin laden, everything else about his leadership abroad has been feckless, flaccid and full of apologies for American power and purpose. The president’s hostility towards Israel has shocked even his own party’s base voters.
That is the storyline of 2012 –the referendum on a president who makes Jimmy carter look strong and decisive. All of the Republicans in the race will be making these points each day from now until the party selects a nominee and then all of them who didn’t succeed will continue the effort to unseat Obama because they are each committed to the country’s future and the U-turn the country so desperately needs.
All of the candidates and every conservative needs to battle the MSM memes on behalf of the entire GOP field from now until Iowa and New Hampshire. Certainly elbows will be thrown among the candidates, and supporters will trumpet their favorites’ strengths, but the MSM’s tropes should be denounced by all people seeking the exit of Obama from the Oval Office in January 2013.
The weakest candidate in the field is the incumbent, and the election is a referendum on him. That is the story of 2011, and 2012.