Quote:
Originally Posted by Crapshoot
See, this fascinates me - he's polling reasonably well right now in a head-to-head (admittedly early). You don't think your Southern buddies hate Obama more than they hate Mormons, or is the ObamaCare (And Romney's basic predecessor of that) that is the issue to you?
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Much more, exponentially more, the latter than the former. Truth is, he seems to be getting a pretty free pass on the subject of religious brand affiliation. As much as anything though, it's really about the distinctly divided nature of the field at the moment.
He's at about 25% preference in the primary right now (based on the RCP average, just to have something to work with). He seems unlikely to ultimately draw well with supporters of Palin & Bachman & Perry who jointly have 27% between them. I'm not sure how he'll play with backers of Cain & Paul either, that's another 16%. In short, nearly half the current field's supporters will not, I believe, end up particularly fond of him.
There's quite a bit of bloodletting still to come en route to the nomination, I anticipate other issues to end up around his neck albeit as much smaller albatrosses than his health care history. (If you made me guess, he'll end up coming across too lukewarm on immigration and too weak on cutting spending)
edit to add: In the end, he's McCain all over again ... except that this time there'll be more hope that Congressional control (and ineffective D's) will neutralize a lame duck Obama to prevent any further damage and it'll keep enough voters away from the lever/box/touchscreen to end up with a worse loss than McCain's.
Ironically though, that also makes the critical control of Congress less likely & could end up backfiring. I'm afraid that I'd be in a minority who showed up to vote down ballot but simply stayed away from the race at the top altogether (in the absence of an attractive, never mind viable, 3rd party candidate).