ON THE OTHER HAND: Why Obama’ll win

By Peter Laurie | Sun, February 12, 2012 - 12:00 AM

The conventional wisdom is that Obama is in danger of losing the presidential election this year. Don’t bet on it.

It’s a trite media narrative, triggered by past statistics (no modern president has ever been re-elected confronting unemployment above eight per cent); but it’s dangerous to rely on the predictive power of past events.

Here are ten reasons why Obama will win.

One: he’ll have more money (nearly $1 billion) than Mitt Romney, the likely Republican candidate. Being able to define your opponent is critical. Romney will be deluged with a slew of negative political advertising that will brand him as an opportunistic, flip-flopping, out-of-touch billionaire who made his money from “vulture” capitalism.

Two: Obama has superb political skills and instincts. Not just a good orator and debater, but quick on his feet, wily and ruthless when necessary. His campaign strategists and managers are some of the best in the business.

Three: the American people like Obama personally; even those who disapprove of his policies. Personal likeability counts for a lot in politics. Obama is comfortable in his own skin; Romney isn’t.

Four: Romney is the classic political prostitute: no convictions, no vision, no nothing – just lust, lust, lust for power. You look at Romney and you see unadulterated vacancy. For anyone who’s seen the movie Wall Street, Romney is the villain Gordon Gecko.

On the other hand Obama has, and has always had, a clear vision of where he thinks the country ought to be going, rooted very much in his understanding of its complex and difficult history. This vision is evident in his autobiography Dreams From My Father and every major speech he has given from his brilliant address to the 2004 Democratic Convention onwards.

He’s neither a conservative nor a liberal in American political terms. Indeed, it’s impossible to pigeonhole him. He’s not an ideologue. Maybe the best political description of Obama is a pragmatic progressive, like Errol Barrow.

Five: the economic trend is upwards. Once this holds, the unemployment rate is less important. Obama will argue successfully that the Republicans got the country into this mess and he’s getting them out of it, slowly but surely.

Six: he has major achievements under his belt. Obama (1) found and killed Osama bin Laden and destroyed most of his network; (2) oversaw the arrival of new democracies in Libya and Egypt without the loss of one American soldier; (3) saved the American auto industry; (4) presided over the nearly complete recovery of the American stock markets and stabilized its financial institutions from the worst collapse since the Depression; (5) ended the American military presence in Iraq; (6) and passed the first comprehensive health care reform plan since Medicare. Not bad for one term. And he will remind the American people of those achievements.

Seven: an incumbent president always has significant advantages over his challenger. Obama will use that advantage for all it’s worth.

Eight: Obama will make this campaign and election essentially about one thing: what kind of capitalist country will America be? The discredited Republican prescription of trickle-down unregulated market economics in which the more breaks you give the wealthy the more prosperous everybody becomes?

Or sensible and appropriate government interventions to safeguard the vulnerable, protect the common good and sustain balanced and equitable economic growth? It’s a risk, admittedly, to cast an election in such stark terms. But Obama will use his oratorical skills to remind the American people of the true history of the crisis.

Nine: income inequality in the United States is one of the worst of all industrially advanced countries.

This is immoral as well as socially and economically disastrous. It’s good ground on which a progressive can fight.

Finally: however much the pundits say this election will be about the economy, Americans like to feel their commander-in-chief can keep them safe.

On national security and foreign policy, Obama wins hands down.