2012 Poll

[miraja2]

Originally Posted by Danzig

no, you can't prove it wrong. but i think we'd be a laughingstock all the same. instead of criticism about obama bowing down to another countries leader, we'd be reading criticism of her butchering the english language. and i wonder who her supreme court choices would be? now that's scary!

An excellent point.
This is one of the areas where presidents can make a big difference. There are plenty of others too. People would be better served focusing on those areas than attributing every change in the nation's (or world's) economy to the person in the Oval Office. The bottom line with Obama will probably be:
1) if the economy is doing well or surging mightily in the summer and fall of '12....he'll win.
2) if it isn't....he'll lose.

That's stupid.

Things the president can control (Supreme Court nominees, some aspects of foreign policy, pushes for legislation on social issues, etc.) often take a back seat to things the president can't control in the minds of voters. The country re-elected the Bush administration after a truly miserable first four years on a number of fronts....many of which (Iraq) were the direct result of actions taken by the administration. People didn't care. Then the country turned against him in the second term largely because the economy fell apart "on his watch." Sure his administration only deserves about 1% of the blame for the economic meltdown, but most voters are too stupid to figure that out.....which is probably the answer to your other question about why there aren't good candidates. There aren't many good voters.