Visual source: Newseum
Charlie Cook looks at 2008 and compares:
This fight is very different. This year, it seems that Republicans have become self-absorbed and obsessed with their conservative base. They seem unable to acknowledge or unwilling to care that the rest of the electorate is watching and getting turned off by overheated rhetoric almost guaranteed to alienate all but the most conservative voters.
Andrew Samwick on the GOP response to the economic news:
Shorter version? You are making inadequate progress getting us out of the hole we dug for you despite our opposition to every program you propose.
Bloomberg:
Obama’s Re-Election Case Bolstered as Jobs Data Point to Stronger Economy
A surge in new jobs last month that held the unemployment rate to 8.3 percent highlights a strengthening economy that bolsters President Barack Obama as he approaches re-election.
“Over the last several months, the economy has gone from being a net negative for Obama to probably something close to a wash,” said Dan Schnur, a campaign adviser to Republican presidential candidate John McCain’s first bid for the White House in 2000.
Schnur went on to say that this is all good news for John McCain, who still has hopes of winning the 2008 election.
Jonathan Bernstein:
Back in 2010, it was so easy: Clearly, anticipation of tax increases by President Obama and a government takeover of health care had caused the economy to tank in 2008. Everyone knows that.
But now? With solid (albeit hardly spectacular) jobs growth? It’s trickier. Is the economy still stuck in a rut thanks to the socialist in the White House? Or is it an economic boom — and if so, was it caused by the Bush tax cuts or by the anticipation of Romney tax cuts?
It’s on days like this that Republican operatives and GOP-aligned hack economists really earn their pay.
NY Times:
But many Tea Party supporters said that while they would work to help any Republican defeat Mr. Obama, their real passion was for electing small-government conservatives further down the ballot and building a stable of leaders who grow up in the movement rather than trying to adapt themselves to it. If that means it takes four or eight more years for them to feel any passion for a presidential nominee, they said, it will be worth the wait.
Ruh-roh.
Paul Krugman:
About that hostility: Mr. Santorum made headlines by declaring that President Obama wants to expand college enrollment because colleges are “indoctrination mills” that destroy religious faith. But Mr. Romney’s response to a high school senior worried about college costs is arguably even more significant, because what he said points the way to actual policy choices that will further undermine American education.
Here’s what the candidate told the student: “Don’t just go to one that has the highest price. Go to one that has a little lower price where you can get a good education. And, hopefully, you’ll find that. And don’t expect the government to forgive the debt that you take on.”
Wow. So much for America’s tradition of providing student aid. And Mr. Romney’s remarks were even more callous and destructive than you may be aware, given what’s been happening lately to American higher education.
And where are the Republican voices refudiating the attack on higher ed and middle class aspirations? Crickets. They're too busy attacking women's health. See
No love for the GOP among America's women, and thank Rush Limbaugh:
Meghan Daum/LA Times:
I won't list all the reasons this stuff arises when a woman speaks up about an issue even tangentially related to sex. But here's one that stands out for me: Sandra Fluke is the kind of woman that people like Limbaugh know nothing about. She's simply not on his radar screen. In the sad slice of America he represents, an America driven by fear of diversity, impatience with facts and an unwillingness to see things in anything but the starkest black-and-white terms, women come in two categories: dirty sluts and pushy feminazis.
Leonard Pitts Jr:
So even when it's his fault, it's not his fault. The liberals made him do it. But repugnant as he is, last week's attack says less about Limbaugh than about the social and political atmosphere he has come to symbolize.
"Severely conservative," said Mitt Romney some weeks ago in self-description. He'd been driven to Freudian candor by the need to "out-conservative" his opponents and thus, spoke more truly than he perhaps intended. So "severe" are conservatives now that Ronald Reagan would not know them.
Sally Quinn:
Ah, but everyone does not agree with Fluke (whose name rhymes with cook — not duck!). In my segment on the O’Reilly Factor, I suggested that saying the president was accusing the right of waging a “war on women” was no different than Republican candidates accusing Obama of waging a “war on religion.”
This apparently did not sit well with some viewers, a number of whom called and emailed me after the show. One of the first emails was from a man whose comments were laced with so many vulgarities that I cannot repeat them here. Another vile attack went on to say, “what Rush Limbaugh called Fluke is mild compared to what you should be called. I hope you burn to death in a car fire. I have really come to hate bastards like you.”
I said on the show that there certainly is a perception that conservatives are conducting a “war on women.” After these messages and calls, I am convinced.
Bill Press:
The courage of advertisers, however, appears in stark contrast to the timidity of Republican leaders. This could have been Mitt Romney's "Sister Souljah" moment. Instead, he merely avowed that "slut" and "prostitute" would not have been his "choice of words" -- leading Obama adviser David Axelrod to wonder how Romney could be trusted to stand up to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad if he was afraid to stand up to Rush Limbaugh. By their near silence, Republicans signaled either their assent with Limbaugh's comments or their fear of him. More likely, the latter.
Kathleen Parker:
Republicans might wish nothing more than to stuff birth control pills back into the bottle, but Democrats aren’t about to let them. The narrative already has a title: “The Republican War on Women.” Cue theme from “Psycho.”
One can hardly blame Democrats for taking advantage of a perfect storm of stupefying proportions. The only thing Republicans failed to do was put a bow on this mess.