The New Republic's John Judis has an eye-opening story about the long-term prospects for the red team. He argues that even if Mitt Romney wins in November, the strategy he's pursuing could backfire on him as early as 2014. Judis thinks that the way the Repubs are going, they're pretty much asking for a national Democratic landslide.
Bush and Rove understood that majority coalitions have never been built on strict consensus. Instead, successful coalitions are heterogeneous. They include groups (such as Southern whites and Northern blacks during the New Deal) that don’t get along with each other, but still prefer the one party coalition to the other. And a successful candidate will offend one part of the coalition (with the expectation they’ll still vote for him) in order to reach out to parts of the opposing coalition. Bush could support immigration reform and pick off Hispanic votes with the expectation that he would still win white working class votes. But Romney, perhaps because he is not really a Republican conservative, has sought to be all things to all parts of the Republican base—from the Tea Party opponents of any social spending to the nativists worried about a Mexican takeover of America to religious conservatives wanting to ban all abortions. As a result, Romney has closed off opportunities to pick off parts of the Democratic coalition.
Judis argues--convincingly, I think--that Romney's singular focus on stroking a base that doesn't entirely trust him may get them to the polls in November, but could cost him big in the long run. As a case in point, he argues that Romney's hardline stance on immigration is a non-starter among Latinos. He thinks Romney will be lucky to get 30 percent of the Latino vote.
Judis also argues that Romney is making no effort to peel off women and professionals. As we all know, the main key to Clinton's victory in 1992 was his ability to peel off professionals and suburbanites who weren't too keen on the GOP cliff-diving to the right on social issues. Those voters swung hard tohim in 1992, and have stayed with the Democrats more or less ever since. As we all know, that's a major reason that a reasonably competent Democrat starts out with 245 electoral votes--173 locked up tight and another 72 that should go the Democrats' way unless there's a landslide.
For someone who is running on his record as a businessman, Romney has little concept of a long-term strategy.