In a somewhat backhanded compliment, the Economist - a traditionally conservative and pro-business economic magazine- has thrown in their support to Obama. The piece is more of a take-down of Romney than a celebration of Obama, but here's the conclusion.
As a result, this election offers American voters an unedifying choice. Many of The Economist’s readers, especially those who run businesses in America, may well conclude that nothing could be worse than another four years of Mr Obama. We beg to differ. For all his businesslike intentions, Mr Romney has an economic plan that works only if you don’t believe most of what he says. That is not a convincing pitch for a chief executive. And for all his shortcomings, Mr Obama has dragged America’s economy back from the brink of disaster, and has made a decent fist of foreign policy. So this newspaper would stick with the devil it knows, and re-elect him.
Not exactly a ringing endorsement, but their takedown of Romney is based upon his predilection for changing his stances. See more below the orange croissant.
They cite Romney's prior foreign policy decisions:
Take foreign policy. In the debates Mr Romney stuck closely to the president on almost every issue. But elsewhere he has repeatedly taken a more bellicose line. In some cases, such as Syria and Russia (see article), this newspaper would welcome a more robust position. But Mr Romney seems too ready to bomb Iran, too uncritically supportive of Israel and cruelly wrong in his belief in “the Palestinians not wanting to see peace”. The bellicosity could start on the first day of his presidency, when he has vowed to list China as a currency manipulator—a pointless provocation to its new leadership that could easily degenerate into a trade war.
And his incomprehensible budget and taxation positions:
Yet far from being the voice of fiscal prudence, Mr Romney wants to start with huge tax cuts (which will disproportionately favour the wealthy), while dramatically increasing defence spending. Together those measures would add $7 trillion to the ten-year deficit. He would balance the books through eliminating loopholes (a good idea, but he will not specify which ones) and through savage cuts to programmes that help America’s poor (a bad idea, which will increase inequality still further).
To be fair, The Economist did endorse Obama in 2008, but has not exactly been kind on his performance since then. They even come out in the article and state that if there had been a more pragmatic Republican candidate they would probably have endorsed him. But Mitt is not that candidate, and their endorsement goes to Obama.