ROMNEY ADVISERS: WE'RE LOSING

[kpete]

By JIM VANDEHEI and MIKE ALLEN | 9/8/12 8:28 PM EDT

President Barack Obama heads out of the national political conventions with a much clearer path to winning, top advisers to Mitt Romney privately concede.

The Romney campaign, while pleasantly surprised by Obama’s lackluster prime-time performance, said the post-convention bounce they hoped for fell well short of expectations and privately lament that state-by-state polling numbers — most glaringly in Ohio — are working in the president’s favor.

“Their map has many more routes to victory,” said a top Republican official. Two officials intimately involved in the GOP campaign said Ohio leans clearly in Obama’s favor now, with a high single-digit edge, based on their internal tracking numbers of conservative groups. Romney can still win the presidency if he loses Ohio, but it’s extremely difficult.

The Obama and Romney campaigns anticipate little movement in national polls before the first debate on Oct. 3, which both see as the most important day of this campaign. They also see eye-to-eye on their belief the election will come down to whether Romney can persuade voters he understands the problems of ordinary people and that his solutions are at least marginally better for turning things around economically.



Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0912/80949.html#ixzz25wUyc457

[alcibiades_mystery]

1. Fucking weasel words

"The Romney campaign, while pleasantly surprised by Obama’s lackluster prime-time performance, said..."

Wait, did Obama have a "lackluster prime-time performance?" Was that an opinion put forth by the Romney advisors? Is that the journalists opinion? Is this a news article? Who taught these people how to write sentences?

[GoCubsGo]

4. It's their new meme.

They're all spewing that "lackluster" shit.

[Tarheel_Dem]

12. Vandehei pretty much stated the same meme on Real Time. I'll bet it pained him to have to....

write this article, that probably explains the "lackluster" dig. Peggy Noonan started with that characterization, and the rest have run with it.

[winstars]

13. He is an ASSHOLE!!! On Real Time he was so predictively a complete DICK!!! n/t

[Tarheel_Dem]

14. "A complete dick" sounds about right, and highly descriptive. I wasn't impressed with the panel.

I like Vandenheuval, but she needs to shout more, when the guys interrupt and make false claims.

[lastlib]

31. Nah, he's just foreskin--he's not big enough to be a complete dick n/t

[MFM008]

33. omg lol

[winstars]

35. "YOU ARE CORRECT SIR" n/t

[magical thyme]

19. meh. they're the same people who pushed Ann's charm offensive

because it never dawned on them that she would come across as truly offensive.

If Obama's speech seemed lackluster to them, it's only because it followed Michelle's and Bill's speeches. They are incapable of weighing it on its own merit and whether it did what needed to be done.

[CTyankee]

40. Oh, but she was Mitt's "secret weapon"! Didn't you know that?

They weaponized her, all right. Only the weapon shot them in the foot...

[magical thyme]

42. given how much time he spends with said foot lodged in his mouth, he's lucky

she didn't blow his head off!

[CTyankee]

43. What a bomb she has been! Unbeileavably BAD!

[treestar]

21. They flunk journalism 101

It's all about getting their opinions in now.

[WCGreen]

29. and their guy gave a barn burner....

Fuck these people.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

2. A much clearer path to winning...What a beautiful phrase!

Now we must GOTV.

[lastlib]

32. ...AND win the down-ticket races!!!!

[marybourg]

3. "lackluster prime-time performance"? Gee, it seemed plenty

lustrous to me (yeah, Spell Check says that's how it's spelled. Looks wrong to me too)

[Cha]

5. WHAT!? Oh, that's right..it's Politico..

"The Romney campaign, while pleasantly surprised by Obama’s lackluster prime-time performance, said the post-convention bounce they hoped for fell well short of expectations and privately lament that state-by-state polling numbers — most glaringly in Ohio — are working in the president’s favor."

"Politico in All-out MELTDOWN Over DNC Convention? (updated)"
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021301509

Who got the convention bounce and what convention was Lackluster? Hmmm?

[CoffeeCat]

6. How in the hell can romney...

...lament about Ohio? How in the hell did they ever think they could win there?

Romney came out and said, "Let GM fail!". Romney also wrote a blustery WSJ op-Ed about why Obama was wrong on the auto bailout.

Everyone in Ohio knows that the auto bailout helped Ohio and saved jobs. Romney was dead wrong and Obama was practically prescient.

Romney was never going to win Ohio because the state serves as a reminder that Romney really doesn't know what the hell he is doing when it comes to the economy.

[magical thyme]

17. I one point I disagree with you....

"...the state serves as a reminder that Romney really doesn't know what the hell he is doing when it comes to the economy."

That's a best case scenario.

It is equally possible that Romney knows exactly what he is doing on the economy, and saw the failing auto industry as the mother of all leveraged buyout opportunities for his cronies.

[Victor_c3]

23. honestly, I thought the auto bailout was wrong too

Fortunately, I was wrong about that.

You can't deny that the economy of that part of the country is better directly as a result. I guess some people are just gifted with a certain insight that the rest of us don't have.

[0rganism]

28. they plan to win Ohio by keeping people from voting

Their plan is fairly simple to figure out, really. If it works, they'll win Pennsylvania too.

[CoffeeCat]

38. Do you believe that the recent rulings in Ohio...

...that mandate early voting--will help to thwart Republican voter-suppression efforts?

I agree with you wholeheartedly. These unpopular bastards can win an election without cheating, because their ideas are so unpopular and absurd. I think they'll try to cheat all over the map.

However, I think the recent court ruling--which forced early voting in all counties is definitely a victory. I think their nefarious efforts in Ohio are severely hampered now.

I have heard that PA is a huge mess, with so many outrageous ID requirements.

Makes you sick doesn't it?

[cynatnite]

7. They may be using this to fire up their base hoping that hatred of Obama will be enough. n/t

[Qutzupalotl]

8. More like BLACKluster, am I right??

Sure, Clinton outshone him, but Obama's performance was far better than Romney's. Romney will always come off as imperious, but Obama is far more real sounding. That's a better tone considering the jobs numbers are lower than we need them, though far better than four years ago. So with our arguments we must have won the independents. We have the momentum. We just need to win big in Ohio so they can't tamper with enough votes.

[Booster]

9. I would think the difference in the treatment of our troops would push a lot of people to

Pres. Obama. Rmoney planned his speech and left them out, then later said it wasn't important enough for him to talk about it. That should sink him right there.

[Jennicut]

10. "High single digit edge" = 7 points or higher/Obama's speech had higher ratings then Rombot

They are in trouble without Ohio. Obama's speech and entire convention was pretty seamless (besides the stupid hand wringing with the platform). Lots of good speeches and Michelle, VP Biden, Clinton and President Obama were all better then Romney, Ryan, Queen Anne and the rest of the Repub idiots.

[Tigress DEM]

11. “Their map has many more routes to victory,” (translation = Cheat like we did before) nt

[defacto7]

15. That's what I think.

[magical thyme]

18. more likely they'll focus downticket and block Obama for 4 more years

and then Rove can run his bff Jeb and the takeover will be complete.

We need to be focusing on the congressional and local seats as much as, if not more than, the presidency.

[Tigress DEM]

24. Do you ever think they ran these losers because they didn't want the Presidency?

Culpable deniability, I think it's called. Well, we ran for the office, but these people were too extreme. So they throw these guys on under the bus to keep us busy while they focus down ticket.

[magical thyme]

25. absolutely.

The economy is still on the brink and they want to bring it down for good and blame it on the black guy. Then they can run Jeb in 2016 as the "rational" one.

[CoffeeCat]

39. The jobs forecast for 2013...

...is fairly positive. Apparently 3 million jobs will be added, no matter who is President. I think it's important that we are at the helm when this happens. I hope that we gain houses in the House and Senate, so we can finally get things done. They can blame Obama all they want, but they made his efforts impossible.

I'd like to see a Democratic sweep. If we don't get 'er done, then let the Republicans have it in 2016.

[magical thyme]

41. meh again. Companies make final hiring/firing decisions based on

quarterly results. 3 million jobs will be added if and only if companies believe there will be sufficient demand to support them. In fact, lately only if they already have more demand than current overworked staff can deliver.

[ScarlettOhara]

16. No worries, mate.

"... the election will come down to whether Romney can persuade voters he understands the problems of ordinary people ..."
Obama wins!

[BumRushDaShow]

20. "the election will come down to whether Romney can persuade voters"

The man has been campaigning for President since at least 2007. If he hasn't "persuaded voters" by now (outside of literally paying them to vote for him), it's never gonna happen. Period.

[Coyotl]

22. If trailing, take advantage by lowering expections then making any comeback seem impressive

Lots of posturing and spin like this reminds me of Bush v. Gore, when the Bush team made sure expectations were low.

There guy sure needed it to look like he shined any at all

[graham4anything]

26. no Mitt, you are wrong. YOU ALREADY LOST, don't let the door hit your botox forehead

or as Roy Orbison sang

it's over it's over it's over
IT'S OVER!!!

and the expectations are so high for Mitt in that first debate, and he is a horrible debater, whereas President Obama is a Master DeBater (nyuk nyuk nyuk)

[liberal N proud]

27. You could see it in all the republican talking heads this morning

Numbers are out and they are not even in the ball park. They are losing.

They will spin this thing all the way to the election that Romney can still win Ohio or Florida or name the state. But facts are facts and they are losing.

[lonestarnot]

30. yeah, why don't you just take a couple of weeks off, may help you and you're good at it! Your Cngrs

shows us that every other week.

[lunatica]

34. Obama's lackluster primt-time performance?

Dream on dudes.

[dixiegrrrrl]

36. Obama’s lackluster prime-time performance????????

What did I miss???

So glad to hear Ohio is leaning, it is such a key state.
Now we need Fla.

[bigtree]

37. kick