Presidential Race 2011

 Alex Castellanos, an astute Republican consultant, notes (in the Daily Caller) that in 2008, Obama “held the best hand of cards” dealt to a candidate in living memory — a discredited GOP, a too-familiar 72-year-old opponent, an economic meltdown and, especially, George W. Bush: Obama won all, but only, states where Bush’s favorable rating was below 35 percent. Still, even then, when Obama was a relatively blank slate, he won only 53 percent of the popular vote. He cannot be a novelty and the nation’s Rorschach test twice.
There are many paths to 270 Republican electoral votes. Of the 10 states that will lose electoral votes because of the 2010 census, Obama carried eight in 2008. The states John McCain carried then had 173 electoral votes and now have 180. A Republican nominee who holds those and adds Florida, Ohio, North Carolina, Indiana, Virginia and Nevada has 272 electoral votes.
In Pennsylvania, which has voted Democratic in five consecutive presidential elections, a late-April Quinnipiac poll showed independents disapproving of Obama’s job performance by a 20-point margin, 57 to 37, with a majority of Pennsylvanians saying he did not deserve reelection. If he loses Pennsylvania, where Republicans gained five House seats last year, he is unlikely to win Ohio — Republicans also gained five seats there — or a second term.
June will be the 762nd month since January 1948, when the Bureau of Labor Statistics began calculating the unemployment rate. And June will be the 68th month since 1948 with the rate at 8 percent or higher — the 29th such month under Obama. So 43 percent of the most severe unemployment in the past 63 years has occurred in the last 21 / 2 years. No postwar president has sought reelection with 8 percent unemployment.
The recession ended in June 2009, yet a late-April Gallup pollshowed 55 percent of Americans describing the economy as in a recession or depression. Hence 78 percent are dissatisfied with the country’s direction.
In 1960, candidate John Kennedy’s mantra was, “I think we can do better.” In 2012, a Republican can win by recasting that as a question: “Is this the best we can do?”