Well if you disagree posting some useful commentary would be preferred. Although you would be hard pressed to go against anything I stated.
There's no way Obama is on level with how he performed in 2008 in Pennsylvania. Polling has consistently shown Obama polling terrible in Pennsylvania with approval ratings below the national average. I think he's still favored to win this state, but no way will he win it by more than 10 points, especially if Romney is the nominee.
When every pollster comes up with similar results, then what are you going to believe -- corroboration or collusion?
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The matchups so suggest. One way of looking at them is to say that if the President leads 49-41, then the President needs to win 1% of the relevant vote or that the challenger needs to pick up 9% of the vote. 50% wins. Sure, both are possible, but one is far more likely than the other. Such should be obvious.
Between pollsters we see much the same -- that the President has an approval rating in the mid-40s yet he still wins the critical matchups. Must have to believe that the incumbent President is wonderful before they can vote for him? Hardly!
So what is going on?
1. The Republican challengers aren't so great. What seems to remain are Rick Perry and Mitt Romney. It's not that the Republicans have a strong set of challengers, any of whom could readily beat President Obama. "Just don't be Barack Obama" obviously wasn't enough for Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann, neither of whom is a Hillary Clinton of the Right. Newt Gingrich is eloquent -- but he has huge faults of character. Tim Pawlenty just wasn't up to the challenge. Rick Santorum surely excites the base -- of the other Party. Ron Paul is a fringe candidate. Jon Huntsman is too connected to the President to be credible to Republicans. Herman Cain has no experience in elected office. This is an unusually-weak field. Could Mike Huckabee return at the last and an opportune moment? Good question. Most of us want to see an easy return to good times.
2. Nobody has a credible, easy solution. The Republicans have nothing to offer but more of what we did wrong between 2000 and 2006. That shows in approval ratings for the Congress, especially Republicans in Congress. So suppose you have ten years of experience as an accountant and suddenly are out of work. For several years you would have never dreamed of taking a job as a bookkeeper... but now there are no accountant jobs available, and you get to choose between being a bookkeeper and a checker in a box store.
Bookkeeping looks relatively good now even though it is something that you thought you had left forever ten years ago. Two years from now you may be an accountant again, which is far easier if you start over as a bookkeeper than if you slide groceries across a UPC reader and say at the end of the transaction, "Thank you for shopping at X-Mart!" But as a bookkeeper you will make about half what you made as an accountant...
You are going to pretend to be thankful for survival, but behind the forced smile you might simmer with resentments toward about every authority figure around.
President Obama might not look all that good as President, but for many he is far better than the Tea Party failures who better serve rapacious and domineering elites than they serve anyone else.
3. Incumbent Senators, Governors, and Presidents on the average gain about 6% from approval ratings at the start of the campaign season to election time. One can't satisfy everyone while governing or legislating; some people are going to be unhappy with the results. It is unlikely that one will satisfy labor and management, pacifists and military contractors, environmentalists and resource-extractors, and people on opposite sides of the abortion issue at the same time. As an elected official one must address issues in ways that can never please everyone.
But as a campaigner one can exude optimism and make glowing promises while glossing over some difficulties. Maybe one does more good than bad. A failure as an incumbent runs from his record and invariably loses, perhaps making fresh promises that could have been met during the previous term. A success runs on his record, gives the promise to do more because he has shown the ability to do so, and wins.
So which is President Obama? He has some unambiguous achievements in legislation (like them or not), and he hasn't created any obvious blunders of military or diplomatic matters. Dubya got re-elected with far worse.
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When every pollster comes up with similar results, then what are you going to believe -- corroboration or collusion?
