Talk Elections

Meanwhile, President Obama's standing against two potential Republican rivals has ebbed a bit. Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney leads the president 50%-46% among registered voters, Romney's strongest showing against him to date. Obama edges former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum by a single percentage point, 49%-48%.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/politics/story/2012-02-20/GOP-convention-poll/53172644/1?csp=34news

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Hmm, a week or two ago there were only very favorable polls for Obama - now there are only sh**tty polls showing him down ... :P

Meh.  It's been pretty quiet politics wise.  That's when Romney gets to play Generic GOP.

It's already been proven that Romney in spotlight = Obama bump.

doesn't make sense

How can Obama suddenly trail Romney after the economy started improving?

I suspect many Main Streeterss are going to take some convincing of that. Hypothetically, if unemployment was to be lower than it was in January 2009 come Election Day, there'd still those who think he's the worst president EVER ::)

According to Kos, their national PPP poll will show tomorrow Obama with positive approvals for the first time since the killing of Osama.
So I find strange the last batch of polls which show Obama trailing in states like Iowa and Virginia.

At this rate the entire first page of threads here will consist of 'outliers, outliers, outliers!'.

Well, you explain why this should be the case, genius.

It is an outlier, since no other polls show anything like this happening. That's the definition.

LOL people would really vote for Romney?

LOL at poor Gallup.

Gas prices are rising.

So now we have a majority of national/state polls showing Obama in good shape but a significant minority showing him in serious trouble. Kind of odd but it is probably mostly due to different methodologies being used.

This is Gallup though, so whether they're in the right ballpark or not this poll will probably get a lot of coverage, and it could turn the current positive media narrative for Obama to a negative one.

And perfect timing for MI and AZ...

What the hell ?

Yep, gas is going up. Unemployment is up to 9.1. Total out of the workforce is close to a 20 year high and people still believe that Obama is doing well?

Baffles me. I remember when Gas was half what it is now, and that was only a couple years ago.

And four years ago it was just fine and dandy, wasn't it?  :P

It's not like Obama snips with his fingers and the gas price goes down to 1$ the gallon ... :P

But don't whine around Americans, you and your 3.50$/gallon price is pretty low, don't you think ?

I have to pay 7-8$ the gallon to fill up my car.

How about buying a 50 miles per gallon car instead of a gas guzzling one ? That might help.

George W.'s approval ratings also dropped in close relation to fuel prices.

That said, of course a large portion of obama's base wants to shellack these people and skyrocket prices. He said so himself.

If gas does go up to seven or eight bucks a gallon it might be possible to get some sort of actual change in the way life is lived in this country that will make things better in this world, but then again even after what's considered 'normal' has more than doubled it hasn't happened yet.

Considering as I was making good money 4 years ago - yes, yes it was.

The formation of Massachusettstan?

I'd be all for that...

More like $8.50 for me at the moment.

New York City is farther from me, than you are from any point in Europe. Including Scotland. USA is not Europe.

How many people drive those distances regularly? Poor argument. Average commutes to work (as in driving around a metro area) are comparable between Europe and North America.

That makes up the majority of miles people drive, by far.

If Austin were in Austria:

El Paso would be Paris.
Amarillo would be Copenhagen.
Beaumont would be Bucharest.
and the Valley would be Rome.

Forget the EU as the United States of Europe, they should aspire to be the Texas of Europe.

I understand that, but you need to look at the average amount of miles people drive in....say....a year. Sure some people like to take longer road trips (I have in the US many times, and the increased gas prices are felt, of course).

Just commuting to work in everyday life, you know, your average 20-30 mile one way commute from the suburbs is not a whole lot different from European commutes. It's 50 km (30 miles) one way from where I live to Frankfurt. Lots of people do it because Frankfurt is where the jobs are.

I don't think the average number of miles driven by Americans and Europeans is all that different. Maybe slightly more on the American side. (Counting actual drivers, of course. Per person it's obviously higher in the US because of the lack of public transportation.)

And considering the gas price is half that of Europe, but cars (slightly exagerated) use maybe double the fuel, I don't think the average amount drivers pay is all that different in a month or a year, either.

I understand that. I'm just saying. Draw a 500km circle from Frankfurt. You'd encompass, what, several hunded million people?

You can't look at the US as a whole. Average mileage for folks back east is not the same as it is for the average mileage for folks in Texas.

Texas averages 12k miles per person.

Germany averages 12k km per person. So Texas people drive about twice what folks in Germany do.

That number is per person, right? Not per person that drives? Texas is also unique in that it offers virtually no legitimate public transportation ;)

Although point taken, your average Texan can't help that fact.

One thing that Texas and New England have in common is that both people inside them and people outside them can get pretty gung-ho about the idea of them not being part of the United States any more.

Though that wasn't what I was thinking of. My assumption was that we could actually maybe focus on finding some way to meet our energy needs that did not emit putrid smoke or at least emitted it in less immense quantities, not that it would lead to some sort of Mad Max-style balkanization. Call me a dreamer.

I'd certainly rather not prejudice your ability to get to El Paso or Beaumont, but I'd like for there to be a way for you to get to El Paso or Beaumont that doesn't poison the area between you and El Paso or Beaumont. I think we all want this unless we have perverse incentives not too, we just all have different ideas about how to attain it.

It's a function of population density.

There's something to be said for freedom.

True, emissions associated with oil + gas industry may be bad, but there are major chemical advantages to the use of oil and natural gas to power automobiles.

1, energy density
2, availability.

I can see natural energy used to generate electricity, or heat, but gas in cars works really really well, and is far superior to hybrids. And I haven't even gotten into the issues with rare earth metals that are required to make the hybrids work.

I think the real solution is to accept the fact that gas is just the best fuel for automobiles and work at making them more efficient, or finding a way to generate synthetic gas relatively cheaply. You could probably do that with nuclear power plants.

Synthetic gas generated by nuclear plants would be a fabulous idea, and it's certainly possible to make gas-powered automobiles much, much more efficient--indeed, good work in this is already being done. Synthetic gas would also have the advantage of being exactly as American-made as we needed or wanted it to be. Of course, I'd support inter-city rail lines as well, because I live in a pretty rural area (there are rural areas in Massachusetts!) and I know how annoying that can be. I'm lucky the buses in my particular little area are decent.

Gas prices?

It's 8.3 and has been going down month after month.

Less focus on Romney maybe?

Once he surges back then I expect Obama to start leading again, and Santorum's too out of the mainstream on social issues to be elected.

Yeah. Romney's 'Generic R' right now.

Obviously the people want Romney as President so he can straighten out the economy.

Wouldn't Santorum be more qualified to do that?

Santorum....let's just say if he were a computer programmer, he would be obsessed with "debuggery".