To win a Presidential election in the United States a candidate must accomplish two things: inspire a good voter turnout of his party, and gain a majority of independent votes. These two goals are contradictory no matter which party is observed because in order to please the core of the party one must be too “radical” to please independents, but since both parties have this problem and someone has to win, the winner will typically be the party and candidate that best thread the needle.
The primary election process introduces yet another contradictory situation, usually for only the non-incumbent party. In the primary elections a candidate must appeal only to his party, and needn’t woo independents. This tends to bring a more extreme candidate of the non-incumbent party to the forefront to face, in the general election, an incumbent that has already successfully pleased both his party’s base and enough independents to win the previous election. This helps explain why a previously elected incumbent President was defeated only three times in the twentieth century, except when challenged by his own party.
So President Obama should be enjoying a comfortable advantage, but currently his base is uninspired because he hasn’t ushered in world peace or made the world a socialistic utopia, and independents are disappointed in the economy and mostly negative on his legislative agenda. A historically more typical Progressive President would have passed the stimulus bill and waited for results before rocking the economic boat with unprecedented spending, the Healthcare Bill, and threats of Cap-n-Trade; but President Obama was elected to create change and he charged forward to do so. If the election were held today there’s little doubt that there would be lackluster turnout by the Democratic base, and a Republican landside among independents.
This gives Republicans an advantage in an election that should find them the underdog. They can dethrone Barack Obama with the right candidate, but while the President is unable to rouse his base, the Republican Party has it within its power to do so by nominating a candidate that is repugnant to them. Such a candidate would also swing Independents toward the President. If she were running, Sarah Palin is a perfect example of a candidate that would erase the Republican advantage and probably hand the election to the Democrats. Millions of disillusioned Democrats that wouldn’t bother to leave the house to vote for Obama would walk naked through fire to vote against Palin. Millions of Independents that might vote against President Obama’s handling of the economy would not vote for any candidate as socially conservative as Sarah Palin. Conversely, Mitt Romney might not spark enthusiasm among the far right but Republicans have ample reason to flock to the polls no matter their candidate. I’m not endorsing Mitt Romney, in fact he would not be my first choice; I’m simply using him and Ms. Palin as examples to point out a political reality.
When standing in slippery, slimy mud at the edge of a precipice, one must take tiny steps away from it. The choice of candidate is more important in this upcoming election than in any within memory, and the best choice to defeat the President is probably not the best choice from a fiscally or socially conservative viewpoint. It’s just an unfortunate fact that in the 2012 primaries, each of us much ask ourselves, “Which candidate can win?” rather than, “Which candidate best represents my philosophy?”, because we cannot afford to squander the historically unusual advantage that President Obama’s incompetence has given us.
Giant steps are difficult in politics because they scare and arouse the opposition and the moderate, but small steps can have giant consequences. Replacing President Obama with a moderate Republican might seem like a disappointingly small step, but preventing Barack Obama from continuing his Progressive policies and preventing him from appointing one or more additional Supreme Court Justices is a giant consequence. If at the same time conservative turnout results in conservative majorities in the House and Senate, then this small step is actually huge.
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