Saturday, October 20, 2012

I Hope This Pessimism Is Just Some Bad Feijoada I Ate

How about this? The Salt Lake City Tribune has endorsed Obama. Thanks to Fred Schultz for sending this to me.

Not that it means anything. In our screwed up electoral system, Utah isn't even "in play," and I doubt that newspaper endorsements actually sway voters anyway, even if it were.

The scary news is that, while all the other polls are showing a neck and neck race, the Gallup poll shows Romney with a 6% lead.  If we were all to take a page from the opposing playbook, we would accuse the Gallup poll of having a bias toward Republican candidates. Instead I will just scratch my head and hope to hell Gallup (which has a record of 16-3 in presidential elections, going back to 1936) has got it wrong.

Hey, the Yankees got swept in four straight; it can happen.

This comes on top of a NY Times headline that asks the question, "After Romney Gains, Should Obama Concede Florida?"

We've always known it was going to be a close election but, frankly, I'm more worried at the moment than I have ever been. It is nearly impossible for me to believe that people would vote for the same ideological outlook that got us into this mess, but apparently they might.  I can't believe that people haven't realized en masse that the Republicans always have the same program of cutting taxes on the wealthiest and cutting services to the neediest regardless of what is happening, whether we are in good economic times or bad. Whatever the problem, they have the same solution. And if they haven't realized it, the Democrats deserve the blame for not pointing it out more forcefully.

For now, at least, I can take two Johnnie Walkers and feel better in the morning, with hope springing eternally. If Romney wins, my body can't tolerate the amount of Johnnie Walker it would take to make me hopeful.



2 comments:

Bob Peterson said...

For you comfort, Vegas will take your bet and pay you $2 for every $1 bet if Romney wins.

The bet on Obama calls his odds of winning to be fairly certain, maybe overwhelming.

Gerald Martin said...

I'm not saying you're wrong, or that they're wrong in Vegas; in fact, I obviously hope yhey're right. But 2x1 odds make no sense to me when the polls are within the margin of error, or even favoring Romney as the Gallup is. I'd be curious to know who has a better record since 1936, Vegas or Gallup. I hope Vegas.