If you suffered through MSNBC's post-debate focus-group session as I did, I'm sure you were also left wondering: What in God's name are these people waiting for?
There were eight previously undecided voters; at debate's end, there remained six (one settled on Obama, the other on Romney). These six hummed. They hawed. And they pondered and thunk. Boy is this hard.
The one thing that left me as desperately slack-jawed as the gang of six was just that: their agonized difficulty in choosing between a president who's bringing us back from Romney-like, uncreative destruction and yet another supply-siding Destroyer himself. One needn't be a political junkie to be visited by the better information-bearing angels of economic improvement: whether in measurements of falling unemployment or a 10-point upswing in GDP or just today's anticipated news of a housing-start "surge"--a turnaround which will happily ripple throughout innumerable economic sectors--Obama has a proven, positive, four-year record to run on. Romney? He's offering another quarter-million a year to the infinitely comfortable, a shredding of the safety net, the impoverishment of seniors and 12 million new jobs which mainstream economists say are already on their own way, thanks to Obama.
Boy, this is hard.
Post-debate polling numbers will likely swing back in Obama's greater favor now, largely because of a satisfying one-night stand from which handfuls of the perpetually perplexed will finally gather some resolve. I wish I could take more pleasure in that myself, but there intrudes this nagging fact: this should never have been a contest, not even close. Our representative democracy remains at the mercy of the least informed, the least engaged, the least comprehending.
I caught that last night, and I must agree with you, P.M. that in the case of undecideds voter suppression is completely appropriate.
Posted by: AnneJ | October 17, 2012 at 11:24 AM
But why in the first place PM do these weak links control the outcome ?
Because 45% of the nation is in thrall to the right wing delusion, which means most of us are misinformed, unengaged, unknowing.... it pretty much means you have a problem with democracy in America....
Posted by: brave captain of industry | October 17, 2012 at 11:48 AM
My sense after the first debate was that the right-leaning but uncommitted voters saw enough for them to jump in with both feet for Romney. I also suspect there is a subset of undecideds whose vote will depend on to whom they last spoke, and many of them followed the crowd toward Romney.
I expect a similar dynamic coming out of last night's debate toward Obama. The follow-up spin will influence alot of the previously mentioned subset of persuadables.
It was telling that town hall format yielded but one (I believe) foreign policy question. That is a good because it probably means the electorate is satisfied with Obama, but it might also mean the electorate takes the current good news for granted.
Romney continues to mine this field. I suppose he is looking for an October surprise. That is not likely, and the final debate seems well positioned solidify a majority of the undecideds.
Both campaign's micro-messaging seems to be pretty sharp. Romney seemed to use his to make tactical missteps last night, primarily via setting up straw men (such as acts of terror and the 47%) in failed efforts to knock them down).
I expect to see a significant shift toward Obama in polling by Friday, leaving Romney in a deep hole with a short time to climb out.
https://mmicdata.rand.org/alp/?page=election
Posted by: Robert Lipscomb | October 17, 2012 at 12:31 PM
All representative democracies suffer from the same problem. That is true because every human population contains a substantial number of people who simply do not trust their own judgement. Such people are the bane of my professional existence. A carefully crafted opinion weighing the pros and cons of a specific technical proposal will be met with dithering indecision even when the pros vastly outweigh the cons. Second opinions will be sought. And third opinions. And if these differ even slightly, as they must when one weighs professional opinion, rivers of angst will flow but no decision will be made. I do not think it is entirely fair to call such people low information voters. Many are loaded with information but lack the critical faculty to assess it.
Posted by: Peter G | October 17, 2012 at 01:03 PM