Obama and Romney

Published in El País
(Spain) on 5 April 2012
by Editorial (link to originallink to original)
Translated from by Pedro Garcés Satué. Edited by Gillian Palmer.
The presidential election campaign is focused on the two candidates … with the Supreme Court’s permission.

The true campaign for the November presidential election has just begun. Obama has started to plainly criticize Mitt Romney; the latter has started to obtain good results from his attacks to the president in the three primaries of Wisconsin, Maryland and Washington, D.C. In fact, the target of his attacks is not his rivals within the Republican Party but Obama himself. However, the institution that will certainly have more influence in these elections does not have a vote but, rather, a ruling. In June, the Supreme Court will issue a statement about the health care law, which has become Obama’s banner. If the judges bring in a ruling against it, this would present a torpedo in the waterline of the current president’s campaign.

In fact, people are paying more attention to the Supreme Court’s hearing on the topic than they are to the primaries. The central aspect of the hearings concern whether or not the government can force people without private medical insurance to sign up for it. Obama, who has spoken in public about this for the first time, thinks there is a “human element” in this law, and 30 million citizens without medical coverage can benefit from it. He also states that the Supreme Court cannot overturn a law “passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress."

The second issue of the campaign is the increasing economic inequality in American society. This goes back a long way, but in the solution to the crisis, the wealthy are those who are taking advantage of the recovery of growth experienced during the last two years. Among the wealthy, something that can become his weakness, we can find Mitt Romney, former entrepreneur and main Republican candidate today.

Thanks to his right-wing speech, Romney has managed to attract some of Rick Santorum’s followers from the radical tea party, comprised the most conservative voters, as well as some evangelical Christians. Nonetheless, he does not have 652 delegates of the necessary 1,144 to ensure the Republican nomination in August (20 primaries are still to come). Romney has become the true Republican candidate, but at a price of a radicalization in his speech that, at the moment, clears the center for Obama. In surveys, the distance between the two of them is of four points in favor of the president. The situation can still change, except for the conviction that this election is just a matter of the two of them and the Supreme Court.


La campaña para las presidenciales se centra en los dos candidatos, con permiso del Supremo

La verdadera campaña para las elecciones de noviembre a la Casa Blanca acaba de empezar. Obama ha empezado a criticar por su nombre a Mitt Romney, y este, en las tres primarias de Wisconsin, Maryland y el Distrito de Columbia, ha empezado a sacar buenos rendimientos de sus ataques al presidente, que sustituye como blanco a sus rivales del Partido Republicano. Pero la institución que más puede pesar en esas elecciones no tiene voto, sino sentencia. El Tribunal Supremo se ha de pronunciar en junio sobre la ley de reforma sanitaria, que se ha convertido en el estandarte de Obama. Un fallo en contra por parte de los máximos jueces supondría un torpedo a la línea de flotación de la campaña del actual presidente.

De hecho, la ciudadanía ha estado más atenta a las audiencias del Supremo sobre esta materia que a las primarias, siendo el punto central si el Estado puede obligar a contratar un seguro médico privado a quien no lo tenga. Obama, que por primera vez ha hablado en público de este asunto, considera que hay un “elemento humano” en esta ley de la que se pueden beneficiar 30 millones de ciudadanos actualmente sin cobertura sanitaria, y que el Supremo no puede echar abajo una norma aprobada “por una fuerte mayoría de un Congreso democráticamente elegido”.

El otro tema de la campaña es la creciente desigualdad económica en la sociedad. Viene de lejos, pero en la salida de la crisis, son los más ricos quienes más se están beneficiando del repunte de crecimiento en los últimos dos años. Y entre esos ricos —lo que se puede convertir en su debilidad— está el exempresario y hoy principal aspirante republicano, Mitt Romney.

Aunque aún no disponga de los 652 delegados sobre los 1.144 necesarios para asegurar la nominación republicana en agosto —quedan 20 primarias—, Romney ha logrado con su discurso derechizado atraerse a parte del voto que hasta ahora recababa Rick Santorum entre los seguidores del radical Tea Party, los más conversadores, y los cristianos evangélicos. Se ha afirmado así como el genuino candidato republicano, pero al precio de una radicalización de su discurso, que, de momento, despeja el centro para Obama. La distancia entre ambos en las encuestas es de tan solo cuatro puntos a favor del actual presidente, lo que da una situación todavía muy abierta, salvo la creciente convicción de que esa elección es ya solo cosa de ellos dos, además del Supremo.
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