The Possibility of Romney’sEntering into the White House

Due to the sudden attack of Hurricane Isaac, the four-day Republican National Convention scheduled for Aug. 27 in Tampa, Florida, in which the presidential nominee Romney and vice presidential nominee Ryan will appear in front of the public, has been delayed for one day. Almost all of the first-day speeches aimed at attacking Obama were cancelled. Worse still, Hurricane Isaac might be upgraded to a second-grade hurricane, bringing serious disasters to New Orleans and turning the cheerful atmosphere into a heavy-hearted solicitude.

If so, on the one hand, the invincible spirit of the planned Romney-Ryan “comeback team” will be greatly reduced. On the other hand, a week later, the unimpressive Democratic National Convention will take advantage of this to catch a pigtail of the Republicans. It seems that the gods are trying to help Obama.

On Aug. 11, two weeks after the appearance of Congressman Paul Ryan, the vice presidential nominee elaborately selected by Republican strategists, the lifeless Romney presidential selection suddenly shined. Young and aggressive, Ryan, who is the same age as Romney’s eldest son, showed that his ambition went even further than the latter’s when confronting Obama.

Before that, people (including members of the Republican Party) generally believed Romney was a weak competitor. This year’s selection is a vote on Obama’s four-year performance. Now, the Romney-Ryan pair has become very assertive. Public opinion has cast its lens on Romney, watching how he will take America out of its plight and judging if he is a qualified American leader.

For half a month, Republicans at the grassroots level have been very excited. Romney, who has been lagging behind in surveys of public opinion, has now jumped forward in the polls, becoming even with Obama. The Republican team posted a hopeful, confident posture, showing that they have methods for revitalizing the economy. The Democrats’ propaganda aimed at discrediting Romney was useless. Grassroots support for Democrats began to lose its passion.

Americans Are Tired of Obama’s Eloquent Speeches

The Republican’s wishful thinking was to repeat the historic change of 1980 (a year when both Romney Sr. and Reagan were state governors), when Republican presidential candidate Reagan pulled down President Carter, a Democrat. Just like Carter at that time, Obama faced the same sluggish economy and high unemployment. But Democrats do not believe that Romney has the charm that Reagan had, and Obama’s eloquence surpasses Carter’s.

Public opinion holds that Romney excels compared to Obama when it comes to revitalizing economy, but his likability cannot be compared with that of Obama. Democrats, on the one hand, deny that such a “gap” exists; on the other hand, they spared no effort to promote Romney’s image as a very human leader. This would be the subtext in Republican National Convention held in Tampa.

Obama is still popular wherever he goes for rallies, but the huge, overwhelming crowds of people that showed up four years ago are not seen any more. During his more than three years in office, Obama has constantly compromised, throwing away many of his campaign promises. Now, he’s afraid the public will not buy it if he tries again to win people’s trust by drawing a rosy picture for future.

People are tired of the courageous words of Obama. People will decide whether or not to cast a vote for him based on their economic situation. In the last presidential election, Obama was a star of “freedom and change.” This time, he is tied up by the rope of his work performance and has lost the “freedom.” It’s now Romney’s turn to be the star of “freedom and change.”

Currently, the ratio of support for Obama and Romney among women is 60:31. Black voters favor Obama over Romney at a rate of 94:0,* completely leaning to Obama’s side. Romney tried hard and went to the black community to strive for its support, but he has hardly gotten 3 percentage points. However, black Americans only account for 12.85 percent of the whole population. They will not have a big impact on the overall situation. The Romney-Ryan pair can only give up on winning black support.

Latinos, however, make up 22 percent of the entire population and are the fastest growing group. It’s said that Romney is unlikely to win if he fails to get 31 percent to 35 percent of the Latino vote. Currently, 67 percent of Latinos support Obama, while 23 percent support Romney.

That’s why the Republican National Convention was arranged in Tampa, Florida, which possesses a large Latino population. Up until now, Romney has spent seven times as much money on making Spanish advertisements as Obama. He also needs to show humanism when dealing with Hispanic issues to correct his “anti-Latino” image.

Both Parties Strive for Women’s Votes

Obama enjoys high prestige in American women. Nationwide, more women than men vote. So, if Obama can secure women’s votes, Romney can hardly win. Experts estimated that among middle-aged and elderly women, Romney also enjoys a certain prestige. Now Ryan has joined in, which helps to win relatively young women’s votes.

Romney and the Republicans’ strategy for winning women’s votes is not to separate women from family and community, and thus to avoid the endless quibbling over “abortion,” unlike the conservative party of Democrats. Instead, it aims at drawing women’s attention to the economy, employment, family and children, so as to enhance housewives’ support.

At the Tampa convention, Romney’s wife will appear like a super star. Her speech is arranged in the golden time slot of the first night. On the one hand, she will praise her husband’s virtues from a housewife’s perspective. On the other hand, she will promote the perfect image of “the first lady” and “the first family.”

Even since Obama was elected, many American right-wing conservatives have been determined to prevent him from being re-elected. In Obama’s presidency, the partisan division has been most serious. Many American hated him simply because of his name, skin color, ancestry and his international “anti-hegemony” speech. A majority of American really believe the rumors that he was an African Muslim born overseas.

Obama’s ruling policy has had two tendencies. First is to enhance the functions of government, and the second is to rectify the financial order and make a series of policies to supervise corporate behaviors, which resulted in a lack of investment, despite sufficient capital. People willing to create enterprises are reluctant to take risks. In addition, Obama’s new healthcare bill will be implemented next year. Middle and small-sized enterprises will be unable to afford the heavy burden of their employees’ medical insurance. Romney was just aiming at this point and shouted that his first priority would be to cancel Obama’s heath care reform bill and make new laws that both care for people’s livelihood and protect current insurance from bankruptcy.

The U.S. vote calculation method is very odd. It takes each state as a unit, and the number of votes for each state is determined by the ratio of its population [to that of the nation]. (The bigger the population, the more votes it gets.) The one who wins the most votes in a state will win all the votes for that state. Traditionally, states that support Democrats are called “blue states,” and states that support Republicans are called “red states.” The states [where the two parties] have equal strength are called “battleground states.”

This time, the Republicans are concentrating efforts on winning back battleground states by carrying out a “3-2-1” strategy, which consists of the following: 3. Recapture three states, namely Indiana, North Carolina and Virginia. 2. Regain Florida and Ohio. 1. Win just one more state (for example, Ryan’s Wisconsin) to finally win the White House.

*Editor’s notes: The ratio offered by the author here is undefined. CNN recently reported that 87 percent of registered black voters support Obama.