“Bush didn’t make people vote for 0bama.
They voted for him by the millions because it was a feelgood personal statement for them to vote for the first black candidate to run for president.”
The economy had fallen apart and Bush was personally very unpopular. That is all it takes, in ANY election. Sure, Obama’s ethnicity played into this to an extent, but that was mostly window dressing. Had Hillary come out of the primary as the winner she would have won, same likely with Edwards, unless his sex scandal would have broken during the general, which would have thrown the election to McCain/Palin, headwinds be damned.
This election was lost before it began because of the faltering economy and the sitting president’s lack of job approval. In 2012 the situation will be exactly opposite.
If the economy is out of recession and the jobs market is recovered by 2012 we have zero chance, if the economy is bad we probably have a strong chance to beat Obama, regardless who opposes him. It IS indeed the economy, always and foremost.
All the economic projections show the earliest sign of recovery being mid 2012, and those are the rosy ones that assume 0bama’s policies will do what they claim. This recovery isn’t going to be even across the country, either. The more reliably Democrat areas won’t begin recovering until 2014 or later by these estimates.
But even if there is an economic recovery that 0bama claims credit for, there is still a good chance that people will revolt against his big government takeovers of their life savings and their healthcare. When Government Motors starts unfairly penalizing Ford trying to shut down the competition, people will react strongly against that too. And when 0bama’s foreign policy bungling leads to a real international crisis, people will begin to see him as a danger to our national security.
So there are a number of other issues to factor into the 2012 election besides the economy. However, don’t underestimate the stubbornness of a Cult of Personality’s flock. Just look at the Palin supporters who are still in denial over her downfall.