All he needs to win is the votes.
The way you win is you first hold your own base then you peel off a faction or two from the other guy. We are running a guy who has yet to prove he can hold the Republican base. He is running against a guy whose own factions are HIGHLY UNLIKELY to switch and vote Republican ~ more likely they will simply not vote for the top position.
That's why we need to operate under the assumption that Obama has to lose 15% of the vote he had last time, and that we cannot count on picking it up ourselves.
Our candidate has to be charismatic in the extreme to overcome the problem that our last two candidates for President came nowhere near the number of voters that Obama got! In fact, we have a declining vote total 2004 to 2008!
“The precedent for assuming that Obama can win is that Roosevelt, who had progressively worse economic records, won THREE MORE TIMES!!!”
Not really true, the economy grew under Roosevelt’s first term, going from the depths of the depression and 25% unemployment to merely a rotten economy.
“We are running a guy who has yet to prove he can hold the Republican base.”
Polls are already showing that to be untrue.
“That’s why we need to operate under the assumption that Obama has to lose 15% of the vote he had last time, has to lose 15% of the vote he had last time,”
Which he will. Just a portion of the 25 million long-term unemployed and he is toast.