But just to play the game if it stays close: Obviously Ohio is the Keystone state, not Pennsylvania, for purposes of handicapping the electoral college vote. With Ohio all things are possible for Romney and without it it will take a near miracle to win for two reasons: First, he must cobble something together with Wisconsin and Nevada or some such combination. Second, the loss of Ohio means that Romney's message is not resonating and he is likely to lose places like Iowa, Virginia, Colorado, and Nevada and it will be very unlikely that he could under the circumstances pick up the odd state like Wisconsin plus one to substitute for Ohio. On the other hand, this tendency will also run the other way if his campaign gathers the momentum both you and I expect it will then Romney is likely to pick up Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania and run pass 300 electoral votes.
We have seen several straws in the wind blowing in Romney's direction: First, North Carolina has now become a virtual lock for Romney; Second, Romney has just pulled up even in Ohio; Rasmussen has now been joined by two other polls showing Romney in a virtual tie in Ohio; the primary results in Wisconsin look very favorable for the Republicans; even the fiasco in the Democrat primary in West Virginia signals an incipient revolt in Democrat ranks; a look at the map reminds me that West Virginia abuts Ohio; Rasmussen has got Romney up 4 or 5 points nationally in the three-day rolling average poll of likely voters and the states have not yet been freshly pulled to bring the trends up to date which undoubtedly will show marked improvement for Romney.
Obama has not been able to sound a Chord which resonates. He has failed in his attempt to separate women from the Catholic Church, for example. The youth vote remains apathetic compared to 2008, as does the Hispanic vote. The momentum is clearly with Romney.
Finally, Goldman Sachs is just downgraded its GDP expectations to 1.9%. The employment numbers this week are just as anemic as last week, although they have not received media attention. Gasoline prices are holding at a very high level and if they come down it probably means that they are coming down in price because demand in a weakened economy is reduced. There is, therefore, virtually no hope of a palpable improvement in our living standard before the election which would prompt the voters to give Obama an opportunity to stay the course and certainly nothing to impel them to reward Obama for a job well done.
