Obama vs Romney Polls: Obama Tanks Among Women and Independents

Just 47% of registered voters in the latest ABC News/Washington Post poll see Obama favorably overall, down 7 percentage points from his recent peak in April, while 49% rate him unfavorably. He’s numerically underwater in this group for the first time since February.

The decline has occurred entirely among women registered voters – from 57%-39% favorable-unfavorable in April to a numerically negative 46%-50% now. That’s Obama’s lowest score among women voters – a focus of recent political positioning – in ABC/Post polls since he took office.

On top of that, according to CNN’s latest poll, Romney’s lead among independents has jumped in the last week from 3 points to 10 points today among likely voters.

Against that backdrop of new polling, there are more campaign ads being released targeting women voters.

Independent Women’s Voice is a 501(c)(4) nonpartisan, nonprofit organization for mainstream women and is the sister organization of the Independent Women’s Forum. IWV has a track record demonstrating that it uses resources wisely while effectively developing and delivering messages to independents and women, key blocs of citizens in 2010 and 2012.

A good friend of mine worked with IVW on putting that ad together and after testing it, found that it was effective in moving the needle. An Ohio focus group moved from 44% disapproval of Obama to 62% after viewing the ad.

Apparently, it also got the attention of the RNC, who just released this ad today that’s eerily similar in its message.

You have to admit, both ads aren’t particularly venomous, even offering understanding about how Obama may have inspired them in 2008 and promised them a new direction for America and its politics. The pitch (and the message discipline) produced a reasonable tone and approach, one that tended to ask for unity rather than make a strident base-appeal rally.

Now contrast that with the abortion-palooza that’s the 2012 Democratic National Convention.

“I have NEVER heard this much about abortion as in that hall last night…” That’s according to Melinda Henneberger, who writes the "She the People" column for the Washington Post. She was responding to a post Matt Lewis wrote in which he argued that Democrats risk turning off undecided voters if their convention turns into “abortion-palooza.”

Even liberal columnist Margaret Carlson recently wrote on Bloomberg, “I hate to bring up abortion during the Democrats’ festivities, which are going so swimmingly, but I have a question. Why has the party removed the sentence ‘Abortion should be safe, legal, and rare’ from its platform? It was in the 2004 document but not in 2008’s or this year’s. Can’t Democrats just throw a crumb to the many millions who are pro-choice but not pro-abortion?” (Btw: kudos to Carlson for pointing out the difference).

There’s no doubt that one of the key demographics the Obama campaign is counting on come November is women and are keeping up the disingenuous “War on Women” rhetoric to scare more and more women voters into their corner. It’s also why they’re still trying to keep Sandra Fluke (remember her?) fresh in everyone’s minds.

But the entire convention is turning into a primal scream on abortion and contraception. Don’t be surprised if swing voters feel repelled by the spectacle. They may be breaking up with more than just Obama by the end of this week.

...I think it would be even better run in rotation with this one from American Crossroads

You are probably right, but I wish we did not have to use this sort of victim-group pandering to combat the left's victim-group pandering. Obama is at war with capitalism, not women. If that war has produced more female than male "casualties," I doubt it was intentional.

Pro-choice but not pro-abortion, that is the second time today that I have heard a liberal try to make a distinction, one that I admit completely escapes me.

I agree. It is a coward's reply. Like you said, either it is a human life or it is not. Either abortion kills a human life or it doesn't. The whole reason, I believe, that there is so much equivocation by some can be blamed on the Supreme Court, who would not take a stand on the "person hood" question in the Roe v. Wade ruling. They used the "we don't really know for sure when life begins" argument and it was BS then and is even more so now. We DO know when human life begins and abortion kills that life.

It is a cop-out, to coin an old fogey phrase, to hide behind a "personal" opposition to abortion but a belief in a woman's right to choose abortion. It is not much different that saying, "I personally am against slavery, but I can't tell you you can't have slaves." Or, "I don't believe in killing my unborn baby, but I won't stop you from killing yours." Either it is morally wrong or it is not. For those who say, "You can't legislate morality.", I say, "Wrong! ALL laws legislate what is right and wrong." Morality comes in when a person must decide whether or not to obey the laws. Certainly, in our day and age what is considered moral anymore has drastically changed - but taking innocent human life has ALWAYS been against the laws of God. We cannot allow the depraved element of our society to determine by their own morays what should be right or wrong. We are not so far gone... yet.

There is trouble for Bambi among the Mexican American population in Tucson. It may not be enough to make him lose among that demographic, but I consider it a big shift from four years ago. My son was telling me that he has a lot of friends who are anti Obama. One girl in one of my son’s classes said Obama is the devil. She said this to a teacher. This school is about 80%+ Mexican American. The teachers are mostly liberal. Duh!

The "Libertarian" perspective surely must admit that the role of government - the CENTRAL role of government - is to protect the unalienable rights of its citizens, yes? If there is a "right to life" that supersedes all other rights, and it most certainly has to considering no rights would be of any worth to one who is not alive, then governments must protect this right - of innocents most of all - above all others.

The words you used could support the libertarian case [Note: I am not a libertarian, just trying to articulate their perspective]. Government exists to protect inalienable rights of the citizens, and to do little else. The unborn are not citizens; pro-life Americans recognize their humanity, but no one considers them citizens. Citizenship is conferred at birth. Therefore, regardless of morality (remember, libertarians as the term is used in the United States generally also believe that moral issues such as adultery, prostitution, and drugs are outside the scope of government power), protecting the unborn is a personal moral choice rather than a government responsibility.

I'm not being argumentative just to argue. It is important to understand how rational people who disagree with pro-life values actually think. There is no point in trying to understand how the far left thinks - because they don't think.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.