Rove on Obama's chances

Karl Rove wrote a column in the Wall St. Journal arguing that Obama will lose in 2012. Rhodes Cook at the Center for Politics and Peter Lawler at Big Think responded. Neither engage Rove's points directly, but they make the general point that there is little sign of real opposition to Obama within his party.

Rove's primary argument is that the economy sucks, which is true, but if employment were improving Obama would win in a landslide. A bad economy just means Obama has to work harder for a narrower win. Rove's demographic arguments, that Obama is in trouble with Jewish, black and young voters, are a joke. Losing share among Jewish voters is a perennial and empty scare tactic. Democrats getting a smaller share of black voters is also unlikely, especially so in Obama's case. Rove only lightly touches on Latinos and other minorities, probably because the growing minority population in the states he cites swamps any diminished enthusiasm for Obama.

The rest of his demographic argument rests on job approval numbers, which don't have a strong correlation to voting patterns and are thus weak predictors of electoral performance. Rove's policy argument uses sleight of had to shift attention to an abstract 'Obamacare' from the massive approval, even among Republicans, of Obama's specific policies on Medicaid, Medicare, Social Security and health insurance.

Rove's last argument, that voters don't like politicians who point out their policy differences with their opponents, is absurd on it's face.