I'm a bit worried that republicans in general and the Romney team in particular are missing the point when it comes to economic performance under Obama - of course it's fine to criticize how poor that performance has been, but to me the real thing you want to hit on here is the failure of a left wing approach embodied in Obama doctrinal proclivities to fully maximize the potential of American business and entrepreneurial dynamism - that's the key to America's future, not simply some marginal improvement in a few indicators, but rather it is the threat of economic potentiality being suppressed by leftist obsessions - and Obamacare, Dodd-Frank, the GM bailout that rewarded unions and screwed bond holders, an ill conceived and utterly mismanaged stimulus that was a walking talking manifestation of how wasteful and incompetent big gov't tends to be - all these things fit very nicely into a line of attack that focuses on lost or significantly impaired potential.
What worries me is that incumbents are given much benefit of the doubt by voters and this tendency will be even more in play when it comes to Obama because those insipid, misguided voters who were motivated by the superficial allure of an African-American as president in 2008 are gonna be very reluctant to come off that position and admit failure - even a small uptick in economic data that in objective terms may be meaningless could prove enough of a pretext for these deluded types and allow them to embrace once again a comforting illusion - and let's not forget, even the faintest whisper of an upturn on the economic front come October will be amplified into a symphonic cascade of good news by the media.
For this reason republicans have to be sure not to get caught up in mere numbers - they have to hit on 'the vision thing' and sell the message of lost potential - in other words, moderate voters whose allegiances may be pliable, need to believe it as a fact that 2 percent GDP growth is not even remotely close to being good enough - they must feel it in their hearts that America under Obama is not living up to its full potential and the world as a whole suffers as a consequence - or, put another way, pretty speeches full of lofty platitudes and sweet nothings may win you the fawning praise of a liberal press, the catamites attending the imperial bedchamber - but that's not true leadership, that's not true power - that's a pretense, a pantomime that cannot last, an empty show.
