Thursday, September 20, 2012

'It's Time to Admit the Romney Campaign is an Incompetent One...'

That's Peggy Noonan at yesterday's Wall Street Journal, "Time for an Intervention":
I think there is a broad and growing feeling now, among Republicans, that this thing is slipping out of Romney’s hands. Today at a speech in New York with what seemed like many conservatives and Republicans in the audience, I said more or less the above. I wondered if anyone would say, in the Q&A, “I think you’ve got it wrong, you’re too pessimistic.” No one did. A woman asked me to talk about why in a year the Republicans couldn’t lose, the Republican candidate seems to be losing.

I said pre-mortems won’t help, if you want to help the more conservative candidate, it’s a better use of your time to pitch in with ideas. There’s seven weeks to go. This isn’t over, it’s possible to make things better.

Republicans are going to have to right this thing. They have to stabilize it.

It’s time to admit the Romney campaign is an incompetent one. It’s not big, it’s not brave, it’s not thoughtfully tackling great issues...
Folks can read it all at that top link.

I published an analysis at yesterday at PJ Media, which echoed some of Noonan's points: "Is Romney Imploding?" It's straightforward analysis, although hard-right partisans will blow it off as "demoralizing" the GOP base, or whatever.

I'm still waiting for that big Romney breakthrough, like waiting all year. And the polls remain where they've been for months, with Obama enjoying slight gains in the key battleground states and in nationwide surveys. It's seven weeks to go. Lots can still happen, as Charlie Cook suggested the other day. But Romney needs something, anything, that's a game changer. I hope I'm wrong and they'll be a surge of grassroots mobilization and turnout, or something. But at this point some polls are even finding that the enthusiasm gap has basically closed.

I'll have more on this, but I'm not going to be sugarcoating things.

PREVIOUSLY: "Fox News Battleground States Poll: Obama Up in Florida, Ohio and Virginia."

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