Thursday, May 3, 2012

Will Changes in the Electorate Sink Romney?

There's a notion floating on the right and left.  It goes like this: the electorate has changed so dramatically that it favors President Obama's re-election.  Will Mitt Romney be a November victim of generational and demographic tyranny?  Or will external factors -- including the president's dismal performance and policies -- impact the electoral equation to Romney's advantage?
Mitt Romney's election strategy needs to account for changes in the electorate, making appeals that resonate with contemporary voters.  But an updated appeal doesn't mean Romney should jettison core conservative principles -- just the opposite.
The year 2012 is a golden opportunity for Mitt Romney, entrepreneurs, and enterprising Republicans to expand their party's franchise.  The GOP hasn't had a better chance since Jimmy Carter's 1980 failed re-election bid to showcase practical conservative solutions to the nation's problems.  In fact, 2012 is a "teachable moment" for voters among key non-Republican constituencies.  A teachable moment can be the stuff of a winning moment for the GOP, short- and longer-term.    
Despite the propaganda, women, young voters, and Hispanics aren't monolithic.  Segments among those cohorts are persuadable.  A crippled economy made worse by President Obama's policies, and the president's spendthrift ways, make more than some voters receptive to being taught -- voters who otherwise would be closed to Republican arguments.

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