President Obama has been re-elected as the President of the United States of America. This news came to the nation at around 10:30 on Tuesday, November 6th. The night was over the moment that Ohio fell into the blue column, a state that virtually every pundit had deemed essential to Governor Romney’s efforts. The President is projected to receive well over 300 electoral votes, although Florida is yet to be called.
Mitt Romney’s electoral troubles can be traced all the way back to 2008, when just days after President Obama’s innauguration he was being called the inevitable 2012 nominee. So called “Tea Party” republicans and others felt bypassed and looked for the “Non-Mitt Romney” candidate for the entire primary season. This tension between some of the most active grass roots members of the GOP and the party’s leadership lasted for much of the race.
After the Governor had essentially wrapped up the nomination, he was limited by campaign finance laws from using the money he had raised for the general election until he officially took up the mantle of the party’s presidential nominee. This created about a month of total silence from the nominee, giving the President free reign to paint his own picture of the election.
The President effectively portrayed Romney as an ultraconservative corporate baron that was only interested in representing the top earners of the country. His record at Bain Capital was hammered again and again by ads from the President and his allies. That month long period lead to a huge deficit in the polls, and an incredibly steep uphill road for the republican ticket.
One essential turning point of the race came in early October during the first Presidential debate, when Mitt Romney began to make waves with much of the country. This first head-to-head meeting between the President and his challenger was described by most as a decisive win for Governor Romney. Pundits described the President as dismissive, distant, and disinterested in debating. Those 90 minutes brought the Governor’s personal likeability numbers above President Obama’s for the first time in the long election cycle.
In the following debates and weeks, the two candidates were neck and neck. One jumped ahead in one poll, just as another gained a key endorsement. Just as one candidate appeared to be making strides, the other would battle back. This hard fought election culminated in a fairly anti-climactic election day, in which President Obama was quickly declared the winner. The President’s first responsibility in the coming months will be responding to the looming fiscal cliff, and working with the divided congress to create jobs and solve the debt crisis.
