Obama Presses On
Jules Witcover

In the closing hours of President Obama's drive for re-election, he sounded a most unusual rallying cry to his supporters. He urged them to join him in "keeping on keeping on," his way of promising to stay the agonizingly slow course to economic recovery of his first four years.

It was hardly an echo of his pledge of hope and change that won for him in 2008. But it was a wholly realistic acknowledgment of the state of affairs he had inherited then, and a plea to Americans to see in the limited progress made, and recent signs of more to come, that he was on the right track.

Obama managed on Tuesday night to amass more than 300 electoral votes, a modest cushion beyond the magic 270 required. The margin of victory however, was achieved by winning by only a percentage point or two in a string of states that went down to the wire, underscoring the sharp polarization in the electorate.

He was rescued by significant backing from the same elements that brought him the presidency four years ago -- young voters, women and most notable of all, huge margins among African-Americans and Hispanics. His direct appeal to them, coupled with the luck of having a Republican opponent with a tin ear to their needs and views, allowed him to prevail.

Mitt Romney proved to be a serviceable foil for Obama's argument that, despite the slow slog of the economy and lingering high unemployment, he was a known quantity, as opposed to the rich venture capitalist who was a serial flip-flopper on key issues and seemingly insensitive to the less well-off citizenry.

Romney's Republican Party, too, at least the version he clung to with varying degrees of conviction until his late sprint toward his former moderation, enabled Obama to make the most of the contrast. This was particularly so on the issue of immigration reform, which assured the president an overwhelming advantage among Hispanic voters.

Without the issue of race covertly raised or exploited, the fact that the face of the GOP of today has become increasing white, male and prosperous enabled Obama to offer himself as the champion of the shrinking blue-collar middle class. In this regard, too, Romney played into Obama's hands by opposing the auto bailout and haplessly saying he would have let the beneficiaries go bankrupt.

His defeat in critical Ohio, one the largest auto-making states in the country, may well have been assured by his campaign running false radio and television ads suggesting a Chrysler plant in Toledo was being closed down and the work shipped to China. But this was only one of several ham-handed political missteps that undermined the Romney campaign.

As for Obama's determination to "keep on keeping on," the results in the House and Senate races offered him little hope of an easier perseverance that he faced in his first four years. While his Democaratic Party will retain its slim majority in the Senate, the Republicans will keep their House majority, with immediate signals that they have no intention of abandoning their strong obstructionism of the president's first term.

House Speaker John Boehner wasted no time declaring that while the voters rejected Romney, "with this vote the American people have also made clear that there is no mandate for raising tax rates." That comment was a clear warning that the House GOP intends to continue resistance to any compromise twinning deep spending cuts with increased tax revenues as way to avoid the post-election "fiscal cliff" facing a lame-duck session of Congress.

Obama in pre-election interviews expressed the hope that his re-election would persuade Republican congressional leaders to adopt a more conciliatory and cooperative posture, now that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's goal of making him "a one-term president" has been shattered.

With the Republican Party reeling, however, and with internal recriminations likely to be laid at Romney's feet, the prospects for a second-term comity between the parties on Capitol Hill would seem to require more of the old Obama hope that was left in ashes over the previous four years.

 

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Obama Presses On | Politics

 

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