Obama, Trumping Despair, Can Win Comfortably: Albert R. Hunt

[one...two...tree 2,762]

June 16 (Bloomberg) -- There are three types of U.S. presidential elections: landslides, comfortable margins and squeakers. With 20 weeks to go, this one isn't going to be a landslide, though it starts with a decided tilt toward Barack Obama.

Looking at the national surveys over the last week and polls in the dozen or so most-competitive states, and factoring in the underlying fundamentals -- history, the economy, war and an unpopular incumbent -- the professional bettors are smartly putting the early money on the Democratic nominee.

There are four emerging elements that can shape, or reshape, this race: the map, as it's called, or the Electoral College of states, which, as the world learned in 2000, decides the presidency; changing conditions or circumstances; the vice presidential decision, and what dominates the agenda this fall.

Some American journalists love to focus on the state-by- state electoral breakdown, full of fancy-colored maps -- red for Republican, blue for Democrat -- that add little value. If a candidate wins the popular vote by 4 or 5 percentage points, there is no practical chance the Electoral College will go the other way; the map follows the voters.

However, in a razor-thin election -- 1960, 1968, 1976 and, of course, 2000, when Al Gore won the popular vote and lost the presidency because of the infamous Florida recount -- the map matters.

Both camps talk about expanding their party's universe this year, competing in states that used to be out of reach. Disregard most of that; if Senator John McCain, the presumptive Republican candidate, wins California or New Jersey or if Obama takes Texas or Georgia, it will be a landslide like 1964, 1972 or 1984.

Past as Prologue

Realistically, the best starting point to look at the electoral map is the 2004 contest, a narrow Republican victory but one that today suggests an Obama edge.

Of the bigger prizes, Obama eyes two red states, Ohio and Florida, and McCain has his sights on two blue ones, Pennsylvania and Michigan. Pennsylvania, with its progressive suburbs, leans to Obama and Florida still looks better for McCain. The other two are tossups.

Obama has changed the dynamics in medium-size and smaller states from four years ago. There are more than half a dozen 2004 red states -- Iowa, Colorado, New Mexico, Virginia, Nevada, Missouri, even Indiana and Montana -- where Obama is competitive. There are very few -- New Hampshire and Wisconsin -- that McCain can turn from Democrat to Republican.

The Bush Drag

An unforeseen development can always reshape the outlook. The most often-cited possibility is a foreign crisis or a terrorist incident at home, which most experts think would work to McCain's advantage.

Anything else highlighting the incumbent president, though, would cut the other way. It is almost impossible to exaggerate the drag that George W. Bush is on Republicans, including McCain, even with a concerted new effort to create distance. If in 1988, Ronald Reagan had Bush's current approval ratings, hovering below 30 percent instead of in the mid 50s, Democrat Michael Dukakis, for all his imperfections, would have been elected president.

Then there's the vice presidential pick. Hans Nichols of Bloomberg News, one of the most insightful reporters on the McCain trail, assures me the candidate's choice will be surprising and unconventional. He has no idea who that might be.

It's not any easier predicting Obama's choice. Ten days ago, when Democratic polltaker Peter Hart suggested Gore, it seemed fun, the flavor du jour. The more one thinks about it, the more appealing it seems.

Presidential Persuasion

Democratic strategist James Carville, who ran Bill Clinton's 1992 campaign, the only successful Democratic presidential insurgency in the past three decades, embraces Gore with an important added element: make him the energy czar as well, with a charge to cut American dependence on foreign oil by 25 percent in 10 years with everything on the table.

Everyone says Gore wouldn't want it. They're right, so it would take powers of presidential persuasion to change his mind.

Finally, perhaps most important is who sets the agenda and what it is. Without exception, the candidate who controls the agenda wins.

That will be framed by the conventions as Obama, 46, hopes he can duplicate Bill Clinton's biography-centered and successful 1992 effort and McCain, as always, tries to emulate Reagan. Joint forums or debates between now and Nov. 4 will also be revealing, though this year's primary contests demonstrated they probably won't be determinative.

Hope Over Fear

Overall, there is something else axiomatic about American presidential politics: Hope or optimism, when conveyed effectively, trump fear and despair. Every candidate offers a steady diet of negative stuff about what a disaster his opponent would be. Sometimes, when the opposition is flawed, that's sufficient -- the Nixon landslide of 1972, for example.

Usually, however, in big elections like those of Franklin Roosevelt and Reagan or small-ball ones like those of Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, the victor is the one who seizes the high road and offers a hopeful vision of where to lead the country, capturing the can-do American spirit.

That's a terrible dilemma for McCain, 71, who, by nature, is a can-do political figure. His only real hope of winning, saddled as he is by his old adversary Bush, is fear; scaring voters about Obama's inexperience, or his associations or the threat of terrorism.

Obama, an Illinois senator, has to counter these charges and convince voters he's ready and resolute. If he can do that, as he basically did against Hillary Clinton's formidable challenge in the primaries, dial that expectations clock up from a close win to a comfortable one.

(Albert R. Hunt is the executive editor for Washington at Bloomberg News. The opinions expressed are his own.)

To contact the writer of this column: Albert R. Hunt in Washington at ahunt1@bloomberg.net