Winning The Obama Republicans

Presidential Races can be close. They can also be blowouts. Ronald Reagan's 1984 defeat of Walter Mondale was a blowout: every state except Minnesota went to Reagan. In contrast, the 2000 race between Al Gore and George W. Bush was so close that a single state going the other way could have changed the outcome of the election. In 2012, the Presidential race may be very close. It is likely that independent and moderate voters, which actually make up a majority of the American people, will be the group that decides the race. The far-left won't vote Republican and the far-right won't vote Democrat. The center, however, could go either way.

In 2008, nearly 1 in 10 Republicans voted for President Barack Obama over their party's nominee, John McCain. These so-called "Obama Republicans" or "Obamacans" helped the President secure the win. Likewise, in 1984 Ronald Reagan was able to win 49 of 50 states because of the support of "Reagan Democrats" and other moderate voters. President Reagan, after all, helped curb inflation, reduced taxes, grew the GDP, and helped create jobs in America. Moderate Americans support those principles, and if President Obama can do the same, moderate Americans -- including, yes, some Republicans -- will vote for him again in 2012.

It is clear that the number one priority of the American people is the economy. Financial issues, not social issues, are what Americans care about. For many Americans, it doesn't matter if something is a Republican solution or a Democrat solution, but rather if something is a working solution. If the far-left ideas of greater regulation and higher taxes created more jobs in America, raised the average families income, and improved the GDP, most Americans would be happy. Unfortunately, it has been shown in the past that the best way to bring prosperity to America is by embracing supply-side economics. As Arthur B. Laffer mentions in the Wall Street Journal, supply-side economics created 21 million jobs between 1982 and 1990.

Unfortunately, for President Obama, should he fail to America on the path to economic prosperity, the people will start to demand change. Not the "change" he campaigned on, but change to a different leader, likely a more conservative, Republican leader. The best way for President Obama to win an election in 2012 is not through charismatic campaigning and the support of large unions, but rather by bringing economic prosperity to the American people.