lol @ the idea there was any opportunity to compromise. The Teabaggers and McConnell's master plan made it impossible.
The War on Women won the 2012 election. Midterm turnout just isn't right for it.
Obama swung into unpopularity because of Edward Snowden, wasting time with gun control legislation, and he never recovered.
No. It was the economy, just like it is every election. Voters remembered that it was just 4 years earlier that the economy went to hell under George W. Bush and his housing bubble of 2001 - 2006. The economy recovered just in time in 2012 that people gave Obama another term, and Mitt Romney's biography only reminded them of why they don't trust Republicans on the economy.
Women were just one part of Obama's coalition. A very important part, yes, but so was every other part. The Coalition of the Ascendant is large enough to deliever a solid victory when all of them turn out, but each group composing that coalition (gays, Hispanics, Blacks, Asians, poor people, working class, etc.) is individually strong enough that if just
one of them peels away, it's over. When the gender gap was broken down by marital status, it revealed that while there was a difference in the way men and women voted, the biggest driver of the difference and Obama's margin in the female vote was their economic status, which is directly tied to marital status. Married men and women (married couples tend to more financially established) gave a majority of their votes to Romney, while unmarried men and women gave their votes to Obama. Obama successfully painted Romney as an out-of-touch flip-flopper who would give tax breaks to the rich and start wars everywhere well before Aiken and Mourdock threw gasoline on the embers. The election was essentially over in early 2012 when Romney emerged from the primaries bloodied, unemployment was falling, and Team Obama's smear campaign had already been in full-gear.
It always was, is, and will be about economics. That's why Udall is faltering in Colorado this year: he thought muh birthcontrol and the War on Women was
the winning point, as opposed to just one nail in the coffin. Gardner on the other hand, did moderate on birth control and abortion, but also discussed the economy, healthcare, energy, foreign policy, etc.
And back to the original topic: it's the economy. Unemployment has fallen and 10 million jobs have been created since 2010, but wages and growth are still weak and a vast pool of underemployed and discouraged workers still exists. In 2012, the recovery was shifting out of low gear into medium gear, so people saw this as a positive sign and gave Obama another chance. But we've been stuck in medium gear and have failed to shift into high gear for the past 2 years, and that is why people have once again soured on Obama. It's been 6 years and he doesn't have GWB to kick around anymore. Add into all of this ISIS, a resurgent Russia, rocky ACA rollout, all the "scandals" from last year, Ebola, etc. etc. etc. and you see why.
The Congressional GOP never wanted to compromise with Obama while they just controlled 1/3 of the legislative process, because they'd be forced to give up more than they could gain with the scales tipped in favor of Obama and the Senate Dems. When they failed to destroy him in the run-up to the 2012 election, they are biding their time out until the take the Senate this year and will control 2/3 of the legislative process, where they will have the high ground and can pin intransigence on Obama, because the American people elected them to accomplish their agenda, right guys?
It wasn't about compromise, the War on Women, gun control, etc. It's the economy, stupid! Every other issue you guys listed is important in and of itself, but when compared to the overriding issue that is Americans' financial situation, it is just another nail in the coffin. That is where Obama went wrong: he lost people on the economy in terms of message and policy.
