What should be Romney post-conventions strategy?

[Peeperkorn]

An honorable defeat?

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

Romney should have rejected the hardcore fundie wing of the party in the first place and appealed to one of the big groups Republicans have been shedding; suburban white-collars. If he ran an economically conservative and socially moderate (not socially far-right and trying to make people ignore it), he'd be doing far better in Virginia, Colorado, and New Hampshire. However, the fact that his campaign has decided to turn off both Rustbelt blue-collars and Mid-Atlantic white-collars is great for us Democrats.

[CLARENCE 2015!]

Presenting an alternate vision for where he wants to lead this nation...one thing you can NOT say about Obama and the Dems is that they don't have a plan- I disagree with it, but a vote for Romney at this point is a vote for the unknown

[後援会]

Crush Obama in the debates. Or at least try to.

[Adam Griffin]

Throw money at the problem, like he always has.

Crush Obama in the debates. Or at least try to.

Even better, throw money at "the problem" during the debates. I could easily see Mitt getting all flustered and then proceed to pull out $100 bills, fold them into paper airplanes and toss them at the President.

[xavier110]

Fake an illness and have other people campaign for him.

[Grumpier Than Uncle Joe]

Go dirtier than Obama.

[Snowstalker Mk. II]

Crush Obama in the debates. Or at least try to.

That would be tough. Obama isn't a great debater, but Romney falls apart when he gets flustered to the extent that even Rick Perry could slam him.

[Joe Republic]

Throw money at the problem, like he always has.

Crush Obama in the debates. Or at least try to.

Even better, throw money at "the problem" during the debates. I could easily see Mitt getting all flustered and then proceed to pull out $100 bills, fold them into paper airplanes and toss them at the President.

$10,000 bet he won't?

[Likely Voter]

I bet that two weeks after the DNC the race will be roughly where it was in early August, or around Obama +2, but with fewer undecideds. From that point the Romney strat will be simple. Use the money advantage on TV to tell a positive story and try to move the remaining persuadables, and let the party and the superpacs use their ginormous amount of money to run negative ads which should help both rally their own base and depress the vote of other undecideds and left leaning indies. That alone could return the race to about a tie. He then needs to win the debate season to put him over the top.

It's doable, but he is going against a headwind, which is why the betting still has Obama as a somewhat favorite.

[NHI]

I bet that two weeks after the DNC the race will be roughly where it was in early August, or around Obama +2, but with fewer undecideds. From that point the Romney strat will be simple. Use the money advantage on TV to tell a positive story and try to move the remaining persuadables, and let the party and the superpacs use their ginormous amount of money to run negative ads which should help both rally their own base and depress the vote of other undecideds and left leaning indies. That alone could return the race to about a tie. He then needs to win the debate season to put him over the top.

It's doable, but he is going against a headwind, which is why the betting still has Obama as a somewhat favorite.

All the above and ask the question: Are you better of than you were four year ago, and he wins this election, perhaps narrowly, but still wins it.

[Likely Voter]

The "are you better off?" thing can only take you so far. The dems are answering it well at their convention and bear in mind that more people blame Bush for the bad economy than Obama.

To cross over Romney cant just rely on comparisons to the past, he has to convince people he has a plan for the future (and that it is different than George W. Bush's).

I think the only place he can effectively do that is in the debates.

[mondale84]

Figure out how he can articulately blame Ryan for his impending loss.

[© tweed]

pray for, and to whatever extent he is capable attempt to provoke, a geopolitical calamity.

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Tweed, I thought you were starting to feel threatened by the Romney-Ryan ticket. What happened?

Anyhow, I'm not really a fan of politicians telling voters what they think or what they want... but asking "are you better off" just isn't going to work. Both sides can twist the facts to answer that question in a favourable way. So why give the Dems room to do that?

Romney should just flat out say "you are not better off—don't be stupid." It's less cushy.

[© tweed]

Tweed, I thought you were starting to feel threatened by the Romney-Ryan ticket. What happened?

where and in what manner did I indicate this?

[Yank2133]

I bet that two weeks after the DNC the race will be roughly where it was in early August, or around Obama +2, but with fewer undecideds. From that point the Romney strat will be simple. Use the money advantage on TV to tell a positive story and try to move the remaining persuadables, and let the party and the superpacs use their ginormous amount of money to run negative ads which should help both rally their own base and depress the vote of other undecideds and left leaning indies. That alone could return the race to about a tie. He then needs to win the debate season to put him over the top.

It's doable, but he is going against a headwind, which is why the betting still has Obama as a somewhat favorite.

All the above and ask the question: Are you better of than you were four year ago, and he wins this election, perhaps narrowly, but still wins it.

Bill Clinton just neutered that talking point.

Romney actually has to give a reason for people to vote him.

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Tweed, I thought you were starting to feel threatened by the Romney-Ryan ticket. What happened?

where and in what manner did I indicate this?

Maybe it was opebo. I get you two mixed up.

[JFK-Democrat]

Figure out how to get less people to vote.

[5280]

Figure out how to get less people to vote for Obama.

[stegosaurus]

Romney should focus on the numbers:

1. 15% of the country does can not find work, has stopped bothering to look, or is not meeting their needs with their current jobs.
2. 46.7 million people are on food stamps.
3. The national debt is over $16 trillion.
4. The federal deficit is $1.3 trillion

Regardless of whose fault you think this is, those are ugly numbers for an incumbent to run beside.

[mondale84]

Romney should focus on the numbers:

1. 15% of the country does can not find work, has stopped bothering to look, or is not meeting their needs with their current jobs.
2. 46.7 million people are on food stamps.
3. The national debt is over $16 trillion.
4. The federal deficit is $1.3 trillion

Regardless of whose fault you think this is, those are ugly numbers for an incumbent to run beside.

The problem for Romney taking advantage of those figures is that he would make all of them worse.

[Yank2133]

Romney should focus on the numbers:

1. 15% of the country does can not find work, has stopped bothering to look, or is not meeting their needs with their current jobs.
2. 46.7 million people are on food stamps.
3. The national debt is over $16 trillion.
4. The federal deficit is $1.3 trillion

Regardless of whose fault you think this is, those are ugly numbers for an incumbent to run beside.

Ok....so what is Mitt going to do to change this?

Republicans seem to be missing the point that Mitt has to make a case for himself.

[J. J.]

I bet that two weeks after the DNC the race will be roughly where it was in early August, or around Obama +2, but with fewer undecideds. From that point the Romney strat will be simple. Use the money advantage on TV to tell a positive story and try to move the remaining persuadables, and let the party and the superpacs use their ginormous amount of money to run negative ads which should help both rally their own base and depress the vote of other undecideds and left leaning indies. That alone could return the race to about a tie. He then needs to win the debate season to put him over the top.

It's doable, but he is going against a headwind, which is why the betting still has Obama as a somewhat favorite.

All the above and ask the question: Are you better of than you were four year ago, and he wins this election, perhaps narrowly, but still wins it.

Bill Clinton just neutered that talking point.

Romney actually has to give a reason for people to vote him.

No, this time, he didn't feel their pain.

First, outline a solid plan.

Second, poverty, unemployment, housing, debt.

[SPC]

Having a natural affinity for the underdog, I'd like to think about what Romney should do to win. However, the problem seems to be that the main obstacle preventing Romney from doing that is Romney himself. Even without all of his gaffes, he is simply a terrible candidate for virtually every swing state.

The only idea I can think of that would give him a Hail Mary would be to repudiate the Ryan budget proposal and instead call for dramatic cuts in military spending to make incremental cuts to social spending more palatable. Obama would be unable to successfully attack him on this for much the same reason Romney has been unable to attack Obama on foreign policy. Obama could attack Romney for flip-flopping, but given Romney's reputation I hardly think this would do any marginal damage. Of course, Romney's a hyper-militarist so this would never happen.