"Liberals will not be to blame this time if Obama loses!"
...when did he lose before?
And where in the piece did it say he would lose? The
chart show him even as in 2008. From the article:
<...>
That said, it would be close. And the reason it would still be close despite Obama's poor numbers is that voters really are not big on the Republican contenders. Rick Perry's favorability spread is the 'best' of the GOP hopefuls but he still has only 34% of voters with a positive opinion of him to 43% with a negative one. The rest all have net favorabilities of -20 or worse: Michele Bachmann's at -23 (29/52), Mitt Romney's at -24 (28/52), Sarah Palin's at -31 (32/63), and Newt Gingrich is at -39 (22/61). That lack of appeal across the board for the Republicans means Obama's still going to have a decent chance at winning this state again so long as he gets his approval back up into the 46-48% range.
One thing that's particularly notable on these North Carolina numbers is Perry basically doing the same as Romney against Obama. The conventional wisdom has been that Romney is the stronger general election candidate but at least in this one swing state that's not the case. Perry's favorability with independent voters is 44/34, while Romney's is 35/50. The lack of an electability gap here could just be a southern thing but it's worth keeping an eye on.
Against the second tier of Republican candidates Obama does better, leading Bachmann 47-45, Gingrich 48-43, and Palin 49-42. Of course the chances of any of those folks being the nominee don't look very good right now.
Obama will still have a good chance at winning North Carolina if he sees a little improvement in his popularity. But his prospects look drearier today than they have at any other point in 2011.
<...>