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The article says "Democrats are likely to look at the economy with rose-colored glasses because they want their candidate to win in November" which doesn't really address anything. If they believe that the economy is bad and that Obama isn't going to fix it, why are they going to vote for him? The article doesn't give any reasoning at all for why people would want to vote for Obama, just makes them seem crazy for wanting to do so. As for your questions, James, I think they did pick the best candidate at the time. I just think that Obama is a really remarkable politician and public speaker, whether you agree with him or not, and Romney can't compete with that. That, and many people really do believe that Obama is improving the economy.

I'm not seeing the true point of this article. I think the "rose-colored glasses" refer to people that will support Obama regardless of the campaign. I think that there are people who like what he has done and trust him so will vote for him regardless of the economic state right now...but is that hard to believe? Not really. He probably has some advantage from winning people's trust in the past 4 years.

Yeah I agree. I don't think the article went into enough detail with enough facts to convince me of anything. Of course people who support Obama and want him to win are going to see him in a better way then people supporting Romney. And I think depending which part of Obama you choose to focus on, there is a good and bad just like with the policies or actions of any other politician.

Sabrina, I disagree with you in just about nearly everything that you said. The economy is not getting better. He's put more long term damage on us than I thought imaginable 4 years ago. I don't think that he has helped our economy, and here is why: Yes, he did help save us from total collapse, but even then, it wasn't him, it was TARP, signed into law under Bush, which even permitted his actions as acceptable. Gas prices have raised by 1.30/gal and the amount of americans on food stamps has doubled. Sure, short-term unemployment is down from a couple of weeks ago, but the fact of the matter is that at this time in 2008 it was 13M, and it is now 22M. Yes, I understand that Obama has to deal with the Bush era's layover, but in 2016 he will have only improved this number slightly to 19M, not nearly enough to say that he is helping our economy. Under Obama, income inequality was greater than in 2008. Long term unemployment rates have doubled, which in my opinion, is a better indicater of long term well being. The big 5 made 48% of our GDP this year, compared to 32% in 2008, thanks to Dod Franklin. He's increasing middle class tax burden by about 3,000$ with the passing of Obamacare. ACA will increase our debt by 500M a year because it calls for 1T in funds, but only allows tax raises totalling half of that, causing our budget deficit to increase rapidly. At current rates, excluding the increases in deficit from ACA and others, in 2016 our spending will be 130% of our GDP, which is simply instable and can in no way be considered 'helpful' to our economy. Let's not forget the high intrest on our debt, so this number will only drastically increase in the long run. Some of you will be paying taxes by 2016, and as a taxpayer you will owe the government around 220K apeice, because at that point in time an even lower fraction of our population will be paying taxes than currently. I do not like Obama as a politician at

It's frustrating to me that the advice this article has for Obama is to "Attack Romney". Something that I really appreciate about Obama is that he's always very respectful towards Romney, and I hope he'll continue with that trend. Also, I think it's impossible to achieve the excitement and hope Obama had 4 years ago. It's just not the situation, and we don't live in the same world.

This article is about how Obama's target audience in his advertising is mainly blue-collar women (middle aged white women without education). It brought up two major questions for me: 1. how important is advertising? It seems to be most affective when criticizing the opposing candidate. 2. how important are women (specifically blue-collar women) in this election? How do women's rights tie into the swing votes/why are many GOP-leaning blue-collar women now leaning towards Obama?

I found this very interesting, I normally don't really think of what the midwest's demographic is, but to see that it is blue-collar white women is super interesting. I also think the connection between advertising and the women is really powerful. The ads they are showing are definitely working since much of Obama's supports are their targeted audience.

It's funny that they focus on such a specific group. This quote stood out to me: "Democrats say blue-collar women have been the principal, and most receptive, target for their extended ad barrage portraying Romney as a plutocrat who is blind, if not indifferent, to the struggles of average families." The ads all seem to be focused on saying how bad Romney will be for these women, rather than Obama helping them. How can they know that Obama is really right for them if all they know is that they don't like Romney?

I actually really enjoyed this article just in the way it was written. There have been a lot of articles on how it will affect the polls and for the most part there seem to be losses for both candidates. I think Obama handled the situation well but I think it could go either way if it will gain him support for his efforts off lose him support from the suffering people will be going through

I agree, I think it was a smart idea that Obama did not panic about the storm. I think if here were to have, then that would have probably stressed the people out making him seem unprepared for this disaster. I think this would have had an impact in the polls, but since he took the news of the storm in calm manner that I do not think it will affect the polls.

I think the storm was really interesting because it makes people forget about politics for a second and think about life. It turns from Republican or Democrat to life or death, so people's minds must be really turned around right now. I think Obama's gentle care - and if he continues to have success in calming the people - will be majorly to his advantage because he helped people in a time when their lives were at threat. This seems more memorable than a critical TV campaign, so I'm thinking the storm will help Obama if anything.

I think that as the incumbent Obama has automatically been criticized more easily. Romney can say basically anything but has not been president whereas Obama can be attacked for anything and everything he has done. Romney's changing opinions I think can be seen one of two ways: concerning or sometimes brave for allowing his opinions/beliefs to change publicly with time. I think those supporters of Romney will forgive his wavering whereas Obama supporters will not. I'm unsure how the swing voters will react to this...we'll have to wait and find out.

I don't think that this will change anyone's opinion on Obama: Democrats will say that it makes him light-hearted, ready to make a joke, and able to connect with people. Republicans will say that it's unprofessional and inappropriate. Imagine the same thing happening to Mitt Romney.

I agree with you about how it might make the President seem a bit more relatable to the public when he went on to the television show "The View" but right now was an awful time for him to do it. He is avoiding the world leaders that have come here for the United Nations General Assembly and he is shirking his responsibility to them and this country. He put his campaign in front of the foreign policy he is supposed to be in charge of. Sure as Secretary of State, Hilary Clinton should be the one to handle the majority of the foreign policy affairs, but Obama still has to do his part, which he failed to do according to this article, by putting his campaign in front of meetings with Global Leaders.

James, I couldn't agree with you more. Why should the president be trying to appeal to the masses right now? If anything, his adamant resolution to work things out with Israel says way more about his integrity than going on some talk show to try to impress the masses, which, in most cases, aren't exactly adamant followers of international news. Obama selfishly chose the election over America, and just went down even more in my book.

I also think that in this case, Obama should have spoken with world leaders instead of going on a talk show. He is campaigning, but he's also the President of the United States, and that should still be his most important job right now.

I agree that Obama did not make the best decision in putting the talk show above metting with world leaders. I think it is a hard thing to balance when trying to figure out what the American people will think of either choice but I do believe that as the president, it would not have hurt his campaign and could have possibly helped his campaign if he had put international affairs above a tv show.

I do think it will have an effect on voters but in two different ways. I think for a lot of people they will opt out of voting because they have more immediate things on their minds. Or others, I think that in hard times people are grateful for bigger governments and it could potentially convince voters to vote for Obama rather than Romney.

I don't think that Hurricane Sandy will have a significant effect on voters in the states that were hit. Sure there will be some people who simply can't get to voting machines or voting machines won't be working in their area but these people won't have a significant effect on the outcome of the election. It seems that the states hit by this hurricane have really stepped up in figuring out new ways for the people living in their states to vote. For example I read that a state, I believe it to be New Jersey, created an email ballet to make it convient for those people who can't reach a working polling machine to vote.

James, I guess my question was more based on the politics of the natural disaster, like FEMA aid or Christie's response.

I want to go off of Abby's point in that I also think people feel safer with larger governments in times of natural disasters. But I don't necessarily think people will change their votes after Hurricane Sandy. I also think it's important to remember that (at least I think/hope) any President would take a step back during these disasters and stop campaigning to focus on the people in need. But sure, Governor Christie's praise for Obama is a nice reminder that at the end of the day, both republicans and democrats have similar values.

I think this is a big part of this article: "there are now officially more jobs in the U.S. than when Obama took office." Yes, we need more, and any unemployment at all isn't a good thing, but we are moving in the right direction and that's what matters. The Republicans can't say that Obama has done nothing, because there's clearly some improvement.

I think this is an accomplishment and "the trajectory clearly indicates a recovery" but am not sure why this is related back to the debate. I thought Romney answered the questions more thoroughly and didn't shy away as much as Obama did. Overall, I thought Romney did a better job even though I don't agree with every thing he said. Just because these numbers came out doesn't mean Romney didn't debate successfully.

To answer your question on who I think won, I would agree that Romney won the debate. Before the debate I had been reading a lot of articles which claimed that unless Romney pulled through with the debate, he had pretty much already lost the election. I think that debate helped him to 'bounce' back and have a shot to stay in the race rather than fall out even if it did not give him a real boost to be ahead. Additionally, the article showed wide gaps in the peoples' opinions on the less political traits of the candidates (relatable, likable, ect.) I am curious how much those polls actually matter if the difference is so vast between the candidates.

There is absolutly no way to say that Romney didn't win the debate. There was a strict set of facts that Obama could have used to harm the GOP in general, but he didn't. He stumbled through his last bits and filled his speech with tons of 'um', and spent the entire time looking down. Unfortunatly, a good bit of the population votes based on who they like as a person, and that can't be changed.

I am a little bit confused by the poll results, 51% of voters like Romney and 56% like Obama, but the article claims that Romney definitely won. If you are looking at, which candidate is liked better, there is not a huge difference between Romney and Obama, but Obama is obviously liked more. I would agree that Romney won the debate since he seemed more confident and secure with what he was trying to get across. I got to see a side of Romney that made him seem more powerful then Obama because I felt like Romney got more into the debate and was defending/attacking Obama.

"Early voting is a major component of Obama's mobilization strategy, and is useful for ensuring that supporters who may have trouble getting to a polling station next month end up casting their ballots." This quote is really interesting and timely because of the storm that is about to spread across the east coast. I know early decision college applications have been pushed further out so I wonder what will happen if the election falls during this bad upcoming storm. Voting early seems to help many people who would not otherwise be able to get to the polls, but at some point-doesn't the process have to be standardized?

This was really interesting to me particularly after reading it just after posting my most recent article against early voting. Obama's campaign has been pushing hard for people to vote early in the opinion of Scott Paulson, it is an advantage to Obama. It will be interesting to see how that plays out but I am also curious why it would be good for Obama to have his supporters vote early but Romney isn't pushing it?

This was an interesting article but I feel like it simplified a lot of the issues that Obama was being criticized on. While he didn't create as many jobs as he set out to, he did create many and it seems nit picky to me to discredit him because they were "low-income" jobs.

This article isn't discrediting Obama because the jobs he created were "low-income" jobs, but because the many low-income jobs that he created replaced the middle wage jobs that were there before they were lost during the recession.

What's most interesting about this article to me is that the Huffington Post, which is very liberal, is very openly criticizing Obama. I think this says a lot for their integrity and not just reporting news that supports their opinions.

I agree that this race will be very close, but, like the article we read, polls aren't always reliable.

I would hate to think that Obama payed tribute to Chavez to strengthen his campaign. I think as president, it seems in his "job description" to honor the National Monument. And sure, this might have given him an opportunity to re-connect with some Hispanic voters, but I don't think it's fair to constantly scrutinize every "nice" move he or Romney does.

Of course there will be suspicion in generous actions performed by either candidate in terms of their how genuine they are, just as colleges might be suspicious about the multitudes extracurricular activities we list on our applications. I would say this move is more positive than negative, regardless of whether or not he actually felt passionate about it, one because it is better than just ignoring certain cultures that exist in America, and two because "empathy" (as we read in Obama's book) and cultural connection is something Obama emphasizes in his campaign.

I agree and I think it is impossible to say the tribute was for one specific reason or another. Avoiding the question of if it was for his campaign or not, I think it sounded like an inspirational and nice event.

He can't change his policies but he can change the way he expresses his policies, and that's half the battle. Also, (unsurprisingly) Romney acts as if it was not Obama's lack of energy at the debate that made him lose his lead but his policies, but it's not like the debate was the first time the people had heard these policies.

Obama was definitely rusty compared to a fresh-out-of-the-primaries Romney and I believe that if he wants to generate the same levels of enthusiasm that he had four years ago, he has to raise his own energy levels.