Positive News for Obama

With elections just a year away, many people have been questioning if President Obama has a viable chance to win reelection. With his approval rating plummeting since taking office and support with his key groups at a new low many people are wondering if he can win or not. President Obama’s most difficult task since taking office has been tackling the high unemployment rates. Majority of the people are not happy with how is handling the unemployment situation. However, this past week President Obama received some good news in term of people unemployed in the United States.

As reported in my earlier blog, President Obama faces a scary statistic. No incumbent president has ever won reelection with an unemployment rate above 7.2 percent (Soltis). President Obama has been trying to battle that high unemployment with his American Jobs Act, but it did not get enough cloture votes. However, President Obama did receive good news last week. The November unemployment rate fell to 8.6 percent from 9 percent in October (Lee and Parsons). In November the economy gained 140,000 private jobs while losing 20,000 public jobs (Lee and Parsons). Many of those jobs were in retail. “Retailers last month boosted their head counts by 50,000, the second-largest holiday hiring in November in a decade” (Lee and Parsons). The average monthly rate of creation of new jobs over the past three months has been 143,000 jobs which is almost twice the number of news jobs that were created a month over the summer (Lee and Parsons). Also, November is the 21^st   consecutive month to show job growth in the private market (Lee and Parsons). Another positive note for President Obama is the fact that unemployment rate has not been this low since March of 2009 (Lee and Parsons). However, as positive as this new number is there are still millions of people out there who are unemployed. Speaker John Boehner echoed this sentiment by saying that “the jobless rate in this country is still unacceptable” (Lee and Parsons). I have to agree with Boehner on this one. Although, this is a positive sign, we need to be posting these kind of unemployment rate decreases every month. Since November was a holiday month, it would be interesting to see how many of those jobs were temporary in preparation for the holiday.

Another scary statistic facing President Obama is his approval rating. No incumbent president has won reelection with an approval rating of less than 48 percent (Soltis). Compared to that his November approval rating of 43 percent is not looking very promising (Jones). Although, it is an improvement from the 41 percent it was back in August it is still very low (Jones). Only President Carters who had 40 percent approval rating November of his third term, had a third year November job approval rate below President Obamas (Jones). According to Jones, “All recently elected presidents were at or above 50% in December of their third year in office.”  The most recent three presidents had approval ratings from the low to mid fifties (Jones).  George H. W Bush had November approval rate of 56 percent, Bill Clinton 53 percent, and George W. Bush had 52 percent (Jones). If President Obama wins reelection, his November numbers would be a stark contrast to theirs.

The 2012 elections will be very interesting to watch. Congress’s approval rating is even less than President Obama’s. With the “Occupy Wall Street” movement and more people calling for higher taxes on the rich, I wonder if a Republican can really win no matter how unpopular President Obama is right now. It will be interesting to see what happens in the upcoming year.

                                                                    Works Cited

Jones, Jeffrey. "Obama's November Approval Weak From Historical Perspective." Gallup.Com - Daily News, Polls, Public Opinion on Government, Politics, Economics, Management. Web. 04 Dec. 2011. http://www.gallup.com/poll/151106/Obama-November-Approval-Weak-Historical-Perspective.aspx.

 

Lee, Don, and Christi Parsons. "U.S. Unemployment Rate Falls to 8.6% - Los Angeles Times." Featured Articles From The Los Angeles Times. 02 Dec. 2011. Web. 04 Dec. 2011. http://articles.latimes.com/2011/dec/02/business/la-fi-jobs-20111203.

 

Soltis, Kristen. "Kristen Soltis: Is Obama Destined to Win or Doomed to Fail?" Breaking News and Opinion on The Huffington Post. Web. 04 Dec. 2011. <http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kristen-soltis/is-obama-destined-to-win_b_1124431.html>.

Herman Cain Suspends Campaign

              This Saturday Herman Cain announced that he will no longer be running for the bid of Republican presidential nominee. During the last month Cain has been plagued by rumors of affairs and sexual harassment charges from years ago. While at first he was not addressing the rumors, lately he has been denying any sexual misconduct ever happened. He even held a news conference where he said that the rumors were no true and that he would even take a lie detector test to prove his innocence. At the news conference last month he said that he would not pull out of the race believing that he is the best choice for the American people.

However, it seems like the recent accusations of a thirteen year affairs by Ginger White proved to be just too much for the businessman (Daly). White claims that it was a sexual relationship and that Cain even gave her money at times (Daly). Cain, on the other hand, claims that it was only a friendship (Daly). But it seems like the new accusations had had an effect on the campaign since, just a week after the allegations came out Herman declared that he would be suspending his campaign saying “"I am suspending my presidential campaign because of the continued distractions, the continued hurt caused on me and my family” (Blackmon and Yadron). He also announced his new venture working on a new website www.thecainsolutions.com (Blackmon and Yadron). In addition he said that he would endorse a candidate in the upcoming future (Blackmon and Yadron).

At first Cain supporters were not affected by the allegations.  However, as more women started to surfaces Cain support began to falter. A poll by the Des Moines Register released just a day before Cain suspended his campaign showed that only 8 percent of voters said they would support him at the Iowa caucus (Daly).  Only a month ago Cain had 24 percent of voter support in Iowa (Daly).  It seems like Herman Cain’s remaining supports will be divided about the two front runners Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich. Newt Gingrich is leading Mitt Romney in the Iowa polls, which is the first in the nation to hold its caucus on January 3^rd (Babington and Fouhy). A poll released this weekend by the Des Moines Register found that Gingrich is leading in Iowa with 25 percent support of the people likely to vote in the Iowa caucus (Babington and Fouhy). Ron Paul is in second place with 18 percent of likely votes in Iowa (Babington and Fouhy). Mitt Romney is in third place with only 16 percent of the votes (Babington and Fouhy).

Herman Cain’s endorsement for a candidate will not only be beneficial to that person supporter wise, but also financially. Since the Federal Election Commission does not discuss the meaning of suspension of a campaign, technically Herman Cain can still raise funds until he officially puts an end to his campaign (Eggen and Sonmez). After Herman Cain puts an end to his campaign the Federal Election Commission rules allow him to then transfer his funds to candidate or political committee (Eggen and Sonmez). I think that whoever Cain endorses will also receive his remaining funds. I am interested in seeing who Cain will endorse and whether or not he will transfer his funds to that candidate. Even though, I will miss the sometimes crazy things Cain says, I think he made the smart choice. He has been losing support with the voters. And with more and more allegations surfacing I think it was very unlikely that he would receive the nomination.

                                                                Works Cited

Babington, Charles, and Beth Fouhy. "Romney, Gingrich Proceed Carefully in GOP Showdown - ABC News." ABCNews.com: Daily News, Breaking News and Video Broadcasts - ABC News. Web. 04 Dec. 2011. http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/wireStory/romney-gingrich-proceed-carefully-gop-showdown-15080240.

 

Blackmon, Douglas, and Danny Yadron. "Herman Cain Suspends Campaign - WSJ.com." Business News & Financial News - The Wall Street Journal - Wsj.com. Web. 04 Dec. 2011. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204826704577076491325757510.html.

 

Daly, Corbett B. "Ginger White Apologizes to Herman Cain's Wife, Kids - Political Hotsheet - CBS News." Breaking News Headlines: Business, Entertainment & World News - CBS News. Web. 04 Dec. 2011. http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-57335433-503544/ginger-white-apologizes-to-herman-cains-wife-kids/?utm_source=feedburner.

 

Eggen, Dan, and Felicia Sonmez. "Cain’s Exit Gives Him Financial Flexibility - The Washington Post." Washington Post: Breaking News, World, US, DC News & Analysis. Web. 04 Dec. 2011. <http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/cains-exit-gives-him-financial-flexibility/2011/12/04/gIQAnUyfSO_story.html>.