We’ll have to bookmark this wisdom of David Brooks and check back in November to see if he was prescient or dead wrong:
I’d say that Obama is a slight underdog this year: the scuffling economy will grind away at voters. But his leadership style is keeping him afloat. He has defined a version of manliness that is postboomer in policy but preboomer in manners and reticence.
Ezra Klein helpfully eviscerated the premise of Brooks’ column. The economic fundamentals predict a modest win by the president, and treating poll numbers as economic fundamentals is the work of a high-paid wanker. The president is suffering from a temporary dip in the polls brought on by the shock a lot of the country experienced when he endorsed gay marriage. Once people have a little time to digest that decision and the campaign moves on to other issues, the polls will return to the status quo. Nationally, Obama will lead by a small margin, but in the key states, he will have a comfortable lead. The reason for this is that Obama is very unpopular in the states he will lose, which brings down his national numbers. Yet, in the swing states, he is preferred to Mitt Romney.
The only time David Brooks mentions Mitt Romney in his column is to note that one analyst thinks Romney is operating with a disadvantage and another analyst thinks the contest is a toss-up. At no point does Brooks consider the possibility that the president is doing so well because his opponent is a terrible politician who emerged unloved from a disgraceful GOP primary. Instead, it’s all about the president’s post-feminist ‘ESPN masculinity.’
The president is winning because he’s self-evidently a better person and a better leader than his opponent. He’s winning because the economic fundamentals, while not strong, are good enough that people aren’t going to toss him out in favor of a bullying dork whose policies are based on fantasies and flip-flops. You can’t explain this election without noting the president’s strengths, including his likability. But you can’t explain it without noting the ridiculous state of the GOP and their preposterous standard-bearer either.
