It's November 7th and Rick Santorum is President-elect: How did it Happen?

[customerserviceguy]

24. The only thing he has to do is win the states Shrub won in 2004

We have no idea what's going to happen with the European debt crisis, or what Israel and Iran are going to do to each other. We don't know about the next steps in the 'Arab Spring' or how ugly things are going to get in Iraq and Afghanistan. Being as an accidental book burning pisses them off more than drone strikes, it's simply unpredictable what will happen and how the independent voters are going to feel about that, or who they will want to blame.

The only states that Obama peeled away from the 2004 Bush list are: Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico, Iowa, Indiana, Ohio, Virginia, North Carolina, and Florida. I don't think the President's got too good a chance in the Western three states, we all know how Santorum has worked Iowa, the two Midwestern states are susceptible to Santorum's manufacturer tax exemption proposal, and I just don't see VA and NC falling back into line for Obama this time around. If Santorum picks Rubio, he wins Florida.

If he does win, it will be because he has managed to stop babbling about culture war issues, because he's already got the nomination and the fundies will know that he has to tack to the center to win. His tax proposals might also help. As for the President "going wrong", it will be because he's failed to motivate the base as much as he did in 2008, and has failed to hold the confidence of white people who thought that electing a black man was what they wanted as part of the story of the USA. He really won't have made any major mistakes, unless things go to hell in the Middle East, and he is seen as not being decisive enough.