In another article from The New York Times, we see that Democrats are finally waking up to the reality that the American people are deeply unhappy about the direction of the country and the economy, and that they might express their displeasure at the ballot box in November of 2012.
Of course we get the usual excuse making that we have come to expect from the left. “Obama is not getting his message out. Obama needs to be tougher,” etc. Democrats are still, for the most part, unwilling to face the fact that their policies and ideas don’t work, and in fact are doing ever greater damage to the country with each passing day. I don’t think that the true believers will ever really want to face that reality.
But Democrats can and do read polls. And the numbers must be pretty dismal for so many of them to be speaking out about the coming election in such terms as we see in this article. The news for the left just keeps getting worse and worse.
The president’s economic address last week offered a measure of solace to discouraged Democrats by employing an assertive and scrappy style that many supporters complain has been absent for the last year as he has struggled to rise above Washington gridlock. Several Democrats suggested that he watch a tape of the jobs speech over and over and use it as a guide until the election.
But a survey of two dozen Democratic officials found a palpable sense of concern that transcended a single week of ups and downs. The conversations signaled a change in mood from only a few months ago, when Democrats widely believed that Mr. Obama’s path to re-election, while challenging, was secure.
“The frustrations are real,” said Representative Elijah E. Cummings of Maryland, who was the state chairman of Mr. Obama’s campaign four years ago. “I think we know that there is a Barack Obama that’s deep in there, but he’s got to synchronize it with passion and principles.”
There is little cause for immediate optimism, with polls showing Mr. Obama at one of the lowest points of his presidency.
His own economic advisers concede that the unemployment rate, currently 9.1 percent, is unlikely to drop substantially over the next year, creating a daunting obstacle to re-election.
