By Ian Rosoff

The term American Exceptionalism was coined by Alexis de Tocqueville back in 1831. When it comes to political candidates brandishing their swords of patriotism and national pride, paying homage to the concept of American Exceptionalism is par for the course. And like everything else in the political silly season that precedes voting day, Republicans and Democrats can’t seem to agree on what this fuzzy concept should mean to Americans.

American Exceptionalism took center stage at the Republican and Democratic conventions, particularly in how the candidates talked about Exceptionalism through the lens of the American Dream. There was an interesting contrast to how each party articulated why the U.S. is the greatest country on earth. That difference reverberated in the media and it could end up influencing the ballot box. 

By and large, American’s love the dream Mitt Romney is selling, even if they say they like Obama’s more.

The two speeches that best expressed perspectives on the American Dream were Michelle Obama’s and Mitt Romney’s.  Speaking for Democrats, Michelle crafted her narrative in the vein of a traditional “rags to riches” story but with a crucial difference.  She substituted the riches part with a new ending to that classic tale. In her version, “making it in America” isn’t about money, it’s about contribution to society. Like Romney’s version it included working hard, believing in oneself, and staying true to convictions, but Michelle painted a more modest pinnacle, one where sending your kids to college, was the loftiest of goals. Her speech was not only about achieving the American Dream, but passing it along and sharing in its fruits. 

Romney also discussed why the U.S. is the greatest country in the world, except he predictably talked about money. He embraced the conventional American Dream trope, and cast himself as a shining example. “In America” he said, “you can build a better life,” and Mitt certainly embraced the idea that the U.S. is an immigrant nation when he said, “they came for the richness of this life.” His message, American’s do what is hard and achieve what is great, but always with an economic context.

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By Sam Pauken

The veteran vote will prove to be one of the important swing constituencies in the 2012 race and both campaigns. When recent polls showed some pretty significant differences in approval ratings for President Obama and Mitt Romney among veterans, we had to dig a little deeper to figure out what was going on.

 What do the polls say?

According to a recent Gallup poll released two weeks ago of 3,300 U.S. veterans, veterans favor Romney 58 percent to 34 percent. If you consider non-veterans though, both candidates are tied 46 percent to 46 percent.

A Reuters/Ipsos online poll of “Gen at war” individuals indicated different results.  This one states that post-Gulf War veterans and their families favor the President over Romney 44 percent to 37 percent, while non-veterans favored the President 42 percent to 35 percent.  These results are very similar when compared with those of all registered voters, with the President leading 45 percent to 39 percent.  (Reuters/Ipsos did not provide any analysis of their results.) 

What’s going on here?

The Gallup results may be linked to two factors.  As those in the military become socialized to military life and military views, they become more politically conservative.  Additionally, within the past decade, many of those who have enlisted are believed to have been Republican before enlisting.

Part of the disparity between these two polls is the samples are completely different.  The Gallup poll was a survey of veterans, regardless of which war(s) they served in, while the Reuters/Ipsos poll was of post-Gulf War veterans and non-veterans.  Both of the Reuters/Ipsos groups are from the “Gen at war” group, and there is no explanation in the poll report as to what this group is.  As demographics are far less diverse among post-Gulf War vets with respect to age, we can expect these polls to yield differing results.  Additionally, the vast majority of living veterans served in Vietnam, and older generations generally lean more conservative, explaining the overwhelming support for Romney over the President in the Gallup poll.

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The not-Romney candidates have proven time and again they have staying power. Even after a decisive victory by Romney in Illinois (which was expected), Rick Santorum had just as strong a showing in southern states. Newt Gingrich, struggling to pay his bills this week, has promised to stay in the race, even if it means running his entire campaign by himself.

Given the amount of time and money that Mitt Romney is having to spend to fend off his erstwhile Republican nominees, some are expecting the 2012 general election to be relatively more easy for President Obama to be reelected. For Republicans this almost seems like snatching defeat from the jaws of victory when just a few months ago the President’s approval ratings nearly dropped below 40%.

Although Obama’s approval ratings are on the up and up, American presidential elections are not decided by the popular vote. I would still bet Obama if I were in Vegas, but there is little room for error in his campaign and much potential for the GOP to win the election through the Electoral College.

The math is relatively simple: if Romney can take McCain’s 173 votes for 2008, and add Republican leaning states and toss-ups, this is a close race.

For example, Virginia, North Carolina, and Indiana typically lean Republican, and were picked up by Bush in 2000 and 2004. So let’s give those to Romney, bringing him to 212.

Ohio and Florida are big toss-ups, also won by Bush in 2000 and 2004, and would bring Romney to 261 electoral votes (Florida has gained 2 votes since 2008). Not quite to 270, but damn close. And there are a lot of states left in play: Iowa, Colorado, Nevada, etc.

Obama currently holds a statistically solid lead in most of the aforementioned states, but it is likely that lead will shore up in those states once a clear candidate emerges from the GOP and the race gets underway.

There is a lot of time and opportunity left in this election season, and while Romney will have to battle to win states like Ohio and Florida, it is not outside the realm of possibility. There are factors and events yet that might sway the American electorate, but above all, we should remember that you cannot call a November election in March.

2011 was about the 99% vs. the 1%.  The 2012 continuation of that story began with the release of Mitt Romney’s tax returns and President Obama’s State of the Union address.  Recently Romney was asked a question about the distribution of wealth, he responded, “I think it’s fine to talk about those things in quiet rooms and discussions about tax policy and the like.”  The discussion about income inequality is not going to be taking place in a quiet room.

In a recent New York Times Op-Ed Charles Blow asked, “Is income inequality becoming the new global warming?”  Like global warming many republicans deny that there is a wealth distribution problem.  And like global warming the facts are pretty clear. According to Business Insider, over the past two decades if you were in the top 1% your income soared, if you weren’t, your income stagnated.  What’s interesting is that this is not a new problem.  The attention wealth inequality is being given by politicians, citizens, and the media is however a recent phenomenon.

What’s also interesting is that despite growing inequality, Americans don’t resent the wealthy.  Alec MacGillis explores “what voters really think about Romney’s wealth” in this New Republic piece, and the conclusion is essentially that the people who have the most incentive to begrudge Romney’s success (the ones he fired) don’t, but rather respect and understand that in free market economy businessmen must sometimes act ruthlessly. MacGillis is supported by a Gallup poll taken just last December, which confirms that Americans accept that there will always be rich and poor in the system.

Voters are still in love with the American dream, and tend to celebrate those like Mitt Romney who take full advantage of that opportunity no matter how unlikely it is they themselves will ever see a million dollars let alone make fifty million in a year.  Except that politically Romney is being attacked for what potentially could be his biggest asset. So is the Obama camp misguided in making wealth inequality the defining issue of 2012?

An astute review of the President’s State of the Union written by Jonathan Cohn pondered how Obama is going to make “fairness” the theme of his reelection bid. He is positioning himself on the side of the American rags to riches dream, by arguing that the dream is dying and the only solution is to even the playing field.  It is a compelling argument that does not directly vilify the rich, but instead commends them for their success, and reasonably asks them that they pay their fair share.  The crux of his appeal lies in a phrase he used in the State of Union and again in Ann Arbor a few days later, “we can either settle for a country where a shrinking number of people do really well, while a growing number of Americans barely get by, or we can restore an economy where everyone gets a fair shot and everyone does their fair share.” While it’s hard to call this kind of rhetoric class warfare, it suggests that the rich aren’t doing or paying their fair share, which in most cases simply isn’t true.

Former Harvard Professor James Q. Wilson reminded us in the Washington Post last week that inequality is not the fault of the rich.  Inequality is not about who is rich, but who is poor.  Poverty in America is the real problem and taxing the wealthy does nothing unless we invest in education, health care, and programs that help the unemployed enter the workforce.  Wilson leaves us with perhaps the most important question, “suppose we tax the rich more heavily- who would get the money, and for what goals?”

As if further proof is needed that wealth inequality is a hot button issue right now, today’s fallout from Mitt Romney’s comments about not focusing on the poor are dominating the Nevada campaign coverage.  Both the Obama and Gingrich camps were quick to name Romney a divider, and Gingrich explained that he wants to be president of “all of the American people.” It is clear where Romney’s political opponents feel he is weak, but despite this apparent gaff it’s showing no signs of slowing him down, for now as he sports a healthy lead in Nevada.  As Romney continues to look like the GOP nominee income inequality will be at the forefront of the national debate.

The impact of sites like Twitter and Facebook on elections is difficult to measure, in large part because metrics like “fans” and “followers” say very little about how ardent the support for a candidate might be among social media followers. It certainly doesn’t say anything about who among that follower base actually votes.

Anyone can click the “like” or “follow” button, but might not care about the messages being tweeted after that.  A candidate whose messages are being scrolled past and ignored is not achieving the success that his “numbers” may suggest.  Instead, it is perhaps instructive to examine other data points to get a better picture of the relationship between a political figure’s social media presence and his or her eventual success at the polls.

When it comes to the Republicans still alive in the GOP race, it is clear that Newt Gingrich, with 1.5 million followers, is the Twitter leader.  Mitt Romney has a meager 270,000 followers; next is Ron Paul with around 200,000. Rick Santorum seems hardly worth mentioning, lagging behind with only 85,000 followers.

The reality of the situation, however, is that Gringrich’s support is a mile wide and an inch deep, as this article on Gawker seems to confirm.

Twitter has a few ways of digging deeper into the strength of a social media following and not getting too hung up on its size.

Statistics such as average retweets per tweet and retweets per follower indicate how engaged your twitter folowers are with the message and campaign.  It’s like going around posting virtual signposts.

For example, despite the fact that Gingrich has more supporters than the next three major candidates combined, he is third in average number of re-tweets per tweet (45). Ron Paul leads with around 80 retweets per tweet and Romney is second at 50.

Retweets per follower tells an even more interesting story. Again, Paul is first, but Santorum is second with Romney and Gingrich third and fourth respectively. In looking at this metric, we see that, although not as many tweets are being retweeted, the [sometimes small number of] followers are dedicated to spreading the message of their favored candidate.  This, perhaps more than any other statistic, comes close to quantifying or ranking a candidate’s true level of support.

The more advanced Twitter statistics also seem to back up the claim that Twitter users engage more with Paul, Romney, and Santorum than they do with Gingrich.  Gingrich also stacks up poorly in mentions per hour and followers per mention.

Obviously it’s impossible to know how Twitter statistics will correspond to election results, but increasingly, campaign battles are fought via Twitter and Facebook, so an understanding of a candidate’s successes and failures in social media can give insight into how politics might be transformed by the Internet and technology.