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Presidential Elections (2012)

Introduction

The presidential election taking place on November 6, 2012, will mark the first time an incumbent African American president is on the ballot as well as the first time a Mormon has been the candidate of a major party. Despite these two landmarks, the race between President Barack Obama (D) and Republican challenger Mitt Romney will center on the fundamental policy differences that have separated the Republican and Democratic parties for decades.

The U.S. economy, which has struggled with sluggish growth and high unemployment since late 2007, has been the focal point of both campaigns. Romney has argued that only private industry, free from the constraints of government regulations, can fuel an economic recovery. Obama, on the other hand, has during his presidency backed government action to boost the economy and promoted regulatory changes aimed at curbing the kind of reckless behavior in the financial sector that experts agree contributed to the economic crisis. This paper discusses Presidential Elections (2012). It also discusses History of Voting, Electorate College, Pros and Cons of Electorate College, Biography of Republican Mitt Romney and Democrat Barack Obama.

Discussion

The economic slump plaguing the United States has also brought renewed attention to the distribution of wealth in the country, specifically the widening gap between rich and poor. Additionally, a great deal of debate has been focused in recent years on the growing national debt. Obama has argued that allowing rates of tax to increase for the wealthiest U.S. citizens will deal with both issues, whereas Romney espouses the Republican position that decreasing taxes, principally for the rich, buoys the whole economy via creation of jobs and amplified investments (Rosebloom, 63-65).

In addition to ongoing arguments over how to fix the economy, two major changes in the nation's political climate—namely the growth of the Tea Party movement and a restructuring of how campaign finance works—have already dramatically shaped the presidential election in unprecedented ways. The movement of Tea Party first took shape in the year 2009, when hundreds of activists who were conservative held demonstrations protesting health care reform measures advocated by the Obama administration. The movement received ample media attention with its raucous rallies and heated attacks on Obama, and it enjoyed behind-the-scenes financial backing from conservative groups associated with the Republican Party. Although many political analysts initially dismissed the Tea Party as a fringe movement too unorganized and extreme to hold much sway in the mainstream, Tea Party-favored candidates have won elections on the local, state, and national level over the past few years, reshaping the dynamics of Congress and, many pundits have argued, pushing the Republican Party establishment noticeably to the right. Republicans in Congress aligned with the Tea Party have been stalwart advocates of reducing government spending, lowering the national debt, boosting states' rights, and safeguarding individual rights from what they see as government overreach. They have been unusually resistant to compromise with Democratic legislators or with the Obama administration on issues concerning taxes and government spending, ...