With Two Weeks to Go ...

As many of you know, I predicted back in January that Mitt Romney would be the nominee for the Republicans, and that he would get beat—trounced, I believe I said—on Election Day, now only two weeks away.

Alas, there are always factors we can't account for when we go out on a limb. One of the factors I hadn't counted on (and that no one else had counted on so far as I know) was that Barack Obama would throw the first debate ...

And that Romney, of all people, would show finesse, and actually appear to care about that 47% of the population that was left strangely unmentioned by the president. And that, moreover, Romney had every intention of keeping not just these freeloaders but his own freeloaders—military contractors, Big Pharma, insurance companies, private equity types, hedge funders—everyone, pretty much, but PBS and Big Bird, flush with taxpayer dollars, this while lowering the revenues from which these payments come.

If I hadn't known better, I'd have thought he had a sensible plan to clean up the spectacular mess Obama inherited and have our economy cranking again like it was after we'd won the Second World War. Back when we had industrial power second to none, and the world, in rubble, mostly, needed it, badly. Before we were importing more than we were exporting, and the Dollar began giving way to the Chinese Yuan—at least it would, or should, if the Chinese weren't "cheating."

Back then, after the war, we had a deficit relative to GDP that was larger than now, if just barely, and yet the circumstances, as anyone, especially Mitt Romney, ought to know, were quite a lot different. Radically different. We'd emerged from a depression as a country of savers. The Defense Department was still called the War Department, and amid the crisis of war, we'd been forced to ration rather than told to shop.

Why do I mention this? Because no one in his right mind would suggest rationing to support a war or anything else these days. Not if he wanted to get elected president. Not even if you're a supposed born again fiscal conservative running on a ticket purporting to swing a meat axe at the deficit.

Thus, I hadn't counted on Moderate Mitt, Conservative Mitt, Equivocal Mitt (who was for so much before he was against so much, only to be for most of it all over again), Whatever Mitt, to so enamor "the base" by promising even more, with less revenue, than his challenger.

But no. Not only were we going to get our Cold War military back, but the farmers and Big Ag would keep getting their subsidies. Patients and bilkers alike would keep getting their full share of Medicare. And all the cost savings in Obamacare/Romneycare—eliminated (saving, once you start it, is practically as bad as rationing, and means less money going to someone who might otherwise vote for you), and yet we'd get to keep the nice parts—for, say, those with pre-existing conditions. Big bills mean big money, for someone who might vote for you. We're a country where a lot of folks make good bank on the backs of the sick, and what lunatic running for office would want to change that?

Aside from a little trimming in "discretionary" spending, we'd get to keep all the stuff paid for by the supposedly wild spending he'd been railing against for months AND we'd get a tax cut! After which, in four short years, he'd balance the budget just like Reagan and Dubya did.

Or did they quadruple and more or less double the debt, respectively?

But has it mattered, really? Dick Cheney—and what fiscal conservative other than Ron Paul doesn't love Dick Cheney?—said Reagan proved that it didn't matter. So if it doesn't matter, what's everyone worried about? And wouldn't it be nice to have everything and more, and pay less for it?

If you watched that first debate, and took Mitt seriously, that was pretty much Mitt's plan.

I hadn't counted on it ... Mitt running, at the last minute, as a spendthrift. As a guy that not only the rich could count on for charity from the taxpayers, but the old, the poor, the sick, the 47%, everyone—everyone!—would keep getting and then some, if we just voted for the conservative guy. For Mitt.

And here's another thing. I hadn't counted on a significant portion of women not thinking through the implications of having Roe versus Wade overturned, of having abortion only legal in cases of rape and incest and the health of the mother, which seems so reasonable just as long as you don't think about it at all. I hadn't counted on women, a significant number of them, apparently, not caring about what two guys named Mitt and Paul had in mind with regard to their right to make their own decisions about what happens inside their bodies and not have to stand and make their case in front of a tribunal just so they could terminate a pregnancy if they happened to get impregnated by, say, an uncle or a rapist.

I thought: if just all the women who can vote in this country said, "Are you out of your fucking mind?" and voted for the other guy, while all the men who supposedly want to take rights away from women voted for the guy who wanted to take rights away from women, the other guy—not Romney—would still win, because women have the numbers.

At this point in our history, I figured that was a pretty safe bet, that at least a strong majority would vote for the other guy, and yet ... we'll have to see.

I had counted on even the dumbest fool on the planet understanding that neither candidate is going to balance the budget in the next four years. Not even close. I had counted on most people, particularly the ones getting older, with little in the way of personal savings, not again buying into the tax-cutting to a balanced budget and more for everyone bullshit.

I used to be certain. I'm not anymore. You might say I have a bad feeling ...

Still, here's my prediction: Obama wins in a squeaker (that should have been a blow-out, but everyone loves a game 7, which I, of course, didn't count on), on the kind of strong end-game/ground-game/door-to-door fighting and all out nastiness that got Bush re-elected in 2004. It's a dirty business, for a thankless job. There will be those ironies and more for the pundits and all the rest of us to talk about as we run up our cards trying again to spend our economy into health during the holiday season.

Or ... maybe Carville was right, and Obama, for one night in Denver, saw his way out of his predicament but couldn't quite bring himself to follow through.

The writer, once again, losing out to life.

In two weeks we'll know for certain.