WILLIAMS: 2012 election is all about Obama’s failed policies

ANALYSIS/OPINION:

The media is gearing up full throttle to tease and manipulate the public again with the early favorites leading up to the 2012 presidential election. At the inception of the 2008 election season, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama wasn’t a blip or an afterthought in the minds of the American people as someone who had a snowball’s chance in purgatory of capturing the coveted prize of the White House.

How shocked we all were when the dust finally settled that indeed a new breed and untested brand of leadership would covet the most sought after prize in American politics. For that reason, this election season is proving very interesting to watch.

We already are being told, as we were in early 2007, who to keep an eye on: President Obama is starting his campaign well before anyone else; Hillary Rodham Clinton is saying that she doesn’t want to work for Mr. Obama anymore; and Donald Trump, with his hair, is making his presence known as a possible candidate, a vehement birther and a television star desperate for viewership, who still, somehow, resonates with the people.

Mr. Trump has garnered so much attention that it makes me wonder, whether Charlie Sheen will run as the “tiger-blooded” presidential nominee for the Warlock Party. Who knows?

Seriously people, it is way too early for any of this to be making headlines. There is so much wrong with the country that we should be more concerned with fixing the issues instead of consuming ourselves with whoever will become the next Scape Goat of State.

Mark my words, the sudden exit of Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour from the Republican presidential race will be followed by many more. The prospects will either bow out before they ever catch fire (Rick Santorum), or they may never enter the race because of the writing on the wall (Rep. Michele Bachmann).

Put simply, these candidates lack the fire to stir men’s souls. They can’t mobilize the voter base across the wide swath they know they’ll need to win the White House. It’s more than just the entire Republican “base,” more than even some disgruntled out-of-work independent voters, and it’s certainly more than the tea party faction.

The winning Republican candidate will need all of these blocs and then some. He or she will need to galvanize voters across party lines, making sure that the issues meaningful to the American people are accounted for. But can it be done? Of course. Yet I don’t think that candidate has emerged.

Let us not be so short on memory that we forget 2008. By the media’s account, the presidential race was to be a heated battle between former New York City Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani and Mrs. Clinton, as if there were no other candidates. However, from the flanks rose Mr. Obama.

Even if the person who defeats Mr. Obama is among the crowded field today in the form of a Mitt Romney, Mitch Daniels or even a Tim Pawlenty, the 2012 election won’t even be about them. I’m serious.

This race is all about Mr. Obama. He’s weak politically and, if current trends continue, his brand and stock will only fall. Four dollars a gallon for gasoline? A plummeting U.S. dollar? Borrowing 35 cents on every dollar we spend? That’s only the beginning, folks. Unless this White House can put some significant punch back into this economy, Mr. Obama will lose the election.

I’m not saying it won’t be a fistfight — it definitely will be. Mr. Obama’s campaign is gearing up for one hell of a contest. Media buyers are predicting this election cycle to tip the $2 billion scale in terms of ad buys and placements in the next 18 months. Yep, that’s billion with a b.

A Republican candidate will emerge, and he or she will be battle-hardened from a rigorous primary. You can bet on that. But the less this is about personalities and the more it is about the direction of the country and the principles of the Obama White House — larger government, paternalistic nannyism — then the more voters will be galvanized into sending a clear message.

And that is where I fear the Obama political team is tone deaf. Folks aren’t at town hall meetings with Republicans to complain about draconian cuts. They’re coming to gripe that the majority party isn’t cutting enough. The Democrats aren’t listening.

This is a seminal moment in our nation’s understanding of fiscal policy. Because of the Great Recession and the continuing mass foreclosures, the billions and trillions are starting to matter. The numbers are no longer “just on paper” — meaningless terms hidden beneath legalese and technical jargon. They are real. The impact on families and businesses is tangible and plain to see; the fear is there and it’s palpable. Americans have watched their friends and families suffer the consequences of a Wall Street meltdown and are starting to sort out in their own minds what a bankrupt nation could mean to them and their futures.

When will this administration grasp that? How many more houses must be foreclosed on? How many more businesses must fail? How many more people must lose their livelihoods before someone on the president’s economic team realizes these policies are a joke?

Something needs to be done, and it needs to be done right away.

Nineteen months out is not the time to worry about who will rise from the GOP and assume his or her rightful place in the presidential pantheon; there’s plenty of time for that. If our country doesn’t get on the right track in very short order it will not even matter who is or is not our president. We will be fighting for our survival domestically in the United States and, especially, in terms of the global economy.

From my perspective, I’m more interested in seeing how much further down this road of disrepair the current administration will take us. Mr. Obama is his and this country’s own worst enemy right now, and if the past is any indication of the future, then Republicans would do well to get out of his way and let him continue to ruin himself.

• Armstrong Williams is on Sirius/XM Power 169, 7 to 8 p.m. and 4 to 5 a.m., Monday through Friday. Become a fan on Facebook — www.facebook.com/arightside, and follow him on Twitter at www.twitter.com/arightside. Read his content on RightSideWire.com.