With just 10 days left till November 6, today's morning's headlines were not what Romney wants to see. It's all about Mourdock: his comments, Romney's endorsement ad that he has not called on him to take down, and of course McCain's demand that Mourdock apologize or lose his endorsement.
Ever since that Denver debate, the Romney team has largely been in control of the media narrative-thanks largely to the complicity of the media that didn't worry about fact checking in the first debate just whether the President had a downward glance.
Then the media kept talking about a Romney bounce that had actually peaked on October 11. Indeed, since then we've seen the President's likelihood of winning according to the Five Thirty Eight Forecast rise from a post-Denver low of 60% back to 71% yesterday after some better polls. Indeed, even Joe Scarborough has an unwelcome headline for Romney today over at Politico: the President is stubbornly holding on to his electoral lead.
http://www.politico.com/blogs/joe-scarborough/2012/10/two-new-polls-scream-advantage-obama-147160.html?hp=r3
If you look at the front pages of Google News this morning all you see are headlines about things like "God's Will", "Rape", "Pregnancy", "Mourdock" and, yes, "Mitt Romney", and that this has jolted both a Senate race and the Presidential one.
Romney had done everything he could in the last month to convince female swing voters that he is no Far Right werewolf. It has been joked a number of times during this campaign that God-or Nature if you prefer-is not a Republican. Or maybe God really is a woman; or maybe Mother Nature is the true God...
It does seem, however, that timing has been terrible for Romney. I don't know for sure if God's a Republican: maybe He's voted for them in past elections but this time around, He's not feeling them.
Even after his big debate win in Denver, two days later the economic data belied his gloom and doom about an economy that is in freefall and has no hope as long as the President is in office. Now when he's trying to sell us his Moderate Mitt snake oil, the GOP coughs up another Todd Akin moment.
So now McCain is doing what Obama and other Democrats are calling on Romney to do: take away his endorsement without an apology. Indeed, the Dems are going further: Romney should drop Mourdock. That would put Romney in a very uncomfortable position. If he does turn on Mourdock this would further erode GOP hopes of taking the Senate-which already seem pretty feeble at this point. The original Akin moment is a big part of that.
McCain's backing away from Mourdock here is the last thing Romney needs right now:
"If Mitt Romney was hoping the Richard Mourdock story he’s deeply entwined in would go away fast, he apparently didn’t get the memo to one of his top surrogates."
"Just as Democrats and the Obama campaign began amping up their effort to highlight Romney’s ties to Mourdock after the Indiana Senate candidate uttered his claim that pregnancies caused by rape are “something that God intended to happen” — and Romney and the Republicans worked to put the moment behind them — John McCain sat down with CNN to throw a wrench in the Republican effort."
"Last week, McCain was in Indiana campaigning for Mourdock, who won the Republican nomination by beating the man McCain backed, veteran Sen. Richard Lugar.
Asked if he’s still backing Mourdock following his rape comments Wednesday, McCain instead backed far away from him."
“It depends on what he does. I think it depends on what he does,” McCain said. McCain said that “if he apologizes and says he misspoke and he was wrong and he asks the people to forgive him,” the Arizona Senator would get behind him again."
http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2012/10/richard-mourdock-john-mccain.php?ref=fpb
Just when he was trying to sell the snake oil, this: incontrovertible proof that Romney is in fact a werewolf on women's issues. God is not a Republican at least this year.
P.S. In other news, the Republican, Colin Powell, has again endorsed the President.
http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entry/colin-powell-endorses-obama-will-stick-with-him?ref=fpb
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