By Michael Barone
Thursday, October 18, 2012
An interesting story from last winter: An email friend
who lives in an affluent suburb far from Washington, a staunch Republican, was
watching one of the Republican debates with his wife, a staunch Democrat.
He was surprised by her response to Mitt Romney.
"He's a grown-up. He's someone who is reliable," he told me she said.
"People will feel safe if he is in charge."
I've been thinking about that email in the wake of the
first presidential debate on Oct. 3 and the vice presidential debate last week.
(This is written on deadline before the Oct. 16 Long Island, N.Y., debate.)
There's obviously been a surge toward Romney. He was
trailing in just about every national poll conducted before Oct. 3. He has been
leading in most conducted since.
His national lead was matched as swing state polls came
in. In the realclearpolitics.com average of recent polls, he's ahead or even in
states with 248 electoral votes. He's ahead, even or within 2 points in states
with 301 electoral votes, 31 more than the 270-vote majority.
Fascinatingly, it appears that he's made greater gains
among women than men. The USA Today/Gallup poll has him running even with
Barack Obama among women, 48 to 48 percent. Pew Research Center's post-debate
poll has women at 47 to 47.
That's a huge difference from 2008, when the exit poll
showed Barack Obama leading John McCain among women by 56 to 43 percent. Men
favored Obama by only 1 point.
All the evidence suggests that the first debate made the
difference. "In every poll we've seen a major surge in favorability for
Romney," Democratic pollster Celinda Lake told USA Today's Susan Page.
"Women went into the debate actively disliking
Romney," she went on, "and they came out thinking he might understand
their lives and might be able to get something done for them."
That sounds a lot like what my email friend's wife said
last winter.
Obama campaign strategists are pooh-poohing the notion
that Romney could be making gains with women.
Why, he's against "access to contraception,"
they thunder. That was something we heard a lot about at the Democratic
National Convention.
But it's code language. "Access to
contraception" turns out not to mean access to contraception. No one
anywhere in the country is proposing to ban contraceptives. The Supreme Court
ruled in 1965 -- 47 years ago! -- that states can't do that.
The code language refers to the Obamacare requirement
that employers' health insurance pay for contraception. So "access"
means you won't have to pay the $9 a month contraceptives cost at Wal-Mart.
Big deal. That's about the price of two pumpkin lattes at
Starbucks.
Maybe it's just possible that women voters are more
concerned about an economy where 23 million people are out of work or have quit
looking.
Or about a president who the day after the murder of a
U.S. ambassador flew off to a Las Vegas fundraiser and for two weeks kept
blaming it on a spontaneous response to a video, contrary to what his State
Department knew on day one.
Joe Biden tried to appeal to women by predicting that a
Supreme Court with more Republican appointees might overturn Roe v. Wade and
make abortion illegal.
One is reminded that Biden was near the bottom of his
class at Syracuse Law School. A Roe reversal, which is highly unlikely no
matter who is confirmed to the high court, would simply return the issue to the
states. Abortion wouldn't be banned anywhere except, maybe, in Utah, Louisiana
and Guam.
Once upon a time, abortion was a defining issue for many
voters. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, partisan preferences on both sides
were linked to strong religious and moral beliefs. Voters didn't switch parties
much.
In the last half a dozen years, voters have responded
more to events, emerging issues, and leaders' strengths and weaknesses. Many
switched parties to vote for Obama. Some, many of them women, are switching now
to vote for Romney.
Women tend to be more risk-averse than men, and the
gender gap grew when Reagan Republicans were depicted as scaling back welfare
state protections.
The debates may have shifted the perception of risk. The
downcast Obama and the cackling Biden may have sounded dangerously risky. Many
women may have felt, as my email friend's wife said last winter, they would
feel safe if Romney were in charge.
Readers who watched Tuesday's debate can judge whether
that still holds.
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