Comments:United States re-elects Barack Obama

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Why re-elect Obama if he's such a bad president? RocketMaster (talk) 17:46, 7 November 2012 (UTC)

If he's such a bad president, why was he re-elected? Logical fallacies can go both ways. :)

Well, maybe people don't know. It's a fact that many non-politically inclined people (the vast majority of the American public) are likely to vote for the candidate they see as more charismatic, youthful, likable, and empathetic toward the middle class (1960 televised debates, anyone?). Politics aside, Barack Obama is all or most of these. Mitt Romney doesn't have a silver tongue, isn't youthful, and struggled with personal likability for much of the campaign. Obama's both more charismatic and more likable. But here's my general rule of thumb: I vote for the guy who's most qualified to run the country and is politically like-minded, not the guy who I'd rather watch the game with. And it might so happen that the guy I vote for has both of these, but the second one is most certainly not make or break (as it seems to be for so many voters).

It's a fact? Sounds more like a claim, to me. I certainly wouldn't let it into an article I was reviewing without attribution. :-)

A historical trend, then. In 1960, it was the televised debates that made the difference in the razor-thin contest. The well-groomed and calm Kennedy became a preferable alternative in many voter's minds to the jowly-looking and sweaty Nixon. There's no denying that we humans like our leaders to be charismatic and energetic, at least on a subconscious level--to the point where it affects the voting tendencies of the undecided voters that so often determine the outcome of close contests like the 2012 election. It's a psychological reality, but it's not something I'd put in an article anyway. :-)

No. It's not a "psychological reality". It's a judgement you (in this case) are making, based on a freehand analysis fraught with potential confirmation bias. It might be a correct judgement; on the other hand, it presumably accrues extra plausibility because it fulfills our impulse to believe in others' superficiality, and that in itself should make us skeptical of it. But regardless of how relatively correct or incorrect it is (one suspects this isn't an area for absolutes), one thing it isn't is some sort of manifest truth.

I would suggest the non-politically inclined and politically apathetic were actually less inclined to vote for Obama and instead just note period. I base this on personal experience and voter turnout. I'd be inclined to agree Obama was a bad president, so long as it was recognised that I think think Bush was worse and Romney would have been worse. (I love the choice between bad and worse. It makes me want to run out and vote for... well.. neither.)

It's popular for a lot of young people in the U.S. to support Obama (even ones that possess very limited political knowledge) because of his embrace of the idyllic values of "hope" and "change", although this was less pronounced in 2012 than in 2008. Romney was absolutely pummeled among youth. And this is also due, to be fair, to the increased social tolerance of the millennial generation, many of whom grew up with George W. Bush in the White House and have thus developed a very negative paradigm of the Republican Party that they are likely to carry for much of their lives (or until another Republican is elected President and turns out better than Bush).

the president can do nomore than the cabnit members elect him to do. what have anyone ever donee for this country with help? can you do the job all by yourself? no" it takes more than one to do the job. was world war one won by one general, or one admiral? by one soilder? no. so stop blaming every thing on one person. did one man build the ship that took man to the moon? no he had help. everythin done was done with someone.