Jeff Ward: Why President Obama Just Got Four More Years

First, reader Colin Campbell dared me to grace the virtual pages of Patch with my prescient predictions. In general, I tend to avoid gazing into the future because, as it was with the Old Testament prophets, some people feel a sudden urge to throw stones when you tell them something they don’t want to hear.

You’ve already seen just what can happen when you write something about cheerleaders. I had to hire Glen Ellyn and Burr Ridge Patch Editors Samatha Liss and Sabrina Wu just to protect me from the salvo of incoming pom pons.

And speaking of cheerleaders, Ken Loebel also chided me for tackling tough topics like cheerleading, club soccer and whether pork really is the other white meat. He then dared me to write about the more pressing political topics of the day.

It ain’t easy being me!

But since I’m nothing if not a slave to my readers, if you issue a challenge within the bounds of reason (no jumping off cliffs), I’ll probably take you up on it. After all, if it wasn’t for you, there’d be no column-writing me.

And this is one of those rare opportunities to deflect two reader-inflicted gauntlets with the same sharp stone. Though I’m not quite sure that analogy works, let’s proceed as if it does.

The 2012 presidential race ended last Saturday in South Carolina. That’s right! I’m officially declaring Barack Obama to be the winner. There’s no need for any more attack ads, baby kissing, political punditry, or clueless candidate comments. You can tell it’s over because the skinny columnist just sang.

Now, you know I love it when you hit the submit button, but before you do, please consider the fact I’m no longer a big fan of our president. He sides with big business too often, no one from Wall Street has done the perp walk, he hasn’t shown the kind of political backbone moderates expected from him, and he hasn’t done nearly enough to stop the creeping erosion of the middle class.

That said, the guy who spoke on TV Tuesday night, I could get behind. The guy who’s been governing for the last four years—not so much.

But despite all that liberal/moderate disappointment and the fact that most conservatives’ can’t stand him, Barack Obama will be reelected because, after South Carolinians made it clear that Mitt Romney wouldn’t walk away with it, we’re left with just two possibilities.

And neither outcome is good for Republicans.

The first and most likely scenario is that Romney and Gingrich will continue to wage a five-month, take-no-prisoners, pyrrhic primary battle that produces no real winner. Fueled by boundless Super Pac cash and relentless venom, the two candidates will engage in a mutually assured destruction death grip, giving Obama, a proven campaigner, everything he needs to make mincemeat out of his bloodied opponent.

In their blind fury, those GOP Super Pacs are doing all the Democrats’ dirty work.

After all those lethal blows have ceased, and considering the timbre of the GOP debate, instead of making peace, repulsed by the opposing candidate’s dirty tactics, not even the specter of four more years will get Romney supporters to vote for Gingrich and vice versa.

They’ll just stay home. And Obama wins by 10 percentage points.

The only other possible scenario is, emboldened by South Carolina’s vast capacity to ignore his massive moral shortcomings, Gingrich ratchets up the scorch-and-burn strategy and runs the rest of the primary table.

Ironically, this is the outcome that Republicans fear the most. The Daily Show presented a montage of conservative pundits lamenting the fact that Gringrich isn’t an outsider, isn’t a conservative, isn’t a leader, doesn’t carry a moral imperative, and most of all, he isn’t electable.

Despite not having much of one to begin with, I was laughing what’s left of my butt clean off as I watched them all throw a hissy fit!

What did they think was going to happen? If you shriek, scream, whine, obstruct, thump your chest, and generally act like spoiled brats at every turn just to energize the base instincts of your ultra-conservative base, there’s gonna be a consequence. And that consequence is Newtenstein.

Why is anyone surprised that the current Republican frontrunner embodies all the worst qualities of the GOP base? Newt’s entitlement mentality alone is unsurpassed in the annals of U.S. political history.

Then the very folks who created this monster have the nerve to look upon their creation with abject horror? This is what happens when the Tea Party, religious right and other wacky elements start believing all that crazy Republican posturing. And now they’re stuck with him!

Those Fox News pundits do have one thing right, however. There’s no way Newtenstein beats Obama.

And here’s why. Though I will , I do understand female voters. Whatever contempt conservative women may hold for Barack Obama is not nearly enough to get them to hold their nose and vote for a man who treats his wives with such contempt.

For those of you who haven’t already heard, Newt presented divorce papers to his first wife while she was in the hospital recovering from cancer and then he cheated on his second wife for six years. When wife No. 2 refused to grant him the privilege of an open marriage, he divorced her for No. 3.

So Obama wins by five points.

And if conservatives thought Obama was a liberal before, just wait until he doesn’t have to worry about running again! I’m wondering what it will take to make conservatives finally realize that, if you choose to live by the sword then you will most certainly die by it, too.

I’ll even take it a step further. With the GOP’s inability to moderate and an improving economy, we won’t see a Republican president for the next three terms

So never let it be said that Jeff Ward is one to back down from a (reasonable) challenge. Keep ‘em coming, dear readers. You know it’s your feedback—positive or negative—that keeps me coming back to Patch.

As for Ken and Colin, I hope you’re happy now! If my longsuffering editors call me on the carpet for not writing local enough, I’m telling them to talk to you two. And it’s also up to you guys to defend me from the slings and arrows of outrageous conservative fortune that are bound to come my way in the ensuing comments.

It’s the least you could do.