Obama re-election campaign may already be too late in overcoming unemployment rate

It has become a cliché among political pundits, but it may be truer in 2012 than in any recent election: President Obama’s chances of winning another term depend on where the unemployment rate stands on Election Day.

This morning’s news that the jobless level has risen, to 9.1 percent, certainly is good news for the Republican Party. Given all the pessimism and caution demonstrated by consumers over the past two years, I would suggest the unemployment rate on Labor Day 2012 could decide the November vote. If the rate is falling – but still historically high – two months before the election, Obama probably cannot survive.

At The Washington Post, Chris Cillizza has a different take. He surmises that Obama will stand a good chance of winning re-election if unemployment is on a consistent downward path in the fall of 2012, regardless of the actual rate. That is the road less traveled that Ronald Reagan took to a landslide re-election victory in 1984.

In addition, while Obama’s economic track record is weak, his poll ratings stand at 53 percent approval of the job he is doing, with 39 percent disapproval.

Analysts who look back at the last 10 sitting presidents who sought election notes that Obama looks comparatively good in terms of his approval rating, but the 9-plus unemployment rate should spell disaster.

Here’s the Cillizza summary, with the help of a chart created by the folks at Third Way:

“Obama’s job approval standing — if history is any guide — puts him on solid ground as he approaches the 2012 campaign.

“Of the five presidents who preceded Obama in office, only two — George W. Bush and George H.W. Bush — had higher job approval ratings at this point of the presidency than Obama. (George H.W. Bush had a 71 percent approval rating in June 1991 but went on to lose 16-months later to Bill Clinton.)

“Clinton, for his part, stood at 48 percent approval in June 1995 while Ronald Reagan was at just 43 percent in June 1983. Both men were re-elected.

“The president with the lowest job approval rating at this point in their term was, not surprisingly, Jimmy Carter at 29 percent. Carter went on to lose convincingly to Reagan.

“History is less kind to Obama’s prospects when viewed through the prism of the unemployment rate.

“One needs only look at this handy-dandy chart from the centrist Democratic group Third Way to see the ill omens for Obama:

“Given that reality, what Obama and his political team have to hope for is a situation akin to Reagan’s 1984 reelection. While the unemployment rate on Election Day stood over 7 percent, it had dropped considerably over the prior 18 months — down from 10.3 percent in March 1983.

“That downward trend line allowed Reagan to effectively make the case that his policies were working and the best way to keep the economy moving in the right direction was to give him four more years to work on it. The voters agreed — overwhelmingly.

“Leading indicators — whether economic or political — are not meant to be predictive of outcomes. But when the weathervanes on top of the national political barn — if you will — are pointing in opposite directions, it becomes nearly impossible to predict what will happen 522 days from now.”