By Andy Sullivan
WASHINGTON, Nov 6 (Reuters) – President Barack Obama won a
second four-year term in office as voters handed him a victory
on Tuesday over Republican challenger Mitt Romney, television
networks projected.
Here is a snap analysis of the result:
* Obama’s win is not likely to change the dynamic in
Washington.
Obama’s victory will not strike fear into the hearts of
Republicans, who are projected to retain control of the House of
Representatives. Obama’s Democrats will hold on to the Senate,
but fewer moderates of either party will be returning to Capitol
Hill.
That is a recipe for more white-knuckle showdowns over taxes
and spending, and gridlock in other areas. Reaching consensus on
even the most routine legislation will be difficult.
“If there’s no perception that going against Obama would
detrimentally affect Republicans in 2016, there’s not going to
be a lot of goodwill on the Hill,” said Princeton University
history professor Julian Zelizer. “The party lines will be
hardened after this election.”
* The economy showed just enough of a pulse to return Obama
to office.
The United States is still digging out from the deepest
recession in 80 years, and employers are barely adding enough
jobs to keep up with population growth. But if the economy is
not exactly roaring ahead, it improved steadily over the course
of the year.
Historically, voters have given a second term to presidents
who preside over even modest economic growth during an election
year. That pattern appears to have held for Obama.
“It was never going to be a landslide,” said John Sides, a
political science professor at George Washington University.
“But it was always his race to lose.”
Obama also was helped by the fact that voters largely blame
the recession on his Republican predecessor, President George W.
Bush, and Obama argued that Romney would bring back policies
that led to the crash in the first place.
* The auto bailout provided a crucial boost in Ohio.
Obama scored many legislative victories in his first two
years in office, but they have not been terribly popular with
the public.
But Obama’s 2009 bailout of General Motors and Chrysler has
been popular with a crucial slice of the electorate: white men
in Ohio, where roughly 1 in 8 jobs is tied to the auto industry.
Obama did not win the white-male vote in Ohio, but he did
better with that group in Ohio than elsewhere. According to
Reuters/Ipsos exit polls, Obama lost white men nationwide by 20
percentage points. In Ohio, he lost by only 13 percentage
points.
(Reporting by Andy Sullivan; Editing by Marilyn Thompson and
Peter Cooney)
