After a wobbly and shaky four year term of the current US President Barack Obama, it would be a nervous contest on the 6th November 2012, when the 57th quadrennial US Presidential Elections take place. A majority of Americans are looking forward to the ‘contest of the year’ and may well have decided who they would want to see in the White House.
Considering the present scenario and the poll surveys, it is being projected that it would be a contest between the incumbent president Barack Obama, a Democrat who had crushed the Republican presidential candidate John McCain in the presidential elections of 2008 and Mitt Romney, the current Republican prospect.
The mid-term elections held in 2010 gave a big blow to the Obama Administration as the democrats suffered major defeats in many national and state level elections, with many seats switching to the Republican Control.
Since the economic downturn in 2008, the Obama administration has been under the scanner right from the start. Despite the stardom of Obama, there is a common anti-Obama sentiment doing the rounds, especially in the middle and the upper-middle class. The increasing unemployment, the stuttering economy, runaway public debt and the non- fulfillment of the promises has taken a toll on the Obama Administration.
The President, however, has taken some very important and popular decisions like US demilitarization from Afghanistan by 2014, the success that had eluded the previous president, George W. Bush i.e. killing of the Al-Qaeda Leader Osama-Bin-Laden: the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks, Obama has also been successful in maintaining healthy international relations and has shown responsibility by intervening in the Libyan Protest, etc. But despite the efforts, the real work didn’t seem to happen, the successive failures of the economic policies gave rise to a common fear of an upcoming economic recession, the many policies and projects proposed to fight unemployment have not yet seen the day’s light, the inflation has been seeing sky-high figures; the Obama administration is certainly not in the best of health. Recently, President Obama was targeted for petrol price hike; he also had to face the anger of the Conservative Groups for his not-so-promising energy campaign.
Polling in 2011 found that American voters were increasingly frustrated with the US Government. The debt-ceiling crises further eroded the trust in the Obama Administration.
Mitt Romney, the prospective Republican Presidential candidate has been a relieved man lately as he is performing well beyond the expectations and is looking quite determined. It is difficult to say if it is his candidature or the anti-Obama sentiment that is working in his favor.
No doubt the US Presidential Elections are the most talked about and the most followed elections at the international level .Whether it is the election campaign or personal lives of the candidates, people show interest in anything and everything. There is a lot of excitement and surprises in store till the results would be finally out. A drama and action packed US Presidential Elections 2012 are here, let’s keep tuned in.