newjerseynewsroom.com

BY GINA G. SCALA

NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM

COMMENTARY

Here’s the thing about politics for the average person; it’s frustrating to watch common sense be thrown out the window in favor of ego. The only remedy for most is at the polls, which is not a good sign for the Republican Party.

Case in point: Rep. Todd Akin (R-Mo.) who refuses to quit the Senate race after making inexcusable, ignorant comments about rape. Even after Republican vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan asked Akin to step aside, he insists on finishing the race.

"What he cares about is his own ego. He was showing off, fancy footwork and what he knows about the medical impact of rape on a woman’s body. He has harmed the Republican Party, and this is not a time to be fooling around," author and columnist Ann Coulter said, according to Real Clear Politics.

The question now is whether the Republican Party can recover; Election Day is just 74 days away.

“This is the Republicans’ worst nightmare. They were hoping to define the campaign as a discussion about jobs and the economy, and now it’s turned into a debate over abortion rights,” said Ken Warren, a political scientist at St. Louis University, to the Boston Globe. “It hurts severely the Republicans’ chance of winning back the Senate.”

Akin’s ego is strike three for the Republicans, if you are keeping count. The GOP brand is already facing an uphill battle going into election session, which kicks into full swing after Labor Day. In a new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll, a majority of voters said they believed GOP presidential candidate and other Republican candidates aren’t in line with most Americans. Nearly 30 percent of registered voters said they had a “very negative” impression of the Republican Party.

"It’s frustrating. This president has spent tens of millions of dollars trying to tag Republicans as the party of the rich and the 1 percent," said Frank Donatelli, the chairman of GOPAC, a group dedicated to training Republican candidates, according to NBC News. "Republicans need to push back even harder talking about growth and jobs. That is the issue of the election; we’ve gotten a little bit away from that."

Still, a new CBS News/New York Times/Quinnipiac University poll shows the gap for the presidential race is closing in three swing states.

Obama’s lead in Florida has been cut in half in the past month; down now to just three. And Romney is just two points behind the president in Ryan’s home state of Wisconsin and six behind in Ohio, according to the poll.

But the biggest challenge for Romney and the rest of the GOP is the gender gap, widened further no doubt by Akin’s comments. In Ohio, the president holds a 13 point lead over Romney; 12 in Florida and nine in Wisconsin, according to poll numbers.

"President Obama is yet again on the attack, trying to divert attention from his failed economic policies, which have been especially devastating to women,” Iowa's lieutenant governor Kim Reynolds told CBS News.

For the GOP, facing poor economy and Americans fed up with high levels of unemployment, the good news is New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is delivering the keynote speech next week in Tampa. He isn’t always right and his style doesn’t always sit well with others, but there’s little doubt his no nonsense, common sense approach to politics can help turn the tide for Republicans, who can never seem to get out of their own way when the deck is stacked against them.