“A Modest Reelection Victory”

The new employment report is the most hopeful in a long while. Which gives some context for Noah Millman's prediction for the president:

From November 1991 through July of 1992, the unemployment rate increased with every reporting. Obama’s situation may be more comparable to the situation under the second President Bush, when unemployment inched its way down from its peak in July, 2003 through just before election day.

Now, obviously, the absolute level of unemployment is going to be way too high on election day for a majority of people to be satisfied with President Obama’s performance. But the trend probably matters more at the margins. A strong positive economic trend led to an overwhelming reelection victory even though no sitting President since World War II had been reelected with such high prevailing unemployment rate. A weak but positive economic trend in 2004 led to a modest reelection victory even though the absolute level of unemployment was much better than it was in 1984. That’s what I expect for President Obama in 2012: a modest reelection victory based on weak but improving fundamentals.