Is There Any Republican Who Isn't Competitive Against Obama?

Yesterday, polls showed Obama neck-and-neck with Ron Paul and George W. Bush. Today, Public Policy Polling reports:

Our monthly look ahead to the 2012 Presidential race finds Barack Obama more or less tied with all four of the leading candidates for the Republican nomination. He trails Mike Huckabee 47-45 and Mitt Romney 45-44, ties Newt Gingrich at 45-45, and leads Sarah Palin 47-45. This is the weakest performance Obama’s posted in these 13 monthly surveys and a pretty clear indication that passing health care has not done anything to enhance his political standing, at least in the short term.

As Jennifer Rubin notes, "Indeed it suggests the opposite — that it has cemented opposition to Obama and elevated candidates thought to be 'unelectable' to parity with the sitting president." Other issues could arise to alter the political landscape, but Obamacare will continue to drag down the Democrats through 2010 and 2012.

Voters defeated the Democrats in Congress in 1994 in order to eliminate the threat of left-wing legislation. The Republican victory sufficiently allayed voters' concerns about liberal overreach and ironically paved the way for Clinton's victory in 1996.

But losing Congress in 2010 won't similarly make it easier for Obama to win reelection in 2012. Now that Obamacare is law, unlike Hillarycare which merely posed a threat, voters will have to throw congressional Democrats and Obama out of office in order to repeal it.