I can't believe it is even a race.
It is a race because the Republicans are canny. They never underestimate what Americans will believe. You listed the "issues" -- if it was about the issues, the Republicans wouldn't have a chance. Instead, to win they have to appeal to the uneducated "swing voters" the pundits keep referring to:
- make intelligence a suspect quality. Them smart educated people are trying to pull one over on us; they are elitist intellectual snobs who don't understand the real problems us regular people face.
- appeal to the crazies: those other guys don't have faith in God like we do. They will have aborted fetuses littering the street and gays running all over the place. They'll take away our guns, too, dangit!
- run against themselves. Even though they have been in charge for most of the last decades, the economic conditions are the fault of them liberals. Even though the gdp rises under Democratic governments and the budgets get under control, somehow they can't manage government like we can. Overlook the fact that you have been managing things -- run against yourselves and promise to "change."
- promote the myth that "Big government" is bad and "deregulation" is good. Even though taking power from government agencies has been responsible for everything from the financial crises to the inept response to Katrina (in that case by appointing incompetent cronies to FEMA), we know how to organize things.
- We will lower taxes! Those other guys will raise them. Make sure to keep referring to the theory that lower taxes for rich folk makes more jobs (even though it doesn't work). Don't refer to the huge debt built up by continuing to spend without having the funds to pay for it.
- that using threats and bullying is the way to run foreign policy. Diplomacy is for wimps. It doesn't matter what the rest of the world thinks. Foreign ideas in general are suspect. "Cosmopolitan" is a bad, scary thing to be.
- appeal to some never-existing past where hard work, rugged individualism, and faith in religion is all you need to succeed. If it hasn't worked for you, you're a whiner or freeloader, or....
- make your opponents' strengths out to be weaknesses. That guy sure can talk and rile up a crowd -- it must be all talk then. We want barely articulate guys that don't seem to be "better" than us.
- use misdirection. "9/11!" "Support our troops!" "God Bless America!"
Granted: John McClain and Sarah Palin are not George Bush and Dick Cheney, and would be an improvement in the Executive Branch. He is not a wingnut Christian; she is, but is not part of the cabal responsible for the current situation. They are not, however, agents of change. The policies are the same as the current ones.
Obama is also part of the Democratic machine, and I don't believe for a minute that he will (or could) accomplish the things he says he will. But sometimes you just have to hope, and anybody that doubts his leadership skills just has to see how he and his organization have outsmarted everyone to put a black man this close to the Presidency. They plotted around every setback and won the nomination like they were playing the biggest chess game in the world. Maybe, just maybe, they can use the same skills to actually change things.