Marc Lamont Hill: GOP has some game but, nope, it's still Obama in '12

A FEW MONTHS ago, I wrote a column predicting that President Obama would easily win reelection in 2012. Many of you wrote letters scolding me for prematurely re-crowning Obama without allowing the Republican field to fully emerge and develop.

"Wait until September," you said, "then we'll know what's really going on."

Well, it's September. And I still feel the same way.

In all fairness, though, things have changed considerably. The GOP, buoyed by an increasingly shaky economy and Obama's numerous strategic missteps, has managed to produce a field of candidates that are worth our attention. Here are the top four:

Rick Perry: Out of nowhere, the Texas governor has become the Republican Party's most legitimate hope for retaking the White House in 2012. With considerable executive experience (10 years) and enthusiastic support from major GOP power brokers, Perry has the right profile to court mainstream voters. The fact that he threatens to secede from the union, wants to eliminate Social Security and has a penchant for executing the mentally retarded only endears him further to the extreme wing of his party. Barring a major scandal, or the entry of Sarah Palin into the race, Perry will likely be his party's nominee.

Mitt Romney: Since Perry entered the race, the former Massachusetts governor has quickly gone from prohibitive favorite to sloppy seconds. The reason is simple: Mitt Romney is boring. Everyone knows him, many people respect him, but few people have strong feelings about him one way or the other. In a field populated by strong personalities, this is not a good sign.

Romney's only chance at winning is to lie quietly in the weeds, à la McCain 2008, and wait for the competition to make an irreversible error. Given the extremist banter coming from this bunch, this is not a farfetched possibility.

Michele Bachmann: For months, Bachmann had the market cornered on the xenophobic/racist/anti-environment/screw-the-poor wing of the GOP. Since the infinitely more viable Perry entered the race, however, she's become more of a sideshow than a legitimate contender.

But this doesn't mean that she can't do considerable damage on the campaign trail. Just ask Perry, who will spend the next week (if not longer) responding to Bachmann's critiques of him forcing 12 year old girls to get HPV tests in order to satisfy corporate interests. Also, as long as Bachmann is in the race, the entire field is going to be dragged further to the right, making them all more vulnerable in the general election. If the front-runners are smart, they'll find a way to get her to go away. Quickly and quietly.

Sarah Palin: As always, Palin is the wild card. If she decides to throw her hat into the ring, the former Alaskan governor will immediately terminate what's left of Bachmann's candidacy and put a hacksaw to Rick Perry's base.

It's no longer certain that she has sufficient support to win the whole thing, but she could easily open the door to a Mitt Romney victory. Even if she doesn't enter the race, there's no doubt that she'll continue to hurl entertaining (and damaging) barbs from the cheap seats at the three other candidates.

Despite the strong emergence of these candidates, I still cannot see any reasonable circumstance under which Obama loses an election to them.

And, no, this isn't wishful thinking.

After all, I've been extremely critical of the president and his policies for his entire term. This is just a sober assessment of a political landscape in which the incumbent president is too savvy, too popular and too well-funded to lose.

Yet, if the past few months are any indication, this will still be a fun ride.