US Presidential Election 2012

[Monseratto]

The Republicans cater to the christian conservative red necks. The affiliation with the ultra-right conservative Tea Party made it worst.

What were the lessons here that the GOP should learn before 2014?

Well, I have few thoughts:


•Unlimited dark money doesn't necessarily buy votes. Karl Rove's and others' Super PACs poured hundreds and hundreds of millions of dollars, much from anonymous sources, into key races to win Congressional seats, Senate seats, and the presidency. Now working in Colorado, I became a victim of this unlimited money, where 100 percent of the ad time was bought up, and I was carpet bombed during morning news shows, evening news shows, and primetime programming. The electorate here became numb, and I believe all those millions had little to no effect in major races.

•Voter participation matters. The GOP became complacent and over-confident after the 2010 mid-term "landslide," and badly over-reached. They won in 2010 not because the electorate suddenly became more conservative with the addition of Tea Party members; they won because regular people didn't vote that year. In presidential years, turnout is around 60 percent (which is deplorable), but in off years, turnout is an anemic 40 percent or less. Candidates are often picked in the primaries by 5 percent or less of the electorate. In 2010, turnout was 41 percent nationwide. With only 20 to 25 percent of the electorate's support, the Republicans claimed a landslide mandate, thumping their chests about how the country had suddenly become extremist, and introducing radical social legislation by the truckload. Freshmen Tea Party darlings almost drove the economy into the ditch by trying to hold it hostage over simple debt limit votes. Their problem, though, was that the mandate they claimed didn't exist. They had simply benefited from low voter turnout, and had hoped that no one noticed. In 2012, however, results were vastly different. The voter ID laws and other voter suppression efforts by Republicans in 2011 and 2012 generally failed and/or were thrown out by the courts. Voters turned out. I haven't seen voter turnout numbers yet for this election, but based simply on reporting of long lines on election day and in early voting, turnout was big. When turnout is big, Democrats do well.

•Candidates matter. Especially after the 2010 mid-terms, GOP leadership has been hijacked by the Tea Party, and as Steve Schmidt said this morning, ran "loons" in key races, especially for the Senate. In the last two cycles, Republicans lost six Senate pickup opportunities by running nutjobs like Sharon Angle, Richard Mourdock, and Todd Akin. Neanderthals don't get elected by normal people, at least most of the time. If the party wants to start winning again, they have to run people who are actually qualified to hold office by killing off the candidacies of crazy people in the primaries.

•Non-white voters don't support candidates whose issues important to them are used as weapons against them. Some sources this morning are reporting that 75 percent of hispanics went for Obama last night. To get nominated during the clown show of the primaries, Romney lurched to the right of even Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry, idiotically declaring that we need to make things so bad for Hispanics that they would "self deport." He played to the worst proclivities of his base, and it cost him big time in the general.

•Lying doesn't work. The most shocking strategy of the Romney campaign was a conscious decision made by the candidate that winning was more important than truth. He freely lied about the president, the economy, welfare reform, the auto bailout, major companies, history, and even Americans themselves. He flipped on every single social issue that he had advocated as governor of Massachusetts and stridently concealed his own tax records. Almost without exception, he doubled down on his lies and shifting positions when publicly called out. In the end, he badly damaged his reputation by the freeform lying, reducing confidence in his candidacy. Many other Republicans followed suit.

•Pandering to an immoral base doesn't work in a general election. The GOP, driven to the extremist fringes of our society by screwballs who have taken over the party carries a cost when you have to appeal to normal people in a general election. The base now consists of Bible thumping, gun-toting, war mongering weirdos who squawk about being pro-life while advocating for capital punishment, starting new wars, destroying personal rights, and country music. They were actually successful at re-opening long settled issues like contraception and equal pay for women, scaring the hell out of millions of potential voters. This pandering threatens to turn the Republican party into a regional body dominated by hillbillies, rednecks, bigots, religious zealots, and simpletons.

•You have to live in the reality based world. The GOP's response to every single bit of bad news during the campaign was to impune either the data or the people generating the data. During the campaign, the candidate, or his surrogates, accused the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the Congressional Research Service, the Congressional Budget Office and the Office of Management and Budget of "cooking the books" whenever any of these non-partisan agencies issued reports with which they disagreed. They engaged in free character assassination of every analyst, blogger or pundit with whom they disagreed. Nate Silver of the New York Times 538 blog, who is a well-respected statistician, was openly attacked for his conclusions, even though he has a spotless track record in calling races (and baseball). Their other dimension existence was put on full public display last night after Fox News statisticians called Ohio for Obama when Karl Rove, a paid flack for the GOP and Romney, demanded to be put on the air to retract the call, making a fool of himself and his network in front of millions of viewers. I believe Rove's attempt to alter the results caused the awkward hour and a half delay before Romney finally conceded.

[timrev]

ang isa sa ayaw ko kay obama balak nya ibalik sa US ang mga call center dito sa pinas

Obama win seen to affect local BPOs | ABS-CBN News

[Monseratto]

ang isa sa ayaw ko kay obama balak nya ibalik sa US ang mga call center dito sa pinas

Obama win seen to affect local BPOs | ABS-CBN News

Obama got to get pass the republican congress first...

[CVT]

Pa- Democracy, Democracy pa sila? Then, work hand-in-hand with other democratic countries in the world.....

China muna sila mag-pull-out.... Sangkaterba ang mga factories nila roon.... (H)Ekta-(h)ektaryang lupa ang mga buildings ng factories sa China....

O,- takot sila sa China?....

17.3K:type:

[niky]

The Latinos, who came in at >10% according to the news, tipped the balance this time....

17.3K:type:

Lations were a big part of it, since they overwhelmingly voted Obama.

But it's multiple factors:

1. None of the minorities like the Republicans all that much, due to their hardline stance on immigration and their hawkishness on foreign relations

2. Women. Obama got 55% of the women vote because of the idiotic statements of a few Republicans, which the Party failed to distance itself from.

3. Urban vote. Overwhelmingly Obama. The rich consevative farmers and vast midwest that are typical Republican strongholds don't have the numbers anymore.

4. The Gay Vote. Who wants to lay wagers on what miniscule percentage voted for the Republican Party?

The Republican Party ought to reassess their definition of "conservative". The defunct social and moralist agenda that discriminates against everyone who isn't a caucasian male means they have no chance of winning any Presidential Election, ever again, if the status quo remains.

Even with the crappy economy. Even with people pissed off about Obamacare. Even with the frustration. People's distrust and dissatisfaction with Obama is not enough to overcome their disgust with the Republican party. Especially as many of those same people who are pissed off about the economy still blame George Dubya.

The Republican Party has to go back to being the "Conservative Party" for small government. Tax Reforms. Budget Cuts. Less spending. Leave the moral issues at the sidelines because their idea of moral issues is to trample on personal liberty to further a Fundamentalist Christian agenda. Focus on good governance first. They can keep their moral stance, but make concessions instead of taking a hard line. You can still oppose abortion without appearing pro-rape.

[uls]

Romney lost coz of the extremist right

[Ry_Tower]

Medyo OT.

[Retz]

Ang close ng labanan. Buti pa si Romney, he knows how to accept defeat. This is a total opposite of the election here.

[Monseratto]

Harharhar....

[chua_riwap]

^mga maka romney..........