The Failed Republican Turnout Of 2012
All across the ‘net and on the news-fight channels you can see the typical “the GOP is outmoded/must change/reach out to this group/that group/make a new group” arguments. We have heard them all before and the only thing new this time is you can’t blame a third-party spoiler because their guy only pulled 1% and many of them would never have voted for Romney or Obama. They would have stayed home with the moderates.
The sad truth of the Obama sinking ship, a vessel hemorrhaging over 7 million votes per cycle, is that it was guided to safe harbor by those moderates who stayed home. The science is in, folks; it was moderates in southeast Ohio and in Florida who had a tantrum and sat this one out.
Ohio routinely had turnout rates below 30%, yet they overwhelmingly voted for Romney in the primary. When it came time to deliver for the candidate they chose, they stayed home. Same thing in Florida; and it has to be said, these folks didn’t just vote for Mitt Romney in the primary, they cried for him. Every other candidate was too extreme, too short, too inexperienced, too unelectable… whatever the hell that means.
The Republicans of the USA had voted for Mitt. No GOP overlords chose Mitt or forced him on anybody; most of you just plain chose Mitt over the others. So being stuck with Mitt, the southeastern United States, which routinely showed greater support for other candidates when compared to Ohio and Florida, turned out for Romney/Ryan in a big way. Seeing that Gary Johnson didn’t pull more than 1%, we can guess that many libertarians still crossed over despite being treated poorly during convention time.
In North Carolina we had the hardest job. President Obama ended his 2008 campaign here, Launched his Green Energy initiative in Steele Creek, brought the DNC Convention to Charlotte, and we still kicked his butt out and sent team Obama home early. We flipped the state and installed a Republican Governor.
After all of that work in NC, Florida and Ohio could not turn out an extra 2%? Florida at least has the excuse that a decent percentage of their voters are really New Yorkers who migrate seasonally, something they need to handle in the state legislature. Even with the influence of fake snowbird voters, who would never declare they are Floridian over New Yorker, FL only went to Obama by 0.7 percent. They couldn’t even beat Alan West without a recount. Ohio and Florida were given away by low turnout.
The arguments floating around right now are laughable. For instance: the argument that we need a different message is a croc. When Americans don’t like your message, your House members take a hit like Republicans in 2006 and the 2010 tsunami that Democrats still have not recovered from. This year saw little change and the Democrats creeped in on two Senate seats and a few squeaker House races.
I would criticize the Black outreach of team Romney/Ryan, but you can’t complain about something that didn’t exist. Although representation was up since 2008, 2004 was still the high water mark with almost 7% representation at the convention. There are some stats in this link, which features a picture of Charlotte’s own Earl Phillips, driving home the point that NC showed up everywhere and defeated Obama in our own state. You can say that Black conservatives were wooed by President Obama or you can say that there was no Black outreach on the Romney/Ryan website, which featured extensive Hispanic outreach and outreach to everything but Black republicans.
In fact, the moderate Republican wing has copied the Democrats in favoring Hispanics over Black voters and to what end? Even in President Obama’s second election, more Black Republicans appeared at our convention, so they definitely are not buying into the race argument. Why then do Republicans want to copy a strategy that has the amazing Obama losing over 7 million votes and each election? Who knows? If those moderates would have shown up at the polls on Election Day, we could have asked them.
Aside from all of the above, Americans are engaged in a heated argument over spoilers and third parties. I think 2012 proves that an energized third-party movement isn’t the end of the Republican Party, with Gary Johnson pulling less than 2%. Many of the libertarians who voted for Johnson also vote for Republican Governors, representatives and judges, making them a net gain at the poll.
The only time third parties kill us, is when moderates have a tantrum.
When Theodore Roosevelt had his third-party tantrum against Republican President Taft, America got Woodrow Wilson, a racist anglophile who dragged Franklin Roosevelt into his administration as the Assistant Secretary of the Navy. Between Wilson and FDR, America was burdened with income taxes, payroll withholding, the League of Nations and when that failed they created the United Nations, which is essentially the League of Nations part two.
That’s just the tip of the iceberg and it all stems from moderate Republicans allowing a complete nut into the White House.
Fast forward a few generations and in 1992 moderates flocked to Ross Perot, giving him 18% of the vote and allowing Bill Clinton into the White House with his message of being a “new democrat” and papers declaring him “the man from Hope.” America didn’t buy that line then but Democrats could count on Republicans fracturing enough to let them slip through.
Now in 2012 we have a guy who lost the confidence of over 7 million voters and we throw it away by 3% nationally and less than 1% in some battleground states that were formerly hostile territory? This was the ultimate moderate meltdown because they didn’t choose some wild-eyed egomaniac, they chose to let a far left total failure rule their lives by staying home.
Republicans do have to look at their primary selection model, because too many people who didn’t deliver in 2008 and 2012 didn’t show up when it counted, even after getting their way.
As far as all of the articles declaring the left-wing mandate… please. This isn’t the ‘30s, the ‘60s, the ‘70s or the early ‘90s, where Democrats get to foist one statist nightmare after another on Americans without notice. Republicans need to regroup, but Democrats are losing many millions as daylight is cast upon them. If Republicans get serious about holding their representatives feet to the fire over spending and turn out a mere 3-5% more, we could beat President Obama and this Democrat message every time for several elections. All the while, libertarians could continue to flourish and we have our side squabbles over weed and the fed.
The other argument that is a waste of time is all of the hand wringing over social issues and the need to be overly polite. First of all, your right to be polite ends when it costs my children. It’s time to get back into the politics that wins; and that means hard hitting and tough. President Obama has been vulnerable on his wacko upbringing under Jeremiah Wright, his various declarations that America is built on “white man’s greed,” an incredibly disastrous green energy program, his praise for China’s infrastructure (slaves and caveman living conditions in their western half? Really?), his anti-Israel policies, monies handed over to terrorist supporting regimes, and his totally wrong praise of the so-called Arab Spring that is really the Jihadist Uprising.
None of this was used to any effect. It was as if we were back to the old “He’s a nice guy but we can do better” garbage. No. He is not a nice guy. He called all Americans who disagree with him his “enemies that needed to be punished.” He declared his base should vote for revenge. Where was this stuff in our ads? It was nowhere. Even the efforts on Benghazi were anemic. We need to get over the fear of being impolite to people who, for the most part, hate the United States of America.
Hope it was worth staying home on Election Day, because this election was not won by President Obama and Democrats. It was forfeited by Republicans who couldn’t do what North Carolina did. Democrats lost three states, including Indiana. They do not have a winning model. Unfortunately, America doesn’t have one now either.
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