Quick Post-Election Thoughts (A Prescription for Recovery)

Forbes ^ | November 07, 2012 | Pascal-Emmanuel Gobry

[Colonel Kangaroo]

My main concern right now is a Republican Party that can win elections and majorities again, and do that for the conservative movement. Now is the hour of our discontent, when all of the factions inside the GOP turn on each other to blame each other for the loss.

Here’s what I think went wrong:

•NOT social issues voters. This will be a predictable line from elite/moderates/liberals. The fact of the matter is social issues voters are still around 30% of the electorate and the GOP can’t get to 50% without them. Deal with it.

•NOT “extremism”. And may I remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice! Wait, the guy who said that lost in a landslide. Urm. Uh… Well. The point I want to make: there’s extremism and there’s extremism. Mitt Romney was down the line mainstream Republican in this campaign and he got to a hair of 50%. Americans just don’t think the Republican Party platform is wildly extreme the way they thought that about Goldwater or McGovern.

•By the same token, NOT “moderation”. A lot of people on the right of the GOP and in the grassroots will try to say that Romney lost because he was too moderate. Nope. Again, he was a down the line mainstream Republican...

[Bainbridge]

Seriously, neither of them would have won.

[Bainbridge]

Seriously, neither of them would have won.

[gaijin]

Ah, I forgot —I think we will see major arms races emerge in the Middle East and also in Asia. Seeing Iran, does anyone think Saudi Arabia and Egypt will NOT pursue nukes? I’m leaving out several others.

Will Taiwan just sit on their hands? Japan?

Both those actors understand Obama will have their backs with all the dedicated furvor as he backed Bengazi SEALs.

[Eagle of Liberty]

•NOT social issues voters. This will be a predictable line from elite/moderates/liberals. The fact of the matter is social issues voters are still around 30% of the electorate and the GOP can’t get to 50% without them. Deal with it.

The problem is that 80% of the Dems ARE social issues voters ONLY! Deal with it. Mourdock's comment was a deathblow.

[The Great RJ]

The GOP or what ever party replaces it in four years will have an advantage, no one, but no one will be happy about how the economy will look in 2016. Unemployment will never drop below 8%...that will be the new "norm" and will probably spike at close to 12% in the next year as Obamacare and new taxes kick in. Energy costs will skyrocket as a result of Obama policies and radical EPA regulations. I look for gasoline to be well over $4 per gallon by the end of 2013 and electricity costs will go up 20-30% as more coal plants are closed. Even higher prices will follow. I also look for rolling large area blackouts during peak demand periods to become common. Congress will continue to spend wildly and the US debt will be downgraded further. The US dollar will plunge as the Fed continues its quantitative easing...that will push oil prices up further. Obamacare will be a disaster as the health care exchanges that are the touchstone of the program will not be in place by 2014 and millions of Americans who lose their employer plans, cannot afford private insurance and make too much to qualify for Medicaid will have no place to go for health insurance and will be hit with higher taxes as a result. Israel will attack Iran by years end and precipitate a major war in the Middle East. Obama will not side with Israel even if they are attacked with weapons of mass destruction. Islamic terrorists will continue to strike US targets including in the US and I expect a dirty bomb or nuclear attack on a US city before 2014. Obama will by regulation seek to muzzle talk radio and Internet blogs and the attacks on Fox News will increase.

In my nightmare scenario Obama will suspend the Constitution and rule by decree as dictator... not as far fetched as it might seem.

[luckystarmom]

Palin would have just made the split larger.

I honestly think abortion has to go from the platform. I think the fight against abortion needs to be amped up at the church level, and taken down on the political level.

I live in California and my kids go to a conservative Christian school. Most of my daughter’s friends are not buying that abortion is wrong. They just think their teachers are old and don’t get it.

[formosa]

If we are not very careful we will end up in burkas. My greatest fear is that we will see war on US shores. Our weakness will encourage enemies to attack. This is a country teaming with natural resources and fertile land. Things are ugly out there and we are seeing all countries, not just our own turning more dangerous and dictatorial. We could even end up in a larger war with China or Russia.

In my honest opinion, I believe there are many and the left who would welcome this with open arms. They despise American principals just that much.

[fireman15]

Things have been unpleasent under Obama’s first four years, but now we are going to see what he is really capable of. Our enemies have been unleashed... they know he won’t lift a finger to stop them. The workforce will largely be going to 29 hour weeks so employers can avoid paying for Obamacare. Energy prices are going to triple at least as the EPA shuts down domestic energy production.

The silver lining is that Obama did enough damage in his first four years that Romney would might not have been able to fix it and four years from now the electorate would have been blaming him. Obama now owns what he has done. I guess things hadn’t got bad enough for people to swing hard in the opposite direction.

[cripplecreek]

that would've helped in Ohio? PA? VA?

Yes I think it would. Santorum resonated with the blue collar crowd far better because they felt his ideas were better for creating jobs at the street level. Things like eliminating the tax on manufacturing is something that the guy on the factory floor understands immediately.

He also proved that he could win anywhere when no one else could. He was winning primaries in the north, south, midwest, and west. He even tied Romney in Michigan when Romney flogged McCain here by double digits in 08.

[greeneyes]

Some one who can articulate conservative, common sense message in simple language, with confidence and good humour. Like Reagan did. He got through the media filter-short and clear answers in terms that people understood.

Is there a Governor or ex Governor out there that can do that? No I don’t mean Palin - love her and she has charisma, but she does not have the same clarity when she communicates that Reagan had.

And so far she has not been able to break through the media filter/smears to connect with voters outside the base of the party.

Someone conservatives can agree on so GOPe doesn’t get to play coservatives against each other.

Who can communicate the best, who is really smart, well known that people generally like?

[carmody]

My college age son had a conversation with a young lady. He said - this is a win for communism. She replied, “There is nothing wrong with communism.” That is where the young generations heads are. The biggest issues among his classmates at college: abortion, contraception, gay marriage, and ... Romney is RICH! They truly believed that Romney was going to shackle women and make them leave the workplace. The ‘binder of women’ resonated as a reason to fear Romney. The young voter literally feared Romney and a return to the 1950’s.

[KC_Lion]

Take your Conservative Candidates else where good sir!

The GOP is a Moderate party don't you know.

We can do the welfare state better and cheaper.

I am thinking Jeb Bush in 2016!

(do i need a /sarc?)

[SunTzuWu]

Bush in ‘04 received more votes than obama did last night...obama received 7 million less votes last night than he did in 2008....the elections was there to be won but last night was another case of the GOP snatching defeat from the jaws of victory...as far as Americans wanting no form of conservatism- they came out in droves 2 years ago and put conservatives in office, only to have the GOPe spit in the faces of those of us (the Tea Party) who were responsible for getting them there...

Sounds like the Tea Party folks stayed home and didn't vote in protest that their candidate wasn't nominated. I think you're right. There were certainly enough FReepers here who loudly and proudly said they were staying home. To those folks I say; "Congratulations, revel in your purity while America sinks. The tipping point is past and yesterday was our last chance."

[henkster]

“I think Rick Santorum was a better choice. Gingrich as VP would have rounded out the ticket.”

Romney ran as good a campaign as could have been done. He was up against the media and a stupid electorate. It didn’t matter who ran for the GOP. We could have run Santorum, Gingrich, Reagan, George Washington or Jeffrey Dahmer. It didn’t matter. The game was fixed from the beginning.

[tanknetter]

If what you’re describing is true, then the non voting Tea Partiers cut off their noses to spite their faces.

I’d guess that Ruth Bader Ginsburg will retire in the next couple years, denying the opportunity to have a solid Conservative Majority on the Court. I also think that Kennedy and/or Scalia will leave the Court (possibly feet first like Rehnquist did) meaning that there’ll be a Liberal Majority for the next generation at least.

I also don’t see the GOP taking back the White House in 2016. All the demographic numbers and trending clearly point to it. This year was the tipping point for the success of an identity politics driven national majority. There’s also no Reagan out there like after Ford lost to Carter in 1976. And the GOP House margin while large can’t really be seen as strong or permanent.

[cripplecreek]

Romney ran as good a campaign as could have been done. He was up against the media and a stupid electorate.

That's all nice and good but I have an actual memory and was right here with the rest pointing to the fact that the media themselves were the ones who wanted to foist Romney on us.

Go back a year and you'll find FReepers complaining about Politico trying to push Romney on us. Then go back a week ago and you'll find the same FReepers attacking Politico for being anti Romney.

Moral courage and honesty go a long way but I find them just as lacking at FR as I would at the DU. Stand for something, or fall for anything.

[tnlibertarian]

I honestly think abortion has to go from the platform.

I truly believe that Obama, and the resulting destruction of our economy, is a punishment from God. A punishment caused by the murder of 3000 babies a day. How can anyone expect God to bless a country that allows that? While you may have a point politically, the issue is deeper than that. Changing hearts and minds is necessary, too. However, we don't simply try to change the hearts and minds of murderers and rapists to not kill and rape. We make it illegal to protect the potential victims.

[Buckeye McFrog]

The Republican Party is history.

I think we are about to witness a replay of the C-CRAP fiasco that occurred in Canada in the early 90's.

The Tea Party has had enough of the RINOS and is going to strike out on its own. This is going to lead to a decade or two of Democrat hegemony winning three-way races, until the RINOS cry Uncle and invite the Tea Party back in to run the show. By then the Dems will have run the train into the ditch so many times the voters may give them a shot. But the damage inflicted in the meantime will be indescribable.

[stanne]

You would wear a burka? That’s a big problem.

[formosa]

Personally, I’d die first. Guess that came out wrong. There are however women who wouldn’t.