Posted on 11/07/2012 12:42:40 PM PST by Tailgunner Joe
Mitt Romney's loss on Tuesday laid bare a Republican demographic problem that, if not addressed, could transform the GOP into a permanent minority party.
Romney dominated among white voters, who made up 72 percent of the electorate: He won that group by 20 percentage points, according to the national exit poll. But he was crushed among Latinos, who broke for President Obama 71 percent to 27 percent.
The former group is shrinking as a portion of the electorate. In 1988, they were 85 percent of all voters. By the year 2000, that was down to 81 percent. It's fallen nine more points since them. The Latino population, meanwhile, is growing at a staggering pace: Latinos accounted for more than half of the U.S. population increase between 2000 and 2010, according to the 2010 census. The black and Asian vote, which also broke overwhelmingly for the president, is also growing. Blacks were 13 percent of the electorate this year, up from 10 percent in 1988; Asians have risen from one percent of the electorate to three percent over the past two decades.
It's a demographic reality that already has some Republicans calling for a new course in the wake of Romney's defeat.
"The conservative movement should have particular appeal to people in minority and immigrant communities who are trying to make it, and Republicans need to work harder than ever to communicate our beliefs to them," said Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.
On "CBS This Morning" today, newly-elected Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz argued that "the values in the Hispanic community are fundamentally conservative, but you've got to have candidates that connect with that community in a real and genuine way and communicate that the values between the candidate and the community are one and the same."
Romney's weakness among Latinos cost him dearly in the battleground states of Nevada, Colorado, Virginia and Florida; if future Republican candidates don't perform better among that group, red states like Arizona and even Texas are on a path to become battlegrounds themselves.
"Immigration has caused the Republican Party to leave votes on the table," Gary Segura of Latino Decisions said Wednesday. Pointing to the president's margin of victory, he argued that "For the first time in American history, the Latino vote can plausibly claim to be nationally decisive."
The GOP's demographic problems don't just break down along racial lines. Voters under 30 supported the president 60 percent to 37 percent, and voters between 30 and 44 years old backed Mr. Obama by seven percentage points. Some of these voters may become more conservative as they grow older. But rapidly shifting views suggest they almost certainly will not embrace the GOP's opposition to same-sex marriage. And young women, who overwhelmingly backed the president, will most likely continue to oppose Republicans when it comes to access to contraceptive health care coverage and abortion rights. Al Cardenas, the head of the American Conservative Union, bluntly told Politico that his party "needs to realize that it's too old and too white and too male and it needs to figure out how to catch up with the demographics of the country before it's too late."
The question now facing Republicans is whether they shift toward the middle or instead try to appeal to growing demographic groups while staying planted firmly on the right side of the political spectrum. There are those who will look at the past two presidential cycles, in which relatively moderate Republican nominees fell short, and conclude that the party needs to nominate a true believer willing to stand behind core conservative principles. Rubio, who is already being discussed as a leading 2016 presidential contender, is the kind of candidate that could energize those who want to reach out to new types of voters without abandoning the party's beliefs.
John Hudak of the Brookings Institution argues that the best past forward for the GOP is to move - slowly - toward positions that hold appeal for groups that voted for Mr. Obama this year.
"If they move too quickly to the middle, it's going to alienate a lot of people in their party," he said. Fifty-nine percent of voters in the exit poll said abortion should be legal, but if Republicans suddenly embrace abortion rights, evangelicals and values voters could abandon the GOP. If they shift leftward too quickly on fiscal issues, it could prompt Tea Partiers and libertarians to do the same.
Hudak said the GOP's handling of same-sex marriage provides a template. In the 2004 election, Republicans used opposition to same-sex marriage to drive voters to the polls. But as attitudes shifted, Republicans for the most part simply stopped talking about the issue.
"That's the first step to neutralizing these social issues," he said. "It's not to change your mind. It's just to not speak your mind. And that way people can think this isn't that aggressive party anymore, and it opens the door for them to vote for you based on other issues."
"It's definitely a challenge," Hudak added, "but I don't think it's insurmountable."
The GOP doesn’t have a soul.
They are vacuous dirt bags...
That social conservatism was absent from the Romney campaign and that Romney had a liberal record on social issues is the reason why he couldn't win Iowa, Colorado, Virginia and Ohio.
The establishment better wake up and start figuring out that it needs a social conservatives to have any chance of winning the key battleground states.
“This gave Obama lots of ammunition and opportunity to use against him.”
No Democrat candidate ever needs ammunition when they always have the MSM Force Field Shield!
They are impervious to facts & truth. All they need to do is to pass out freebies to the mobs, relax and let the MSM & unions do their fighting for them. When the GOP-e declines to fight, why that’s just whipped cream and a cherry on top of their fruitcake.
So all the GOP needs is a transvestite homosexual black abortion Dr with a spanish surname for a candidate...
They just tell the customer, us, what they believe and what we should believe.
The secret to good salesmanship is getting the customer on your side by interacting with you.
AMEN!
Let them remain in their natural habitat, the democrat party - the party that boos God and caters to vice and stupidity.
They just tell the customer, us, what they believe and what we should believe.
The secret to good salesmanship is getting the customer on your side by interacting with you.
I do not believe the exit polls....any of them.
I firmly believe we have just been the victims of the biggest fraud in the history of mankind.
I refuse to believe that the American people were energized to vote for President Obama yesterday.
This election could be a script from a movie, therefore, I am starting to believe it was designed as such.
I think it is far more likely that a plan has been in the works to corrupt this cycle since 2010.
Multiple blue states voted for every Democrat in statewide races by a similar count as what President Obama gained in that state.
States that typically split their statewide vote went 100% Democrat for every statewide race. That can only come from straight party-line voting.
If you wanted to demoralize your opponents, and had the ability, you would arrange the votes in a few safe districts within a few states to overwhelm the other partys safe districts, regardless of turnout.
Then, you would ensure the exit polling contradicted everything your opponents believe, everything they expect and everything they support.
At that point, your opponents would turn on each other, re-think their beliefs and dissolve into irrelevance.
Who would have thought that four years ago, the United States would elect a man who served only 40 months in the US Senate to the White House? Who would have thought his background, his history and his performance would be protected, minimized or dismissed over the course his first term?
If an evil alliance of socialists and islamists really exist in our world, could they have engineered such events?
Oh goody! Another group to whom to promise freebies paid for by confiscating white money!
Demographics might have given the resident a less fullsome reelection. I’m sure the Democrat machines in the dense population centers cranked out fraudulent votes as quickly as they received reports from Republican polling stations, but the growth of what were minorities, legal and illegal, probably will combine into a “checkerboard majority” for some years. What’s truly sad is that they’ll be the first to taste the bitter fruit nourished by B Hussein’s insane policies.
CHRIS CHRISTIE who else? After all he has a photoop now with Obama that will drag him to victory in 2016. He is the next GOGE prima donna, after all it shows he can cross the isle./extreme sarcasm.
Remember this one: FNC talking heads....MITT ROMNEY IS THE ONLY ONE WHO CAN BEAT OBAMA?.......
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Freerepublic has also tipped. The vast majority of FReepers demonstrated that their supposed conservative principles are disposable when inconvenient when they went all in for a flaming liberal.
Party over principle has ruined/destroyed the GOP and it is killing conservatism.
Conservatism is dead in the GOP, let's not let it be dead on FR, it is our only hope.
The GOP has failed us beyond repair and must be replaced.
It was a close race and if those who did not vote or went 3rd party are pulled in, or things get so bad liberals will pull their heads out, conservatism can tip the nation back.
I've not given up on conservatism. I am a conservative, I can do no other.
I think you are correct. I think a majority of people have been dumbed down to believe that the government is the best solution to giving them things. I also believe that a majority of the people have been taught to lead with what they “feel” rather then lead by core values.
If the GOP decides to change it’s core values and try to win people by making them “feel” good, then they just become the Democrat party and lose even more true conservatives.
At least there are a few states that will function in a conservative manner, but how long that will last is unknown (how long can they survive if federal funds are held back). In the mean time I guess we become the Divided States of America.
*Straight* (i.e. legitimate) party line voting wouldn’t have yielded what began happening as last evening progressed, but I do accept your premise: we got bated by masters.
Worse is that many Dems voted as socialists, unaware that “leaders” of their “movement” are marxists, not socialists foolish enough to enlarge government until it collapses under its own weight, but bosses who will pull power to themselves until their inescapable paranoia sets them at each others’ throats.
I suggest listening to Luntz on Hannity today if you can get the transcript. He made a lot of sense to me and it doesn’t require you to give up being a conservative. It may require getting rid of the Millionaire club Republican Rinos. That should be a pleasure to most of us.
BooHoo Boner, is the worst that I can think of unless it’s Mitch the mundane.
Marco Rubio, hey what? Ryan’s a great guy. He’s just another white boy who does good, while Mr. Rubio is a guy who is exceptional. Either was a good choice. Mr. Rubio would have been better. There are Latino people here in Arizona who would have voted for Mr. Rubio. Now I KNOW that makes too much sense for the Republic leadership.
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