Posted on 11/18/2012 5:01:56 AM PST by Kaslin
In the wake of Mitt Romney's loss, many Republicans say the GOP must make far-reaching changes to be competitive in future elections. White voters are a smaller and smaller part of the electorate, they point out, while Latinos and other minorities are growing as a percentage of the voting public. Unless the Republican Party reinvents itself to appeal to those voters, the argument goes, the GOP can get used to being out of power.
There's something to that. The electorate is changing, and the Republican Party needs to keep up with the times. But the more fundamental answer to the GOP's problems could be much simpler than that. To win the next time, Republicans need to find a really good candidate. Just listen to the masterminds of Barack Obama's victories in 2008 and 2012.
On Thursday afternoon, the Obama campaign held its last conference call for reporters. Toward the end of the call, the three top officials in Obama's re-election effort -- David Axelrod, Jim Messina and David Plouffe -- were asked what will happen to the mighty Obama campaign now. What next for the enormous campaign infrastructure, with its massive databases and voter profiles? Will it go to a new candidate?
"You can't just transfer this," said senior adviser Plouffe. "People are not going to spend hours away from their families, and their jobs, contributing financially when it's hard for them to do it, unless they believe in the candidate."
"All of this, the door knocks ... the contributions made, the phone calls made, were because these people believed in Barack Obama," Plouffe continued. "And so for candidates who want to try and build a grassroots campaign, it's not going to happen because there's a list or because you have the best technology. That's not how this works. They have to build up that kind of emotional appeal so that people are willing to go out and spend the time and their resources and provide their talents because they believe in someone. ... The reason those people got involved was because they believed in Barack Obama. It was a relationship between them and our candidate."
Plouffe is right. He and Axelrod and Messina could have created the most awesome campaign machinery in the world, and it would have failed had the candidate not been able to forge an emotional connection with enough voters to win. Obama could do that, especially with blacks and Latinos and young people, but also with a significant portion of white voters.
Mitt Romney, on the other hand, appears not to have excited any big group. Yes, he won the support of 59 percent of white voters, but there are indications that whites actually stayed away from the polls in large numbers. Overall, Romney won fewer votes than John McCain's doomed 2008 campaign.
"The 2012 elections actually weren't about a demographic explosion with nonwhite voters," writes analyst Sean Trende of RealClearPolitics. "Instead, they were about a large group of white voters not showing up. ... The reason this electorate looked so different from the 2008 electorate is almost entirely attributable to white voters staying home."
Trende is not sure why so many whites didn't vote. Looking only at Ohio, he suggests many did not like Obama but were turned off by Romney, or at least the negative picture of Romney created by Obama's attack ads. So they did nothing on Election Day.
There is much data still to come in from Tuesday; the popular vote figures and exit poll details aren't yet final. But it's fair to say Romney's problems stemmed as much from his failure to appeal to white voters as his failure to appeal to any other voters. He lost because he did not connect to large swaths of the voting population.
That's where finding a great candidate comes in. Romney is an able, accomplished, intelligent and hard-working man, but Republicans knew from the start he was an imperfect candidate. During the primaries, GOP voters tried every alternative possible before finally settling on Romney. He remained a flawed candidate in the general election.
Now, because of Romney's loss, some are urging that the Republican Party completely remake itself. Some argue that GOP lawmakers must support comprehensive immigration reform and change positions on other issues. The answer, they say, is broad, across-the-board change.
But listen to the Obama team. There is a less complicated lesson to this election. Voters want to believe in a candidate. If Republicans find that candidate, they will win.
We old ,white guys (speaking for myself of course)ought to style ourselves as cutting edge, in that we do understand, somewhat, the Constitution and what it’s about. They used to say, prejudicially IMHO, that “Nobody knows if Christianity works, because it’s never been tried.” It has never been more imperative to force public policy arguments to be framed around the Constitution because there’s never been, again IMHO, a President more focused on underminihg it.
Ronald Reagan advised the American people that you never get 100%.
Apparently the 100%-ers don’t believe that and would not have voted for Reagan knowing he believed that.
Let’s hope that 2012 spelled the end of the Romney tries at the Presidency.
Go home, Mitt. Enjoy your retirement.
What belief did voters place in Obama? That he would f### up everything worse than he has already done? If so, the country's over.
You have really nailed it. It has been a long time since the Constitution as adopted has been in force. I suspect that the over-extension of democracy, wherein “dependent persons” have been allowed to vote, in contravention of the Founders’ intent, is the root of most ills. Imagine what the media would do with that inconvenient truth.
As part of the OWG minority, I have wondered: do I appreciate the Constitution as written because it was created by OWGs like myself (except wiser) to secure the advantage of IWGs? Or is it because the alternatives to free markets, the rule of law, a vibrant civil society, individual initiative and responsibility, etc., bring economic ruin and tyranny? We have to explain somehow that “sustainable compassion” requires big-picture, long-term thinking powered by enlightened self-interest.
Who did New Hampshire choose?
The ability , the resilience, this country has had under the Constitution to maintain stable government with passage of power from one competing interest to the next within the rules of the framework is still its crowning glory. The incipient factionalism and even tribalism that you allude to is a threat to that, even as the dichotomy over slavery was. However, we got to stable succession sooner than anybody else, solved the age old nemesis of civilization, dating back to the ancient empires, and taught the world. How amazing that even today, the left celebrates Castro and Chavez and their like; that Putin perpetuates himself like a leech in Russia, etc, etc. Turn that sovereignty over to countries that haven’t even accomplished the first lesson? It shows the contemptible nature of people like Buzzie Ginsberg.
Romney.
The answer to your perception, is Barack Obama.
That's when people start bringing guns to the polls. That's when the shooting starts.
[RiNO's Like You] + [Obama's Death Panels] will make your prediction come true. Thanks for helping him rub us out, Quisling.
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Polls indicated that Romney was going to win the election. The economy is close to Great Depression era conditions, and unemployment is almost as high as when Obama entered office. Economic conditions became so dire after Obama took office it prompted the rise of an entire new movement, the Tea Party.
Presidents rarely win reelection when the economy is in the tank.
So how did Romney lose a race that numerous reputable polls and pundits predicted would be an easy win, based on historical patterns?
Massive voter fraud.
There are massive reports of criminal activity
(not mischief, not shenanigans, as many term the fraud- but CRIMINAL ACTIVITY) going on all over the U.S during the presidential election.
Reports of machines changing votes from Romney to Obama, eyewitness reports of Republican poll watchers who observed busloads of non-English speaking Somalians in Ohio being instructed to vote Obama- the list is endless.
http://www.ObamaVoterFraud.com/
Romney lost because of this, not any other reason.
Nobody could have won against the fraud planned and perpetrated by the Obama Machine.
The evidence is overwhelming!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-aVy_s76ZY
https://www.facebook.com/lori.patriot/posts/404694619604138
http://www.westernjournalism.com/obama-stole-the-election/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=LbOtYQceBxI-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=Hbf3iaEbAuY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ILJDudUpct0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=dmJtaOO2etc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ILJDudUpct0
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k_rMpQKqZhM
http://obamavoterfraud.blogspot.com/
http://newtgingrich360.com/profiles/blogs/obama-stole-the-election
http://appalachianforums.com/forums/Dickenson_County,_Virginia.pl/md/read/id/255145
http://www.wnd.com/2012/11/adding-up-the-evidence-to-a-stolen-election/
http://politicaloutcast.com/2012/11/allen-west-mitt-romney-and-the-massive-voter-fraud-machine/
http://www.truethevote.org/news/how-widespread-is-voter-fraud-2012-facts-figures
http://foxnewsinsider.com/tag/voter-fraud/
http://www.humanevents.com/2012/11/01/voter-fraud-is-no-myth-its-more-common-than-you-think/
http://thewillcountynews.com/?p=415
http://video.foxnews.com/v/4279497/obama-stole-election/
http://www.wnd.com/2012/11/the-big-list-of-vote-fraud-reports/
Go to http://www.facebookcensorship.com and see the documentation of their censorship and harassment.
Bro. Winter Christian Bible teacher http://www.prime.org
http://www.barrysoetoro.net
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We can not wait for 2014 and 2016 to regroup and figure out new strategies. By then it will be too late. The Marxist/Muslim usurper will have completed his planned distruction of America.
That’s what people fail to understand.
Silence in the face of evil is itself evil. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.
What you can do:
.
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Visit these sites:
http://www.ObamaVoterFraud.com/
http://thecompetentconservative.com/elections-have-not-yet-been-certified-heres-what-you-can-do/
Most of ‘Obama Voter Fraud’ activity is moving to FaceBook.
‘Obama Voter Fraud Volunteers
http://www.facebook.com/#!/ObamaVoterFraudVolunteers
‘Obama Voter Fraud’ on FaceBook-
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=488176621204089&set=a.488176614537423.110863.488173144537770&type=1&theater";-
Sign their petition- over 99,000 and counting -cards, email
http://www.petition2congress.com/8222/petition-recount-on-2012-presidential-election/
Another petition, The ‘We The People’ petition has 60,000 signatures and counting-
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/recount-election/ZQmy0Mlv#thank-you=p
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The best Obama Exposure site on the net:
http://theobamafile.com/indexArchive.html
The United StatesLibrary of Congress has
selected TheObamaFile.com
for inclusion in its historic collection
of Internet materials
http://theobamafile.com/LibraryOfCongress.html
.
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