The Republican Party’s uphill path to 270 electoral votes in 2016

Washington Post ^ | 1-18-14 | Dan Balz

[Verginius Rufus]

Add DC, VT, and RI and you have 194. Add Michigan and the Democrats have 211 without breaking a sweat.

[justiceseeker93]

US Grant was elected to two consecutive terms as POTUS; after Grant, no Republican managed to do that until Eisenhower.

Not quite. McKinley was elected to two consecutive terms, but was assassinated in the first year of his second term.

Also, Calvin Coolidge probably could have breezed to a second election victory, but politely decided to "choose not to run.

[RKBA Democrat]

The gop wing of the uniparty couldn’t win a game of tic-tac-toe if you spotted them three moves. But then again, winning elections is not the gop’s purpose. It’s primary purpose is to act as a judas goat for conservatives.

[billhilly]

Your post is one of the most sensible that I have read here in some time. Most of the posts here seem to be gloating in advance that we lose another presidential election. There seems to be some perverse pleasure in pulling down the only chance at regaining sobriety in government.

[Monorprise]

Maybe we should start running as democrats. Their base is so full of card punchers we need merely push out the leftist.

[Rusty0604]

Can’t win with all the voter fraud.

[xzins]

When was the last conservative Republican who ran for the presidency?

Romney, McCain, GW Bush, Dole, GHW Bush, Reagan

[OneWingedShark]

When was the last conservative Republican who ran for the presidency?
Romney, McCain, GW Bush, Dole, GHW Bush, Reagan

That's kinda my whole point.

[SunkenCiv]

OH, sorry, yeah, each time I’ve posted that I’ve also noted “and completed both terms” or just said, “served two terms in his own right”. :’(

Coolidge is a woulda shoulda coulda, fact is, he didn’t run, and as it turned out, would not have quite finished a second (third) term.

[RPTMS]

Gingrich? Santorum? Perry? Bachmann?

[afraidfortherepublic]

How many fraudulent voetes were cast?

[OneWingedShark]

Gingrich? Santorum? Perry? Bachmann?

Do you think any of them would be allowed to win?
Do you remember the shenanigans during the primaries — how there were retroactive rule-changes that benefited their anointed?
Do you remember NY-23?

One of our fellow FReepers has personal experience about how the RNC would rather Democrats win than lose out to "conservatives" who won't toe the line.
(Video.)

[RPTMS]

Yes, I remember. My point is that there isn’t a lack of conservative candidates. I don’t understand why conservatives don’t control the RNC, and why it’s so hard to unite around one candidate. I need to study some more, I guess.

[OneWingedShark]

Yes, I remember. My point is that there isn’t a lack of conservative candidates. I don’t understand why conservatives don’t control the RNC, and why it’s so hard to unite around one candidate. I need to study some more, I guess.

Part of it is, as I mentioned before, the RNC is not about to allow anyone they cannot control win — that is, in itself, a huge disadvantage.

Another thing is that there are different things that "conservatives" find unacceptable:
As an example; let's look at my stances:

1. I believe the War on Drugs is a contraconstitutional operation and usurpation of power.
   (Would the loss of the we must continue with the War on Drugs demographic be acceptable for people who look ay 'electability'? I don't know.)
2. For abortion, too: that Roe v. Wade was the overstepping of the USSC into matters rightly belonging to the States.
   (This would certainly drop me out of favor with some pro-life people; even though I believe abortion is murder and shouldn't be allowed, even in the cases of rape and incest. [Why kill the child for the sins of his parents?])
3. Immigration; my hard-line policy would probably earn me a lot of infamy in the press… it'd probably be considered too extreme by most of the Republicans on the national stage.
4. I would likely make a LOT of enemies by endeavoring to shut down government agencies that are not either directly commissioned by the Constitution, or that are not fulfilling an act directly authorized by the Constitution. (e.g. stripping the Secret Service of its protection duties and having them concentrate on counterfeiting.)
5. I would also make a lot of enemies by prosecuting the actors of Fast & Furious to the full extent of every law those agencies [DEA, FBI, ICE, and BATFE] were involved in breaking (Treason, treaties, firearm-smuggling, state-sponsored terrorism, multiple conspiracy-laws, etc).
6. Enacting the same treatment to the NSA would, no doubt, cause some to complain about me "weakening our defenses" — but I would do it anyway; they are not above the law.

So, in the end, would I be an 'electable' candidate?
Probably not; I'd probably make too many enemies and "rock the boat" too much, disturbing the comfort of our ruling caste.

[zeestephen]

RE: “Why, when your opponent is the party of incompetence and perversion, should it be an uphill battle? Its because we ceded the infrastructure of the war of ideas. Schools and universities, the news and entertainment media. Who controls these controls the politics.”

I disagree.

2012 Presidential Election - White Voters
Romney - 59%
Obama - 39%

It's “an uphill battle” because we spent the last 30 years importing Socialist voters.

It's “an uphill battle” because the Republican leadership spends more time attacking Conservatives than Democrats.

It's “an uphill battle” because 4 million Conservatives stayed home in 2012 and refused to vote for our most recent center-left presidential candidate.

[Ann Archy]

We re so IMMORAL, only GOD can save us, and we have KICKED him out. We are DOMMED unless we turn to God.

[Alberta's Child]

The bigger issue is that the biggest disasters of his presidency were self-made, and didn't require Republican majorities in either House for his administration to carry out. Think Medicare prescription drug coverage (yeah, that's the ticket -- a massive expansion of a Federal entitlement program that's already heading into insolvency), for example.

And by the time Bush left office in 2009, the military campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan had already carried on longer than the U.S. involvement in both World Wars combined.

No wonder this country was willing to elect a jug-eared Kenyan at that point.

[mvymvy]

The number of electors in each state is equal to the number of members of Congress to which the state is entitled,[4] while the Twenty-third Amendment has granted the District of Columbia with the minimum number of electors permissible for a state, which is currently three. In total, there are 538 electors, based on there being 435 representatives and 100 senators, plus the three electors from the District of Columbia. - Wikipedia

[mvymvy]

If big cities controlled the outcome of elections, the governors and U.S. Senators would be Democratic in virtually every state with a significant city.

Even in California state-wide elections, candidates for governor or U.S. Senate don’t campaign just in Los Angeles and San Francisco, and those places don’t control the outcome (otherwise California wouldn’t have recently had Republican governors Reagan, Dukemejian, Wilson, and Schwarzenegger). A vote in rural Alpine county is just an important as a vote in Los Angeles. If Los Angeles cannot control statewide elections in California, it can hardly control a nationwide election.

In fact, Los Angeles, San Francisco, San Jose, and Oakland together cannot control a statewide election in California.

Similarly, Republicans dominate Texas politics without carrying big cities such as Dallas and Houston.

There are numerous other examples of Republicans who won races for governor and U.S. Senator in other states that have big cities (e.g., New York, Illinois, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Massachusetts) without ever carrying the big cities of their respective states.

[mvymvy]

A League of Women Voters study notes that Americans are twice as likely to get hit by lightning as to have their vote canceled out by a fraudulently cast vote.