I guess he didn't see this map (/sarc). Bush won Iowa later.
Posted on 11/08/2004 5:48:35 AM PST by OESY
...There is no doubt that John Kerry showed great skill at embracing deeply contradictory positions, but that does not make him unusual; all politicians have mastered the art of self-contradiction. What was remarkable in this election is that one candidate, President Bush, never changed: He said what he meant and meant what he said.
If the Democrats could not appeal to the moral values of people, that fact must have been lost on the 48% of the voters who supported Sen. Kerry....
I am just as mystified by Mr. Friedman's lament that "Christian fundamentalists" are ruining his America by fostering "divisions and intolerance." It would make as much sense to say that liberals are fostering division and intolerance by favoring abortion and gay marriages. In fact, abortion was not an issue in the election and Messrs. Bush and Kerry both opposed gay marriage. A ban on gay marriage was approved in Oregon, a state won by Sen. Kerry....
People vote for the president for a host of reasons that pollsters have difficulty in grasping. All we seem to know very clearly is where they live.... To explain the vote requires us to explain the variety of factors.... One problem is that they have only some very gross measures on which to work, such as the state of the economy and standings in the polls.
The pollsters do no provide much information because they usually gather too few responses to permit observers to cross-tabulate data into all of the relevant categories....
I draw lessons from the election, but not very deep ones. One is that the profound liberal bias among many big-city newspapers and most TV stations did not determine the outcome....
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
The very assumption that the red states are comprised of monodimensional stepford bots who get programmed on Sunday then vote on Tuesday is itself a superficial stereotype. Its lone function is to allow the left to feel superior while they lose.
I've never seen such suicidal groupthink on such a scale.
"Could it be because you did not have to be a rocket scientist to see how big a phony he was?"
I think you've nailed it. Just like Algore, JFK promised everything to everyone.
This country does not like slick, polished, snake oil salesmen, ie. your typical politician.
Anyone who bothered to look at Kerry's votes in the senate could see that he was a total phony.
CHARACTER!
And yes, it does matter.
Yet every one of your salient facts about Kerry's misbehavior by necessity involves moral and ethical judgment; ie, "values". We saw though Kerry and voted values.
Cordially,
"What turned the fencesitters"
You're exactly right Mr. S. First of all, if these exit polls were all such BS, then why are we paying attention to the analysis of who "turned" based on them? One reason only: the MSM and dems WANT us to believe it was the "evangelicals" who did it for Bush. Why? It gives them ammo to use against all of us, stereotyping us as intolerant gay-bashers.
As you said, the social issues were NOT the thing that caused a small portion of the electorate to switch their party votes to Bush.
It was, in reality, the MILITARY-MINDED VOTERS who crossed over -- longtime dems who were perhaps Vietnam Vets or family members of vets, veterans from other wars who felt solidarity with our soldiers from Vietnam and today... I'll bet even some labor union type folks who, as the ad says, in the solitude of the polling booth KNEW Bush was the right man for the job, but could never, ever admit it for fear of reprisals.
I know for a fact about hundreds of veterans and active duty military who crossed over. And my neighbor is a teamster, long time dem, who was the FIRST in the neighborhood to put a Bush sign in his yard (he couldn't take a bumper sticker for fear of reprisals at work). My neighbor is the Harly riding tough guy, and knows we're fighting a real war here...but surprisingly, he also admitted to me that Bush has been better for his business than any democrat ever has been.
Question is: who do they have like that?
Lieberman
Let the rats NOT figure this one out correctly. Then in the next election cycle, then the next election cycle, then the next election cycle....THE RATS NEVER WIN AGAIN.
Simple. Kerry lost because he was an extremely flawed candidate. The Democrats, in their haste to nominate anyone but Dean, failed to take a realistic objective look at Kerry.
Yes, Lieberman might do OK, but I think he's probably too old.
Thank you, I've been saying the same thing for a week. I know a LOT of Dems who jumped sides and voted for Bush precisely because of national security issues, nothing else.
While 22% picked "values" as their highest priority, that still means that 78% didn't. And if you add the "Iraq" (something like 20%) and "Terrorism" (something like 19%) together you come up with 39 or 40%, higher than the generic "values".
I don't like what is being done with this poll and the values number. The MSM is playing it up that the Republicans are all religious nutjobs, the lefties are eating it up, and some of the religious right are trying their best to prove them right. And it's all detracting from the most serious issue we face, the war on terror.
Meanwhile most people just don't want to get blown up in their office buildings.
LQ
Good one.
I guess he didn't see this map (/sarc). Bush won Iowa later.
He lost because he was a pompous ass who thought he was better than everyone else. That's evident on how he treated his butler/valet. BUTLER/VALET. He brings his Butler/Valet along on the campaign trail then F's him over a silly hairbrush? A hairbrush folks something that maybe a really poor person doesn't even own yet Kerry hollers at his butler/valet because the man forgot kerry's brush? This ALONE should tell you the level of the character of kerry. This being the candidate who was gonna FIGHT for this and FIGHT for that and FIGHT for the middle class. I wonder...did kerry give back HIS PORTION OF THE TAX CUT?????????? How come kerry rode in an SUV family owned or not? He was and is a phony baloney. He lost because we all saw what he really was even though the MSM thought only a story of a young girl jokingly sticking her tongue out at the press was more important than the stories coming out in the magazine we keep hearing about today of the things that took place in the kerry campaign. I said throughout this campaign that God IS watching and...He WAS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Because he sux.
Wilson is one of the "Uriah Heeps" out there plotting and planning to co-opt the 2004 conservative victory for their own secret agendas.
The Uriah Heeps of the world would manhandle the social conservative victory----and dilute the presidential mandate conferred by proto-conservatives----for their own self-serving agendas.
The Uriah Heeps could care less for the rights of the unborn and the restoration of conservative values to our Nation-----the proto-conservative issues that drove millions of Christians to the polls.
The agenda-laden, elliptical thinkers lurk in the shadows plotting ways to take over conservative victories. It ain't gonna happen.
Any mucking up of our hard-won conservative victory will be met with fierce resistance.
Moral issues were this election's key to victory, and moral issues will set the agenda.
Every card-carrying conservative worth his/her salt knows what "moral issues" means.
Karl Rove knew where to get the "values voters" to give Bush the majorities he needed to win. Rove is not the only one who knows where they are.
You have to wonder who is goading Wilson to make these comments, although I'd gladly wager a guess, and I would be right.
Many in the press/media are still trying to figure out what the words values and morals means
An issue to you, but this article was not about you. Abortion isn't the overriding issue of this, or any modern day election. Sorry.
I guess the fact that Specter's nomination is now the number one issue confronting the new administration is also unconnected to murdering the unborn?
Sorry, ghoul. Your empire is crumbling.
That is another post-election tranqulizer they are trying hard to swallow.
Kerry is representative of the ideology of the heart of the Democratic party.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.