Posted on 12/18/2010 9:25:43 AM PST by Brices Crossroads
Predictably, the blogosphere is alive with polls telling conservatives that, in spite of the smashing conservative triumph of last month inspired and led by the TEA Party and Sarah Palin, Governor Palin's nomination for President in 2012 will result in an electoral debacle at the hands of Barack Obama. Most recently, ABC and the Washington Post produced a poll showing that Obama would trounce Palin by 22 points.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/12/17/AR2010121701512.html?hpid=topnews
I frequently see bloggers and conservative analysts, even those who favor Palin, try to refudiate such polls based upon the sample size, the length of time between now and the election, the absence of the momentum building, year long Presidential campaign, the fact that Regan came back from even greater deficits, and many other factors which render such polls meaningless. All these rebuttals are well taken, but it seems to me that they miss the point.
Notice how the MSM outlets always focus on generic national polls, using 2008 turnout models, ignoring the 2010 elections. By responding to these polls as some do, we are making a classic mistake that no good lawyer or advocate ever makes: We are letting the opponent frame the issue and accepting their premise. The election is not a national election, based on a generic plebiscite. It is 50 separate state elections. The Establishment and its MSM pipe organ never want to talk about the real key to electability....the Electoral College, because it does not fit their chosen meme of Palin's unelectability. Instead, an analysis of the Electoral College, which is the true measure of electability not only shows that Palin is electable, but that it is Obama whose hold on the presidency that is becoming increasingly precarious.
The electoral map is now tilting heavily in her direction, with the South solidly in her corner and the Midwest (especially Ohio and Wisconsin) trending heavily away from Obama and toward her. If she holds the McCain states (which is a given) and adds just six more (Florida, North Carolina, Ohio, Nevada, Indiana, and Virginia)---traditional red states, in each of which Obama's poll numbers are in the tank-- she wins the Presidency with 271 electoral votes.
I do not even include formerly blue states that went deep red such as Wisconsin (Tea Party Senator), New Mexico (Mama Grizzly/Tea Party Governor) and New Hampshire (Mama Grizzly wins Senate 60-40 over Dem Congressman). Obama will be hard pressed in all three, especially Wisconsin.
We all need to block out the Charlie Cooks and the other proponents of the MSM agitprop that Palin cannot win. They are out to demoralize us and their generic poll numbers, two years out, do not change the electoral college math, which favors Palin. We need to stop allowing the lamestream media to define "electability" in such a way that it suits their purposes.
From now on, when someone challenges Governor Palin's electability and throws an MSM poll in your face, politely redirect the argument to the electoral college and enlighten them about the fact that, under the Constitution and in light of the current political conditions in the battleground states, Sarah Palin is not only electable, but it is Obama who is becoming increasingly unelectable.
http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/254939/elite-guilt-begat-obamacare-interview?page=5
LOPEZ: Who is the ultimate anti-elite?
BERAN: The founders of the Republic. They were, certainly, an elite; but they were an elite gifted with self-knowledge, and they created a constitutional system designed to frustrate the human will to power. Their system of checks and balances has preserved Americans’ liberties and at the same time allowed men like Lincoln to rise into greatness — men who lacked elite credentials and would not have gotten very far under the elitist regimes of the Old World. The question today is whether we can prevent the wreck of the founders’ labors and restrain the Leviathan of the administrative state.
As a result of the mandarin revolution over which our elites have presided, too much discretionary authority has been confided to unelected regulators and unaccountable quasi-public bodies (like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac), and too much purse-string power has been vested in robo-laws that automatically trigger expenditures of public funds and steadily increase the size and scope of the government. It is sobering to reflect that overall government spending in the United States, which accounted for less than 7 percent of the gross domestic product in 1903, was estimated in 2009 to account for as much as 43 percent of GDP.
LOPEZ: Is Sarah Palin’s popularity a response to the “pathology of the elites”?
BERAN: Richard Cohen said in theWashington Post the other day that the Left “has long thought that there ought to be some connection between intelligence or learning and the right to govern.” How nice it must be to belong to that good-thinking mutual-admiration society that so forthrightly opposes its opponents’ faith in government by the stupid! For Cohen, the connection between intelligence and the right to govern is sufficiently attested in President Obama’s case by the fact that he and his wife have been “accredited by no less than four Ivy League institutions — Harvard twice and Princeton and Columbia, once each.” Res ipsa loquitur, as we elitists might say.
Sarah Palin infuriates the elites because she has not only questioned their system of accreditation, she has identified their moral “spinelessness” precisely with the elite training they have received, and has in particular questioned the moral value of an “elite Ivy League education.” Palin is saying essentially what Trilling said 60 years ago when he argued that the “educated class” of his day, however accomplished it might have been, was morally unintelligent. Your garden-variety elitist will put up with this sort of criticism from Lionel Trilling, but not from Sarah Palin. They despise the folksy candor that has made her a popular figure in much of the rest of the country.
(much more at link.....great interview of the author of “The Pathology of Elites”)
I think if Obama won in 2012, it would be time for secession.
Ping!
Great analysis, as usual, Brice. Well done.
From your keyboard to the great facebook beyond the sky
Dude! You freakin’ ROCK!
Thanks for another great piece of writing.
I should mention that in five of the six sates I mentioned—Florida, Ohio, Nevada, Indiana, and Virginia—there are GOP governors and Secretaries of State so the opportunity for electoral fraud will be minimized.
In North Carolina, it won’t be that close and it is my understanding that the the governor there has no role in certifying the election.
post hoc, ergo propter hoc I would say in response:
“After, therefore because of.” A common fallacy in reasoning, in which causality is ascribed to preceding conditions which were in fact irrelevent to the supposed effect."
This was an excellent post to read with my first cup of coffee for the day.
Great job...
What a GREAT article. I’m going to cut and paste it to my FaceBook page immediately.
I can’t tell you how frustrating it has been to hear my conservative friends say over and over again, “I like Palin, but she’s unelectable.”
No, she’s NOT unelectable, especially in 2012.
Forget what the pundits and Republican elite are saying. Just look at how they savaged the choices the people made in primaries when they weren't to their liking and you know they're not concerned about winning and recovering the Constitutional Republic as much as they're concerned with staying in their nice little cat bird seats.
Regards
I do believe the biggest hurdle will not be the general, but getting the nomination.
With people like Pence, Bolton, Cain, and other decent sounding conservatives (most of whom we like) getting into the race, the primaries become the more difficult race. None of the conservative elves can win, but if Huckaphony enters the race, the biggest danger is the vote splitting allowing the GOP elite to get its dearly beloved candidate, one Mitt Romney slithering into the nomination.
Palin is more likely to be the GOP nominee then Obama is to be the Demo nominee
This will really irritate the rats at my Local Watering Hole.
In 1978 Reagan was about as popular as Palin, maybe less so.
“I do believe the biggest hurdle will not be the general, but getting the nomination.”
I am not so sure, Sharky. I think she can win the nomination fairly easily. The Establishment tried to jam Regan with a big field as well including Phil Crane and Bob Dole (who was considered a conservative at the time). In spite of the number of candidates (which included the Senate minority leader Howard Baker and former TX governor and Treasury Secretary John Connally, they were never able to pry Reagan’s fingers off the conservative base.
I expect the same will happen with Palin. Her positives are so high among the GOP in Wisconsin, Ohio, Iowa and South Carolina (and even more off the charts with conservatives) that I expect her to sweep the field.
Thank you for an outstanding piece of original work!
I think you’ll enjoy this one.
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