[GeronL]

they stayed home because Romney is a RINO probably

[sten]

never saw that coming

oh wait, I did

all you need to do is see the reaction here between Mormons and other various Christian denominations to understand people would stay home instead of vote

of course, the other main reason Romney lost was the demographic no one is talking about. the druggies, deviants, and various criminal types. they look at Romney as their polar opposite... everything they could have been... the summation of their failures... and they run screaming (mentally) from Romney.

one reason Sarah is so appealing is her background. the more they try to tear her down, the more she ‘looks like them)

[gusopol3]

Thanks, finally a meaningful analysis of the election.

[Zhang Fei]

The GOP has been sticking it to Reagan Democrats for a couple of decades. It's one thing to go after unions, and quite another to suppress all working class wages by not controlling the border. I think the GOP is also losing the white collar professional vote by allowing H1-B visas to balloon. I understand why plutocrats would want unlimited H1-B visas to lower their costs - men like Zuckerberg and Koch (not to mention luminaries in the Democratic party) stand to gain additional billions of dollars from increases in the value of their stockholdings. The question is how do you deal with the economic devastation this causes to college-degreed Americans who have spent huge amounts of money getting their credentials only to lose out to foreigners - Americans who are now turning against the GOP along with the imported foreign workers who were inclined to vote Democratic anyway.

Reagan imposed tariffs and import quotas on Japanese goods because he understood that unemployment benefits, welfare or suggesting that these people work at McDonalds are not an adequate political response to the problem of American industry shedding huge numbers of jobs. The GOP has now compounded the rapid losses of jobs to imports with domestic wage rate erosion by turning a blind eye to tens of millions of illegal alien workers while seeking to import even more skilled workers to drive down wages.

Then there's the GOP's relentless attacks on Medicare. Paul Ryan was an albatross who sank Romney's campaign because he wrote a budget that focused on cutting Medicare, a benefit that GOP voters have spent decades paying for. Having Ryan on the GOP ticket was a stick in the eye for any working man or woman looking at retirement in the next decade or so.

It seems to me that a basic precept of political maneuvering is that you attack the economic interests of the other party's voters. The GOP seems relentlessly focused on attacking the economic interests of its working and middle class voters, seeming to think that narrowing its voter base to social conservatives and plutocrats will keep it in power. If it's not careful, and goes through with an amnesty bill, it could end up folding in 2014.

[gusopol3]

One thing they barely mention is the community organizing strategy of Obama/ Democrats . I believe their precinct captains are given a quota and no matter what will turn out that number. With driving people around from place to place to vote multiple times, they’ll get their numbers. I wonder how much voter ID can disrupt that where it needs to, the swing states.

[aragorn]

I have doubts about this explanation.

I remember watching the various FR threads on election day. As I recall, many, many FReepers reported that there seemed to be heavy, even record turnout at their polling locations. Indeed, this was my experience as well - when I went to my tiny rural polling place and asked the poll workers about the turnout, the numbers they relayed to me were several times what I have come to expect as "normal" out here.

So, my question is this: did a certain segment of voters simply stay home, or were their votes somehow negated?