Posted on 11/07/2008 6:16:43 PM PST by SeekAndFind
As usual, the media has missed the huge story of this election. Their story is that Obama registered huge masses of new supporters and got them to the polls. At first, that was what I thought, but that is not the key factor. I was expecting the highest percentage turnout in 100 years amounting to 130,000,000 voters, but instead as of 5:00 PM EDT, 121,146,964 people voted for Obama or McCain. In 2004, 121,069,054 people voted for Bush or Kerry. Hence in a hotly contested election in which a fortune was spent on the race, there was no big surge in voter turnout. The population is bigger and the number of registered voters is larger than in 2004, yet just about the same number of people voted. What are we to make of this? We know that a higher than normal percentage of minorities and under 30 youths turned out pushing up the Democratic votes. We know that about 15% of Democrats who voted for Hillary Clinton voted for McCain-Palin (the PUMA voters). So how are we to explain the results? The conclusion is inescapable. The Republicans stayed home in droves. Obama did not win the election, the Republicans gave it to him by not getting out and voting.
For those of you who have been following my previous articles, you know I was predicting a McCain-Palin landslide in the electoral votes based on the P.U.M.A. Factor. Since these disgruntled Hillary supporters would normally vote Democrat, that should have been enough to tip the balance in the key states. I even allowed for a huge turnout because of Obama's vaunted ACORN express in my calculations so as not to underestimate the number of PUMA voters required. I have been doing this for 45 years and have never been wrong before. It goes without saying that when the results were widely different from what I predicted, I wanted to know how I could be so wrong. At first I thought it was because the PUMA voters did not turn out and vote for McCain-Palin but they clearly did. Then I thought that it was because Obama got millions of new voters to the polls and simply swamped the PUMA factor.
It was only when the turnout figures became available that I had to discard that theory. If the usual number of people voted yet more Democrats than normal turned out and there a sizable number of PUMA voters voting Republican, how could McCain-Palin have lost? When the results were staring me in the face, I was totally shocked. The smaller turnout meant that even fewer PUMA voters were required in the key states than I had calculated so McCain-Palin should have done even better than I predicted. Naturally my predictions were based on a normal Republican turnout. Who would have ever thought that the Republicans would fail to turn out in this election? While I am still busy trying to wipe the egg of my face, I am also extremely curious as to why so many Republicans stayed home. I imagine that I am not alone in wondering that at this point.
Did all the publicity about a Obama landslide and polls showing that Obama had it made in the shade cause the Republicans to stay home? Were too many Republicans so unhappy with President Bush that they felt that there was no point in voting? Were the Republicans that unhappy with McCain and Palin as the candidates? Were too many Republicans affected by white guilt about slavery and figured electing Obama would prove that America is not a racist country anymore? Yet the tracking polls only showed a 6% defection to Obama from Republicans. Mark Bureau has suggested that it was because McCain voted for the bailout bill which is an excellent point. Whatever their reason was, it does not change the results.
I will add two more possible reasons for the low Republican turnout. It has been speculated that it was the Romney supporters who stayed home. The other reason being floated is that too many Republicans bought into the media portraying Sarah Palin as a total twit. I have more than one personal friend that falls into that category. Obviously, my reputation for knowing what I am talking about is a bit tarnished at this point. A lot of people have written to say that they cannot imagine why anyone would listen to what I have to say. My answer is that I am not always wrong and I am not wrong about why Obama won. I offer in my defense: Much-hyped Turnout Record Fails to Materialize Convenience Voting Fails to Boost Balloting. In case you do not wish to follow the link, here is the relevant part:
"A downturn in the number and percentage of Republican voters going to the polls seemed to be the primary explanation for the lower than predicted turnout. The percentage of eligible citizens voting Republican declined to 28.7 percent down 1.3 percentage points from 2004. Democratic turnout increased by 2.6 percentage points from 28.7 percent of eligibles to 31.3 percent. It was the seventh straight increase in the Democratic share of the eligible vote since the party’s share dropped to 22.7 percent of eligibles in 1980."
The trouble with people like McCain is, they spend a decade trashing the conservative base, ridiculing conservatives, spitting in the face of conservatives, ignoring or going against the desires of conservatives (amnesty, McCain-Feingold, gang of 14 etc), then he turns round and expects the same conservatives he’s been abusing to vote for him.
In a way McCain deserved every bit of the whipping he took from the MSM. After all, the same McCain had spent the last 8 years, playing up to the MSM, and using the MSM to undermine the Republican Party, conservatives, and President Bash at every opportunity he got. In a way its poetic justice. He deserved whatever he got.
Without Gov Palin, and the very horror of an Obambi presidency, there’s no way I’d have voted for this clown.
McCain lost because of McCain.
After two years of BO’s economics and broken promises, the Republican Party (if it can pull itself together)should retake the House of Representatives. That will put a brake on BO’s first and only term.
In the end, I think it was mostly Evangelicals staying home, and maybe the bishops not getting the word out soon enough about abortion being the deal breaker.
McCain really made himself unpopular with the Evangelicals in 2000, and he screwed up again this time, too. He really just doesn’t seem to get it. I was hoping Sarah Palin would be enough to bring them out, but evidently it wasn’t quite enough to counterbalance their distaste for McCain.
The advertisements and 24 hour news channel support put this into motion. A fluctuating society, as we are and should be, is not necessarily a bad thing. A communist leading it is potential disaster.
open *and early primaries in NH and FL sealed the GOP fate.
Six weeks ago when I said McCain's campaign couldn't get him elected in a High School Class officer election I got flamed big time. When I said McCain had problems in Indiana I was told I was just an Obama booster and McCain had Indiana in the bag. McCain did absolutely nothing to win Indiana.
McCain's loss was of his own doings.
“The remaining 60% of the party had sufficient numbers who still didn’t like McCain that they didn’t vote for him.
Non-voting Republicans controlled the outcome”
********
You know what’s really funny about all this?
Even at the peak of the campaign, the brain dead McCain was still going flat out for the Latino vote (who were never going to vote for him anyway), with promises of amnesty, instead of wooing the conservative base of the Republican Party, who were not so eager to vote for him.
In the end , Republicans staying home just cost him these elections. Why after all, should they vote for a guy that was STILL promising to screw them up, by granting amnesty to 20 million law breakers, rapists , drug dealers and killers so far as their crimes had not been discovered yet?
Despite all his pandering to LaRaza and other extremist Latino amnesty and open borders fanatics, he got exactly nowhere with those people. Talk about a really stupid guy.
No question about that. McCain is too nice of a guy. When it comes to campaigns, he lives in a fantasy world where neither candidate attacks the other. Each candidate is simply to say why he should win, not why the other should lose. This belief of his is the foundation of McCain-Feingold. McCain never wanted to attack Obama; Obama never had such an inhibition.
With that said, those Conservatives who didn't vote for him for his not being a Conservative were foolish. It's better to have a Center-Left President, than to have a Communist President. Sometimes you have to pick between crappy choices. Not voting is a choice and that choice will give us President Obama on January 20.
Thanks for the link. I’ve read it numerous times but it’s still interesting. George Washington was not known to behave like this.
Wasted?
What better could you have done with it?
Ultimately, those who failed to support real conservatives in the primaries are the ones responsible for the nomination of McCain, and thus his inestimably botched campaign, and thus the loss a few days ago.
After two years of Obama, we will rule the House. I am looking forward to that.
From your PC to God’s ears
No, it wasn't them. I know exactly which Republicans stayed home this election.
The Ron Paul Republicans.
I completely agree - I will NEVER understand this sadistic mentality - why suffer to make a point? Or, why make EVERYONE suffer to make your point...
I completely agree - I will NEVER understand this sadistic mentality - why suffer to make a point? Or, why make EVERYONE suffer to make your point...
I could have voted my conscience and wrote a name in. It would have been no more of a waste than my vote for McCain.
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