My perception could be wrong, but I don’t think Romney ran THAT bad of a campaign.
Obama lost lots of support from 2008, Romney gained some. It was not enough. Obama still had a huge minority vote.
But I didn’t see a terrible Romney campaign. He was pretty aggressive, he didn’t back down, he romped in the first debate, held his own in the others.
If I want to Monday morning quarterback, I’d say that lull before the GOP convention, they needed to go more negative on Obama as Obama was “defining” Romney to many people in the BG states.
I agree with your perception. But I still never hear anyone put the blame where I think it belongs: on THE MEDIA. And I’m sick of everyone scolding “don’t whine about the media bias.”
Until the media does it’s job, with unbiased/balanced reporting, the GOP will never win the low-information voters. Sadly, never.
Romney could have devastated Obama on so many things, but chose not to for some reason. He didn’t know how to fight the Chicago thugs.
Sorry! “Romney gained some.” Romney got fewer votes than McCain in 2008. I wish I had voted for Ron Paul! Never again!
Nowadays everything has to be the worst ever. If you don't overemphasize and exaggerate your message doesn't get through.
Romney and his campaign were definitely missing something. Just what it was and whether it was something he and his people could have provided and whether that would have been enough to win are all tough questions.
I argued since September that Romney needed to nationalize his message, and augment it with coattails in each state. Romney needed to present a leadership team beyond Ryan, and run on the strength of that team. Romney should have appeared in each state with their House and Senate candidates, and campaigned on a message of sending his team to Washington to put the country back on track.
He didn't. Instead, Romney ran a passive, safe (or so he thought), campaign that lacked focus. Instead of building and maintaining momentum, Romney coasted on the little momentum he did gain from the first debate, and then let events sweep him from the news in the final weeks of the campaign.
-PJ
Socialists always use scare tactics, and we rarely fight back.
Glenn Beck had it right...he spent countless hours exposing the truth behind Obama and his administration and supporters, along with Tea Party supporters.
The result was a huge victory in 2010. But then, the GOP establishment types pushed the Tea Party aside and Beck left Fox News.
I don’t mean that Glenn Beck has to be the guy, but we need someone in the media willing to educate about why socialism is a bad thing. It can be done, but we have to get the establishment out of the way for it to work.
We’re not talking about Romney, who personally ran a good campaign.
It was all those campaign funkiest and consultants who did the details, which are the ones Caddell is talking about.
Think of that buffoon Eric Fehrnstrom who after Romney took strong stands on amnesty and other issues in the primaries came out and said “we’ll change our message like an Etch a sketch”
That lost millions of those white Reagan democrats and others who could no longer trust Romney.
We’re not talking about Romney, who personally ran a good campaign.
It was all those campaign funkiest and consultants who did the details, which are the ones Caddell is talking about.
Think of that buffoon Eric Fehrnstrom who after Romney took strong stands on amnesty and other issues in the primaries came out and said “we’ll change our message like an Etch a sketch”
That lost millions of those white Reagan democrats and others who could no longer trust Romney.
I think he ran a pretty bad campaign. One way of looking at it is how much better did the GOP ticket do because of Romney’s campaign?
IOW, lets say after the convention Romney had announced “Look, we all know how awful Obama is, I’m not even going to bother campaigning. It’s simple. If you want 4 more years of Obama, vote for him in November, if you don’t, vote for me.
Would he have ended up any worse than he did?
I don’t think so/
In the end, he wound up with the 47.5% or so who would have just as soon voted “Not Obama”. I don’t think he really added anything to that or built on the anti-Obama vote to get him the extra few pts he needed to get over the top. That’s on the campaign.
Romney was making huge gains after the first debate, but after that, he was advised to get back above the fray and NOT TO ATTACK Obama. We all see where that got the GOP.
Steve Schmidt, McCain's senior/main consultant is STILL making noises about the far Christian right ruining the party, when it is really he and other consultants like him giving bad advise.
Schmidt was the leader in trying to trivialize Palin's effect on McCain's campaign, when in reality, she had a much more helpful effect than Schmidts advice did. If he had gotten out of the way and McCain had grown a backbone, he could have won.
This article and Cadell's speech is on the money.
vaudine
Romney was the personification of what liberals in my living memory have accused the Republican Party of being. Rich, separatist, white country club members. The JonStewart media did what no campaign accused of the image of white 'rich' people could ever undo or even unmask. AND Romney is not conservative. He could never explain what 'free markets' unmolested by government nannies does for every American.