Posted on 11/05/2008 10:21:26 AM PST by RonnieFan
I have two college-aged sons, both of whom are registered Libertarian, and wrote in for Ron Paul (no, I’m not in a battleground state)
I am also a poll worker, and noticed that the vast majority of young male voters that came to vote yesterday were unaffiliated.
It seems that the Republican Party could do something over the next 4-8 years to capture these independent (in the literal sense) and individualistic voters. If my sons are any example, they are well to the right of the Republicans on fiscal issues. They also hate political correctness, and their college profs drive them crazy. Think “South Park Republican”. There ARE young people who did not drink the Obama Kool-aid. They just didn’t like McCain either.
We can clearly hang this debacle on McCain, and all the other Vichy Collaborators, which includes Bush. One does not work with democRATS, they are to be defeated.
These are just a few. I had the put a piece of tap over his name on the ballot to fool myself into voting for him (this was necessary because people look at you funny if you wear a gas mask into the booth!).
I agree with that and he also shouldn’t have supported the bailout.
I simply said we shouldn’t blame him, he merely took the opportunity provided. We should, however, take a hard look at those so-called ‘conservatives’ who promoted him from the beginning.
The fact remains that:
1. There really was no unifying conservative candidate in the 2008 primary. that may be a problem not just with the field but with the party itself and the conservative coalition of Christian moral conservatives, fiscal conservatives and defense neocons.
2. McCain lost by getting tied to Bush, and ANY candidate with an R next to his name would have been thus pegged.
I doubt any of the choices would have done better, except maybe Romney, since economy was #1 issue - that was one reason I supported Romney.
3. I dont think critiquing McCain would help. Given his money disadvantage and the media bias, he ran as good a campaign as you could expect. OTOH, there were serious technology deficiencies on MCCain side and advantages on Obama side that need to be corrected.
4. I dont think the Maverick status hurt him. Obama’s left-liberalism was enough to make me a committed and active supporter.
5. There is one Republican above all who is responsible for this loss: President Bush. Bush did good things and bad things, but in the end his popularity was the drag on the ticket that pulled all the Rs down. I dont recall the Dems running against a third GOP term in 1988 like they did here. For good reason.
McCain didn’t fight, he collaborated in his own defeat, as he will again back in the Senate. Rudy would have fought and could have won, I believe (and I’m not a Rudyist.)
Ping
Similar thanks to President Bush who has worked hard and endured much but never really understood his supporters.
Young people are the most “marketed to” generation ever created. They are bombarded with ads 24/7. Hence, they have excellent facilities for filtering out the noise.
If the Republican strategists want to reach them, they had better have a different approach than “values voters,” common sense and an old guy who only talks about the past — his past, his opponent’s past, and out country’s past.
How about McCain's own campaign staff, Peggy Noonan, David Frum for starters.
Its not meant as a perjorative. The GOP needs Rinos (especially in the Northeast) to survive. They just shouldn't be picking our candidates.
Thanks, very interesting.
55 million for McCain / Palin. Not small.
But obviously, not enough.
There are very few who could meet those criteria, but McCain was the worst of the bunch for a host of reasons. However, there are more things that unify us than separate us. The Dems are really a coalition of interest groups and more divided than we are. We had so many people in the field that McCain could take the nomination with 31% of the vote. The problem lies more with the process than the candidates.
2. McCain lost by getting tied to Bush, and ANY candidate with an R next to his name would have been thus pegged. I doubt any of the choices would have done better, except maybe Romney, since economy was #1 issue - that was one reason I supported Romney.
That was Obama's strategy, i.e., to make this race about a Bush third term. Although he figured it out too late, McCain finally realized that the only way he could win was to make the election a referendum on Obama. The Dems had nominated one of the weakest candidates ever in terms of experience and resume. We still don't know who this guy is. I know that some would like to blame it on the MSM, but McCain should have had ops research people who could go over this guy like a fine toothed comb. Much of the information out there was never used including Obama's belonging to the socialist New Party and the fact that McCain never mentioned Wright in the debates. Even Hillary did that. Imagine if McCain had attended a white racist church for 20 years.
3. I don't think critiquing McCain would help. Given his money disadvantage and the media bias, he ran as good a campaign as you could expect. OTOH, there were serious technology deficiencies on MCCain side and advantages on Obama side that need to be corrected.
McCain ran a terrible campaign. I can personally attest to that having been a volunteer for his campaign in VA makiing telephone calls and handing out sample ballots. The Obama campaign was much more organized and prepared. I can't tell you how many times this campaign resembled the Keystone cops. We didn't have poll watchers or a presence in many places. And there was no cohesive message. Again, Obama, his experience and his associations, should have been the issue and focus from day one. In many respects, the issues were tangential.
And because McCain was the candidate we couldn't go after Obama on immigration issues such as amnesty, drivers licenses, etc. and global warming. Immigration was, and continues to be a big issue in NoVA. Coal is big in SW VA. And McCain has a difficult time in debating. He is not quick on his feet. Romney and Huckabee were far superior and so are Giuliani and Hunter who would have mopped the floor with Obama. And McCain's supposed advantage with Latinos was a myth.
4. I dont think the Maverick status hurt him. Obama’s left-liberalism was enough to make me a committed and active supporter
If you believe the exit polls, only 80% of conservatives supported him. Bush drew 62 million votes in 2004. McCain will be lucky to draw 57 million. And it remains to be seen in the number who voted yesterday will top the 121 million who voted in 2004. It would be interesting to find out what the Rep turnout numbers were.
McCain was using the Sarkozy strategy of running against his own party. I don't think it worked very well when it comes to getting out the base to vote for you. Hell, I would have supported Giuliani over McCain if it meant winning. I really disliked McCain because of his stance on immigration. I am totallly convinced that an amnesty will destroy this country with the stroke of a pen. A group of us spent a total of four days each in SC and FL trailing the McCain campaign in the primaries demonstrating against him. Yet here I was yesterday standing in the rain handing out sample McCain ballots. I may not have voted for President if Palin had not been selected.
5. There is one Republican above all who is responsible for this loss: President Bush. Bush did good things and bad things, but in the end his popularity was the drag on the ticket that pulled all the Rs down. I dont recall the Dems running against a third GOP term in 1988 like they did here. For good reason.
There is no doubt that Bush was/is a disappointment. I voted for him twice. I won't recite the issues, which I am sure you know. However, I don't hold Bush responsible for the loss. I blame our primary process that produced McCain, the housing meltdown, and McCain the deeply flawed candidate. McCain could still have won if he had from the very beginning made the election a referendum on Obama. It would have been dirty and nasty with the other side calling us racists and bigots, but it would have been effective.
I do blame McCain. He was leading at the time of the bank debacle. His first instinct? Blame Bush’s Treasury Secretary. It was weeks until he figured out that it was Barney Fag and Chris Dodd and Acorn and Obama and the liberals who doomed Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. By then it was too late. The economy was on the GOP’s shoulders and McCain was dead.
“Immigration is an issue that is not working out well for our party, The GOP. That is a reality. Plenty of strong, anti-illegal immigration Congressmen have gone down to defeat in the past 4 years. We’ve not seen such candidates out perform the party (as if it is a winning issue, and such candidates are winning) Not because they are wrong, per say, on this issue (they’re not) but the premise of the argument we’ve lost (till date).”
Why is that? It’s bizarre, but this is an issue that many Dmeocrats are with us on... but dont vote that way in elections. Why can we win an election by taking a position that 60% of voters agree with?
“I wish GWB did not bring up immigration the way he did. However, I also wish our bases response to such should have been more controlled (for lack of a better expression at the moment).”
Immigration is a GOP wedge issue. The fact remains that Obama and the Dems know will give us amnesty. And social security for illegals. It’s also an issue where the ‘monied interests’ and the grassroots are on opposite sides, and this also exposed faultlines in the GOP support wrt other related issues on the economy.
“Lastly the GOP must understand who our enemy is. That is the MSM. Not Democrats. Correcting MSM driven false premises 24/7, 365 days a year is a must. The GOP has to stop allowing false premise after false premise to take root.”
Yes. Let me point out that the one person other than Bush who was responsible for this electoral disaster was ... Scottie McClellan. What a horrible press secretary and then a backstabber. The Bush WH never pushed back on MSM memes that brought them down and the MSM is getting more biased then ever.
I agree with your 2 cents.
1) Where possible, Democrats must be prevented from voting in Republican primaries.
2) Every effort to punish and prevent voter fraud must be pursued. Penalties should be extreme.
3) We all need to agree to NOT SUPPORT FLAWED CANDIDATES! How may times did we hear that candidate X was right on 80% of the issues? That is not good enough. If a candidate is ticking off 20% of the base, DO NOT attempt to force that candidate upon the party — lest we end up with results similar to yesterday.
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