Election Day 2012 LIVE Talkback (Please Read Rules Before Posting)!

[Shawn Hopkins]

Here's the real difference in the campaigns. Willingness to face reality. When Obama's numbers dropped like a stone after the first debate he realized he was in trouble and changed his gameplan to claw his way back.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/08/us/politics/obama-campaign-clawed-back-after-a-dismal-debate.html

In Mitt Romney's world, however, things that didn't tell him what he wanted to hear were "skewed," and he was gobsmacked by election results that took him completely by surprise.

Adviser: Romney "shellshocked" by loss - CBS News

 

[wonderfly]

On immigration, Hispanics are smart enough to realize that Obama was blocked at every turn by Republicans when he tried to do immigration reform, and STILL didn't give up and went around them to get a practical Dream Act in place. It wasn't out of the news, it was in the news and one party looked willing to work with them and one party looked obstructionist.

Full disclaimer, I just don't remember the Dream Act being that hotly contested (or rather, that hot of a news topic) before this election cycle, over the last 4 years of the Obama Presidency. Back in 2006/07, when Bush was trying to push it, for some reason immigration was MAJOR news those years. I just don't recall Obama making immigration a priority, by comparison. But maybe that's just my memory.

It would be a lot better to just raise the question without the potshot, which was insulting. Seriously, this is the thing that has annoyed me the most over the last few days, the implication that everyone who voted for Obama did it because they are stupid or for immoral reasons.

Well, I admit it when I make a mistake, so in case I haven't made it clear by now:

I'm sorry for my potshot, I thought it harmless at first, and then I figured I'd turn it into a debate point. This election thread is an experiment for this forum, and after the election has been decided, it's easy for both sides to get fired up about the results.

So if I may suggest: LET'S ALL TAKE A DEEP BREATH, myself included.

So does anyone have any other thoughts on the election results?? Things that took you by surprise or that you expected?!?

 

[Light Lucario]

For the record, I'm fully aware of how the economy currently is and considering that my father has been out of work for over two years, it would be ridiculous if I didn't notice it. Even so, I voted for Obama partly because of how his plans has slowly improved it and nothing Romney said made me think he could do a better job. He was insulting the poor, so he obviously wasn't that interested in actually helping people, and his plans were pretty vague for the most part. The social issues were important for me, especially healthcare, but I couldn't care less about marijuana if I tried. Though, marijuana and same-sex marriage, which is important to me, weren't up for vote in my state. Obama certainly has problems too, but nothing about Romney made me interested in him more, practically everything I read/heard about him did the opposite, and I wanted to vote for someone who I could agree on at least some issues. Just wanted to get that off my chest.

 

[Space Cadet]

So does anyone have any other thoughts on the election results?? Things that took you by surprise or that you expected?!?

Just how successful Democrats were in the Senate. They had 23 seats they had to defend and were able to gain 5 seats. I was surprised that they were able to pick off North Dakota and Indiana, states that went to Romney.

At the moment, there are five House seats that haven't been called yet. Democrats lead in 5 out of the 6 races. If it holds up, then the Democrats would win 200 seats to the Republicans 235 seats. Not bad at all.

 

[Jacob]

I'll gladly give him credit for things that he did (and will do) that I agree with - I applaud him for authorizing the mission to kill Bin Ladin, I give him credit for the role we took in freeing Libya from Gadhafi.

But Peter asked if I'll find him "OK", and the answer is no, because I fundamentally disagree with his vision for the country. Doesn't mean I don't respect the office of the President, the electoral process, or that I won't applaud him for things I feel he does right.

Moving on:

Why is Florida still listed as "undecided"?

At 97% of the vote counted, Obama's ahead by 50,000 votes roughly. I don't see Mitt overcoming that, might as well toss that state to Obama as well. Ohio says 90% of the vote is in, yet they still declared it for Obama (though Romney's down by 100,000 votes there).

Anyway, if you toss Florida over to Obama, that'll make the final electoral count: Obama = 332, Romney = 206.

In the popular vote, Obama's got 61 million, Romney's got 58 million, a very close popular vote, when compared to 2008 (actually, it's very comparable to 2004, when Bush got 286 electoral votes and Kerry got 251 electoral votes).

I got to looking at the map of 2012 versus the map of 2008.

Here's 2008:

And here's 2012:

So the only changes this time around is that Romney picked up North Carolina, Indiana, and the one electoral vote from Nebraska. Good grief. What happened to the battleground states?!? Indiana wasn't even declared a battleground state, it was just a given that it would go Romney, thus making North Carolina the only "battleground state" that Romney picked off.

New Hampshire, Virginia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Iowa, Colorado, Nevada, and probably Florida - WHAT THE HECK HAPPENED?!?! Iowa - it's right above Missouri - there's not that much difference between our two states, is there?!? Virginia - why are you out of step with the rest of the South?!? You're right next to West Virginia, Kentucky, and North Carolina - why aren't you feeling the vibe from them?!?

Maybe Romney will somehow pull through in Florida (word is they're still counting absentee ballots - that would make for a small concession in Romney's favor, for all that's worth).

I thought for sure that Romney and Obama would split more of the battleground states (thus making for a closer electoral vote). Looking at that popular vote - this was indeed a much closer election. I just wish the electoral vote reflected that a tad bit more, that's all.

Virginia is a southern state, historically, because it was part of the Confederacy. But culturally, it really isn't southern anymore. I mean, if you look at a map of Virginia, about 80% of it is culturally southern. But the western and southern half of the state is sparsely populated. If you did a poll of all Virginians and asked them if they were southern or not, probably only 30 or 40% would say they were. If you think someone like Bob McDonnell represents Virginia, you would think Virginians are all right wingers, but really the only reason he got elected is because VA has crazy off-year governors elections and no one pays attention to them.

North Carolina just barely went for Romney (50%-49%). I think that in a few years Republicans will be in serious trouble there too, with the population around Raleigh-Durham becoming more liberal. Exit polls showed the 18-29 vote in North Carolina was 67% Democratic, which is actually among the highest in the nation (national average was 60%).

Also, if you look at other southern states - Romney only got 53% of the vote in Georgia and 54% in South Carolina. That's a safe win, but it's really not much if you think about it. Georgia has a very high and still rising Mexican population, so it could become more competitive in the future too.

 

[Peter Paltridge]

Here's the real difference in the campaigns. Willingness to face reality. When Obama's numbers dropped like a stone after the first debate he realized he was in trouble and changed his gameplan to claw his way back.

Obama Campaign Clawed Back After a Dismal Debate - NYTimes.com

In Mitt Romney's world, however, things that didn't tell him what he wanted to hear were "skewed," and he was gobsmacked by election results that took him completely by surprise.

Adviser: Romney "shellshocked" by loss - CBS News

You don't know the half of it:

Romney had purchased victory fireworks
"Things didn't go as planned for Mitt Romney on Election Day in more ways than one," says Glen Johnson at The Boston Globe. "The Republican was prepared to celebrate his election as the 45th president with an eight-minute fireworks display within view of his party at the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center." The Romney campaign reportedly paid $25,000 for fireworks that "had a patriotic theme, heavy on red, white, and blue colors."

See, it's stuff like this. It's this kind of arrogance that just makes me.....rrrrgh. Thank goodness he's gone now.

I think the man was just so rich that he had never been told "no" and thought anything was possible for him. That's where the protective bubble originated. Don't need an oblivious guy like that controlling the free world.

 

[GWOtaku]

I'll highlight one big thing that stands out that I don't think is talked about enough: that to the extent turnout was depressed, it was most significant on the Republican side by far. Looking at percentages, not raw numbers, Obama's voters showed up in a turnout comparable to 2008 and better in some cases. Even young voters turned out, which I stand corrected on (in my defense, I don't think even most leftists were calling that one; that group was a point of concern).

Case in point, while I'm sure some votes are still being counted, Politico's account shows fewer popular votes for Romney than what John McCain received. There's a whole lot of talk about demographic shifts and how Republicans need to shift, much of which is with merit, but this is a story that should be remembered and told. Essentially, a historic achievement for Democrats in 2008 was repeated. Signs point to a much better "ground game" and GOTV drive for the Obama operation than what Republicans had. And ultimately, despite dissatisfaction with the state of the economy and jobs and Obamacare, a non-trivial amount of voters were either willing to trust Obama to manage our way to a better place or were simply apathetic to Romney as an alternative (weird dissonance of the day: Dave Weigel of Slate observed that 15% of voters that wanted to see Obamacare repealed voted for Obama). If it seemed like neither candidate seemed to offer much of a compelling vision for the next four years, it's because that's how things happened (or, er, didn't), I've touched on this before, you basically saw two guys saying "trust me". This favors a liked incumbent who's been doing the job for four years. It helps tremendously when voters, er, have positive and affirmative reasons to vote for you, and for challengers it's pretty much mandatory. Hint: "I believe in America" is a nice thing to say and hear but it doesn't count.

Now I am not trying to imply things about how a different nominee might have done instead (the Republicans that were likely to do better than Romney did not run for President), but I think it an inescapable conclusion that Romney was a weak candidate. I've seen the excuses and speculations about how Hurricane Sandy drowned him out in the final week of the campaign, but look: by then who you are and what you want should be established to most people. But he did not close the sale.

If you want to know why Obama won, here's what I say: play back Bill Clinton's DNC speech, which was the political speech of the year. Pay special attention to the parts on the job done, about the "mess" that was inherited, all the stuff about how he was doing the best he could and didn't accept the economic status quo as the new normal. Then ask yourself if half of that stuff was directly and constantly answered by the other team.

Some extra reading:

The Case of the Missing White Voters | RealClearPolitics

Some reactions from the right:

Conservatives’ Terrifying Message - By David French

The Election and the Right - By Yuval Levin

Michael Barone: I was wrong

 

[Shawn Hopkins]

I agree with you about Sandy. If you've been running for six years, a hurricane in the last couple of weeks is not a good enough excuse. People did know Romney, and they just didn't like him.

 

[wonderfly]

And that's as good a place as any to wrap it up. Everyone should've had a chance to give their thoughts on the election, by now. Just like we did in 2008, we've kept the thread going for 2 to 3 nights after the election ended, but it's time to draw it to a close.

One last observation: since the election ended, every day since then, while listening to the radio, instead of relentless campaign commercials for candidates, instead I've heard relentless Christmas commercials! Advertisements for Christmas programs, advertisements for Christmas music coming soon to the radio station, and advertisements for Christmas sales at various retail stores.

It's a welcome change, in my opinion.

Thanks to the success of the election threads this year, we may look to do more political discussion in the future soon. Keep your eyes on the news, and we'll see you around on the forums!