Mitt Romney said that Obama won because he gave gifts to Hispanics, college students, gays, and single women. Of course that would be like saying that the incumbent should always win because he is always able to use policies to buy votes. In this case Obama was doing what he had promised. If one believes that college students should not get financial aid or be covered under their parents' health insurance, they can vote against him. It is like the Republicans promise tax breaks. Every time the government gives a tax exemption to a corporation, it is just like writing a welfare check. Is that a gift to buy votes? Why do you think the wealthy are willing to back the Republicans? It is why defense contractors back the Congressmen on defense budget committee. I don't think that Romney really understands the country and that is the main reason he and the Republicans lost.
With the economy not recovering fast enough, Romney and the Republicans should have won big. But instead of focusing on the slowness of the recovery, they blamed immigrants and unions etc. for the problems of the country. They also focused on social issues such as abortion and gay rights, issues that they cannot win overall. Regardless of whether you believe that illegal immigrants are a net gain or net loss to the economy, you cannot say that they had ANYTHING to do do with the financial market collapse. But Romney moved way to the right on immigration during the primary and even though he tried to come back to the middle, it was too late. It also seems insincere. With the demographic changing, if Romney and the Republicans don't learn from this, it would be difficult for them to win in the future.
Sunday, November 18, 2012
2 comments:
Use the following html code to make a clickable link in your comment (instructions in the sidebar). You can test the link by previewing your comment.
<a href="http://angryyellowman.blogspot.com">Angry Yellow Man</a>
The above example will display as Angry Yellow Man
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Went to see Lincoln this weekend. Pretty good movie, though I don't know if I'd watch it again. It's quite long and slow.
ReplyDeleteWhat I got out of it, was that the Republicans were more progressive than the Democrats, at the time.
What changed? Can parties change platforms? I don't know how they can alienate their supporters by coveting the gay, women, black and hispanic vote. I would think that there would have to be a change in attitudes and moral thinking.
Therefore, I don't think it can be done.
I still don't know if we ever saw the real Romney. Let's say for instance, that he was quite the moderate this whole time. That means he basically lied to the extremists in his party just to get elected into office. Would you want such a person representing you?
-LBOAYM
Well, parties do change. The Democrats, even though they are way more liberal than the Republicans, are no where as liberal as the party of Humphrey, McGovern and Mondale. Bill Clinton was able to adapt. His initial policies like health care reform were more liberal than Obama's policies. But after the shellacking he got in the 94 midterm election, he adjusted. He went along with the Republicans on welfare reform. He became much more moderate and yet he is beloved by the Democratic base today.
ReplyDeleteI believed from the beginning that Romney was the toughest challenger to Obama. There was no way that Santorum, Gingrich etc. were going to beat Obama. While Romney believed that he had to tilt way over to the right to win the nomination, I didn't really think so. With his money advantage and poor conservative candidates in the race, he could have acted like a Mass. governor that he was and won the nomination. Then he would not have appeared to be flip flopping so much in the general election.
If the Republicans are smart and avoid the social issue traps, they can win. They have some good ideas on tax reform and trimming the deficit. There are actually lots of Hispanics, Asians and Blacks who believe in conservative economic views and individual self reliance rather than government hand outs. If the Republicans can meet these people half way, they can win the next election. If they continue to listen to their stubborn extreme base, they will continue to lose big like the Democrats in the 80's.