The National Review's Andrew C. Mccarthy is telling it like it is:
The key to understanding the 2012 election is simple: A huge slice of the electorate stayed home.
The punditocracy — which is more of the ruling class than an eye on the ruling class — has naturally decided that this is because Republicans are not enough like Democrats: They need to play more identity politics (in particular, adopt the Left’s embrace of illegal immigration) in order to be viable. But the story is not about who voted; it is about who didn’t vote. In truth, millions of Americans have decided that Republicans are not a viable alternative because they are already too much like Democrats. They are Washington. With no hope that a Romney administration or more Republicans in Congress would change this sad state of affairs, these voters shrugged their shoulders and became non-voters.
Since I'm a pretty ordinary person, might I suggest that the reason why people stayed home, or opted to vote anyone but Romney was due to a couple of very obvious reasons (if people would be willing to look):
ReplyDelete1) the GOP, lead by their presidential candidate, looked like a bunch of unprincipled, shameless vote whores who would do/say anything to be elected (if a person would look back at Al Gore, they'd see some similarities with Romney's campaign -- it's actually heartening to think that some Americans just weren't going to go for this). It wasn't that Obama was much better in that department, but people are more comfortable with his lying ass because they are used to it, and they were expecting the GOP to throw up an opponent that at least appeared to have some principles -- that didn't happen, so they didn't vote.
2) Romney just gave off weirdness vibes; no, while this may have something to do with his religion, I don't think that can completely explain it (having known some Mormons, while not thrilled with them in general, the individuals in question don't even come close to a fraction of overall weirdness as Mitt does). And again, while Obama is pretty damn odd himself, people are used to it (and were hoping for a non-weirdo candidate from the GOP, which didn't happen) It's kind of heartening that some Americans tuned into it and said "uhm, no thanks" -- makes me have a smidgen of hope.
3) some on the right have acted like first class jackasses; jackasses who seemed to think it was ok to publicly flaunt their jackassery -- in so doing, they shot themselves in the foot; the sad thing is, if they had used some sense, some discretion and wit, many of the things would have not come across so jackass'd (being harsh critics of some things is necessary, but a critic must be smart, not spout dumb, jackass stuff with the expectation of applause for being the biggest jackass) -- but hey, no filters, no boundaries, so it should have come as no surprise that some people were going to be turned off by the whole affair.
Anyway, that's what I saw.
PW
I stopped voting. Voting is consent and I no longer consent.
ReplyDeleteEnjoy the decline!
Yeah, and that too!
ReplyDeleteAlthough I will not enjoy the decline (I've got kids) -- but at least I'm not going to run a con on myself about it in the process.
PW