Hey, I was wrong
I derided the media polls for their assumption of what did, in fact happen: That blacks, Latinos, and young people would show up in the same numbers as they had in 2008. I was wrong. They did.
But the more proximate cause of my error was that I did not take full account of the impact of hurricane Sandy and of Governor Chris Christie’s bipartisan march through New Jersey arm in arm with President Obama. Not to mention Christe’s fawning promotion of Obama’s presidential leadership.
It made all the difference.
A key element of Romney’s appeal, particularly after the first debate, was his ability to govern with Democrats in Massachusetts. Obama’s one-party strident approach, so much the opposite of what he pledged in his first national speech in 2004, had turned voters off. But by working seamlessly with an acerbic Republican Governor like Christie, Obama was able to blunt Romney’s advantage in this crucial area.









Blowback
Note from Hot Air management: This section is for comments from Hot Air's community of registered readers. Please don't assume that Hot Air management agrees with or otherwise endorses any particular comment just because we let it stand. A reminder: Anyone who fails to comply with our terms of use may lose their posting privilege.
Trackbacks/Pings
Trackback URL
Comments
Comment pages: 1 2 Next »
Yes you were. Now go away.
MoreLiberty on November 7, 2012 at 12:12 PM
Status quo.
BadgerHawk on November 7, 2012 at 12:12 PM
His being wrong is what makes him right.
Pablo Honey on November 7, 2012 at 12:13 PM
So the unemployed and underemployed voted for Obama because of a walk on the beach? That’s too simple.
NebCon on November 7, 2012 at 12:13 PM
Hey, we had reason to believe in the landslide theory.
Look at every poll from the last two years having to do with enthusiasm and voter ID.
We were killing it
blatantblue on November 7, 2012 at 12:14 PM
Needed addition… “again”
Red Cloud on November 7, 2012 at 12:14 PM
How can you guys not put a “D’uh” before this headline?
Valkyriepundit on November 7, 2012 at 12:15 PM
And now will you just fade in to the irrelevancy you so richly deserve and take Christie with you.
Ceroth on November 7, 2012 at 12:16 PM
Yeah, this is why I think this was a tipping point election.
We consistently led the enthusiasm gap in polls that turned out to be mostly accurate, and still lost.
The Dem coalition has grown big enough to win a turnout election even with 5 trillion in new debt an 8% unemployment. The GOP base is no longer big enough to counteract that.
BadgerHawk on November 7, 2012 at 12:17 PM
Can anyone explain a D+6 for this election?
I can’t. Unless it was poor GOTV.
Maybe RINOs don’t understand how to motivate the base.
faraway on November 7, 2012 at 12:17 PM
And yet you are still set for life.
CurtZHP on November 7, 2012 at 12:18 PM
STFU
threeinone on November 7, 2012 at 12:19 PM
Unprecedented!
HitNRun on November 7, 2012 at 12:19 PM
I don’t blame Dick Morris for being wrong. Who saw this coming? Not me. It’s just hard to believe half our citizenry are so stupid?
Oink on November 7, 2012 at 12:19 PM
Sandy hurt, but ultimately Obama turned out his base, and the GOP didn’t respond in kind. Without Sandy, we might have won Florida and Virginia, but not much else. If our base had shown up, we would have elected Romney, plain and simple.
SAZMD on November 7, 2012 at 12:20 PM
Why do I get the impression that Dick still works for Clinton?
HotAirian on November 7, 2012 at 12:20 PM
That will change in the next four years.
Only problem is, by 2016, ACA bill will be totally engrained into American society.
blatantblue on November 7, 2012 at 12:21 PM
Well, objectively, it was that. Both candidates were down roughly, what, 10 million votes?
HitNRun on November 7, 2012 at 12:21 PM
El_Terrible on November 7, 2012 at 12:21 PM
When was the last time Dick Morris was right about something?
OneGyT on November 7, 2012 at 12:22 PM
No shiz sherlock
Zaggs on November 7, 2012 at 12:23 PM
11/6/12: Dick Morris’ Last Stand….ended in a massacre
He has zero credibility now…he will go away
LordMaximus on November 7, 2012 at 12:23 PM
Ugh, not today, Dick, not today.
stenwin77 on November 7, 2012 at 12:24 PM
He’s like someone you break up with.. but they keep coming back or calling…”I’m sorry. I’m so sorry”
It’s over Dick.
stenwin77 on November 7, 2012 at 12:26 PM
Dick Morris being wrong is one of life’s few certainties. He should be proud of a flawless track record.
RedRedRice on November 7, 2012 at 12:27 PM
Obama got ten million fewer votes than last time, but Romney got fewer votes than McCain? Might make sense if many white indies shifted to Romney, Obama maintained his base, but lots and lots and lots of conservatives stayed home. But is the latter really plausible?
My guess is the Republican base always shows up. It’s just shrinking – pretty dramatically – from natural causes.
Seth Halpern on November 7, 2012 at 12:27 PM
Inconceivable!!
Bitter Clinger on November 7, 2012 at 12:27 PM
Counter-intuitively, this is a hopeful sign.
These people are all people who are disproportionately energized to turn out for Barack Obama. They’re not going to turn out for Joe Biden or Mike O’Malley.
HitNRun on November 7, 2012 at 12:30 PM
The results of the election were only a suprise to people who choose to get their information solely from the conservative media. Almost all publicly available polling had Obama leading in the swing states prior to the election. Nate Silver was dead-on in his predictions, as were most analysts who based their opinions on the actual evidence rather than listening only to what they wanted to hear.
cam2 on November 7, 2012 at 12:34 PM
I think so too. Gridlock and 4 more years of Obama might shake them off.
El_Terrible on November 7, 2012 at 12:36 PM
Shut up, Dick.
bigmacdaddy on November 7, 2012 at 12:39 PM
The Dem coalition has grown big enough to win a turnout election even with 5 trillion in new debt an 8% unemployment. The GOP base is no longer big enough to counteract that.
BadgerHawk on November 7, 2012 at 12:17 PM
That will change in the next four years.
Only problem is, by 2016, ACA bill will be totally engrained into American society.
blatantblue on November 7, 2012 at 12:21 PM
~~~~~~~
Good God, Obama has been a disaster…he got that done! I know that’s stating the obvious, but it really just boggles the mind that he got health care “reform” passed so easily. It’s just devastating…he sure has been a transformational figure…we’re stuck with this monstrosity now.
ellifint on November 7, 2012 at 12:44 PM
I thought Rush Limbaugh was going to start his program today with a mea culpa for supporting a statist and pretending that he was a conservative messiah, but it sounds like Rush is doubling down behind a loser and is calling into question the election itself, implying that Obama rigged it.
What a sore loser! In spite of all of Rush’s propaganda about Romney being the perfect conservative messiah, the truth is that Romney’s real-world record proves otherwise. None of the propaganda during the election changes that. Rush sounds like he really honestly believes that Romney was the great conservative messiah instead of the gun-grabbing inventor of Obamacare that he really is. It’s a fraud that I though Rush would come clean on and explain how Romney lost the election, but instead we get more propaganda pretending that Romney is authentic—I don’t get it, does Romney or his cronies own Clear Channel or something? It makes me wonder…
There’s no mystery about this election. Romney won naive independent voters but he lost more informed Republican voters that knew full well that Romney is a statist in spite of all the propaganda and possible media ownership. Romney lost this election back when he spearheaded and passed the assault weapons ban. Romney lost this election when he had the elaborate bill-signing ceremony to celebrate the signing of Romneycare, the one thing he’s never flip/flopped on, his pride and joy.
Rush sounds like he’s bewildered how Romney could have lost; it’s perfectly obvious to me, and I predicted this election outcome last night months ago and hit the bullseye.
Now Rush is wondering how could anybody question the R-parties appeal to minorities, look at Condoleza Rice and Rubio, he says. Maybe it was when Republicans told everybody to vote for Romney because Obama is a Kenyan Muslim. Maybe it was when old, white GOP establishment types who supported Bush and Romney locked the doors to shut-out racial minorities who supported Ron Paul during the caucuses. Maybe Rush lost credibility on race when he smeared Ron Paul as a racist, the only Republican candidate that racial minority groups actually likes and supports, and tried to participate in the process but were cheated by people like Rush Limbaugh!
FloatingRock on November 7, 2012 at 12:45 PM
Nothing new
Schadenfreude on November 7, 2012 at 12:45 PM
If Romney or his identifiable cronies owns Clear Channel or something Rush Limbaugh should disclose that sort of thing, BTW. That would explain a lot.
FloatingRock on November 7, 2012 at 12:48 PM
Go away.
Go away.
Go away.
albill on November 7, 2012 at 12:49 PM
I’m taking from Rush that he believes the same thing many of us here do…namely, that the takers outnumber the makers…
ellifint on November 7, 2012 at 12:50 PM
Classic. “I was horribly, horribly wrong. But it wasn’t my fault.”
John Stewart on “The King of Wrong Mountain” a couple of days ago.
urban elitist on November 7, 2012 at 12:55 PM
@FloatingRock: Oh come on, if there were that many terminally disaffected anti-statists, Gary Johnson would have received more than 1% of the popular vote ( half of it siphoned from Obama besides).
But I’m starting to believe the white Republican base is indeed approaching a literal dead end.
Seth Halpern on November 7, 2012 at 1:02 PM
Yeah, but they might turn out for Cory Booker, Deval Patrick, Julian Castro, or Antonio Villaraigosa. If all the Dems have to do is run a relatively young minority for President who’s good on the stump, it’s tough for the GOP to counteract that.
Doughboy on November 7, 2012 at 1:03 PM
I’m not going away, I’ve been here since the early days of HotAir. I’m one of the few people here, perhaps the only one, who called the election results last night months ago and hit the bullseye dead on. A 50/50 Romney loss. That’s because my analysis and prediction is reality-based rather than propaganda-based. Rush may be lost and bewildered right now, perhaps because he’s been wrapped up in propaganda mode for months now, but I’m not lost, my vision has been clear throughout. I’m one of the only people here at HotAir who actually does know what’s going on who was proven right last night; it’s the statists who’ve been smearing and ridiculing me during this election cycle that were proven wrong by real events.
FloatingRock on November 7, 2012 at 1:05 PM
Ahhhh, Shadapp!
princetrumpet on November 7, 2012 at 1:09 PM
Romney won independents by a mile last night so should have won the election had he not lost Republicans by an even wider margin. There’s no denying that unless the numbers I saw about independents yesterday were wrong. If he won them then he lost Republicans. That’s not me saying that, it’s the numbers. Romney lost, we know this now.
Romney and the GOP lost this election when they cheated and rigged votes during the caucuses and maliciously smeared Ron Paul and his supporters, including me. They lost it when they told everybody to vote for the R statist instead of the D statist because the D statist is a Kenyan Muslim who is trying to destroy America. A lot of Republicans obviously stayed home, others voted for Gary Johnson or wrote in Ron Paul.
Romney lost the election when he passed Obamacare and the gun ban and the rest. A billion dollars worth of lies, promises and propaganda just doesn’t change the facts.
If Rush is right that Romney is the pillar of conservatism, yet he lost to the worst president in history, then it sounds like conservatism is dead and Rush has failed.
He need to come to terms with it and have a mea culpu and try to reconcile with former tea partiers like me if he wants to try to rebuild a winning coalition.
FloatingRock on November 7, 2012 at 1:14 PM
If Rubio is the Republican Candidate in 2016 like Rush says then I’m voting for Hillary or something.
It sounds like the Republican Party is dead.
The last time I was in a political Party Reagan was president. I’ve been an independent since he left office. If Rush is going to continue to lead the R-Party down the path to ruin then I guess it’s time I consider Joining the Libertarian Party even though I have some disagreements, especially on illegal immigration and open borders.
FloatingRock on November 7, 2012 at 1:17 PM
I’m thinking about emailing this guy for his weekly picks for NFL games. Betting against all of his picks is a lock at this point.
VinceOfDoom on November 7, 2012 at 1:20 PM
It’s really hard for me to believe that for a few years before the debt ceiling fight I thought Rush Limbaugh was awesome; an unparalleled advocate of small government tea party values. I was hoping that now that the election is over and Romney lost that Rush would go back to small government truth and explain the obvious reasons why Romney lost to the worst president in American history, but I guess I was wrong. maybe Rush will come to terms with the truth again in the days ahead, but probably not if Romney owns Clear Channel.
FloatingRock on November 7, 2012 at 1:26 PM
No Dick, Karl Rove was wrong. You gave a Joe Namath guarantee and furthermore suggested the win would be by three touchdowns. If I ran Fox News, I’d run your sorry ass off the network.
radjah shelduck on November 7, 2012 at 1:29 PM
FloatingRock on November 7, 2012 at 12:45 PM
Bob Beckel’s comment was “the GOP will win when they stop running far right candidates like Romney and Ryan” which just goes to show you how the libs think.
Rush says Romney was a good candidate and he and Ryan ran a good campaign, which is true – hindsight is always 20/20, but they waged a good campaign. The conclusion is that it is hard to beat Santa Claus with an electorate who likes free stuff, and has no idea what it means to be one’s own Santa Clause. Perhaps romney wasn’t perfect, but he at least offfered a clear choice, whic was rejected. Maybe those evangelicals are just trying to accelorate the tribulation.
Queen0fCups on November 7, 2012 at 1:37 PM
Yes, it will. I don’t believe, God help us, that any future GOP Admin will try to repeal it now. It’s Social Security and Medicare and ACA now. That is, unless it is so horrible that 75% of the population goes torch and pitchfork over it.
And then, after it’s done what it was designed to do…..bankrupt big insurance…..that’s when the left rides to the rescue with single payer.
Future campaigns will not be about whether ACA is good or bad but rather which party is better at administering it. GOP, meet the Canadian Progressive Conservative Party ala the 1980s.
JoeinTX on November 7, 2012 at 1:41 PM
then we become Great Briton … like the conservative party … we can run
NHS more efficiently … America … it has been a good run ….
but it is over …. the takers now out number the producers …
the takers now get to decide how much of what you earn is “fair” for you
to keep …. and how much they get to take …
good luck …. it is going to be interesting ….
conservative tarheel on November 7, 2012 at 1:41 PM
Comment pages: 1 2 Next »