By the numbers: In some cases, Romney paid four times as much as Obama for ads

Any serious imperfection in Mitt’s campaign is as a result of the Republican primary going on far too long. Mitt was up against a campaign of an incumbent president who not only had the full support of the media and entertainment industries, etc but whose campaign had been running for 5 years. Sarah Palin is to blame for prolonging the Republican primary in the selfish, egotistical, vain and idiotic hope that the GOP would pick her at a brokered convention.

Basilsbest on November 19, 2012 at 8:58 PM

You were doing fine until you (facetiously?) laid the blame solely at Palin’s feet for the primary. It wasn’t just her, it was the entire righty media sphere. Limbaugh, Hannity, Beck, Levin, Erickson, Malkin, Ace, and the authors of this blog, all of whom were more than happy for the traffic and attention that would not have come if Romney had wrapped it up right at the outset. It was evident after the field had settled that nobody but Romney was equipped and funded to win – but that didn’t matter. With thirty thousand television debates, our party’s gadflies were itching for face time.

That said, Romney’s GOTV failures and organizational inferiority are on his head. Clearly, he was ill-served by his top advisors, many of whom the grassroots properly identified as useless in the first two months after Romney wrapped it up.

KingGold on November 19, 2012 at 9:03 PM

What a load of crap. Was there supposed to be some Romney coronation? The primary process went on so long because Romney was too weak to put away New Gingrich and Rick Santorum, of all people. But it was the fault of the blogosphere and Paloin and assorted other right-wing baddies. Moderates and libs are so much alike. Someone else is always to blame for their failures.

ddrintn on November 19, 2012 at 10:05 PM

I notice that when you quoted me you omitted the line about candidates milking the free-media debates for face time when they hadn’t a prayer of victory. So I’m guessing you agree.

I don’t know what you saw. But I saw nine months of picayune bullsh*t from six or seven candidates with little to no organization and pennies in their campaign funds, and Mitt Romney. And the righty media did not pick a candidate, they picked Not Romney. It didn’t matter whether it was zero-chance Gingrich or zero-chance Santorum, so long as they weren’t Romney, the righty media sang their praises. And conservative Super PACs directed their money accordingly.

Romney’s money was completely gone thanks to the primary, and he was legally restricted from spending ad money throughout the summer. That’s probably when he lost Ohio and Virginia, thanks to nonstop anti-Bain ads Obama was blanketing the state with.

It’s cute for you folk to think that Limbaugh and his like are charitable, altruistic folks who just want to advance conservatism, but that just ain’t the way it is. They’re businessmen and businesswomen. More primary means more listeners and readers, and more audience means more money. Simple as that.

KingGold on November 19, 2012 at 10:19 PM

And, uh, no. Voters repeatedly picked NotRomney.

ddrintn on November 19, 2012 at 10:27 PM

Again, wrong.

Romney tied Rick Santorum in Iowa, won New Hampshire decisively, and came in second to Newt Gingrich in South Carolina, otherwise known as Gingrich territory. Following that, Romney won every major state on the primary docket; skillful delegate manipulation by Ron Paul backers got Paul some delegates, but that’s not the will of the voters.

Now, it is true that Romney did not lead the polling all the way through. But that means what? That other candidates got better right-media coverage than he did, and came up short when it was time for people to actually cast their votes.

KingGold on November 19, 2012 at 10:34 PM