Why did Mitt Romney lose?

[Alex]

If he'd had the same share of the Hispanic vote as Bush, he'd only have won Florida.

He lost because he didn't win enough of the white vote in the Mid-West. I'm guessing voters there have taken an economic hammering and talks of social welfare cuts are not a vote-winner.

not every state, iowas economy is above average.
Illinois was shit, but it's always shit and always votes democrat anyway.

[Vibranium]

why I think Romney lost

- extremists in the Repbublican Party (ie the Rape Squad), that he refused to call out or separate himself from

- doing absolutely nothing to court anyone but white voters and thinking that would get him elected

basically Mitt didn't lose this race, the Republican Party lost it for him

[Alex]

why I think Romney lost

- extremists in the Repbublican Party (ie the Rape Squad), that he refused to call out or separate himself from

- doing absolutely nothing to court anyone but white voters and thinking that would get him elected

basically Mitt didn't lose this race, the Republican Party lost it for him

No, Mitt lost it, the republican party didn't tell him what to say everytime he picked up a mic, i didn't see him reading a lot of papers on what he was saying.
What really fucked him that isn't being discussed a lot of the around 2 months of attack adds with no response.

[Loren]

If I recall correctly, around 60% of Americans are white. So it wouldn't shock me if 72% of voters were white.

It looks like as of 2010, 72% of the US was classified as white. But that's race, not ethnicity. 63.7% was non-Hispanic white, and 8.7% as Hispanic and white.

An overall total of 16.4% of the US identified as ethnically Hispanic.

[7thangel]

why I think Romney lost

- extremists in the Repbublican Party (ie the Rape Squad), that he refused to call out or separate himself from

- doing absolutely nothing to court anyone but white voters and thinking that would get him elected

basically Mitt didn't lose this race, the Republican Party lost it for him

yeah, like Alex stated, Mitt lost it.

what seems to be missing in this is that Obama ran a beautiful campaign that was on the offense. He also had arguably the best ground game ever in the OFA. oh, and Mitt was a horrible candidate, just the best of a bad bunch, and maybe not even that.

And a real sobering fact. if Romney didn't play to the tea baggers and make a blatant appeal to white resentment, in order to get over 60% of the white vote, he would have lost worse than he did. the base were okay with his deceptive flipping at the 1st debate because it meant they might get rid of the usurper-in-chief, but he always needed them. at the end of the day, and before the horse-race push, the odds were that Obama was going to win.

so the question should be 'what Romney could have done to win' as opposed to 'why did he lose?'

[Alex]

yeah, like Alex stated, Mitt lost it.

what seems to be missing in this is that Obama ran a beautiful campaign that was on the offense. He also had arguably the best ground game ever in the OFA. oh, and Mitt was a horrible candidate, just the best of a bad bunch, and maybe not even that.

And a real sobering fact. if Romney didn't play to the tea baggers and make a blatant appeal to white resentment, in order to get over 60% of the white vote, he would have lost worse than he did. the base were okay with his deceptive flipping at the 1st debate because it meant they might get rid of the usurper-in-chief, but he always needed them. at the end of the day, and before the horse-race push, the odds were that Obama was going to win.

so the question should be 'what Romney could have done to win' as opposed to 'why did he lose?'

He could have not made the election about whether he should be president and made it about whether the president should be president.
He failed to do that, when people fail to do that they dont beat the incumbents.

[inferno]

1. Romney invented Obamacare -- and the GOP's big wins in 2010 were based around opposition to Obamacare.

2. The RNC did everything in its power to alienate the Ron Paul movement.

3. Romney is a high mucketymuck in a wierd racist, misogynist, Masonic space-alien cult.

4. Urban Democrat political machines are still voting on behalf of dead people and no-shows.

5. Pro-abortion nuts won't vote for Romney because he's a Republican.

6. Anti-abortion nuts won't vote for Romney because he was a pro-abortion governor.

7. Rove's hacking operation in Ohio was cockblocked at the last minute.

8. Despite its attrition, Obama still has a pretty good-sized cult-of-personality thing going.

9. The rapidly-expanding welfare class wouldn't vote for Romney.

10. The banksters ultimately backed Obama.

[cactusmaac]

Romney did really well in the last month, much better than anyone expected.

This wasn't the typical comfortable victory for a satisfactory incumbent by any means.

He may have won it if he was a better politician than a corporate executive, capable of running a hard-hitting national campaign. And if he'd thought long and hard about a policy mix that would have appealed to the disaffected middle class.

No one cares about military spending and tax cuts now, they want jobs and well-run healthcare and education.

Still, it was a good effort and nowhere near the disaster it could have been after the Bush 2nd term and the 47% debacle.

[stillanerd]

No, Mitt lost it, the republican party didn't tell him what to say everytime he picked up a mic, i didn't see him reading a lot of papers on what he was saying.
What really fucked him that isn't being discussed a lot of the around 2 months of attack adds with no response.

Exactly. Romney and the Republicans unwillingly allowed themselves to be defined by the Democrats instead of making a genuine case why people should vote for them or why their ideas were better than what Obama and the Democrats offered. Which was especially difficult considering how his own party during the primary labeled as a "political flip-flopping opportunist" and "vulture capitalist in bed with Wall Street bankers." The only time Romney really gave a reason for people vote for him was in the first Presidential debate in which he played offense to an uncharacteristically defensive Obama, a debate in which even Democrats admitted Obama lost.

[Vibranium]

yeah, like Alex stated, Mitt lost it.

what seems to be missing in this is that Obama ran a beautiful campaign that was on the offense. He also had arguably the best ground game ever in the OFA. oh, and Mitt was a horrible candidate, just the best of a bad bunch, and maybe not even that.

And a real sobering fact. if Romney didn't play to the tea baggers and make a blatant appeal to white resentment, in order to get over 60% of the white vote, he would have lost worse than he did. the base were okay with his deceptive flipping at the 1st debate because it meant they might get rid of the usurper-in-chief, but he always needed them. at the end of the day, and before the horse-race push, the odds were that Obama was going to win.

so the question should be 'what Romney could have done to win' as opposed to 'why did he lose?'

works for me...that's why I said that is what I thought, not the reasons why

[Omega Alpha]

I never believed Romney or any Republican had a serious shot- if they went crazy and pandered to the Tea Party, they had no chance in the general election, and if they ran on a relatively sane plataform, then they would have no chance of getting the nomination. I actually think he could have done worse.

If the Democrats don't screw up too much, they'll probably win again in 2016.

[stillanerd]

yeah, like Alex stated, Mitt lost it.

what seems to be missing in this is that Obama ran a beautiful campaign that was on the offense. He also had arguably the best ground game ever in the OFA. oh, and Mitt was a horrible candidate, just the best of a bad bunch, and maybe not even that.

And a real sobering fact. if Romney didn't play to the tea baggers and make a blatant appeal to white resentment, in order to get over 60% of the white vote, he would have lost worse than he did. the base were okay with his deceptive flipping at the 1st debate because it meant they might get rid of the usurper-in-chief, but he always needed them. at the end of the day, and before the horse-race push, the odds were that Obama was going to win.

so the question should be 'what Romney could have done to win' as opposed to 'why did he lose?'

Let's not forget thought that the Republican base was not all that enthusiastic about Romney to begin with. Remember, Romney lost the nomination to McCain back in 2008 and had been characterized as a "flip-flopper" and a political opportunist even by members of his own party. The only reason why he got the nomination this time around was because a bitter primary fight between the other candidates that allowed Romney to coast on through with the full backing by the Republican establishment. But all that time, Romney's base support never went beyond that of wealthy and male WASP's and college graduates--the same base supporters he had back in 2008. Mitt Romney for the Republicans in 2012 is what John Kerry was for the Democrats in 2004, a "flip-flopper" who the party elite convinced their base was "inevitable" and "most likely nominee to defeat the sitting president."

In fact, you know who used to be one or Romney's biggest critics? Ann Coulter, who this year was Romney's biggest cheerleader on the cable news and talk radio circuit even before he got the nomination, despite having said this at last year's C-PAC conference:

[Shellhead]

This was a huge electoral college loss for Romney, but not a big loss in terms of popular vote. So maybe it's worth examining his loss in terms of specific battleground states.

In Ohio, Romney was already at a disadvantage, because the Republican governor there had alienated a lot of voters. Obama bailed out the auto industry, while Mitt opposed that bailout. and then Romney ran that recklessly dishonest ad about Jeep outsourcing manufacturing to China.

In Florida, Romney was ahead in the polls until he ran those recklessly dishonest ads linking Obama to Castro and Chavez. And like in Ohio, the Republican governor there was not exactly loved by the voters.

And then the flurry of rape remarks by high-profile Republicans probably hurt Romney all across the map, given that women outvoted men by 2% in this election.

[Shellhead]

Funny thing about Coulter... she did a better job of predicting the electoral votes than most of her right-wing peers. She was off by 67 electoral votes, but others in her party did worse.

http://www.slate.com/articles/news_a...l_results.html

[Kid Kamikaze10]

Honestly, I hope this election exposed the hell out of the GOP, and more importantly, Fox News.

Seriously, after what happened. Their predictions, Karl Roves ranting, Dick Morris in general, the defense of guys who got legitimately trounced in their races.


Why do they still have credibility to some people after this?