Category: 2008 Election

If one of my friends made the joke, I might think it’s funny, but I think this is a bit unpresidential:

When asked if he has spoken to former Presidents, Obama stated that he had spoken to all of those who were living.  After a pause, he said he made that distinction because he didn’t want to get into any Nancy Reagan seance situations.

Bill Whittle knocks one out of the park:

“The army’s whipped!” he cried.

“You are, but the army isn’t,” growled Sheridan, who then put the spurs to a horse who’s back was taller than he was and rode to the scene of the disaster, shouting, “About face, boys! We are going back to our camps! We are going to lick them out of their boots!”

His men were not beaten. They just needed leadership.

Read it.  It will make you feel better.

Hope/Change is soliciting feedback.  Be sure to give them some.  Polite, reasonable, feedback.

Bruce tells us how shovel and mason jar manufacturers are going to be helped out by the Democrats.  Hey, they are already doing wonders for the firearms industry.

Via Instapundit, on the markets tanking, and China’s fear of a retreat from free trade principles:

If even the Communists worry about Obama’s violation of free trade principles, I think it’s reasonable to put failure to assuage the fears of those who expect and rely upon a free market squarely on his shoulders.

Even the communists are nervous :)   Strange times indeed.

The time to start thinking about 2010 is now.  Dr. Helen is off to a good start.  Sadly, her commenters are decending into a fever swamp.  Dr. Helen asks:

Perhaps if conservatives and libertarians work together to defeat a few Democrats and keep Republicans in place, 2010 will be a more welcoming place for us. Anyone out there with any concrete ideas on how to go about doing this–other than the obvious such as putting up and running websites like EvanBayhwatch.com etc?

I think most of the Democrats up for Senate are pretty safe, unless the next two years are an unmitigated disaster (which they could be).  We should probably focus our energies on The House.  What libertarian/conservative folks need to be doing is getting the two magic keys to relevance in politics: money and votes.  There has been talk about growing a “Rightroots” movement.  I will have more thoughts on this later.  I do think the blogosphere needs to get more involved in political action.  If all the right blogosphere ever does is highlight news, and bounce ideas around between ourselves, we’ll just be chattering while the progressives are destroying the country.

If we want people to listen, if we want to be relevant, then we have to work.  No one will listen to you if all you can offer are ideas.  Ideas are like assholes, everybody has one.  Votes and money are a different thing.  If you can bring those to the table, politicians will listen.

McCain did himself a favor when he selected Palin as his running mate.  The base immediately fell in love with her, but the subsequent media lynching, I think, subdued the enthusiasm, particularly on the heels of some poorly thought out interviews she pretty clearly wasn’t ready for.  I think the base still adores Palin, but she needs to gain a bit more expeirence under her belt before she returns to national politics.

You can blame Bush for this one, but Republicans, and center-right Independents have spent the last eight years having to carry the White House’s water on the Iraq War, because the White House was not able to competently handle mistakes, missteps, and difficulties.  We also spent the past eight years watching a President not only fail to articulate and make the case for conservative values, but one who wouldn’t deliver them either.

But McCain’s biggest gaffe, I think, was in the debates.  The debates were all scripted talking points, which tended to work in Obama’s favor.  Obama is comfortable when he’s able to work off of talking points.  Conservatives wanted to see McCain go after Obama, articulate against his policies, and make the case for conservatism.  I think McCain largely failed on that count, and not in a small way.  Conservatives, faced with the prospect of another soft, inarticulate candidate, seem to have decided to stay home in relatively large numbers this election.  The next Republican candidate will need to be able to carry the message.  Obama is popular among the left and center-left because he can do that with great skill.  Reagan was popular for largely similar reasons.  I have to wonder how many conservatives actually saw McCain as just another inarticulate non-conservative, and decided to stay home.

Bitter and I canvassed several neighborhoods for free.  To these people, I say equal pay for equal work:

“I want my money today! It’s my money. I want it right now!” yelled one former campaign worker.

So much for civic duty.

I’ve been analyzing the election results for Philadelphia and its suburbs.  It paints a picture of low Republican turnout, a gradual eroding of the Republican base over the last four years, and huge gains in Democratic registration which seems to have rather obviously helped Barack Obama.

Votes for Party Candidates for President							Difference
Year	County	Democrat	Republican	Year	Democrat	Republican	Difference Dem	Difference Rep
2004	Philadelphia	542,205	130,099	2008	574,042	113,034	31,837	-17,065
	Delaware	162,601	120,425		179,949	109,766	17,348	-10,659
	Bucks	163,438	153,469		178,345	149,860	14,907	-3609
	Montgomery	222,048	175,741		249,493	163,030	27,445	-12,681
	Chester	109,708	120,036		135,150	112,266	25,442	-7770

Voter Registration Statistics
Year	County	Democrat	Republican	Independent	Year	Democrat	Republican	Independent
2004	Philadelphia	796,033	175,434	90,879	2008	799,663	145,387	86,063
	Delaware	131,317	213,030	42,327		157,301	188,924	39,031
	Bucks	173,803	208,639	69,513		185,407	181,701	60,496
	Montgomery	214,223	268,755	81,704		247,881	237,880	76,187
	Chester	98,765	170,419	55,961		113,315	146,956	46,598

Registration Difference
County	Democrat	Republican	Independent
Philadelphia	3,630	-30,047	-4,816
Delaware	25,984	-24,106	-3,296
Bucks	11,604	-26,938	-9,017
Montgomery	33,658	-30,875	-5,517
Chester	14,550	-23,463	-9,363

Looking at the numbers, Philadelphia actually did not have phenomenally high number of newly registered Democrats.  But turnout was higher, but not much higher, than in 2004.  One can also see that Republican turnout was depressed in several suburban counties, and in Philadelphia.  Only Bucks managed to turn out in comparable numbers to 2004, but it wasn’t enough to sway the county.  This strikes me as a group of voters who are just particularly not excited to be Republicans, and to get out to support Republican candidates.  Pretty clearly, we had Republicans voting for Obama in larger numbers than we could afford.

This also shows the suburbs are bleeding Republicans.  In many cases, Republicans switched registratoin to vote in the primary, but it doesn’t seem like they are planning to come back to the party, or that they voted for McCain.  The GOP is in a lot of trouble in the Philadelphia suburbs, and if we don’t start getting more registered Republican voters, we’re finished as a traditional Republican stronghold.  It might already be too late.

The Campaign Spot shows us numbers that indicate Palin delivered for the Republican ticket, and talks about her future in politics.   I would like to see her stay on the national stage, so we can get to know her better.  I have my disagreements with her on some social issues, but I don’t think she’s the kind of social conservative who will want to shove her social values down everyone else’s throats.  I’m hoping she can develop into the kind of political personality that can hold the base together, and appeal to more conservative independents.