Romney lost because he was practically a liberal. He had nothing to offer the genuine conservative. The man invented Obamacare, and his record on guns while governor of Massachusetts was abysmal. Romney couldn’t fire up the base, and he lost because of it.

We needed someone whose only qualification was that he wasn’t Barack Obama.

Ya know what?? I’m FED UP, with both very ignorant sides of this conversation!!! You are WRONG, too!!! Because, MITT WON!!! If not for FRAUD, OBAMA – HACKER SQUAD, [who not only came from Twtr, FB, and Google, but, screwed our tech and marketing from the INSIDE, of those same social sites!! Gibbs works at FB too!!! Schmidt manipulates Google search!! You think they didnt control the marketing algorithms?? Bullshit!! They didnt defeat Mitt honestly.. they hacked him. up one side and DOWN the other!!! Plus, RACECARD!! ADD ILLEGAL AND DEAD VOTE, WHITES and CONSERVATIVE BLACKS Getting threatened!!!! at home, their jobs ect. On a daily basis!!! a FULL year before this election!!! Black on white crime, escalated!!! for FEAR FACTOR TOO!! Then, conveniently, Mahers threat!! WHY are any of you falling for Obamas bullshit SALES PITCH??? LETS LOOK AT THE FACTS HERE!!! He wants to trick the public, AND REPUBS!! to believe his, Why he won- narrative, to MANIPULATE future elections, with THOSE SOCIALISTS policies!!! Its a LIE. Get out of DENIAL!!

Stacy is way more righter than Jonah, but tends to get involved in smaller issues, such as who said what at the convention. (Eastwood was very helpful, BTW.)

We need to remember these facts: The majority of voters are ignorant of policies and platform issues, don’t show much interest in the election until late in the game, and vote largely with their emotions. Many of them respond to the message so often expressed in slightly different words, “Don’t bother to educate yourself–the only important thing is that you do your civic duty and vote for any clown who meets your fancy.”

I’ve said it before and I intend to keep saying it until all agree with me: Presidential elections are mainly determined by two factors: The overall or major narrative of the campaign, and who appears to be the stronger leader.

The controlling narrative of this campaign was that Dubya had so screwed-up the economy that four years of intense striving by Obama was too little time to completely correct matters. The Dems and the media relentlessly sold this idea, assisted by many libertarians and more than a few Republicans.

A candidate as strong as Reagan could have overcome this, but Romney simply did not have an aura of strength about him, nor did we have anyone else much better, although Santorum would have at least attacked like a bloodthirsty berserker.

You can go through every election since 1948 to test my hypothesis. Although Dewey was on track to win, he “looks like the little man on the wedding cake,” and failed to effectively respond to Truman’s last-minute offensive. Strength [the appearance thereof] won. In 1992 the incumbent looked as though he didn’t enjoy himself while debating, and had flip-flopped on taxes and missed the opportunity to take Baghdad. Strength (yes, Clinton!) won.

In 1964 the narrative was, “Goldwater is a madman!” In 1972 it was, “McGovern is a radical fool!” Narrative in both cases.

In 2000 Dubya gradually transformed himself into the stronger candidate, in part because he didn’t hire a feminist to tell him how to dress like an alpha male. Then the DUI story came out, and his response was weak. He should have boasted of his wild youth rather than been apologetic about it. Within a week or two he went from five% ahead to one% behind.

Every campaign can be explained in this way, regardless of all the smaller issues that affect them.

…all that plus the Dems will lie, cheat, steal, threaten, bribe and sell their mothers to win. Repubs are to timid to even think about doing what, to the Dems is second nature.

The Bush DUI story came out the Friday night before the election.

Deep analysis is wrong because it is over-complicated.

As long as low-information Democratic voters will show up and cast a ballot, no Republican will win. Early voting is a huge part of the problem. Not only is it ripe for fraud, but it allows the Democratic GOTV effort a force multiplication: instead of having to get out as many of these slothful voters in a 12 hour window, they have 30 days in some states.

We cannot persuade these people to vote for us. They are too stupid and superficial.

We either have to do the same thing with the dummies on our side who need to be led by the dog collar to the polls, or fight against early voting.

It’s not about philosophy at all. Ask your dog.

^^THIS!^^ Romney certainly fired up the base in SW Ohio before the election and I read similar stories in other parts of the country. People just don’t stand in line for hours in the cold or rain to see a politician unless they’re enthusiastic about him/her and expect to win. I still don’t see how the energy for Romney didn’t translate into a big win at the ballot box.

As long as feeeellinggs trump facts and logic, conservatives are going to have a hard time electorally. We need to stop trying to be “liked” and tell people what they really NEED to hear, regardless of their feelings. Things like “Math – the compound interest equation means the national debt will be unpayable unless we immediately cut the budget and reform entitlements. These things need to happen regardless of how you feeelll about them. No amount of demonizing, protests, votes or judicial decisions can change the laws of economics.” It won’t be popular, at least at first but when everyone reaps the reward of prosperity….

Can I attend if there are any known swingers at the dinner???

Would you dump Mark Steyn, Andrew McCarthy, Michael Walsh, and Stanley Kurtz, too?

You might be confusing candidacy with party strategy and the person selected to win the nomination. Romney ran a nearly gaffe-proof campaign, cranking out many excellent ads, and hitting back against Obama hard, every single day, up until the last three weeks. Despite my distaste for him as the nominee instead of a conservative, I had to admit he ran an excellent campaign.

The problem was the party strategists deciding to go “presidential” instead of going for the win, no matter how ugly. Obama went pure ugly and stole a victory, with a little help from a bloated Republican governor and a storm, and election fraud in many places.

No, Romney was an excellent candidate, he was just not the right man for the job. There is a difference.

Compassionate Conservative is just a funny way to spell Progressive.

I am a fan of Jonah, but he is flat out wrong.

It is a misnomer. Many conservatives are compassionate. But I heard David Brooks on with E.J. Dionne on NPR the other day (Do you think Brooks gently masterbates Dionne each week during that radio show? But I digress…). And he was going on and on how Mitt Romney gave gift to Republicans by talking about “gifts” and how many realize it is the role of government to give a helping hand to the poor and needy so they can achieve…

How far we have fallen when this drivel is coming from so called “conservatives.” Dionne then went to quote Frum as a conservative voice battling lunatics (oh wait, that would be most of us).

Government (at least on the federal level) should be very limited.

Government can be more flexible on the state and local level. I do not think that is generally a good idea (with some exceptions), but it is up to local voters. You want to talk about helping the poor, talk about it there. At least it is under local control and is bound by reason because State and Local governments cannot spend without restraint (like a federal government that prints fiat money can).

They would land on another perch. NR, however, is edited by a coward. Do remember, Rich Lowery is a coward a,d NRO birthed the idiotic Goldberg who has attained fame and recognition far beyond his meager abilities.

Not my recollection, though it might have been Friday that Dubya made his mea culpa.

At any rate, the question is who it affected, why, and how much. That Bush was five percent ahead in polls before the story, and one percent behind after the election is fact. The original analysis was that the story affected evangelicals–I suggest it affected more that that segment. Again, the original analysis was that the “moral” angle was what hurt him, while I suggest it was not merely that but the weakness of his response.

Or ‘Squish’ or ‘Useful Idiot’.

Let’s not throw the baby out with the bathwater here. Lowry may be a squish, but Goldberg isn’t a bad writer. Let’s not confuse “intelligence” with “agreeing with us”.