Mark Levin and the Omens of Doom

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“If Romney is indeed now the ‘inevitable’ nominee, it is a status he has obtained by crushing conservative opposition in an astonishingly expensive and negative campaign . . .”
— Robert Stacy McCain, “Predictably Predictable,” The American Spectator, April 4, 2012

This evening, Mark Levin led his nationally syndicated radio show by reading key excerpts from that column. It was evident that “The Great One” sees the same ominous signs that concern me, that he knows what these omens portend, and that he would like to alert his listeners to the fact that they are being propagandized and indoctrinated.

Unfortunately, judging from the reactions by Levin’s callers, there are a lot of people who don’t get it. They misunderstand what Levin is saying — what I am saying — about the obvious weaknesses of Mitt Romney’s campaign. The uncomprehending callers seemed to think that this is merely a matter of personal opinion, and that their admiration for Romney or their disdain for Rick Santorum are the most relevant facts to be discussed.

Some people can’t see the omens or lack the experience to interpret what these auguries signify. When we try to point out to them the portents of impending doom, these people respond, “Well, that’s your opinion.”

It’s a waste of breath to argue with people who think that way. If I’m wrong, I’m wrong, but we’ll have to wait and see, and there’s no point getting in arguments with people who are merely trying to belittle my intelligence, my knowledge, my experience and my judgment.

Let’s just suppose that you don’t know me from Adam’s housecat, OK? Go ahead and decide that, because I’m telling you something you don’t want to hear, something that contradicts your own opinions, then I must be wrong. Fine: No sweat off my nose and, in the present case, if Mitt Romney actually proves to be a triumphantly successful candidate who clobbers Obama in November, then I will be overjoyed that the Reign of Error is ended.

But . . . what if I’m right?

Never mind. Rule out that possibility. I’ve never been right about anything before, so far as you know. How about Richard Viguerie?

As Bloomberg’s Heidi Przybyla noted, the “defining feature of the 2012 Republican presidential primary race” has been Romney’s relentlessly negative campaign. According to Przybyla’s research, “Since the contests began, Restore Our Future has spent $35 million on commercials attacking Santorum and Newt Gingrich” and “just $1.1 million promoting Romney.” . . .
Romney’s negative ads, many of them factually questionable, have carpet bombed the conservatives in the race. . . .
However, these attacks have done nothing to build support for Mitt Romney, especially among movement conservatives, and to the extent that Romney can claim front runner status it is because he has come to be seen as the “least worst” alternative by rank-and-file Republican primary voters. . . .
Even if one accepts the fuzzy math that Romney claims puts him half way to the 1,144 delegates he needs to clinch the Republican nomination — and we don’t — his negative campaign has left him with a substantial enthusiasm deficit, and no real base upon which to mount a winning campaign against Barack Obama.

But you don’t know Richard Viguerie from Adam’s housecat, either. He’s just some dude you never heard of before. How about Stu Rothenberg?

The bottom line, of course, is that nobody — not his critics and not his allies — really believes Mitt Romney. . . .
The question is whether, in November, Romney may be in a similar position as Obama was or whether the fact that nobody actually believes Romney will destroy his presidential bid completely.
Is Romney such a mass of contradictions that voters can look at him and project their positions on him, allowing them to support him? Or is his credibility so shot that too many voters will simply conclude that they can’t trust him, making it impossible for them to support him?

But never mind that: Who is this Rothenberg guy, anyway, huh? You’re waaaayy smarter than him — and Viguerie, and me, and Mark Levin.

Now the Romney campaign is threatening to “destroy” Santorum in Pennsylvania. And Debbie Wasserman-Schultz says Mitt’s Mormonism is “off limits” (nudge, nudge, wink, wink).

Like I said, some things are predictably predictable.

UPDATE: Romney supporter Cindy Cooper is upset with me. Since I filed my column (I sent it to The American Spectator about 1:30 a.m.) there were evidently late returns that changed Romney’s margin of victory from 4 points to 7 points, and boosted Romney’s total vote to more than 340,000, whereas it had been about 300,000 with 98% of precincts reporting.

OK, so that fact is corrected. Now, what about turnout?

In 2010, in the Wisconsin GOP Senate primary — held in September — Ron Johnson got more than 500,000 votes, and then got 1.1 million votes in the general election to defeat incumbent Democratic Sen. Russ Feingold.

That was a mid-term campaign, and you see that Romney got a substantially lower total in this year’s presidential primary than did Johnson in 2010.  In the 2008 presidential election — turnout is always higher in presidential elections than in mid-terms — John McCain got 1.26 million votes in Wisconsin, but that was only 43 percent of the vote; Barack Obama won with 1.68 million (56%).

Now, a point: WISCONSIN IS AN OPEN PRIMARY STATE.

This means that any voter — Democrat, Republican, independent — can vote in any primary. In 2008, “Super Tuesday” was Feb. 5, and Mitt Romney quit the race on Thursday, Feb. 7 (I was reporting it live at CPAC when the news broke), effectively ceding the nomination to John McCain. However, the Democratic race between Obama and Hillary Clinton that year continued to be hotly contested into the spring.

So, when Wisconsin held its open primary on Feb. 19 — two weeks after McCain sealed the deal for the GOP nomination — 1.1 million people voted in the Democratic primary, while only 395,000 people voted in the GOP primary, which McCain won with 55% (225,000) to Mike Huckabee’s 37% (151,000).

All of this I note, because Cindy Cooper is angry at me for saying that turnout in this year’s Republican primary was “phenomenally low,” when Eric Ostermier of the Humphrey Institute writes:

Wisconsin Republican primary voter turnout surged more than 91 percent in 2012 from 410,607 voters in 2008 to over 785,000 on Tuesday. . . .
In terms of the raw number of votes, the 2012 GOP primary was the second largest on record in Wisconsin behind only 1980 when the three-way battle between Reagan, Bush, and Anderson brought 907,853 individuals out to vote that April.

So, clearly the phrase “phenomenally low” was an inaccurate description of the turnout but — but — these numbers are still important, if you keep in mind that Wisconsin is an open primary state. The cycle-to-cycle “surge” from 2008 to 2012 is explained entirely by the fact that the 2008 GOP campaign was effectively over, while the Democrats were still going tooth-and-nail.

The best recent comparison (insofar as any such comparison doesn’t suffer from an apples-to-oranges problem) is to 1980, when there was a Democrat incumbent (Jimmy Carter) in the White House, and the GOP primary was still competitive. Turnout in 2012 thus represents a 14% drop from 1980. And keep in mind that Wisconsin’s population has grown 21 percent (from 4.7 to 5.7 million) since 1980.

Despite all that, I clearly got some facts wrong, and I’m correcting the record here. Far be it from me to attempt a “fake but accurate” defense. But the data still indicate that Mitt Romney is a much weaker GOP candidate than Ron Johnson or even John McCain.

We will have to wait and see what happens to know whether the omens and portents accurately foretold events.

101 comments

  2.  Exactly. People rightfully criticize Romney’s actions as Governor of Massachusetts which he had to go along with, but they’re willing to give Santorum a pass for things he did as Pennsylvania Senator for the same damn reason. But of course Santorum is “Pro-Life” so everything else is forgiven.

  3. Mitt will run the Executive just like he ran it in the Bay State: all bluster, no guts.  The one time he stood up and acted like a man was when a woman was killed by falling debris in The Big Dig, and that was the softest of softballs.

  7. Well put, Adobe.

    That is a key: lacking the Killer Instinct.

    He’s obviously thick-headed in that this playing nicey-nice when it comes to his comments on the content of Obama’s character [or lack thereof] is a picture perfect replay of what Stacy’s deranged, grumpy cousin did in 2008 – and it was a massive FAIL.

    Ronald Reagan, though the smiles and the laughs [a lot of them ridicule], made it clear that he held Carter in contempt for being lame.  He was still able to capture the Mushy Middle [take that, Adj!].

  10.  Driving us fire-eaters won’t be that easy.  These are different times and we have woken up to how serious the situation is.  We’re not in the mood to compromise anymore [just as The Founders weren’t in 1776 after years of being willing].

    WOLVERINES!

  11. Things have reached a point, Smitty, where I think the Palin Effect can’t happen again.  Many of us will not settle anymore because we believe the stakes are too high — we’ve awakened to the danger.

  14. Milwaukee held an election that will count, now that Barrett is running against Walker. The rest of it was school boards and the primaries.

    GOP Wisconsinites took a look at the delegates and concluded that Romney was a done deal. They’re holding their powder and incidentally not tipping their hands until the actual recall elections in June, after which there will be an actual election in November.

  15. What the heck is YOUR problem? Did I blame you? I don’t give a rat’s ass what you think! You want to support the pro-abortion liberal, go right ahead. 

  16. Problem is, they aren’t potential allies.  The Libertarians had their knives out for him from Day One.  So did Fox after a bit.

    Rick did what Conservatives do when they are unfairly attacked.  He fought back.

    And then we have blaming the victim by calling him whiny.

    The proper way to deal with Libertarians is to hit them with a stick right away.  That way, they know you won’t put up with their garbage, and if they want to talk to you, they have to be reasonable.

    Remember Utopian Seeker=Libertarian.  And Utopians are very dangeorus people.

  18.  Romney is nothing more than a firewall for Wall Street and the Finance industry. They own Obama and have candidates in their pocket on both sides of the fence.

    The DNC is claiming Romney is owned by big oil, but that is only a small slice compared to where the real money is coming from.

    They have had to try to destroy Santorum because he is a true threat to their lofty aristocratic perch.

  23.  Romney was supposedly an executive office-holder.  Santorum was supposed to be part of a party team.  There’s a difference in expectations AND freedom of action there.

  24.  If you give a rat’s ass what I think what the hell are you blabbering about? You just made my point for me. You’re just another Pro-Life fanatic with tunnel vision. And yes, I will support him. Not that I need your fucking permission.

  25.  I’m not seeing a difference. Romney had a democrat legislature he had to play ball with. Note that I’m not blaming Santorum for doing it, just that there’s zero difference.

  26.  That would just result in conservatives forming their own party and moderates either staying in the GOP or going over to the Democrats, who would dominate the country for decades to come.

    Then WHIG could become an acronym for WHERE IS MY GUN?

  29.  It’s not the Governor’s JOB to play ball with his legislature, it’s to enact his policies or at least stop them from enacting bad ones. 

    How many bills did he even TRY to veto?

  32. Governors have to work with their legislatures to pass budgets. And there’s only so many times you can veto legislation. In the case of an overwhelming opposition, usually just once.

  33.  LOL, no PT, not you. You are very tame compared to what I have come across, not only this election cycle but the last one as well and I can tell by your posts that Mitt is not your ideal candidate… In short, the ones I am referring to are akin to Obama supporters.

  37. Incorrect there are more self identified conservatives (who usually vote republican) than self identified Republicans by a margin of almost two to one. There are more self identified democrats than self identified liberals tho many are deluded thinking themselves moderates when they are liberal as they can be.

  38. Isn’t bad enough we’re putting ethanol in cars instead of charred oak barrels? Besides I suspect that would hurt alot!

  42. You see, the real problem with Tabitha is that she just can’t handle the (journalistic) truth.

    Time of OtherCon – the conference for bloggers who tell the really inconvenient truths!

  46. Two thoughts:

    1. Will Romney be as negative, or more negative, on Obama during the campain? Romney’s top campaign advisor said Romney will be at least as polite as Senator McCain during his stellar campaign. How many of Romney’s current media/message meisters will desert him like McCain’s did?

    2. A lot of pundits, especially those purporting to entertain the conservatives, are telling their listeners/followers to vote for Romney regardless – and according to those same pundits any other action indicates one isn’t fit for conservatism. If this primary is as conservative as Romney is going to get, how progressive will he govern?

  48.  So being a cheerleader for somebody I know is finished is supposed to prevent Obama winning? Refusing to accept reality is supposed to prevent Obama from winning?

  49. You know what, Pagan Temple? I am actually looking forward to another four years of Obama. Why? Because sanctimonious cretins like you deserve to suffer under his policies.

    I vote for whomever I damn well please. My state’s primary is next month, and I’ll be voting for Newt or Rick. Probably Rick. Ne thing you’ve forgotten about “reality”: I still have the right to vote for whomever I want – and it isn’t The Reality Candidate.

    I don’t need your advice and I will not take orders from you, as I do not need your permission to vote.

    Romney is going to lose, and I can’t wait to see it. I am through with statist RINOs.

    By the way, abortion has nothing to do with it.

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