Posts Tagged ‘romney’

The Southern Strategy and How the Democrats will Rescue the GOP

Friday, November 16th, 2012

I read a story about how it was the gay vote that pushed Obama over the top. No, other stories say it was single white women. No, it was blacks. No, it was Latinos. No, it was east Asians. No, it as unions.

No, it was all of the above. Had Romney shaved off just one hunk of the Obama coalition, he would be working on his transition right now.

But the GOP is in a pickle and can’t grab any of the Democratic coalition. Because at the very core of the current Republican Party is Nixon’s “southern strategy” of appealing to southern racists. This became a theme with them and the GOP is now defined by what they are against. They oppose: anyone who isn’t white, anyone who isn’t straight, Democrats, abortion, atheism, damn foreigners, uppity women, poor people, cities, science, green-anything, etc. And, they are against government.

They are *for* a left over Norman Rockwell image, particularly if we choose a Rockwell that includes business, guns, and a Bible. That demographic has now shrunk below 50%, and is slowly fading.

The problem with defining a party by being against things is that they can’t open the tent for any of these hated threats without chasing out those already in the tent.

This pickle will vex them for years and years. I don’t see how they can fix it.

Instead, the GOP will regain power when the Democrats mess up enough that people vote for the other party without worrying what that party is. Maybe some third party will get the benefit, but probably it will still be the GOP. Let’s hope the GOP reforms itself into something mostly reasonable by then. For the sake of the USA, don’t pray for the GOP to suffer, pray for their quick recovery.

-kb, the Kent who is still trying to wrap his head around the meaning of the 2012 election.

© 2012 by Kent Borg

Romney’s Not Stupid

Friday, September 14th, 2012

Chattering classes are saying that Romney criticizing of our embassy–criticism released while the embassy in Cairo was under attack–these folks are saying that this was stupid.  Oh, how limited the critic’s vision.

It was wrong for Romney to make such criticism, but was is not stupid.  Not stupid, that is, if his only goal is to get elected.

In this case, it did not work.  Okay.

The downside is that people who already don’t like Romney have further reason to not like Romney.  Big whoop.  Others won’t notice nor care.

The upside: Romney might have landed a good blow in one of Obama’s strong areas: foreign policy.  Things are not going swimmingly in foreign lands, there are some messes out there, to probe at that topic is reasonable.  Sure, this was a wild punch, but if the game keeps going as it is going, Romney is going to lose.  He needs some external event to change the game, and when an external event comes along, he needs to swing at it.  Otherwise, he has nothing left but crossing his fingers and hoping that his minions will manage to steal a key state or five.  Heck, he isn’t even campaigning very hard right now, some days just flying back and forth across the country.  Traditional campaigning isn’t going to do it alone.

-kb, the Kent who tries to figure it out.

© 2012 by Kent Borg