Karl Rove talks to Time Magazine's Mike Allen. The analysis of the election outcome is interesting, this was a razor thin win in many, many races.
Rove is famous for his political statistics, and his team has come up with an array of figures to contend that the Republicans' loss of 29 seats in the House and six in the Senate is not so out of whack with the historic norms. In all sixth year midterms, the President's party has lost an average of 29 House seats and 3 Senate seats, according to these figures. In all sixth-year midterms since World War II, the loss was an average of 31 House and 6 Senate seats. And in all wartime midterms since 1860, the average loss was 32 House and 5 Senate seat.
The Republican get-out-the-vote program Rove helped invent precluded even deeper losses, he says. "People were talking 35, 40 or more and it didn't happen," he said. "There were a number of elections which were supposed to be close and ended up not being close."
The Republican National Committee has been pointing out that a small shift in votes would have made a big difference. A shift of 77,611 votes would have given Republicans control of the House, according to Bush's political team. And a shift of 2,847 votes in Montana, or 7,217 votes in Virginia, or 41,537 votes in Missouri would have given a Republicans control of the Senate. In addition, the party has calculated that the winner received 51 percent or less in 35 contests, and that 23 races were decided by two percentage points or fewer, 18 races were decided by fewer than 5,000 votes, 15 races were decided by fewer than 4,000 votes, 10 races were decided by fewer than 3,000 votes, eight were decided by fewer than 2,000 votes and five races were decided by fewer than 1,000 votes.
It really was very close, wasn't it? Besides the Republican GOTV, I wonder how many votes were pushed to the Republicans by John Kerry in the last week of the election. We'll never know that, of course. But one does wonder. There is a need to move along and not dwell on the past election, of course. And it's about time to do that.
The important thing to remember is that we lost. We must not allow the powers that be to rationalize that fact away. It would be far to easy to allow Rove and crowd to hide behind the fact that the loss was not “all that bad” rather than to confront the real things that brought about the Republican’s defeat and continue business as usual (what lousy sentence construction). The reasons for defeat have been, and will continue to be discussed ad infinitum. As a party, there are real big changes that must be made. We, who call ourselves conservatives (rather than republicans) have got to hold our leader’s feet to the fire. They must not be allowed to ignore the things that brought about defeat.
Some tidal wave of change. Many of the freshmen congresscritters are _moderate_ Democrats selected by Rahm Emanuel precisely becuase they were centrists. I wonder how long until the nutroots figure this out?
“According to an unpublished post-election study by Thomas Schaller, a University of Maryland political scientist, 14 of 48 of the most “liberal” Republicans were defeated.
The Democrats who defeated them can be expected to hold these seats indefinitely. Historically Republican districts going back to the founding of the GOP in the civil war are turning into Democratic bastions. ” – Sidney Blumenthal
You must be this week’s assigned talking point troll, eh, Arlo?
The country is polarized. The polarization is along religious and social rather than economic or political lines. Elections are decided on very small margins and minor issues, like school prayer, intelligent design and abortion.
This is why you see the Bush administration spending huge amounts on the social programs that it’s fundamentalist base needs and expects.
School prayer, intelligent design and abortion?
I thought this election was about the War in Iraq, and national security. And, we’re divided along ideological and political lines. Now, put down the funny cigarettes and back away slowly.