Republican Presidential Candidates

[JewelSong]

Umm, no it doesn't. Capitalism is just about free markets. Free market means you're free to give it away what you make if you feel like it.

Okay...that makes sense, I guess.

[Túrin Turambar]

Lieberman was in fact already a candidate for Vice President, in 2000, as Al Gore's running mate. I don't think that anyone has suggested that the fact that he was Jewish contributed to Gore's loss; on the contrary, it probably helped Gore turn Florida into a virtual tie.

Really, V? I have always been convinced that Lieberman's religion was one of the reasons Gore's sure- fire candidacy failed. That even though Lieberman's socially conservtive position is quite close to the socially conservative Christian right.

Had Gore won, he would have been only the fifth candidate in a hundred years to win a third term for his party in the White House. He was fighting an uphill battle from the start, and it’s a testimony to the strength of the Democratic ticket that he came as close as he did, particularly when the Republican Party was still ascendant across the country. He did better in the same position than McCain, Ford, Humphrey, Nixon Mk 1, Stevenson and Cox did, and better than Carter who failed to win even a second term.

ETA: I made my previous post when I thought this was the anti-Semitism thread.

[Cenedril_Gildinaur]

To say that Palin was the reason McCain lost means that McCain could have won if he had chosen someone better. Personally I think McCain was the reason McCain lost.

I wonder who McCain could have chosen that would have enabled him to defeat Obama.

[sauronsfinger]

To say that Palin was the reason McCain lost means that McCain could have won if he had chosen someone better.

A look at the polling data, both on Palin as an individual and the McCain/Palin ticket clearly shows that Palin was a factor in the GOP loss. She simply failed to attract the Independent votes that are so crucial in a nation election. She was an is a polarizing figure who is loved by a narrow base but is not liked at all by most others outside of that narrow base. Picking her was one of the worst decisions of the campaign. She was completely useless to McCain when he provided no leadership at all in the late September meltdown in which he attempted to actually put his own campaign on hiatus. As he said many times, he knows little about the economy. I wonder what a man like Romney could have done in late September with that economic news? We will never know for sure but I think he would have provided more than simply being able to see a foreign nation from his state.

[Cenedril_Gildinaur]

So who could McCain have chosen that would have enabled him to beat the Obama-Biden ticket? If there is no answer to that then even if she did detract some votes she cannot be blamed for the overall loss - only McCain can be blamed for that. Comparing McCain to Romney only reinforces that conclusion.

[Túrin Turambar]

So who could McCain have chosen that would have enabled him to beat the Obama-Biden ticket? If there is no answer to that then even if she did detract some votes she cannot be blamed for the overall loss - only McCain can be blamed for that. Comparing McCain to Romney only reinforces that conclusion.

She can't be blamed for the overall loss, but she probably cost the ticket votes. I doubt there was any Republican candidate who could have defeated Obama - he wasn't a hugely strong candidate but the change sentiment and unpopularity of the Bush Administration made him almost inevitable. I still think McCain came closer than anyone else in the GOP field would have.

And as I've said before, VP candidates generally don't seem to have a huge affect on the ticket. Having Dan Quayle below him on the ballot didn't stop George Bush from winning big in 1988, although I doubt it helped him.

[sauronsfinger]

To say that Palin was the reason McCain lost means that McCain could have won if he had chosen someone better

The premise itself is a false one. McCain could have picked someone better and still lost but perhaps came closer. He did lose rather decisively.

His first choice was Joseph Lieberman but others in the party rebelled at that. Its only a guess - as lots of this speculation is - but I suspect Lieberman would have done much better with Independents than Palin did in driving them away.

In any loss, its a team effort. Both McCain and Palin bear responsibility. Of course, the person at the top of the ticket bears the brunt of it. However, I cannot remember a presidential election where so much emphasis was on the VP candidate as it was with Palin. And that is not a good thing. In the end, Palin cost McCain votes that he needed in the middle to win. That has been well documented with post election analysis and public polling.

Events in a campaign are unpredictable and can cause unforeseen consequences. I always thought Mitt Romney would have been the weakest Republican candidate because he would cause a division in the Wal-mart and Wall Street blocs because of his religion. But because of the economic events of late September, had he been on the ticket as VP he could have supplied some dynamic business expertise that would have been a great contrast with McCain. Romney could have carried the ball on that important issue while McCain handled other things. Would that have worked? Who can say for sure? But we sure know what did NOT work and that was Sarah Palin.

Look at the polling figures

www.nytimes.com/2008/10/31/us/politics/31poll.html

All told, 59 percent of voters surveyed said Ms. Palin was not prepared for the job, up nine percentage points since the beginning of the month. Nearly a third of voters polled said the vice-presidential selection would be a major factor influencing their vote for president, and those voters broadly favor Senator Barack Obama, the Democratic nominee.

And in a possible indication that the choice of Ms. Palin has hurt Mr. McCain’s image, voters said they had much more confidence in Mr. Obama to pick qualified people for his administration than they did in Mr. McCain.

When 6 out of 10 voters say you are not qualified to be President and a third of voters say it will be a major factor in how they cast their ballot those represent huge negatives. The first rule of a VP candidate should be "first, do no harm". Palin violated that in spades.

[halplm]

once again, it must be pointed out that only dems and the republicans who dislike palin seem to come to the conclusion that Palin was in any way detrimental to the McCain ticket.

Conservatives, on the other hand, would universally agree she was the only posative point of the McCain ticket.

[Pearly Di]

once again, it must be pointed out that only dems and the republicans who dislike palin seem to come to the conclusion that Palin was in any way detrimental to the McCain ticket.

The Republicans who disliked Palin must count for something, surely. I would love to know how many of them there were/are.

The impression I got, as an outsider, was that some Republicans were far from happy with Palin's strong anti-abortion stance or with the fact that their party has courted the Religious Right for so long.

Conservatives, on the other hand, would universally agree she was the only posative point of the McCain ticket.

What do you mean by 'conservative'? Fiscally conservative or socially conservative? The two things do not necessarily go hand in hand. Certainly in the UK they do not, and I can hardly imagine that America is much different in that respect.

[Túrin Turambar]

Conservatives, on the other hand, would universally agree she was the only posative point of the McCain ticket.

We've been through this before, but conservatives are a minority of the electorate. The fact remains that over September her approval ratings fell rapidly and the vote gap in the opinion polls widened, and aggregated polls after the election showed that, for the electorate overall, she made them less rather than more likely to vote for McCain.

Some people who would have voted Republican grudgingly did so more confidently, and she probably won votes in Alaska. Otherwise no ticket benefits from constant negative attention on its VP candidate.

[sauronsfinger]

One more example that the effort to win the GOP nomination in 2012 will be made by appealing to the rightwing rather than to the middle. Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, looked at as a moderate on some issues, gives an interview to a noted conservative site and he steers hard to the right.

http://www.newsmax.com/kessler/tim_pawl ... 76909.html

a sample

“His (Obama's) solutions are federalization of policy, spending way beyond anything we’ve seen in terms of deficit or debt levels, spending the country into bankruptcy,” Pawlenty says. “And what’s behind it is a philosophy that government knows best, a nanny-state mentality on domestic issues that will ultimately be corrosive to the other pillars of our country — to markets, private enterprise, individual responsibility, freedom and liberty.”

On the national security front, “History proves that it is weakness, not strength, that tempts our enemies,” observes Pawlenty. “And he is projecting potential weakness, and enemies may see that and their respect may be reduced as a result of that, or worse.”

In the days after the 2008 loss, Pawlenty was one of the calmer voices in the GOP and actually looked like he was going to try to steer the party away from the swing farther right.

Rasmussed recently released a poll showing that Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney run far better among Republicans that does Sarah Palin based on head to head match ups.

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_ ... bee_romney

a sample

But new Rasmussen Reports national telephone surveying finds Palin losing handily in face-to-face march-ups with her two likeliest challengers for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination.
Among likely Republican primary voters, Palin now trails former Arkansas governor-turned-Fox-TV-host Mike Huckabee by 20 points – 55% to 35%.
When her opponent is ex-Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney, Palin loses by 15 – 52% to 37%.

When given a list of five candidates and asked who they would vote for in 2012, 29% of Republican voters nationwide say Huckabee, while 24% prefer Romney and 18% Palin.
In July, it was close to a three-way tie: 25% said Romney, 24% Palin and 22% Huckabee.

[halplm]

Conservatives, on the other hand, would universally agree she was the only posative point of the McCain ticket.

We've been through this before, but conservatives are a minority of the electorate.

Conservatives are a minority, but so are liberals, and so are independants. Liberals are a SMALLER minority than conservatives, and if you go with "leans conservative" you have a majority.

Clearly, your base does not need to be a majority to win an election. There is NO doubt that Obama is the most liberal president we've had since Carter (personally I think since long before that), and while they are the smallest of all the significant minority blocks of voters, he still won easily.

[sauronsfinger]

from Halplm

Liberals are a SMALLER minority than conservatives, and if you go with "leans conservative" you have a majority.

Leans conservative... what does that mean in terms of practical electoral politics?

Where does this "lean conservative" come from?

[halplm]

basic polling pracitices.

[TheEllipticalDisillusion]

That's funny how liberals are a smaller minority, but if you add "leans conservatives" to the conservatives total, you get a majority. All this without a poll to corroborate, or some experts to agree. Funny.

[sauronsfinger]

TED has a valid point in wanting to see the actual evidence of those polls.

[halplm]

http://www.gallup.com/poll/123854/Conse ... Group.aspx#

[River]

Somehow this was not reflected in people's behavior at the polling places last November.

[TheEllipticalDisillusion]

This is a momentous day! The first piece of evidence to support one of hal's claims! Thank you for finally providing some evidence for your conclusions.

[halplm]

Somehow this was not reflected in people's behavior at the polling places last November.

As I have argued before, it was not just democrats and liberals who were dissatisfied with Bush and the REpublican party, but conservatives as well.