15 Takeaways From Obama’s Win

By Ashish Pabari On November 7, 2012 · 29 Comments

With Obama being re-elected in an electoral landslide, it tells us some very important things about the country politically going forward. My thoughts.

1. This is not a center-right country anymore. The changing demographics of the country have left the Republican party behind, and we saw that tonight. Facing a Democratic incumbent presiding over 7.9% unemployment, Republicans still could not win a national election. If Republicans couldn’t win a national election in this environment, when will they? Republicans have won the popular vote ONE TIME in the last 20 years (2004). The percentage of white voters is shrinking. The percentage of Hispanic voters is increasing. Young voters are more political than they used to be, vote more consistently now, and are overwhelmingly Democratic. Women are overwhelmingly Democratic. Republicans are going to have to change their message dramatically to national audiences if they want to win a Presidential election again. The far-right stances on women’s issues, immigration, etc. will have to change. The country has moved to the center-left on social issues, while the Republican party has moved to the far-right. Just look at what we saw tonight. An openly gay woman won a Senate seat. A President who supports gay marriage was re-elected. The Republican party is going to need to change its brand to focus more on the conservative FISCAL issues that still largely align with the country, and ditch the social issues that are resulting in their shrinking coalition. If they don’t, the changing demographics will leave them behind.

2. You cannot live in a reality-free zone forever. The polls were right. The ones that weren’t were the Republican pollsters — Rasmussen, ARG, etc. Nate Silver, Sam Wang, Votamatic and the other statical models were all validated, as they called the election EXACTLY RIGHT. For months, all we have heard from the right, particularly FOX News and talk radio, is that everything is false, everything is a conspiracy. The polls are all lies. The jobs numbers are all lies. The President’s birth certificate is fake. Minnesota and Michigan and Pennsylvania are close even though no data says they are. Everything that shows Obama winning is a lie. Now it’s over. Obama has won in an electoral landslide. Now what? How can FOX News and talk radio, which had pretty much EVERY one of their analysts ignore all the polling data and predict Romney landslides, look at their audience with a straight-face tomorrow and act like they have any credibility left? And when will the people who used those sources for their information finally realize that they have been misled for months regarding the polls and the state of this race and blame those sources? You can’t ignore facts and reality forever.

3. Empathy matters. A majority of voters tonight thought Romney would do a better job of handling the economy. The economy was the #1 issue. So why did he lose? Because voters overwhelmingly thought that Obama understood them better. That he related to them better. You can’t win a Presidential election without connecting. We spent months talking about how Romney needed a humanizing moment. A moment to make people feel connected to him. He never got it, and he lost. Romney let himself get defined by Obama as an out-of-touch, millionaire businessman who only cared about the rich, and he was never able to break that mold. He tried to move to the center at the first debate, but that didn’t fix his empathy problem. And the 47% video will be remembered for defining Romney to the electorate as a guy who looked down on much of the country, not a guy who empathized with them.

4. You cannot be viewed as a party that is exclusively for the rich and white. Exit polling showed tonight that voters thought Romney’s policies would favor the rich over everyone else. Exit polling also showed that Romney got slaughtered among all non-white groups. This is a country made up of middle class people and a growing minority population. The Republican brand has done a lot of damage to itself with its insistence over the past few years of never raising taxes on the wealthy. This is going to be a key thing to watch in the coming months as Obama and House Republicans go back to dueling over the fiscal cliff and the deficit. If they continue to insist that taxes cannot be raised a dime on millionaires, it will further reinforce the image voters have that the Republican party will sacrifice everyone for the interests of the rich.

5. The Republican party is not the party of Ronald Reagan anymore. They have got to return to a broader, more inclusive message. Quit talking about abortion, about rape, about gay marriage. Those issues will ensure you have the loudest group of supporters, but not the biggest group of supporters. Todd Akin lost. Mourdock lost. Listen to the results. The party will have to seize control back from the Tea Party if they want to be a national party going forward. Being a Southern white party won’t work anymore.

6. The Democrats were able to put their 2008 coalition back together. That coalition of minorities, women, young voters, and educated voters is growing, not shrinking. The fact that Obama kept that coalition together and turned them out to vote in a climate with 7.9 unemployment says a lot. The Republican party has to make inroads into that coalition if they ever want to win a national election again.

7. Do we see a civil war in the GOP now? Many on the far-right are already blaming Romney’s loss on him being too moderate. Other more moderate Republicans are acknowledging that they need to change their message to fit a changing American electorate that has shifted to the left on social issues. Which side wins? The far-right still has a lot of power in the House, still has the microphones of Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Laura Ingraham, etc. and are going to try and use this election result to move the party even further to the right. That would be a fatal mistake, and I think many in the party realize that and won’t just go along with it now. Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, these guys are not far-right guys, and if they want to run in 2016, they know that the party will have to change and they’ll have a responsibility to shift it (otherwise they won’t survive another far-right GOP primary like we saw this year). The problem is, if the Republican party does try to move to the center on social issues, will we see fringe third-parties prop up with far-right social issue positions? And how would that impact the national GOP? This battle will probably unfold over the next 1-2 years. It’s also important to note that a lot of the angst from the Tea Party stems from two issues — the deficit and the high unemployment rate. If the unemployment rate continues to go down, will that anger dissipate on its own? If a deficit deal IS reached, will that anger dissipate? The answer is probably yes.

8. Young voters are more politically engaged and Democrats have figured out how to turn them out consistently. Everybody thought that the youth vote would drop big this time around. It didn’t. They may not have been as excited to vote for Obama this time as they were in 2008, but they still did it. It’s a legitimate voting group that has to be respected now and the Republican party will have to understand that. You aren’t going to win the youth vote, particularly young women, when you have national figures in your party talking about rape, abortion, contraception, not supporting equal pay, gay marriage, etc.

9. If Obama passes some sort of immigration reform in his second term, he has a chance to lock-up the Hispanic vote for the Democratic party for decades to come. This election could have been the last chance Republicans are going to have in a while to try and appeal to Hispanics, and they not only didn’t try to appeal to them, they mostly did everything they could to send them running to the Democrats. This is something that could haunt the GOP for decades.

10. Obama has a winning hand on a lot of the major issues. Exit polling showed that the majority of the country believes taxes should be increased on the top 1%. Exit polling showed that the majority of the country believes illegal immigrants and their children should be allowed to stay and work in the country and be given a pathway to citizenship. Obamacare is a dead issue now. This was the only chance Republicans had to overturn it and with Romney’s loss, that chance is gone and Obamacare is here to stay.

11. Paul Ryan was a bad VP pick. I’m not saying that is Ryan’s fault. The Romney campaign barely used him. He never did interviews, was never put in the spotlight, and Romney ran away from Ryan’s budget. Why pick him then? Ryan was supposed to be the Republican ideas man, and never got to talk about his ideas. It made him look smaller. I feel that this campaign hurt Ryan very badly, and I’m not sure he has national prospects now after this. He also failed to flip Wisconsin. Hindsight is 20-20, but Romney should have picked Rubio or Portman. Even Christie would have been better.

12. Romney’s political career is probably over now. He gave a very classy concession speech, something that was absolutely needed in a country this divided. Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, Marco Rubio, etc. are now the top stars in the party, and it will be up to them to shift the party in a direction that makes them nationally relevant again.

13. Obama owes Bill Clinton big. His speech at the Democratic convention was a turning point. After that speech, the country’s view on the economy got dramatically better and never went back down to pre-convention levels. His strong campaigning for Obama had a big impact. Remember that in 2016 if Hillary runs.

14. With the economy improving, and the demographics continuing to become more and more favorable for Democrats every day, they are set up pretty well for 2016, particularly if Hillary Clinton runs.

15. Obama’s ground game is going to go down as the greatest political ground game in U.S. history. Getting out the vote the way they did in 2008 was remarkable, but doing it again in a climate of 7.9 unemployment is even more remarkable. Obama overperformed the polls in pretty much every swing state, just as he did in 2008, because his ground game registered new voters and targeted sporadic voters that many thought would stay home this year. It’s a machine that has delivered over and over again, and it’ll be interesting to see if that machine stays intact for whoever the 2016 Democratic nominee is.

29 Responses to 15 Takeaways From Obama’s Win

Sean says:

November 7, 2012 at 1:02 AM

Ashish, thank you. I’ve been following 411 politics for 5 years covering 2 major elections. I could not tell you whether I think you lean left/right/center. Your site has been objective, informative, and interesting. I hope you can parlay this into something more. Cheers and keep up the good work.

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TrueblueDS says:

November 7, 2012 at 2:34 AM

Would you do me a huge favor? Please be here in four years to cover this again in 2016. There are very few places where I trust that the news I’m getting is objective, and yours has been one of them. Great job on this election season!

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Dirk Diggler says:

November 7, 2012 at 2:51 AM

Damn proud to be a Democrat tonight. Big wins across the board. If FOX News is any indication, there will indeed be a civil war in the GOP.

PS Donald Trump’s Twitter was hilarious tonight. Epic troll.

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Jeremy S. says:

November 7, 2012 at 3:01 AM

Some of the points here were some of the same things I’ve been saying this election; it’s pretty crazy, especially on the Ronald Reagan points.

Thanks again for this site, it’s been the primary source of news and discussion for me this election.

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G-man says:

November 7, 2012 at 4:41 AM

Excellent analysis and explains why people are abandoning the main stream media. Anyway I posted my result on here as 303 to Obama, but looks like he gets Florida too.

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Cbear says:

November 7, 2012 at 4:49 AM

Ashish,

I enjoyed your posts even though you and I differ on political affiliation. I won’t lie and I am disappointed by the results but that’s the breaks.

I made a few observations of my own

1. Polls, like them or not, matter. The old adage is the only poll that matters is on Election Day but little snap shots on public opinion carries weight.

2. Romney was a formidable opponent. He narrowly lost the popular vote and he reclaimed Indiana and North Carolina (barely) as a red states and did well in others he lost.

3. Romney’s solid performance in Ohio and Pennsylavania hopefully bodes well for future Republicans. People heard and came out to Romney rallies and seemed to be pumped up. Not enough obviously but still many liked what they heard and it could have laid a foundation to build on for next time.

4. The Republican Party needs to re-examine itself, I don’t disagree with your point Ashish. However it’s not that simple. Moderate Tepublicans will have a difficult time trying to reel in Tea Party Members. Those folks represent the extreme right of the party and will not be easily swayed to change their ways.

That being said, the Republicans should not abandon all of their philosophy. Smaller Govt, less taxes and fiscal responsibility are things I think appeal to folks.

5. I am a minority Republican member, but your point about the GOP losing minorities and women is definitely a valid concern. I became a republican because their philosophy of fiscal responsibility and not punishing success through higher taxes appealed to me.
I understand that is not the same for everyone and perhaps Republicans need to sit down with minority leaders and get a grasp for why those folks turn away from them.
Immigration, racial divisions, financial security are all big concerns so its important to start rebuilding the base. It won’t happen overnight so it’ll take time.

6. Obama still has that rock star appeal. Like it or not, the President is very charismatic and can draw in people. The question is…how will this bode for his successor?
Will the next democratic nominee have the same youth appeal as President Obama? Joe Biden doesn’t and neither does Hillary Clinton in my opinion.
The Tepublicans could counter 2016 with. Chris Cristie/Marco Ribio ticket. Lots of youth and fire there, plus both come from Blue States not to mention Rubio is a minority.

I could think of other points but its getting really late and i’ll leave it at that.
No sour grapes here but definitely a bitter taste of defeat.
I’ll take away the fact Romney had a good showing in the popular vote and the fact the GOP still controls the House as minor consolation gifts.
Keep up the good work Ashish. We may stand on opposite sides of the political floor but we all play for the same team.

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Ray says:

November 7, 2012 at 6:52 AM

I think there are two other takeaways that can be made:

1) People aren’t as stupid as they are treated. One statistic from the exit polls was about the economy, and many people acknowledged it was important, but also put the blame squarely on Bush, despite all the obfuscation that has gone on.

2) Money in politics may be a problem in terms of the impact it has in terms of possible corruption, but money alone is not enough to swing the election. McMahon lost despite spending 60 million of her own money. Outside spending against Obama dwarfed the Obama spending, but there were only so many hours of advertising to buy. Not saying that it has no effect, but there are limits to what campaign donations can buy…

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- xjuggernaughtx says:
  
  November 7, 2012 at 11:04 AM
  
  I think your first point is one that both politicans and the media really need to learn. I think there is a silent majority of eye-rollers in this country that don’t raise too much of a fuss, but see right through all this crap that we are constantly shoveled. I know a lot of conservatives, since I work for UPS. Not one of them believes that Obama’s policies destroyed the economy. To keep trying to convince people of that is insulting. You can argue that conservative policy might kick start the ecomony but to say that liberals DESTROYED it in the month or two that Obama was in office is ridiculous. Screaming tha America is becoming a dirty socialist state is ridiculous. Trying to pretend that if business just had MORE tax breaks and LESS regulation, despite the fact that companies are sitting on record piles of cash and less regulation killed the economy in the first place, that THEN they would start hiring is ridiculous. Americans just aren’t this stupid, no matter what our reputation is.
  
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- G-man says:
  
  November 7, 2012 at 12:27 PM
  
  It is not like money goes to just the republicans, many corporations gave to both republicans and democrats, so it is win win for them. We are yet see the full scope of the favors they have bought.
  
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  - Ray says:
    
    November 7, 2012 at 6:30 PM
    
    Hmmm, I think you need to look at the statistics on big money. Obama may have bet Romney in the direct donations category, but over 50% of his donations were under $200. For Romney that number was 23%.
    
    When it came to SuperPac’s it was not even close. Of the 20 biggest SuperPacs, 15 were Republicans, and of the 10 biggest Obama only had Priorities USA, while Romney had the other 9.
    
    There are times you can say “both sides”, but not on a factual question like political spending.
    
    Reply
Luigi says:

November 7, 2012 at 8:46 AM

Congratulations to President Obama. Mr. Romney gave a nice concession speech and the Republican leadership should make your analysis required reading in the coming days. I think the Republican moderates like Christie, Bush and Rubio need to take control from the Tea Party to have any chance next time. As far as the Democrats go, Hillary Clinton will be 69 years old on Election Day in 2016-she ain’t Reagan and she ain’t runnin’.

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- Cbear says:
  
  November 7, 2012 at 1:48 PM
  
  @luigi,
  
  Over Hillary’s dead body she’s not running. You better believe she’ll make a run. Whether or not she wins is a totally different story.
  
  I don’t believe she has the charisma or ‘rock star’ appeal of Peesident Obama. Granted she has Bill in her corner, so that helps.
  
  Reply
  - Ray says:
    
    November 7, 2012 at 6:31 PM
    
    I think you will find the reason Biden is Vice President was to give Clinton a shot in 2016.
    
    Reply
Joseph N says:

November 7, 2012 at 10:51 AM

Thanks Aashish for everything!!!!!

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xjuggernaughtx says:

November 7, 2012 at 10:58 AM

One thing that is clear is that the Republicans lost their huge gamble. They bet that they could just grind the government to a halt with obstruction and let the economy sink Obama. Now that they have lost, they are left with almost nothing to point to in the future as achievements, so were do you go from here? The public has rejected your ideology and you have nothing substantive to run on. Republicans better get a successful agenda together pretty quickly or 2016 is going to be very ugly for them.

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- willia451 says:
  
  November 7, 2012 at 11:59 AM
  
  IMO. Getting rid of the Tea Party would go a long way to getting the Republicans back to competitive status.
  
  The Tea Party cost the Republicans the Senate in 2010. And the Tea Party cost the Republicans the Senate (and arguably the Presidency) again in 2012.
  
  The problem is extremists have almost completely taken over the Republican Party. Every Republican is now scared to death of a primary on their right flank. And just about no matter who they put up for a national run, those same extremists will undercut that person’s efforts; simply by association if not directly.
  
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  - Cbear says:
    
    November 7, 2012 at 1:42 PM
    
    @Willia,
    
    Unfortunately it’s not going to be easy for Conservatives to cut ties to the Tea Party. I know they don’t represent us Republicans as a whole, sadly though they are the loudest and draw attention to themselves.
    
    I believe if the Republicans are to bounce back, the right wing extremists themselves are going to have to come to the conclusion that they are hurting the party as a whole.
    
    That being said, it was a tough loss but we move on from here and look forward to another round in 2016.
    
    Reply
    - Ray says:
      
      November 7, 2012 at 6:51 PM
      
      I don’t know about that. Back in the 60s, the Republicans had a problem with an extremist group called the John Birch Society.
      
      William Buckley and Barry Goldwater shut it down, and they were hardly moderates. At the same time, they solidified themselves as the intellectual leaders of the movement.
      
      I was thinking when Chris Christie praise Obama for his response to Hurricane Sandy that if he wanted to run in 2016, and be able to govern afterwards, that he could build himself a movement by pushing for a more serious Republican Party. Because of his history of yelling at liberals, no-one would question his conservatism and he is one of the few people who could tell the whackos in the party to sit down, shut up and put your shoes on.
      
      I get the feeling there is a wide swath of traditional conservatives who would follow him into that battle.
      
      Yes, he would have to go toe to toe with Limbaugh. Limbaugh already blamed him for losing the election, before the election to boot. But I also get the feeling there is a vast group of true red but ousted Republicans (David Frum, Andrew Sullivan, Dick Luger, Olympia Snowe, Rick Lazio… pretty much anyone who lost to a tea-party nominee in the primaries) plus a bunch of moderates who have had to turn themselves in pretzels to stay in the party (David Brooks) who could make a fairly solid bloc to take the party back.
      
      Reply
  - xjuggernaughtx says:
    
    November 7, 2012 at 2:40 PM
    
    I think the marriage to the christian right was the beginning of trouble with the Republicans. That level of social conservative doesn’t square with a “Government Out Of Our Lives” approach. Christianity is all about GETTING INTO people lives. The Republicans had noticable gains in power by going after these voters, but it has torn apart their ideology. Add to this the Tea Party and they’ve reached a tipping point. Changing demographics here have hastened this. The Republicans need to return to a true philosophy of government out of your life AT ALL LEVELS if they want to be a viable party moving forward.
    
    Reply
willia451 says:

November 7, 2012 at 11:04 AM

I would like to echo some of the sentiments out here.

Outstanding work, Ashish. Your election night blog and updates were fantastic. While I was running around with my butt in my hands looking for ghosts, your updates brought me back down to earth with precision and concrete analysis.

Thanks for that. Probably kept me from flushing my head down the toilet on a couple of different occasions.

I really hope you keep up the great work you’ve started here between the elections as well. I’ll definitely be stopping by regularly if you do.

Again, thanks.

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Mike Finazzo says:

November 7, 2012 at 12:14 PM

Loved this article. As a fiscal conservative with a liberal social stance, I felt I had no choice but to vote Democrat on most of my ballot. (I did get to vote against Richard Murdock)

I think your points nailed it and I’ve become a big fan of your site. Keep up the great work!

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Jerry Chandler says:

November 7, 2012 at 12:33 PM

“And when will the people who used those sources for their information finally realize that they have been misled for months regarding the polls and the state of this race and blame those sources? You can’t ignore facts and reality forever.”

Never.

We’re seeing and hearing it now on social networking sites, blogs and talk radio. fraud stole the election. The “facts” were reported correctly, it’s just the MSM in the bag for Obama that’s covering the theft of the election.

Delusional is as delusional does.

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Anthony says:

November 7, 2012 at 1:03 PM

White Population > Black Population
White Population > Hispanic Population

Black Population + Hispanic Population > White Population

When united we are NOT the minority

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- willia451 says:
  
  November 7, 2012 at 1:57 PM
  
  Black Population = 13%
  
  Hispanic Population = 17%
  
  White Persons not Hispanic = 63%
  
  13% + 17% < 63%
  
  The real takeaway is it takes a coalition to defeat the aged white men that make up the base of the Republican Party.
  
  In short, the Black Population and Hispanic Population had a lot of help. Especially from Women, young voters, and many educated white men.
  
  Just saying.
  
  Reply
  - Chester says:
    
    November 7, 2012 at 4:30 PM
    
    Yeah it’s absurd to hear people go on and on about how Obama didn’t win whites. Blacks and Hispanics didn’t elect Obama…
    
    Obama carried a TON of white people, yes, even white men. Did he lose them overall? Sure. But he kept it competitive.
    
    THE PEOPLE elected Obama for a second term. People of all shades.
    
    The real takeaway here is not that Obama courted minorities and that rode him into the White House for a second term… But that Romney put together a coalition that was almost entirely white and increasingly old.
    
    That’s the problem.
    
    Too much ballyhoo about how there ain’t enough white people. Obama got millions upon millions of white people to vote for him.
    
    You have to appeal to ALL the people. That’s the issue here.
    
    In other news, on my way home yesterday, I was a bit nervous even though the numbers were on our side. I stopped at the grocery store and honestly, I didn’t sense anything palpable in either direction. Nobody seemed particularly engaged. But as I was leaving, I pulled out of the parking lot and the car in front of me had a couple anti-Obama stickers on it. First time I’d really seen any, to be honest. Talking about how they were gonna vote him out or whatever. This is all largely irrelevant, but helps pain the picture a bit better here. The bumper stickers looked relatively new, but who knows.
    
    Anyway, the point is, on the other side of the car was a bumper sticker that said “I don’t believe the Liberal Media”… It was brilliant. This was a guy who no doubt was on his way home, thinking that Obama was a socialist, a Muslim, a super left wing communist and no doubt, about to lose in a landslide to Mitt Romney. He no doubt believed all the polls were skewed and that “Obummer” was one and done, just like Jimmy Carter (who as you know, Obama was exactly like) and that the happy days were just beyond the horizon.
    
    I couldn’t help but think back to that guy several times last night. Locked up in his bubble of insanity and misinformation. Perhaps it’s time we get past this absurd notion of a “Liberal Media” that constantly skews everything to make Republicans look bad and face the cold harsh realization that reality is reality and while the media often doesn’t do a good job in reporting things, the facts are the facts.
    
    I can only imagine the insanity that must have been going on in that guy’s house last night as the losses piled up. As the “Liberal” media was vindicated time and time again. As the numbers were right and every single Fox News pundit was proved wrong. Poor, ignorant, deluded bastard.
    
    Reply
Mr. Ballistik says:

November 7, 2012 at 4:55 PM

Nothing has changed.

Conservatives are arguing that those who voted for Obama are either highly uneducated and/or greedy.Conservatives are stating that the President has no mandate as a result of this election. They claim that the only reason Obama won was because he ran a negative campaign against Romney.

They are not going to give up on opposing gay marriage, legalized marijuana, clean energy, or public healthcare. They will continue to cry about the liberal media, about the bias of the public education system, and the culture wars.

You cannot remove the “extreme” elements from the Republican party because they ARE the Republican party.

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A.C. Sativa says:

November 7, 2012 at 6:37 PM

Hopefully Andrew Cuomo runs in 2016.

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Anonymous says:

November 8, 2012 at 8:52 AM

One thing I take away from this election over at 411:

all of the pro-Romney guys like TheRev, coby, Grant (not the Grant here, *that* Grant was actually intelligent and gave many great points at times) have been *very* silent since their boy Mittens lost the election. Yet they were sooooooo vocal and cocky when there was the ever so slight chance Romney could pull out a victory from his behind. Kinda shows the mentality of *some* GOP supporters in a nutshell.

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Tony says:

November 9, 2012 at 1:15 PM

In terms of popular vote is was 50.44% to 47.94%. 2008 was 52.87% to 45.60%. The GOP gained votes and the Dems lost votes. (Media doesn’t portrait it that way though.) Romney just couldn’t gain enough votes fast enough. To read this article you’d think Romney got like 2% of the vote, that is not the case.

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