GOOD ADVICE!
From the Corner:
1) We got this the old-fashioned way: we earned it. The other side took the fight to us, and we never took the fight to the other side, except coyly and obliquely. That’s not a mistake we should make the next time. “Honorable campaigns” are for losers. Next time, call ‘em as they really are, not as you wish to see ‘em.
2) Where was Bush? Once again, and right to the bitter end, he let his passion for “loyalty” supersede what was stragetically right for the party, not to mention what was best for the country. I think his reputation has nowhere to go but down; yes, he got one big thing right,
but he got everything else wrong. Enough of this family in our
country’s politics!3) Good riddance to Liddy Dole, the woman who gave us the national drinking age of 21 and a host of sozzled underage college students. She won’t be missed.
4) Hillary comes out smelling like a rose, plus unbloodied. She and Bill are already scoping out 2012.
5) Time to clean house. McCain should have been president in 2000, not in 2008. No more “it’s my turn” for the last loser. We need to be looking for our candidates in the ranks of returning war vets — think Eisenhower in ‘52 as the model — and let the Dem’s shifty lawyers run the country for a couple of years. Then hit them across the board with people who know how to lead. Gen. Petraeus might be a good place to start. Lots of junior officers, too.
6) You know what? McCain never did sell himself as a leader. He sold himself as a maverick.
7) One upside: McCain/Feingold is now dead, as is public financing. Talk about being hoist with your own petard!
That Gang of 14 thing really worked out well, didn’t it? Say good-bye to the courts. And we were so close…
9) Joe Lieberman was worse than useless. When he could have made a difference, he didn’t cross the aisle to caucus with the Republicans.
Now, it doesn’t matter. Thanks, Joe.10) Age matters. McCain ran an “honorable campaign” because he never really understood in his heart that the other guy had no intention of doing so; he didn’t “get” Obama’s generation, or Axelrod’s.. Obama would lie about public financing, “oppose” gay marriage but also oppose Prop. 8 and never see it as morally contradictory. The world that McCain understood and operated in is vanishing, and tonight is visible evidence.
11) Unlike the Democrats, let’s show some class in defeat. That doesn’t mean lie down and roll over: it means fighting for what we believe in, doubly so now. But their sneering childishness is not for us; and now that they’ve won, they won’t be able to control it even in victory. This is an unlovely party filled with unlovely people, as America’s about to find out once the Obama pixie dust wears off.
12) Understand, once and for all, that the old media is part of the Democratic Party now. Ignore it. Never send Michele Bachmann onto Hardball again. Never send Sarah to play nice with Katie. We need to develop and create our own work-arounds — Fox, talk radio, NRO, etc. — and use them. Don’t play by their rules: make our own.
Damn right!! I am not going to roll over for these collectivist, freedom hating, socialists! As my Daddy told me a long time ago “We’re Andy Jackson’s boys.” Thats right Daddy, we don’t bend the knee to anyone!
Amen
Hmmm … if those are the lessons you have learned for this election I can only say that you fellas have a long time in the wilderness to which you can now look forward.
KM,
Laugh it up. tonight is yours. However, your party is just screaming to overreach. When it does we, conservatives, are going to kick your ass!
so what are conservatives supposed to do now? “unite” with the winners to heal the partisanship and divisiveness of the past 2 years and keep the country strong-ish, or fight, get smeared as dividers, and have all the mudslinging negativity continue?
or move to Texas and secede from the union?
Agreed – we’ll probably blow it. I’m serious about that.
But I’m just saying that if your plan to win back your current losses, you’ll need more than us screwing it up and handing it to you and the above list of “good advice” isn’t going to help you.
As much as you long to kick our asses, you’ve got to have a message with which to do it … and this ain’t it.
Believe me, I feel your outrage – I felt it for the last 8 years. And considering that I’ve spent the last 8 years being told I’m a terrorist-loving, America-hating traitor, it would be easy to rub your face in this, but that is not at all what I am trying to do.
I fully recognize that, despite the lop-sided win, the fundamental electoral realities of this country have not changed and a good deal of the votes Obama got tonight will probably disappear down the line.
So take it from me, being hard-nosed and pissed off is all well and good for mobilizing the base and making yourself feel better, but it doesn’t win you elections. We tried it from 2000-2004 and look how that turned out.
I’m simply saying that if this is your strategy for coming back in 2010 and 2012, you are only going to be more pissed off when you lose again. Believe me, I lived through it and it’s even worse the second time around.
Let’s see now. John McCain lost because he ran an “honorable campaign”, i.e., an insufficiently snide one?
Yeah.
Right.
I am trying (perhaps a bit feebly) to resist schadenfreude, but commentary like that above makes it difficult.
[...] Southern Appeal has this reflection on the election: [...]
The struggle continues.
Well, I really didn’t believe the American people were that stupid, but there it is.
I don’t know why I’m surprised. Americans don’t seem to be able to do the simplest tasks correctly, like credit my payment to the right account, give me a cheeseburger when I order one, etc., so why should I expect them to be intelligent at sorting out who is really at fault for the economic mess, etc?
Anyway, I guess we better get back to work, coming up with a strong opposition, and hope that we can formulate a message that people with 80 IQ’s can understand.
I think McCain’s big mistake was not trying to put the blame on the economic meltdown on the Dems.
Yes, Bush and the GOP *WERE* to blame for spending, but the proximate cause of the credit crisis and subsequent stock market meltdown had the Dems fingers all over it, and we never really pounded on that message very hard.
The Democratic candidate was sold to the voters like a box of cereal — as could be expected from people who think everything comes from the supermarket or the mall. We are far from the agrarian electorate in whom Jefferson placed his trust.
Judge Andrew P. Napolitano’s book, A Nation of Sheep, seems an apt reference,although the metaphor is insulting to sheep, since even sheep recognize their shepherd’s voice.
My partner is a life-long Republican and about the last person to express any sympathy for Obama–or any Democrat, for that matter. She hated the Clintons, loathes Al Gore and thinks John Kerry is a pussy. Now, she doesn’t involve herself in politics per se, doesn’t read the blogs or watch the debates, and doesn’t like to discuss her feelings with anyone, including me. A good deal of her reticence stems from her awareness that people say nasty things about Bush and McCain (and their supporters), and she has no interest in exposing herself to the sort of “yo mama” games that pass for political conversation these days. However, a week before the election, she was invited to join the Facebook page of an old high school friend. What she found there–an endless vitriolic screed peppered with links to all the most repulsive rumors and lies about Obama and his family–absolutely stunned her. She simply couldn’t believe the level of paranoia, fear and sheer hatred she encountered. After absorbing this stuff for about an hour–following the links, viewing the sources of all this trash–she was inspired to have the ONLY political discussion we have had in our fifteen years together. Well, discussion isn’t the word–she carried on for about a half an hour. All I could say was, “Yes dear…I know, dear…yes, I’m aware of that, dear.”
On election night she followed the polls for the first time since I’ve known her. I’m pretty certain she didn’t change her vote, but I don’t think she was a bit surprised that Obama won, and I get the impression that whatever disappointment she felt over McCain’s loss was tempered by the ugliness she experienced that evening a week ago, getting a little taste of what passed for “discourse” in this election cycle.
I should add that as one of the few conservatives in our mostly-liberal social circles, she’s perfectly accustomed to brushing off the crap people spew about Bush and conservatives in general. But for her, this rose to another level altogether, and I think she was not only caught off guard by it,
but was also profoundly disturbed by it.
Grover, idiots abound. Just be thankful the real morons aren’t in the majority.
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