Election 2012: The Last Word

Ever since President Obama galloped to a second term, the nation's media and political pundits have been draping black crepe paper over the GOP brand.  These nattering nitwits have declared the Republican Party is officially dead or at the least no longer relevant.  

Their conclusions are based on shifting demographics and Hispanic turnout for Obama.  Their theories are rooted in research showing Hispanics are the fastest growing ethnic group in the nation. Furthermore, the Hispanic voting bloc represented a sizable advantage for the president.

No one would argue either conclusion.  However, most voters shared the  GOP's positions on major issues, according to some eyeopening, post-election data from Pew Research.  It wasn't the Republican label that fell out of favor.  Voters mainly liked Obama better than challenger Mitt Romney.

Perhaps that sounds too simplistic.  But the research confirms that most of the drivel about the "lessons to be learned" from the 2012 election is misleading.  Facts often have a habit of getting in the way of strongly held opinions.

Let's start with the GOP standard-bearer's political positions.  Nearly 50 percent of those who voted disapproved of Obama Care, according to Pew's exit polling.  More than half were opposed to an activist government.  Fully sixty percent thought the economy was sick. Voters even told pollsters the economy was their top issue.

Those numbers suggest Romney should have won in a cakewalk since most voters agreed with his positions on the election's defining issues.  

Conventional wisdom also has made much of the Hispanic vote, which Obama carried 71-to-27 percent. While the margin was significant, it fell short of Bill Clinton's performance in 1996 when he racked up 72 percent.  However, Hispanics represented only 10 percent of total voters in this year's election, nearly the same as recent presidential races.  Forty-eight percent of Hispanics did not vote.

Observers have underscored the  president's gains among minorities. Little has been said about Romney's strong showing compared with John McCain's performance in 2008.  Romney posted gains with men (+4 percentage points), whites (+4 points), younger voters (+6 points), Catholics (+6 points) and Jews (+9 points).  That means all those groups were less supportive of Obama.

Astonishingly, Romney also carried the independent vote by a 50-to-45 percent margin.  In 2008, independents were credited by many with the Obama victory.   The president captured 52 percent of the independent vote while McCain managed only 44 percent four years ago.

Obama also tallied 4.2 million fewer votes than he did in 2008.  On the other hand, Romney was able to pick up only 782,967 more votes than McCain, indicating Republican voters were not wildly enthusiastic about the former governor.  Total voter turnout was down by 3.4 million from 2008.

All those contradictions to conventional wisdom beg the question:  "Then how do you explain the Obama win?"

The election boiled down to likability.  Pew found that 53 percent of voters viewed Obama favorably versus 47 percent for Romney. Throughout the campaign, Romney's favorable ratings were at historic lows for a presidential candidate, Pew Research reported.

To underscore the conclusion, consider that voters gave Obama high marks for being "in touch" with ordinary people by a 53-to-43 percent margin over Romney.  That 10 percentage point gap was even more pronounced among women.

Based on that finding, it comes as no surprise that Obama won the women's vote by a decisive margin of 56-to-44 percent, according to exit interviews conducted by Gallup.  Romney had an eight-percentage point edge with men, winning 54-to-46 percent.  That means the gender gap was 20 percentage points, the largest ever in a presidential election claimed Gallup.

In his analysis of the data, Pew Research Center President Andrew Kohut commented: "...Most observers are overstating the gravity of the GOP's problem.  In particular, they are paying too little attention to how weak a candidate Mitt Romney was..."

The chief lesson from the election can best be summed up this way: voters say issues are important, but in many cases, they cast their ballot for the person they like best.  

That may be hard to swallow for political junkies.  Unfortunately it is a sign of the times.  People are either too busy or too lazy to study the issues and candidates in depth.  Their votes too often are swayed by candidates' personality, style and charisma.

In spite of the research, political elitists will continue to sound the death knell for the Republican Party.  But reports of the GOP's demise are greatly exaggerated.

The GOP is not a political dinosaur.  But the party must quit nominating presidential candidates who look and act like one.