# Will The Republicans ever figure out why they lost? **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [December 26, 2012, 9:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224 "2012-12-26T21:33:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 16
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2013, 3:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/301 "2013-06-08T15:56:44Z")
Well, jobs isn’t really an ideological issue. The party that creates them usually wins regardless of any other factors, and the party that fails usually loses. I’ve been going on and on in thread after thread about how Republicans can pick up that group or pick up this other group, but really, all it takes for the GOP to be successful is to govern well. Preside over a lot of job creation, a balanced budget, a government that doesn’t make screwups a daily news story, and they’ll never have a problem winning. ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2013, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/302 "2013-06-08T16:36:53Z")
Unfortunately the Republicans still let ideology get in the way of that “govern well” part. [http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/judicial/301495-democrats-must-overcome-gops-complete-obstructionism-on-nlrb-](http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/judicial/301495-democrats-must-overcome-gops-complete-obstructionism-on-nlrb-) > [@](#): > > The NLRB is facing an unprecedented crisis. Last Thursday, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee held a hearing on the president’s nominees – three Democrats, two Republicans – to the National Labor Relations Board. Yesterday, the committee voted to approve nominees, but Republicans refused to support the nominees as a package and most opposed two of the three Democratic nominees. At any other time in the board’s 78-year history, the Senate would have confirmed the well-qualified nominees without controversy. But not this time. The full Senate will likely not vote on the nominees until July, but it seems certain that Republicans will try to block the package of nominees, even though the office of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) recommended the two Republicans. > > If Republican obstructionism wins out, the NLRB will have no confirmed members when the term of Chairman Mark Pearce expires on Aug. 27, and for the first time, the president will not be able to appoint board members by recess. The real victims of the GOP’s obstructionism will not be the NLRB or “Big Labor,” as Republicans like to state, but tens of millions of private-sector workers across the nation. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2013, 4:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/303 "2013-06-08T16:44:48Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Well, environmentalism is primarily the purview of well off white liberals. as the Democratic Party becomes more minority, environmentalism will fall further and further down the priority list. Which is an opportunity for Republicans, who do actually have some ideas on climate change, such as a revenue neutral carbon tax. > > The GOP needs about 3-5% of the vote to win Presidential elections. IT doesn’t matter which voters they get. If they can run up bigger margins among rich white people, that works just as well as losing by less with Hispanic voters. There are many things wrong with this analysis. To skim the surface in order: Environmentalism is heavily favored by young voters, a much more important demographic when looking at future elections. It is not by itself a major driver of party, rather it’s part of the larger image or brand that each party has created over the past few decades. I’ve said frequently that the Republican Party has had one of the country’s most successful branding campaigns over the past 40 years. Anti-environmentalism is deeply ingrained in that, which will take further decades to change, assuming anyone in the party cares to. There is negative evidence for that. [Washington Post](http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/03/14/could-republicans-ever-support-a-carbon-tax-bob-inglis-thinks-so/) > [@](#): > > The conventional wisdom around Washington is that Republicans will never, ever support a carbon tax to address climate change. And it’s not hard to see why. Right now, they really seem to loathe the idea. > > Take Rep. Steve Scalise (R-La.). The chairman of the Republican Study Committee held a news conference Wednesday to introduce a resolution opposing any new national tax on carbon emissions. He’s lined up plenty of support among conservatives and industry groups, from Grover Norquist to the National Federation of Independent Business. Can Bob Inglis change that? > [@](#): > > Yet if you ask Bob Inglis of the Energy & Enterprise Initiative, he thinks Republicans can be persuaded to back a carbon tax. It will just take time. And Inglis, a former Republican congressman from South Carolina, thinks he knows how to sell the idea. Never mind that he was ousted from Congress in 2010 by a Tea Party-backed primary challenge because of his climate views. The GOP, Inglis insists, can change. This is a party-wide attack on the carbon tax. In the real political world, environmentalists and Democrats have been advocating for it for years. I know you can find some conservatives, mostly ones not in office, who favor the idea, but they first have to convert their entire party to the idea and then make the public recognize that their long opposition should be forgotten. Those reversals do take place, but this one is especially unlikely because it requires a similar reversal of their climate denier image that kills them. Global climate change is real and people will continue seeing the damage it’s doing. It’s a losing issue for the Republicans in a number of different voting blocs because it’s seen as hurting individuals (every time a Republican inveighs against disaster relief spending, e.g.) and as part of the overall anti-science stance of the party. Younger voters hate that. So it’s obviously extremely important which voters Republicans get. They need to increase their share of voters who will be a larger percentage of the population in the future. Those, like you, who kept insisting that Democratic groups wouldn’t vote in 2012 but Republican groups would turned out to be completely wrong. The next election (2016, not 2014) will be similar because there is no reason to assume that the groups in the growing demographics will suddenly stop voting. It’s the older voters who turned out for the Republicans who are more likely not to be there. There simply aren’t enough rich white people in the country to make up for the growing numbers of minorities and young people. Again, this refrain was heard everywhere in 2012 and proved nonsensical. And rich white people are becoming more Democratic every day, so you can’t even count on them. > [@adaher](#): > > I’ve been going on and on in thread after thread about how Republicans can pick up that group or pick up this other group, but really, all it takes for the GOP to be successful is to govern well. Preside over a lot of job creation, a balanced budget, a government that doesn’t make screwups a daily news story, and they’ll never have a problem winning. I know it’s not thought polite to remind Republicans about George W. Bush, but this is priceless. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2013, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/304 "2013-06-08T22:47:33Z")
Will the Republicans ever figure out why they lost? No. As you can probably tell from SmilinJackass’ seven pages of bizarre posts, Republicans have a very specific and narrow view of the world. They assume that it is a given that this myopic view is accepted and correct. That 2+2=4. That it should be patently obvious to anyone with half a brain that the world works in the way they think it does. That’s why you see Republicans say things like “why is Obama trying to destroy America” or “[to win future elections] they will try and become even more politically correct”. They can’t comprehend that people don’t think this way. It’s sort of like an American high school (or at least as I remember it from 20 years ago). You have a bunch of Cool Kids who are popular because they play sports, throw parties and pick on everyone who looks “different”. All the Regular Kids tolerate them because they want to be invited to the parties and don’t want to be stuffed in a locker. But now there are more Different Kids than “regular kids” and they don’t like sports that much and the Cool Kids can’t figure out why they aren’t as popular. So they go to the gym more and pick on more Different Kids and even Regular Kids (who are starting to realize that most of them never get invited to the parties anyway). But instead of getting more popular, the Cool Kids just look like a bunch of mean meathead douchebags whose parents happened to own a pool. The Republicans aren’t about fixing problems. That are about adhering to a particular ideology. And whenever they lose, their go-to strategy is to double down on that ideology. Well, whenever something doesn’t work, doing twice as hard just makes it not work twice as fast. ---
**Author:** ![DigitalC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ebca7d/32.png) [@DigitalC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DigitalC)\ **Post date:** [June 8, 2013, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/305 "2013-06-08T23:36:52Z")
Right, they can’t figure out why they lose because the reason they lose is that they are wrong about almost every single thing. ---
**Author:** ![skdo23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a5b964/32.png) [@skdo23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/skdo23)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/306 "2013-06-09T01:19:50Z")
> [@John\_Mace](#): > > I think most Republicans realize that Romney was a mediocre candidate at best who ran a not very good campaign. And that’s really all there was to it. It’s not simply a matter of Republican’s realizing that Romney ran a lousy campaign, it’s a matter of admitting that they forced him to run a lousy campaign by constantly requiring him to prove his conservative credentials to the GOP base and distancing himself from his moderate. pre teabag era days (i.e. his health care program while he was Mass. Governor) that he should have been touting in order to gain the support of the independent voters who everyone knew would decide the election. Romney didn’t merely underestimate the effect that his weaknesses would have on his campaign, he wore them on his sleeve as a badge of defiance to impress people that by and large would have voted for him anyway. The current GOP strategy isn’t just ineffective, it’s counterproductive. The party is it’s own worst enemy. ---
**Author:** ![computergeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e56c9b/32.png) [@computergeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/computergeek)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/307 "2013-06-09T01:53:05Z")
The party and Romney didn’t lose just because of Romney’s weaknesses. It also lost because so many right wing yahoos just wouldn’t shut up about stupid crap that pissed people off and insulted them, especially women. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/308 "2013-06-09T02:07:54Z")
Yep, but there’s a flip side. It’s not like Democrats don’t say stupid things, the Republicans just don’t make them pay for it as dearly. The closest they ever came was with the “bitter clingers” comment, which probably did help Republicans make gains among white working class voters. Then there’s Bill Richardson’s comment that Ted Cruz isn’t a real Hispanic. If the implication is that real Hispanics aren’t conservatives, then that’s pretty offensive to the 35-40% who voted for GWB. Republicans get absolutely hammered for questioning the Americanness of liberals, Richardson should not have been allowed to get away with his slur against conservative Hispanics. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/309 "2013-06-09T02:35:24Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Yep, but there’s a flip side. It’s not like Democrats don’t say stupid things, the Republicans just don’t make them pay for it as dearly. But it is not for lack of trying; conservatives own talk radio, as well as the most highly rated cable news network. But most voters outside of the right-wing bubble just don’t believe them anymore, because any Democrat gaffes worthy of genuine outrage are diluted in a tidal wave of transparent talking points so over the top as to strain the credulity of even those with minimal political awareness. Conservatives think every criticism must be hyperbolic: Obama must be portrayed as the most liberal, most corrupt, most dangerous, most incompetent president we have ever had. Voters just don’t buy it anymore, they have heard it for too long, and it just doesn’t have the same fear-producing, hate-generating mojo it had when Rush & Co. first started bellowing during the Clinton administration. The appeal of such histrionic outrage is wearing thin, but conservatives are incapable of recognizing what worked ten years ago has not aged well. Adapting to change is not their strong point, so they keep going to the same well, whether it serves them or not. I am afraid they have a ways to dig before they put down their shovels. ---
**Author:** ![computergeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e56c9b/32.png) [@computergeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/computergeek)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/310 "2013-06-09T03:28:49Z")
The party has screwed itself over because it refuses to change and keeps showing how much it refuses to change, but I agree with whoever said wherever they said it that they will win again within the next few years because the political pendulum tends to swing from one side to the other every so often as the voters will tire of one party being in power for so long. Of course, that doesn’t mean the Republicans will be able to stay in power for very long as it depends on what face it manages to show. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/311 "2013-06-09T03:31:19Z")
Seems to me that if they create jobs and preside over a good economy that they could order chastity belts for all women and get reelected. ---
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 3:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/312 "2013-06-09T03:57:47Z")
And I hope you tell that to all the conservatives you know. Remember when conservatives said it was not possible to be re-elected with unemployment over 7%? Some assumptions are just wrong. ---
**Author:** ![squeegee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/squeegee/32/14537_2.png) [@squeegee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/squeegee)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 3:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/313 "2013-06-09T03:58:34Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Seems to me that if they create jobs and preside over a good economy that they could order chastity belts for all women and get reelected. You really think that? ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/314 "2013-06-09T04:10:06Z")
> [@Fear\_Itself](#): > > And I hope you tell that to all the conservatives you know. Remember when conservatives said it was not possible to be re-elected with unemployment over 7%? Some assumptions are just wrong. Obama was not held responsible for the economy, Bush was. Being successful is still the key to winning. Govern well, you win. Govern poorly, you lose. If Obama’s 2nd term ends up being as much of a disaster as Bush’s was, the Republicans won’t have much to worry about in 2016. If Obama presides over full employment and a budget getting close to balance, then it’s a sure thing for Democrats. I agree that Democrats have an advantage right now in Presidential elections when things are more muddled, as they were in 2012. The Democrats will probably get the benefit of the doubt from voters barring clear evidence that they have failed. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 4:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/315 "2013-06-09T04:12:19Z")
> [@squeegee](#): > > You really think that? I was being hyperbolic. But I do notice that at the state level, and in prior national elections, parties don’t get turned out much when things are going well. Voters prioritize jobs and the economy above all. A governing party delivering prosperity can get away with a lot. ---
**Author:** ![Gerald\_II](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/43a26b/32.png) [@Gerald\_II](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gerald_II)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/316 "2013-06-09T08:00:24Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > Being successful is still the key to winning. Govern well, you win. Govern poorly, you lose. If Obama’s 2nd term ends up being as much of a disaster as Bush’s was, the Republicans won’t have much to worry about in 2016. If Obama presides over full employment and a budget getting close to balance, then it’s a sure thing for Democrats. I agree. The Republicans lost because Obama had some very strong successes during his first term: taking out Osama Bin Laden, passing Health Care Reform, and helping to take out Gaddafi without putting American troops on the ground in Libya among other things. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 8:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/317 "2013-06-09T08:31:41Z")
The Republicans lost because Obama ran a skillful negative campaign that focused on the Republicans’ biggest weaknesses, accurately documented in this thread. Obama did not focus on his successes, and if you didn’t already know it, you’d think he wasn’t even the President, but the challenger. ---
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 1:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/318 "2013-06-09T13:21:49Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > The Republicans lost because Obama ran a skillful negative campaign that focused on the Republicans’ biggest weaknesses, accurately documented in this thread. > > Obama did not focus on his successes, and if you didn’t already know it, you’d think he wasn’t even the President, but the challenger. Yeah. Their “biggest weaknesses” being that the Republicans present themselves as racist, sexist, xenophobic, plutocratic, theocratic, mean-spirited, anti-intellectual, hypocritical, elitist, and entitled. > [@adaher](#): > > Obama was not held responsible for the economy, Bush was. > > Being successful is still the key to winning. Govern well, you win. Govern poorly, you lose. If Obama’s 2nd term ends up being as much of a disaster as Bush’s was, the Republicans won’t have much to worry about in 2016. If Obama presides over full employment and a budget getting close to balance, then it’s a sure thing for Democrats. > > I agree that Democrats have an advantage right now in Presidential elections when things are more muddled, as they were in 2012. The Democrats will probably get the benefit of the doubt from voters barring clear evidence that they have failed. That’s what the Republicans thought in 2012. Obama has been a fairly mediocre president IMHO. We’ve seen steady but unspectacular economic growth since the 2008 financial crisis stabilized. But I don’t think he’s really hit it out of the park on any issues. Unemployment was still around 8% during the elections. According to the Republican narrative, Romney should have been a shoe-in. And yet he wasn’t. You can continue to make all the excuses you like. The real reason Romney lost is that most Americans simply do not relate to him as someone who represents their interests. And you still think the best way to hedge against that is to run an old money venture capitalist / management consultant who looks like Guy Smiley from The Muppets. ---
**Author:** ![Oldeb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ea666f/32.png) [@Oldeb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oldeb)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/319 "2013-06-09T16:56:37Z")
> [@adaher](#): > > I was being hyperbolic. But I do notice that at the state level, and in prior national elections, parties don’t get turned out much when things are going well. Voters prioritize jobs and the economy above all. A governing party delivering prosperity can get away with a lot. Thinking like this is bad for Republicans. They’re on the wrong side of a lot of social issues and it’s going to hurt them at least as much as any economic issues. It’s something they either don’t want to admit or can’t admit for fear of alienating their base, but they need to move to a socially liberal position regardless of how conservative they may be fiscally. In 2012 the five Republicans who brought up their anti-abortion/rape stances all lost. You can make the case that few of them were longshots, but Akin was unable to carry the heavily GOP state of Missouri and Mourdock was leading in polls the entire time until his comments cost him the election. It’s not just in the political arena either. There’s evidence that coming out on the wrong side of women’s health costs you _ **even if you’re a women’s health group.** _ The Susan G. Komen Foundation had to cancel seven events this year. Ever since they went up against Planned Parenthood their funding has dropped significantly. As long as they continue thinking they can just talk about the economy and not talk about anything else the Republicans won’t ever win. Things like their blanket anti-abortion stance, their delay in renewing the Violence Against Women Act, and their opposition to the Lilly Ledbetter Act are causing half the population to write them off. Even Fox can’t sustain it any longer. Look at Megan Kelly, an otherwise complete Faux News hack, taking on Fox pundits over women in the work place. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 9, 2013, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224/320 "2013-06-09T17:45:04Z")
> [@](#): > > Being successful is still the key to winning. Govern well, you win. Govern poorly, you lose. Well, yeah, that’s obvious. But that doesn’t really answer the question: Will the Republicans ever figure out how to be successful? Right now, they seem to be hell-bent on governing poorly, and a sizable chunk of them consider governing well to be inherently logically impossible. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224.md?page=15) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-the-republicans-ever-figure-out-why-they-lost/645224.md?page=17)