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Edited by Mrph1 on Nov 30th 2023 at 11:03:59 AM
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The Sexual Assault tape and the accusations that followed also exposed the true moral cowardice of many in the GOP and the religious right. This helped put the possibility of a Democratic majority in the Senate on the table again.
In the final weeks approaching the 2012 election, most of the polls suggested that Obama was going to be re-elected. Which is what happened. The GOP were blindsided since they were swayed by their own biased polls and the size of Romney's rallies. Karl Rove had a particularly epic meltdown once the results confirmed that Obama had won. Romney didn't even have a concession speech prepared.
edited 23rd Oct '16 9:12:03 PM by M84
Disgusted, but not surprisedI have no idea why Romney lost in 2012 really. Then again that was the time where I wasn't really paying attention to politics, before Donald Trump had a chance at winning the Presidency.
But anyway, when you have a collection of candidates, one of whom helped shut down the government because he didn't like a healthcare law, two men who have no political experience, one relative no-name, the son of a president that nowadays is the butt of jokes for things beyond his control, and a number of others, vs two career politicians, one who has a reputation for sticking up for the little guy and calling out injustices, and another who's been a part of the government for just as long and has spent the last four years as a busy busy Secretary of State...
The Republican party runs on the idea of "The white southern Christian population will vote for us because we are white, normally southern, and Christian, regardless of our policies and past deeds." I've seen a lot of Trump supporters on Facebook say that Trump "said some mean words" and that Hillary is way worse. I always think "Are you an idiot? He's done a lot more than that!"
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Yes and no.
McCain was a strong candidate, but he went in under the shadow of Bush, and his veep candidate was completely off the rails.
Romney was successfully painted as an Etch-A-Sketch very early in the campaign, but the media portrayed 2012 as a close horse-race because Obama slept through the first debate, and kept it playing like that until Romney lost.
Obama consistently led against McCain in the last month or so before the 2008 election. Even for several months before that, he led in most polls - but the last month had next to no positive polls for McCain. The margin was typically between 5 and 10%, but sometimes more (and sometimes less.)
In 2012 Obama was leading in a small majority of polls in the last weeks before the elections, and the margin (either way) was almost always very small. It really was a very close run thing, or so it seemed, especially after the first debate. (I don't know if you remember but Obama didn't do at all well there. He improved for the last two, though.)
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edited 23rd Oct '16 9:15:34 PM by BestOf
Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.![]()
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On that last note, I remember it being a big thing on Nate Silver's page (back when he was with the NYT) to constantly comment about about how he was biased skewing the polls to lean towards Obama. I'm sure the same thing happened on various other sites that showed things going against Romney.
edited 23rd Oct '16 9:16:21 PM by LSBK
There's always a lot of inertia in favour of the incumbent - or, if the incumbent is not running, their party. This helps Clinton now, and it should also help her in 2020. She'll have to have a good 4 years, though - winning a second term is not something you should take for granted, even though most Presidents manage it.
Clinton was Secretary of State in Obama's first administration. That was 4 years from 2008. When she decided not to continue in that position for Obama's second term it made quite a fuss, with speculation that she was distancing herself from day-to-day politics and the Obama administration so that she could position herself for a run in 2016. Clearly, that speculation was correct.
Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.The GOP's base was doomed to eventually shrink and become less and less relevant.
People in the west are slowly becoming less and less religious, and the US is no exception. I'm sure most young people don't really care.
White people are projected to be a numerical minority in the coming decades, and currently hispanic immigration is growing.
Their entire appeal is based on keeping a status quo that is hurting a lot of people. This is simply the end result.
edited 23rd Oct '16 9:21:54 PM by Draghinazzo
Some lawyers are chiming in to say that if Trump goes through with his threats to sue his accusers, they'll defend the women pro bono.
Re: Sexual Assault Tape affecting the Senate Race: I mean, it's true that the Demo's chances started looking a lot better after that, but the odd of getting a Senate majority have been in their favour all along, what with several states being safe pick-ups and Nevada being the only place where there's a realistic possibility of them losing ground.
I feel it's not really a coincidence, either.
We live in an extremely socially conscious era where many facets of the racial and gender status quos are being questioned and as such we are experiencing some pretty nasty growing pains. It makes sense that a figure like Trump would rise in this climate.
In 2008, it was pretty obvious McCain was going to lose. Sarah Palin was being mocked mercilessly, his unapologetic support for the Iraq War was politically untenable from the start and he proved in the debates that it was largely indefensible, and Obama's white-hot charisma was raking in tons of young people to the Democratic ticket. Plus, Mc Cain was, and is, a crotchety old man with the views of one. Mc Cain winning through all of that would have been a "Dewey defeats Truman" level of upset.
"For all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream shall never die."Abe Lincoln, for instance, is generally well thought of.
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*nods* Right-wing radio blowhards were pushing that back when Scalia's body was barely cold. Smoking guns include him being found with a pillow on his face (because nobody trying to sleep with the sun up ever has something covering their face) and his family not having him autopsied (because the bereaved always want the remains of their loved ones cut open to satisfy the curiosity of the public).
If someone had used a pillow to kill him, I'm pretty sure they wouldn't have just left it there, literally on his face. You don't get to be that stupid and competent enough to get a gig as big as this one. (Well, as big as this hit would've been, if it had been a hit - which it wasn't. Or, to be a little bit more specific: there's no good reason to think it was.)
Quod gratis asseritur, gratis negatur.Yeah, unless there's actually reason for suspicion, the conspiracy theories against Hillary repeatedly having people assassinated is groundless. There are a number of ones that seem too coincidental (I think I remember one story about a person involved in her email trial dying in a car crash) but I highly doubt she'd do that.
Wait, what? I always thought Wiki Leaks was mainly cheered on by the stupid left, not by the stupid right. :/

So, question: in the final weeks of the 2008 election, was the general impression "Mc Cain's gonna lose"? What about 2012?
Oh God! Natural light!