Obama Mandate...or not?

December 4, 2012

Post-election debate has quieted down

It has been interesting, post-election, to watch the pundits trying to explain why Barack Obama won and Mitt Romney lost.

The two most common words being used in the aftermath have been “demographics,” as in Romney lost because he couldn't get the votes from blacks, Hispanics, single women, gays and Jews. And “mandate,” as in Obama and his administration now have a clear mandate from the voters to move on with his Democratic Party policies, which include raising taxes on the wealthier Americans.

The third most frequently uttered thought is how those currently receiving entitlements overwhelmingly voted to keep Obama in office in order to keep the troughs filled with their necessities.

It’s all a lot of utter nonsense.

Nearly 75 percent of eligible voters who bothered to vote were white. Romney was never going to gain the majority of black, Hispanic, single female or gay votes. However, even without them, he still could have won if he had been able to appeal to the larger white majority. He did not and he lost.

I hear many say the poorer among us who are partaking from the welfare systems voted for the party most likely to continue to supply their needs. However, the poorer actually have the lowest voting participation in national elections. Among the poorer who did vote, most voted for Obama, but they still had the lowest voter participation rate.

We know 95 percent of all African-Americans voted for Mr. Obama. I ask you: If you were a black American, who would you likely have voted for? If you were Hispanic and one party had repeatedly stated it was going to deport all illegal immigrants, who would you have voted for? If you were a woman who strongly believed in women’s rights, and one party had taken a strong anti-abortion stand, who would you have voted for? If you were gay, it’s pretty clear who you would most likely vote for.

Even with all of these constituencies going against him, Romney still could have won if only he had not made so many dumb mistakes. The editorial in the Wall Street Journal in which he stated he would have allowed the auto industry go under cost him dearly. His 47 percent remarks were beyond dumb and he paid for them dearly. Even at the end of the race, his claims about Jeep production all moving to China proved false, but his campaign kept repeating this lie until the very end.

Perhaps the most important issue surrounding the election was the fact that only about 50 percent of eligible voters even bothered to vote. Think about this for a moment. Many Americans considered this to be the most important election in recent history, and half of us who could have voted didn’t bother.

If you analyze the voter breakdown for president, you will see that Obama received about 51 percent and Romney 49 percent. However, that translates into each of them only getting about a quarter of all eligible votes. This translates into Obama at 25.5 percent and Romney at 24.5 percent, with half of all eligible voters not bothering to support either candidate.

This is incontrovertible proof that Obama did not receive any kind of mandate from the majority of Americans. The real question about this election is why so many Americans couldn’t be bothered to vote. Or do these nonvoters actually get it — neither party is actually any different in its actions? Maybe these nonvoters understand that both parties work for the same lobbyists. If low voter participation in national elections is our reality for the future, why are we spending such outrageous amounts of money for campaigns. Let’s apply the money to pay down our debt and just flip a coin to determine our next president.

Maybe the nonvoters have it right. Think about how much less stress you would have in your life if you felt the same way. Think about how much less dough the TV network news shows would make as their viewership dwindled. Think about how much more enjoyable life would be if you tuned in to more reality TV and learned to play video games. Think about how much life would be improved if you never, ever received another robo/opinion poll phone call again.

A few things are clear: Romney did not lose because of demographics. Most of the poorest Americans did not leap on the Obama bandwagon to seek more from the wealthy. And Obama certainly does not have a mandate from the majority of Americans — not by any measure!

These are my opinions. What do you think?

Mike Tower

Please visit a good pal's blog:  Lee's Political Opinions, and the site for an organization we co-founded:  Citizen's Against Politics As Usual