Republicans Lose Fair & Square. Now…

I watched the zombie apocalypse on my laptop from inside the South Dakota Public Radio booth Tuesday night. Keeping my seasoned commentator hat on did a lot to distract me. When I got back in town I went straight to see my Election Shaman. He split hours before I got there and left me with the hotel bill and bar tab.

After years of studying politics, the only thing I know for certain is winning feels good and losing feels very bad. To my readers who are happy today and to President Obama, I offer my sincere congratulations.

It is customary on these occasions to whine, make excuses, and launch accusations. I will not follow custom. The Republicans got beat fair and square. Yes, President Obama and his party had the press in the tank from the get go; however, that has long been true and it didn't stop the Republicans from a smashing victory two years ago, and it didn't stop George W. Bush from winning a second term.

Charles Krauthammer made the argument that Romney lost because he wasn't genuinely conservative enough. His evidence was that exit polls showed a slightly more conservative majority than in past years, at least regarding the size of government. However that may be, the only polls that count are the polls that count. It wasn't just Mitt Romney that lost, but a lot of conservative Senatorial candidates as well. Tuesday the Republicans took it on the chin.

President Obama won a majority by three tenths of one percent of the popular vote. That's a majority nonetheless. His popular vote margin was a hair over two percent. That's much smaller than the seven percent margin he enjoyed four years ago, which I think makes him the first President to be reelected with a diminished popular vote margin since FDR. Two percent is about the same as Bush in 2004, making it very small historically.

I don't believe that the Democrats won because they had a better ground game. Where was their ground game two years ago? I don't believe that Mitt Romney lost because he ran a poor campaign or because he was the wrong candidate. Those are infantile excuses.

There are two factors that determine the trajectory of elections. The direct factor is simply which way the voters swing. The national vote went one way in 2010 and another in 2012. Voters can swing both ways in the same state in the same election. North Dakota went for Romney by twenty points and gave the Senate seat to the Democrat Heidi Heitkamp by one point.

The indirect factor is reality. President Obama would probably have sailed to reelection if the US had enjoyed a typical economic recovery after the recent recession. What happens next if the economy slides back into recession in the next two years? Other realities are waiting in the wings. If you think that climate change is the crucial issue facing Americans and all mankind, you might notice that the President did not campaign on the issue. Ignoring the issue won't make it go away if indeed it presents a genuine existential threat to modern civilization.

If you think, as I do, that public debt is the genuine threat to the future of these United States, you might notice that this was not a major issue in the campaign. Ignoring the trillion dollar a year deficits won't make them go away either. The President frequently pays lip service to the problem but he has done nothing serious to address it. I predict that he will not suddenly become fiscally responsible now that he has "more flexibility."

If I am right, we will see deficits as large or larger each year that Obama remains in office. He will continue to produce budgets that no single Democrat in Congress will vote for. Harry Reid's majority (now two votes larger) will not produce budgets at all, as it has not done for the last three years. Our federal debt will increase from the sixteen trillion where it stands now to over twenty trillion when the President retires. Interest on the debt will begin to put a real squeeze on all other federal spending. In the meantime, unfunded obligations will put a similar squeeze on about half the states.

Fiscal reality will eventually have big political consequences. The Democratic Party is devoted to ignoring them for as long as possible. So far, it's working.

Comments

[Stan Gibilisco]

The "fiscal cliff" is the immediate problem facing us. If "they" don't resolve that and the nation goes back into recession ... Well, all I can say is that I'm glad that I don't live in a big city anymore.

The bright side: We South Dakota voters reaffirmed our staunch fiscal conservatism in their votes on the initiated measures. We're going to mind our own fiscal house even if the rest of the country can't mind theirs.

Funny thing ... different people I talked to made different comments. Some are concerned that "they" will take all our guns away. I'm concerned that "they'll" enact measures that end up tripling my electric bill.

We should all be concerned that the Democrats seem bent on suicide. I guess they have a point there. When you're dead, you don't worry about anything. Or so the theory goes. But how do we know, really, until we try it and see?

[Donald Pay]

The problem with Stan's statement is that South Dakota is a permanent welfare state. It depends on subsidies from the federal government to bail it out of its fiscal mess. South Dakotans have fooled themselves into believing they are "staunch fiscal conservatives." In fact they are the welfare queens, because they won't take fiscal responsibility for themselves.

[larry kurtz]

Senator-elect Warren: ending ag subsidies would flatten fiscal curve:

http://www.eagletribune.com/latestnews/x1499660283/Sen-elect-Warren-walking-up-to-fiscal-cliff

[Stan Gibilisco]

Okay, we're staunch and crafty fiscal conservatives, then.

I wonder what would happen if our whole country became like South Dakota? Maybe then the USA could get China to bail it out of its fiscal mess.

[Bill Fleming]

Well, KB, you haven't been right about Obama this whole season. Why, if you continue with the same doom a d gloom predictions, do you think your arguments should be worthy of any further consideration now? I recommend purging your cache and history files and a hard reboot. Get a fresh perspective on things.

[Donald Pay]

"Ignoring the trillion dollar a year deficits won't make them go away either," you say. "The President frequently pays lip service to the problem but he has done nothing serious to address it." You, of course have done nothing serious to address the issue, including stating how you would solve the present deficit crisis.

The quoted statement makes it clear to me you really are not serious about your stated view that public debt and deficits are the genuine issue. Really, you have no clue about the President's proposals? What are your ideas? Do you even know that the budget was in balance before your man GW Bush insisted on his tax cuts, his Medicare Part D program (unpaid), and his wars?You whine incessantly about this problem, yet never propose anything. You are projecting your own insufficient position onto the President, who has proposed a $4+ trillion

[Ken Blanchard]

Bill: I was wrong about the election and I don't begrudge you the joy of rubbing my nose in it. I would be delighted to learn that I am wrong about the fiscal dilemma facing these United States. If you can explain to me how we are going to pay for the trillions in debt we are racking up each year, I will gladly subscribe to your new math. I note, however, that the interest on the federal debt is now almost as large as the the calculated cost of the Bush era tax cuts. It's going to get larger each year to come, unless the President suddenly and unexpectedly decides to address the problem. How do I "reboot" to make that problem disappear?

[Bill Fleming]

There are any number of ways to solve the problem KB. Let's encourage our leaders to put their heads together, cut the bullshit, and pick the best one. That's what we hired them to do.