On this Veteran's Day, I want to first take a moment to recognize and thank all of our veterans for their selfless service to our nation. We all know well that freedom isn't free, and that we owe an endless debt of gratitude to the brave men and women who have, and who continue to put on the uniform of our nation's military and stand up to defend our freedom and our country. You have our thanks and our gratitude every day of the year, but today, especially, we recognize and salute you, as well as your families, for your service. Thank you, and God bless you.
Thank you also to everyone who wrote back to me to share your thoughts on the election. I will try to respond to all of them; however, due to the amount of replies I received, it will take some time.
While we have all engaged in Wednesday Morning Quarterback, I think it is important to remember some key facts about this election.
- Message. This was not an ideologically based shift in the electorate like 1980. Meaning that the choice was not liberal versus conservative. This was change versus status quo and change won. Simple. Clean. Message. That’s the good news because most of America agrees with the Republican philosophy of limited government, lower taxes and controlling spending. The problem was federal Republicans did not believe it anymore and we lost.The Democrats were written off in 2002 and that was short sighted. Our inability to restrain ourselves will be matched or exceeded by the new rulers in Washington. Sadly, that is the very nature of power within humans. Republicans were written off in 1992.
- Position. Our nominee finished 20 points ahead of the incumbent president from the same party and still finished 6 points behind. The ability for a national party to win three elections in a row is very difficult -- Bush I in 1988 was down 17 points that summer and Gore lost in 2000.
- Money. We got crushed. When you get outspent 4-to-1, you are going to have a tough time winning. Many of you asked, “Why didn’t we hit harder,” or “Why didn’t we get our message out?” We did. There was no echo and that takes money. The daily news was about recent polling for the most part and where the candidates were physically not ideologically. The fact of the matter is – advertising pushes opinion which is reflected in polls. If candidate X spends Y dollars in a market and the numbers move – the next poll will reflect it. Sadly, the polling data became news-driven by advertising, not the issues. How many times did you hear a poll saying that Z% of the people support Obama’s plan on a particular issue? How many polls asked, “Is Barack Obama too liberal?”
- Turn out. There really was no great wave of turnout. Turns out it wasn’t necessary to win. Democrats turned out 2 points more than in '04 and we turned out 1 point less. The other 3 points changed their minds – more or less.
- History. America turned an important page in her history this year and history is a powerful force. As Senator McCain said in his acceptance speech, “We never hide from history, we make history”. Ironically, the American electorate did just that.
As I said in a speech to the RPV Advance last year, we need to represent the people to the government and not the government to the people. Moreover, politicians need to focus on doing their job rather than running for the next office. We need to restrain ourselves and focus on making government work.
Again, I thank everyone who took the time to write and share their election thoughts, and I look forward to continuing these discussions with you as we move forward.
Sincerely,
Chris Saxman
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