Mitt Romney Lost Because He Ran An Insulting Campaign

Of course, when discussing Romney’s penchant for insulting voters, the obvious beginning would be his infamous “47 percent” statements that were released in September, causing the very first great cleavage between his polling numbers and President Obama’s. These comments should be placed next to those of his running mate Paul Ryan, who said that the country was in danger of becoming one of “the makers versus the takers.” And then let’s not forget the immortal worlds of one-time GOP frontrunner Herman Cain, who said that those that were out of work or facing rough economic times should “blame yourself.”

But referring to half the electorate with such disparaging remarks as “takers” or “unwilling to have self-responsibility for the lives” was just one way in which Mitt Romney and his surrogates insulted voters. Another way was his campaign’s reliance on complete, unadulterated malarkey when it came to voter communication and outreach. Consider the following: Doubling down in Northern Ohio on the lies that Chrysler was moving its Jeep production facilities to China. (A lie which drew not only a rebuke from Chrysler’s executive management, but also resulted in Chrysler allowing their workers to take the day off on Election Day.) Romney also made up out of whole cloth the suggestion that President Obama waived welfare-to-work requirements for certain states. In fact, the Romney’s campaign reliance on a “bunch of stuff” became so essential that over the summer a campaign pollster stated that the campaign would “not be dictated by fact-checkers.” An admittance to relying on lies could not be any more blatant, which is just as insulting as telling half the country they are nothing but a bunch of government-leeching losers.

And let’s not forget Romney’s international insult tour this past summer. Although another repeated Romney lie was that Obama went on some sort of “apology tour”—Obama never once said the words “apologize” or “I’m sorry” at any foreign stop, and even if he did let’s not forget that U.S. foreign relations were at a nadir after eight years of George W. Bush—Romney went on a tour in which he left a trail of insults in his wake, from Great Britain to Israel to Poland. Kind of like how Don Rickles is renowned for being the “insult comic” we missed our chance at seeing what Romney could’ve done as the “insult President.” And for that, we should be relieved. During the third debate about foreign policy, when Romney wasn’t agreeing with President Obama, he kept stating that the President had somehow alienated our foreign allies. Which was all it took for one Twitter user to remind everyone of Mitt Romney’s summer insult tour.

Many so-called “expert” political pundits predicted a long night on Tuesday, caused by many states with races too close to count and even suggested a winner may not be known for days or weeks after Election Day. Instead, Barack Obama was confirmed having won his re-election at 8:15 PST, just fifteen minutes later than when he was confirmed four years ago. Many watchers and pundits might have been surprised. For those who had recognized just how insulting Mitt Romney was a candidate, Obama’s quick confirmation of re-election was to be expected.

Check out the ImpreMedia/Latino Decisions 2012 Latino Election Eve Poll

Just some breakdowns (note: the data may change as the results are polished),

• 75% of all Latin@s voted for Obama
• 81% age 18-30 voted for Obama
• 78% of Central American origin voted for Obama
• 79% of Mexican origin voted for Obama
• 96% of Dominican@s voted for Obama [sheeeesh]
• 83% of Puerto Ricans voted for Obama
• 77% of all Latin@ women voted for Obama
• 80% of naturalized Latin@s voted for Obama

And according to this NBC Latin@ article,

Latino voters were key in delivering battleground states.In Colorado,  87 percent of Latinos voted for Obama. In Ohio, it was 82 percent, and in Virginia, it was 66 percent. Strong Latino Democratic support also played a big factor in key Senate races. In Massachusetts, Obama got 89 percent of the Latino vote, and Senate candidate Elizabeth Warren received 86 percent of the Latino vote, “one of the decisive factors in putting her over the top,” according to Barreto.

From the same article,

At 23 percent, Governor Romney’s Latino support is dramatically lower than Bush’s support in 2004,  and John McCain’s 31 percent Latino support.” ”Republicans have to evaluate what policy platforms they will be endorsing, and how they communicate with Latino voters,” says Barreto.

Analysts were throwing out 40% as the magical percentage that Mitt Romney needed from the Latin@ vote and to say the very least, he failed big time. The preliminary data make the Republican platform seem unsustainable moving forward but only if Democrats keep enthusiasm high amongst Latin@s (especially 2nd, 3rd, 4th generation Latin@s) moving forward and with the assumption that Republicans don’t alter their party platform to accommodate the growing Latin@ vote. Obviously it has been all talk and there will be studies that claim that the impact maybe wasn’t as big as the election night talk but there are at least some some preliminary figures that indicate that at least some of the speculation surrounding Latin@s finally “came to fruition”, as political scientist Matt Barreto of the University of Washington notes, where President Obama and Democrats needed them.

I also want to highlight that of the naturalized Latin@ voters, 80% voted for President and 81% voted for Democratic candidates in the House of Reps. That’s huge (even if the total number may be small) so Democrats (hint hint) in office and those of you reading this who identify as Democrats, y’all should pay attention or apply pressure or do something to sustain or increase those numbers moving forward and you know, not deport 1,000,000 and counting.

Now if you’ve made it this far, I salute you and listen to Mexican legend Vicente Fernandez performing the superb Dean Martin songReturn to Me (Regresa A Mí) alongside the great Tony Bennett. It was meant to be.

Alaska 2012 Election Results