Talk Elections

In the 2012 election, Mitt Romney won a decisive victory in the 1st debate over Barack Obama.

He gained a lead in the polls that was cancelled by Obama's solid performance in responding to Hurricane Sandy.

Romney should have played a more active role in responding to the hurricane, in order to take some of the glory of the response for himself.

Since then, Romney has regretted losing the election. He is now an outcast to the Republican Party, as he is useless to them.

Romney didn't have a biggest mistake. He made so many that it was death by a thousand paper cuts.

Hard to say what Romney's biggest mistake was; he was running a campaign against a popular, charismatic incumbent with a strong campaign in a time of economic growth. Coming within 4 percent was an amazing result; anyone else would've lost by double-digits.

Romney was seen by many as an uninspiring elitist who couldn't understand average Americans. , I think his 47% comment sealed his fate, though his image had been well established before then. Sure, his performance in the first debate gave him some hope near the end of the campaign, but it wasn't enough. I don't think Romney would've benefited much from being more active in the response to Hurricane Sandy. Maybe he would've done slightly better in New Jersey, but that's about it.

Yes it was if the liberal media didn't keep smearing Romney

I think the 47% comment was the biggest one. The comment alone probably wasn't enough to make him lose, but it did help.

Really? Because I remember the pundits and politicians all saying that Republicans were favored.

He should have flooded the airwaves in the summer with a combination of positive spots about his record and negative caricatures of the president. Romney allowed Obama to define him early, which became very difficult to overcome.

I also think he should have pushed hard for Susana Martinez to be his running mate. Ryan didn't really offer very much in the end. If Romney had basically kept Martinez in Nevada, Colorado, and Florida speaking Spanish for three months (plus a few trips into Ohio and Iowa touting her gun ownership), she could have moved the needle.

That being said, the race was winnable for Romney until roughly the second debate. If Romney and Obama had given the same performances in Round Two that they gave in Round One, Mitt Romney would now be the president, easily on track for a second term.

Economic growth in 2012 was comparable to what it was in 1992...it's just that Obama was  a better campaigner and didn't have to worry about fatigue (i.e. Democrats had just be in for one term).

And Obama's approval ratings were mediocre too.

Gingrich or Santorum might've lost by more, but nobody was going to lose by double digits. On the other hand if the recovery had been stronger and unemployment had been sub-6%, then yeah Obama could've repeated his '08 victory even running against Romney.

Romney's biggest problem was that he came off so many times as an absolute tool and was the worst kind of cliche candidate the Republicans could have ran that year. He was everything that the Republicans have wrong with them in one person. Rich, full of himself, douchy, uses religion as a selling point, and he ran a very cliched Republican campaign. There wasn't anything the least bit exciting about that Republican ticket that year they were as predictable as they could be.

The majority (if not all,) of that Republican primary field were all a bunch of destined losers. None of them could have out charisma'd or out talked Obama. Romney was the least loony of the bunch who stayed in (Huntsman could have been better perhaps but he quit,)and had the most moderate appeal. Gingrich and especially Santorum would have gotten destroyed especially in the debates. Obama would rip Santourm a new one over a lot of stuff.

I agree with Yankee that it wasn't just one thing that killed Mitt. It was a solid mix of errors and vanity on his part. First and most importantly was the 47% comment; that alienated a lot of people off the bat (including me as I was going to college then,) and he never got over that. He also never properly attacked Obama good enough in terms of defending his rep and character. He let Obama label him early and when he did attack it felt desperate. He could never put down the 47% comment or his business reputation and Obama pounced like the shark in a suit he was. Secondly was the very mediocre-ldy ran convention. It didn't give Mitt a good boost like he could have gotten afterwards and it just didn't motivate the bases very well. He got a limited boost at best that didn't go very far.Then came his various gaffes in the debates like the binders comment, the Big Bird moment, and Obama's put down over the military deal and Romney's lame laughing reaction.  That moment right there was Obama's mike drop and when he started to seal the deal. Romney looked lame and weak and that was the worst thing he could have done.

Obama presented hope still despite being the incumbent, Romney didn't. There wasn't a thing hopeful or optimistic about his message. That's one thing Trump did better; he promoted something different and more hopeful for the Republican base and appealed to all groups not just conservatives and moderates. Romney was so vain to think that they'd come running to him as their savior that he'd taught himself into believing it and when it didn't happen it rocked his world.

It's like Vince McMahon said about Bret Hart: "Mitt Screwed Mitt."

And did worse than him in the second and much worse in the third debate.

He gained a lead in the polls that was cancelled by Obama's solid performance in responding to Hurricane Sandy.
[/quote]
Romney did not get a lead in the polls. He merely narrowed Obama's lead and this had been mostly reversed after the next two debates, before Hurricane Sandy. In any case, this narrowing concerned the popular vote. Obama's lead in the Electoral College was never really in doubt.

He would have looked ridiculous trying to usurp the President's functions.

Does anyone here think Trump could have won in 2012?

-It's possible. He would have done better in Ohio.

The problem is Romney like Hillary was badly damaged in the primaries especially by Newt Gingrich and the 20 debates.


To make up for that Romney should have done this


1. Choose Marco Rubio has his VP
2. Bring up the Reagan recovery more and compare it to the Obama recovery
3. Dont say the 47% comment
4. On immigration , remind people that Obama had a filibuster proof majority and didnt do anything, and his immigration policy is PRO LEGAL IMMIGRANT(which it was)
5. Put obama on the defensive

-How does that help him win Ohio, a state which is now (probably ludicrously) considered a solid Republican state by the denizens of Atlas?

To make up for his weaknesses, Romney shouldn't have bothered with his cutsey business conservative/Bushian message. He should have discarded it for the garbage it was. People saw him as an out-of-touch elitist. He should have brushed up on his populist cred.

Ohio PVI was +1 GOP in 2012 and changing those things gives GOP a national win of 1.5-2.5 points which gives Mitt a 2.5-3.5 win in Ohio


In fact I believe if he did those things this would be the map:

()


Romney/Rubio 279  50.8%
Obama/Biden 259    48.9%

Why? What would he gain. He still had the tea party reputation at the time.


No, that would be pretty weak. The Reagan recovery wasn't that great, and appealing to some guy from thirty years ago isn't a good look.


That gaffe wasn't public. It was leaked from a fundraiser among people who liked that kind of talk. I'm not sure that kind of advice would be the greatest.


What?


What does that mean?


Your suggestions are the kind of things that would make people with your views and style like Romney more, but it wouldn't help among the general electorate.

-For once, Scarlet says something true.

Populist cred caused Trump to lose votes compared to Romney (compare Trump's 45.9% to Romney's 47.2%); he simply got lucky that Hillary declined from Obama as well. (Though Trump '16 compared to Obama '12 does do slightly better in the electoral vote; Trump gains Ohio and only drops NE-2). Romney's platform had more support from the voters than Trump's.

Obama had approval ratings in the negatives, it wasn't 2016. 

RCP has Obama's approval at 50/47 on Election Day 2012, which isn't great but is definitely above-water and almost perfectly resembles the actual election result of 51/47. Obama's approval ratings were consistently positive from September 8, 2012, to May 29, 2013, inclusive.

Biggest mistake?

Running as a sacrificial lamb against Obama in '12, rather than biding his time to run in '16....

On a secondary note, I think the "binders full of women" remark really hurt him with Middle-Age Female Middle-Class and Upper-Income voters in key suburban areas.... the 47% mark reinforced this among a different demographic of rural/Small Town/ and Urban White Ethnic Blue collar working and Middle Class men.....

Voila.... what in theory could have been a late election night didn't turn out that way with late breakers of both suburban women and blue-collar rural and medium sized cities in key parts of the country.

-Yeah, but 47% wouldn't have won Mitt 270. 46% won Trump over 300.

-I was befuddled why he ran as a sacrificial lamb in 2008. 2012 was a winnable year for the GOP; it was just that the GOP ran a slate of bad candidates, Romney included, hurting the GOP up and down the ballot.

That's a good point.... in theory he might well have been a stronger GE candidate against Obama in '08 than '12.....

McCain ran on doubling-down on the Iraq War, as well as other relatively hawkish foreign policy items, at a time where America was going through war wariness with the daily body counts increasing as part of a non-unified, but still significant Iraqi insurgency, incorporating virtually all ethnic groups within the country (Excepting the Kurds that were biding their time for an independent state)....

Romney would likely have been better positioned as the Republican nominee to present a moderate Republican perspective on how to recover from the great recession and economic policy, while still winding down the war in Iraq in a responsible manner, similar to what Obama did....

IDK if any Republican could have beaten Obama in '08 after the failure of the George W. administration, on both economic and foreign policy items, but I think the Pubs by selecting a candidate that was tone deaf on the War in Iraq, made the job that much harder to win over Indies, Conservative Dems, and Liberal/Moderate Republicans to create a popular vote and electoral college majority, particularly in the key battleground states of the Upper Midwest, Western US, as well as key parts of the South Atlantic region....

-2008 was an automatic Dem win all along. Take a look at W's approval ratings. 2012 was an obvious automatic Dem win with Romney (I predicted he'd lose the moment he became the frontrunner), but not an obvious automatic Dem win with, say, even someone like Gingrich.

So what would have made a candidate like Gingrich different than Romney in '12? Who should the Pubs have selected?

If a "Moderate Republican" like Romney was fated to lose, pray tell how someone like Gingrich could have chance the PV and EV outcome?

There is no question that Obama had some key vulnerabilities in '12 among significant elements of his electoral coalition, and trust me looking at the numbers in traditional timber mill towns in safe Democratic Oregon, this is patently clear (Most of the Democratic collapse between '08 and '16 actually occurred between '08 and '12, with the numbers from '12 to '16 more Obama '12 voters writing in Bernie, voting Libertarian, etc, rather than any real net gain for the Pub Pres nominee....

Thinking the Pubs should have tried running an economically protectionist, moderate on social policy but still hitting the right notes with the Evangelicals, and a relatively non-interventionist but strong on defense platform.... Who should that candidate have been?

-Look at the Georgia and South Carolina primary results. Gingrich's appeal was near identical to Trump's, Romney's to Rubio's.

Eharding--- Man do you ever sleep, you're supposed to be out in Michigan.... ;)

So you are talking about the '08/'12/'16 Pub primaries.... how would/should have that translated into the General Elections?

How would Gingrich have fared in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Ohio in the GE of 2012?

Would he have performed better in Florida, New Hampshire, Nevada, and Colorado?

So, Gingrich margins might have been better than Romneys in GA, but what state would have flipped in the GE, and if so why?

Huh, I seemed to remember Pollster having it like 45/51. 

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/ct-chicago-tribune-endorses-romney-story.html (http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/opinion/ct-chicago-tribune-endorses-romney-story.html)

This editorial makes the case for Romney that he should have made for the entire campaign.

-That is a case for Obama and Paul, then, not Romney.
-Can anyone deny they were talking about Paul here? Lol.

-I.e., Romney is a boring sack of respectability politics (read: compromise with the liberal agenda). Why would I want that?

No wonder I favored Barry O over Willard in 2012. Romney offered me nothing. Not even repeal of Obamacare. Can one expect a leopard to change his spots?

Entitlement cuts for everyone, tax cuts for the rich. Not that I totally disagree, but what a terrible general election message to send!

-On the contrary, Gingrich's margins would have been worse than Romney's in GA's, due to Atlanta Republicans defecting to Obama. He would have performed better in numerous parts of the country, Iowa included.

Being too hardline on immigration.  If he wins a higher suburban vote from social moderates and/or a larger share of the Hispanic vote (emphasize Obama's hypocrisy in regard to deportations), he wins the election, swinging Florida, Virginia, Colorado and Ohio (yes, a Republican can VERY, VERY easily win Ohio without picking up White Democrats who hate free trade, LOL).  He probably even tacks on Pennsylvania with enough of a swing in the Philly and Pittsburgh suburbs.  Iowa likely falls in line, too, as it is not nearly as rural or socially conservative as this site thinks (lives in Iowa).

Rubio flip Florida, and emphasizing how he would benefit legal immigrants would wipe out the anti immigrant attack from obama(which was untrue to begin with), and flip Colorado and Nevada to Romney . That would drop obama from 332 electoral vote to 288.

Now you put Obama on the defensive by bringing up his record over and over again, and remind folks that Obama had the house, and a filibuster proof senate majority and still barely got any onf the legislation he wanted passed which proves he is incompetent. That would give Romney the popular vote victory which then flips Ohio, and that charge would also flip Virginia giving Romney 281 electoral votes.

Romney made the same mistake as Kerry in not defending himself from his opponent's attacks so letting Obama define him as an out of touch job killing elitist. Romney should have defined himself as a private sector whiz who has created thousands of jobs and can use that experience to restore America. Probably though,  given he really lost by 5.37% as that was the margin in the tipping point state, he would have needed bigger changes and changes in the fundamentals to win. He could have come much closer though and perhaps even won the popular vote.

-Romney/Rubio is about as unbalanced a ticket as Trump/Gingrich. Doubling down on Romneyism is a losing strategy, and a horrible one. Rubio would flip Florida, but no other state. CO and NV would actually move further away from the GOP.

I agree with the analysis I've highlighted.  That was Romney's campaign and it didn't sit well with an America reeling from 2008.  


The above quote SHOULD have been the theme Romney ran on.  Such a theme would have been authentic for Romney; instead of the phony "job creator", he could be a guy who made tough decisions, did the responsible thing.  He could have been a guy who made the case for states doing healthcare and not the Federal Government, and used his state as an example, instead of running away from taking credit for a success because Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin would bash him on talk radio of he did.  

The above quote describes the man Mitt Romney actually was/is, and the campaign he should have ran.  It wouldn't have been perfect, and Romney was not a candidate without flaw.  But had he run on those themes, he's have been less phony.  Romney came off as one of the phoniest candidates for President in recent memory, trying to be something he really wasn't, and it burned him in the end, IMO.

no mistake.

just the need for mitt to twist his soul to not alienate the republican fringe while being not the biggest charmer in the room.

Two words: 47%

The types of people Romney SHOULD have been winning more of would not have been offended by such a true quote.

He suggested that anyone on any kind of government support supported Obama, which is perhaps the falsest statement to come from any modern presidential nominee.

That part was definitely false.  I was more thinking of the fact that 47% of the country does, in fact, benefit from a more socialized economy, increased government control, etc., and - whether those people were solidly for Obama as one might naturally expect or solidly for Romney for social/cultural/whatever reasons - they were not the voters he needed to spend his time speaking to, quite frankly, because they weren't going to be convinced either way.  And that's true.

An overwhelming majority of Americans "benefit from a more socialized economy". If Romney had only won the votes of those who didn't, he'd have got 3% at most.

The problem with this analysis is that it fails to account for the third parties pulling votes away from both parties. Also, the EC switches don't make sense, since in Florida, Trump and Clinton both out performed Obama and Romney. Also there were a substantial number of Obama to Trump voters in PA and IA, so assuming that they flipped likewise, it is fairly likely that the 20,000 in PA and 22,000 in IA, that make up the rest of the difference between Obama 2012 and Trump 2016, would already be a part of Trump's 2,970,000 votes in PA and 800,000 in IA, thus flipping both states. Of course that is a hypothetical, but you are already comparing Trump 2016 to Obama 2012, so it is just extending that to states and in states such as those where the voting population is stable or declining, the game is vote flips.

2012
Barack H. Obama   Joseph R. Biden, Jr.   Democratic   65,918,507   51.01%   332   61.7%
Willard Mitt Romney    Paul Ryan          Republican   60,934,407   47.15%   206   38.3%

2016
Donald J. Trump   Michael R. Pence   Republican   62,985,106   45.94%   304   56.5%
Hillary Clinton            Tim Kaine          Democratic   65,853,625   48.03%   227   42.2%

Two Party %
2012: 52%-48%
2016: 51%-49%

Trump cut Romney's PV deficit in half almost.

Florida  Trump +500,000 over Romney
Romney 4,163,447
Trump 4,617,886

NC  Trump +100,000 over Romney
Romney 2,270,395
Trump 2,362,631

Ohio  Trump +200,000 over Romney
Romney 2,661,437
Trump 2,841,005

PA  Trump +300,000 over Romney
Romney 2,680,434
Trump 2,970,733

MI  Trump +150,000 over Romney
Romney 2,115,256
Trump 2,279,543

WI Romney +2,000 over Trump
Romney 1,407,966
Trump 1,405,284

IA  Trump +70,000 votes over Romney
Romney 730,617   
Trump 800,983

Trump lost votes compared to Romney in CA, TX, and GA. But not in New York:

NY  Trump +330,000 over Romney
Romney 2,490,496
Trump 2,819,534

There is no way for a Republican to win running Bush 2000/2004 style.

To win back upscale suburbs, they would have to abandon social conservatism wholesale. To win Trump style, you just have to tone it down or slightly alter the messaging.

Which do you think the GOP is going to nominate?

Immigration had next to nothing to do with Romney's loss, outside of maybe Florida. Ratchet up the Hispanic vote to 70% for Romney and he still loses the election.

The working class swing vote is what decides these elections.

In 2007, Romney criticized trade deals. In the 2011, he said illegal immigration hurts jobs and lowers wages. In 2013, he endorsed a $9 minimum wage.

Why didn't he make this case in Ohio August-October 2012? He had no problem saying it in a GOP primary or after the election.

Take a look at the Ohio map. Winning Republicans do better than pluralities in South central OH and 50s in NW Ohio. These are not "Working class Democrats". These are ancestrally Republican areas, at least NW Ohio is. Unlike South Central Kentucky, they are not going to just hand you 70% just for being there. Trump got 65% in those rural NW OH counties, 60% in South Central OH counties (that Romney couldn't get to 50%) and going back to NW OH, he flipped Ottawa, Wood and Sandusky counties.

You don't win those votes by peddling more tax cuts. Even the small business owners, while appreciative of low taxes/regulations, realize the main problem is that Ford shut down the auto plant and now there is no customer base.

That is why Trump won many of the same voters that Romney did in the Michigan Primary, while Cruz got some of Santorum's vote. Trump also got some of the Santorum vote and Kasich got the rest of Romney's.

I agree with this. I think Martinez would have helped him far more than Rubio and certainly far more than Ryan. She was not a part of Washington, had no votes or policies that would hurt in Florida and comes from a working class Democratic background and thus would have played well in the Midwest, despite not being from there. Now of course there might be stuff in the background that precluded her, be it something in New Mexico or some other kind of scandal.

2016 proved that tough primaries don't matter. Donald Trump went through the most divisive GOP primary in decades, several of his opponents outright refused to endorse him or explictly said he was unfit to serve and much of the party still hadn't united behind Trump by November, but he won regardless. Obama also had a rough and divisive primary against Hillary Clinton in 2008, while McCain glided to victory in February, yet Obama crushed McCain in a landslide.

Romney's comment that he likes to fire people was probably his biggest mistake, as more voters have reason to fear being fired than are in a position to fire others.

This will rank with Tom Dewey's "He should be shot at sunrise" remark.

If Donald Trump had said that, it would not have hurt him in the least bit. And it, on its own, did not hurt Romney in the least bit, either. It's Romney's broader message that sucked for the rust belt, and Trump's message that won him it. See The Gamble: Choice and Chance in the 2012 Presidential Election for more evidence on the long-term lack of effect of gaffes.

The 47% comment and the elitist smirk that made him come across like a typical top 1% sociopath certainly didn't help.

There was far more third party vote in 2016. Trump got over a million more votes than Mitt Romney.

Trump barrelled through his primary not changing his message one iota for the general. Romney tried to pivot from being a "severely conservative" advocate of "self-deportation" to a standard business Republican.

47%, binders full of women, corporations are people, immediately come to mind. Of course, this is nothing compared to what we heard in 2016, but Romney didn't have an extremely loyal base to back him up and defend him.

He tried for The Midwest when he should've holed up Virginia, Florida, and Ohio.

If Romney had won Florida, he would have had 235. If he had won Virginia, he would have had 248 and if he had won Ohio, he would have 266.

He was four short of victory, even with his inside straight. He needed either Colorado, Pennsylvania or New Hampshire to win on top of that.

Trump basically conceded Virginia. He campaigned there a few times, but conceding VA and instead put more time into PA, which not only replaces the missing 13, it gets you 7 more on top of that which accounts for the missing 6 electoral votes that Romney needed. As I recall there were maps for Romney's campaign that didn't even include PA as a swing state. Trump and Romney also performed exactly the same in Bucks county, Trump did worse in Chester, but Trump did massively better in Lehigh and Lackawanna valley's (the traditional swing region that matches the Statewide result), Harrisburg Metro (Dauphin is now a Swing County), NW, West Central (That blob of post industrial rural counties between Pittsburgh and Penn State) and SW PA compared to Romney. Trump also did better in North Philly then Romney.

Trump also traded college educated whites in the sunbelt for working class whites in the rust belt, which flipped the electoral college skew away from the Democrats (which they gained by from moving CO, IA and NH so Democratic under Obama. Remember an even shift to a tie PV still had Obama winning the EC in 2012).

Romney's biggest mistake was not continuing the trade and immigration message he had in 2007 into the 2012 general election. He had already made his bed on immigration in the primaries in both campaigns, the notion that he could pivot away from that was a big error and the product of poor campaign consultants and pollsters who fed into a horrendous strategy. They bought into the narrative that African-American turnout would drop along with youth vote because of the economy and thus their models would suddenly became reality. They couldn't envision that the models were wrong and that the voters would show up on election day but not the polls. It is no accident that Trump likewise won on the backs of voters who don't show up well in polling data.

If you recall, in 2013 there was an article by Sean Trende in 2013 that talked about the missing White Working Class voters to the tune of almost 6 million in 2012. Trump got 2 million more votes than Romney, despite losing massive numbers of college educated whites. It is no accident that most of the states that trended or flipped to Trump were in that belt from Maine to New Mexico that Sean Trende talked about.

In retrospect, Romney (or any GOP candidate) was likely screwed from the get-go. The Obama campaign ran a ruthless and highly-effective strategy that mastered just about everything a campaign could master.

Romney was defined very early on and the clowncar process of the primary extended the time Romney had to spend fighting his fellow party members, giving Obama the resources to clobber the presumptive nominee (not doing the same to Trump, above all else, was the Clinton's campaign biggest f[inks]k-up in 2016, in my opinion).

Of course, Romney created a thousand flubs on his own that made for perfect campaign fodder, but even if he had not, the ruthless technological efficiency of the Obama campaign would've cut him down. Take one look at the 12 swing states in 2012:


Even if Romney had flipped FL & OH, that only would've gotten him to 253. Notice the bolded segment of swing states: the Obama campaign was incredibly precise in generating winning results in a cluster across 9 of the 12 swing states, winning with 51-53% of the vote; five are within 1 point of each other. That's incredible efficiency, and basically maxed out vote shares in every state that Obama won.

Where exactly was Romney gonna make up the 5.5 percentage points by which he lost in CO/VA & PA? That's a huge difference - comparable to GA's 2016 result. Imagine both campaigns contesting GA in a full-throated capacity in 2016, claiming it was a pure toss-up, and then Hillary losing by the margin she did.

Romney was screwed from day one: not because he was a gaffe machine, but because he was running against the best campaign in the history of American politics.

Nah, Obama was just a better candidate and campaigner than Mitt, and Romney didn't effectively counter the characterizations that were made of him.

"Let Detroit go bankrupt"

LOL at everyone saying Obama was unbeatable. He was as vulnerable as Bush was in 2004.  What mainly made Obama's 2012 margin bigger than Bush's 2004 margin was the fact that Romney was a worse candidate/campaigner than Kerry and Romney also had a rougher time in the primary than Kerry did. Sure, while it was the Obama campaign that amplified the notion that Romney was a flip flopper and an out of touch elitist, it was Romney's primary opponents that defined him as such. It was also during the primaries that Romney said "corporations are people my friend" and "I like being able to fire people."

All of this and no strong base of support to defend him. He was already damaged going into the general and only damaged himself more with the 47% remark, the "Binders full of Women" thing, and the "Let Detroit Fail" gaffe. There was also his letting the momentum from his strong performance in Debate #1 slip away with poor performances in 2 and 3. Eddie Munster getting spanked by Crazy Uncle Joe in the VP debate didn't help either (I don't Ryan was a bad pick, but then again almost anyone besides Michelle Bachmann would've been an improvement from Palin). I dare say had Obama not had his issues (a weak recovery from the Great Recession, the flaws of Obamacare, etc...) Romney would've gotten beat as badly as Bob Dole did in 1996 if not worse.

All in all I still maintain that while Jon Huntsman agreeing to be  Obama's Ambassador to China was good in a "Country first" sense, it was a dumb move politically. Had he finished out his term in Utah instead and then run for President in 2012, he wouldn't have had his association with the President hurting him with the base, so with this and with the fact that his record in Utah was more successful (and for the base's sake more conservative) than Romney's, he very well might've emerged as the nominee and likely would've beaten Obama in the general.

Bush 2004 state by state numbers would actually beat Obama's 2012 state by state numbers


Here would be the Bush 2004 vs Obama 2012 map:

()

Bush 275
Obama 263

I was going solely by electoral vote (286 for Bush vs. 332 for Obama). I think Obama even slightly outperformed Bush in the popular vote or at least did even with him percentage wise. Even with state by state numbers, Bush didn't do that much better than Obama. All and all, I still think Romney was a worse candidate/campaigner than Kerry, and I'm even (to the best of my ability) factoring out my ideological bias as I say this.

Problem for Mitt was his strategy to get to 270 was that map + NH, and NV and that only would only get him to 285 meaning all Obama still needed was OH(Mitt wasnt going to win IA or WI without OH).

Neither Romney or Kerry was getting above 300 Electoral votes in those elections. Bush and Obama were both vulnerable, but not vulnerable enough to warrant anything worse than a narrow defeat.

I think Kerry getting 311:

()

Kerry/Bob Graham 311
Bush/Cheney 227

and Romney getting 311 as well

()

Romney/Portman 311
Obama/Biden 227

It is rather fitting for Adam to be the one to talk about it all coming down to having more finely tuned gears in the machine, but at the end of the people cast votes not machines and issues/culture/tribalism motivate voters.


A lot of people voted for Obama, but would have voted for someone else (even if said candidate didn't run that year). The fact this operation determined he had X supporters at a given time and turned them out to get 51% in 11/12 states downplays the process of how those voters got to that point.

With this in mind, what PV share gives Trump 270 EV in 2020?  Last time, it would have been about 45.4%- he wins with Wisconsin and ME-02 (which was a Trump blowout at the CD level).