For all Obama’s professed ability to motivate new voters, it seems that more people turned out for Kerry vs Bush than for McCain vs Obama.
2004 Popular Vote: 121,069,054
Bush 62,040,610 Kerry 59,028,444
2008 Popular Vote: 118,225,016
Obama 62,682,389 McCain 55,543,527
Those figures may be preliminary, but considering the population growth in the past four years and the hype surrounding Obama, it’s interesting what the clear light of November 5th has to say. (For one thing, it’s seems he’s scarcely more popular today than Bush was two years into the Iraq war.)
Related: Short coat tails. Gay marriage bans look to have passed from Florida to California. So much for the end of social conservativism.
More on the numbers here. As commentor Free Thinker points out, considering his “unprecedented half billion dollar war chest, total media subservience, timely stock market panic, celebrity endorsements” (not to mention the massive potential for voter fraud in certain precincts) perhaps the Democrats Chicago machine should be asking themselves what went wrong?
Nov. 6 Update – American University’s Center for the Study of the American Electorate (pdf)
Despite lofty predictions by some academics, pundits, and practitioners that voter turnout would reach levels not seen since the turn of the last century, the percentage of eligible citizens casting ballots in the 2008 presidential election stayed at virtually the same relatively high level as it reached in the polarized election of 2004.
It sure is! Congrats to Obama!
I just spoke to a liberal and she told me about Obama’s victory;
” the slave is now the master ”
scary…
Hey, conservatives and libertarians. You are a classy bunch. All over the right-wing blogosphere I am reading the congrats to Pres-elect Obama and a general wishing him well, as well as appreciation that democracy functioned and life will go on. I remember the left’s vitriolic spewings and general derangement after Pres. Bush won 2004. I remember the “Diebold” conspiracy theories and sheer hatred that spilled out.
The contrast in behaviour this time around is very striking. You take loss with grace and class.
The sad thing is, the Dems never rallied around Bush as their Pres, even after 911, and obstructed him at every turn. Repubs will put their country first and try to cooperate with Pres. Obama. And he will then get the reputation of being a “uniter” — all because conservatives are more reasonable and less deranged people.
Sometimes things are so unfair. But the wheel will keep turning . . .
Looks like McCain’s inspired all sorts of republicans to stay home. All the pandering to the left didn’t get any of them to vote for him but it did alienate enough of the Republican base to cause him problems.
Look at the collapse of the Republican vote in those figures. The Democratic effort to turn out the vote failed, but the number of Republican butts that stayed in chairs on voting night is shocking.
Kate,
Get over it. Obama won and no matter how you slice or dice it Obama won! Why don’t you go back to gloating how great Saskatchewan is or denying your a feminist.
Although it is probably a moot point, I wonder how much actual voter fraud took place and how it rates in regards to past elections. Also, will anyone be prosicuted?
Ann is right about the right leaning blogosphere is reacting to the Obama win. The man has certainly got a full plate to handle and time will tell if he is/was indeed presidential material.
the role the msm played in suppressing the GOP vote and even the dem vote by pounding the bo’s got it in tHe bag is significant.
It’s also interesting that Obama got out the vote to return every incumbent GOP governor who was up for re-election. And that the massive surge of Democratic voters supported bans on gay marriage, adoption of children by gay couples, etc.: Ballot measures (via Contentions).
It would be interesting to break down Obama’s vote by race. I’d like to see how many Negroes were encouraged to vote because he was a Brother.
I think you were a little premature with this post.
http://tinyurl.com/62x9hy
The CNN tally you show is only for votes counted so far for Obama & McCain only. It doesn’t include spoiled ballots, 3rd parties, and write-in.
If you click the CNN link now the numbers are already higher than what you’ve posted; higher by half a million votes as of this time.
I wrote that the figures are preliminary, however I don’t think there’s any doubt that the massive voter turnout for Obama that was predicted didn’t come to pass. Young voters up by 1 percent, first time up by about the same. They voted in larger percentages for Obama, but the participation was up only a tick.
(Nor are spoiled ballots included in the 2004 comparison.)
Well at least we know he’s popular in the Middle East.
And as any lefty will tell you, all you need to be is popular in the ME and all the fanatical Arabs and Muslims will lay down their arms and love American’s. It was really just matter of putting a black skinned African American who would pander to their cultural whims in office that was needed, Duh.
That’s right; this whole election was not about color remember, so said the MSM and the democratic campaign? It’s seems a little strange that a minute after the election that is ALL the MSM could talk about, even slavery specials on CBC and the US making it’s rounds through all the black neighborhoods and bars. Hmmmm but it was never about color. It seems clear by the media coverage after the first few hours that black America just received a president, the rest of yall seem to be exempt.
The Dems and GOP will look over the numbers with a cold eye.
Was it McCain failing to insprie, was it the GOP base giving up and deciding that their vote wouldnt matter, was it the GOP vte deciding that it was time for a change and they did it by staying home. Time will tell.
The youth vote not coming out…not a surprise. It never turns out in the manner expected.
The GOP will take comfort from this number, and the Dems should take it as a warning. The analysis will take a few months, be interesting to check back on this story in a bit and see what the data reveals as it is massaged.
Steven Den Beste’s observations pretty much sums up my expectations of Obama and the Dems now unleashed upon us:
http://chizumatic.mee.nu/not_the_end_of_the_world
And, as for voter fraud, Texas Canuck, Obama is never going to unleash the DOJ on that issue. Nor is the MSM ever going to explore the issue either. It’s all moot now. If Obama is s awful as I think he will be his liberal minions won’t be as motivated to cheat in four years.
I wonder if in the next four years Atlas will shrug. Depending on how radically left American domestic policy goes there may be a multitude of productive people marginalized and preyed upon. How much has to be taken before those people just quit trying?
Ayn Rand said in 1964 that American society was a mixture of freedoms and controls with a dominant government trend moving towards dictatorship. Does anyone else fear that she may be much too close to the truth 44 years later?
Given Obama’s unprecedented half billion dollar war chest, total media subservience, timely stock market panic, celebrity endorsements etc. his victory was far from a landslide.
Considering the coverage that Obama received from the MSM I thought the numbers would have been higher. The next few years will bring America into its first serious foray into socialism. With an economic recession on the horizon I feel we shall be seeing a period that the author Dickens wrote about when he began “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness,….”. Congratulations are in order to America and especially to the democrats and to Obama and I’ll leave another quote to the republicans from an early Twentieth Century singer who also entertained us from behind a black face, Al Jolson, “You ain’t seen nothing yet!!!”
another take on the get out the vote meme
” Back in 1954, only 22% of voters identified themselves as independents, according to the American National Election Survey. Fifty years later the number was nearly double. Now, two out of five Americans can’t name anything they like about the Democrats, and 50% say the same about Republicans. What happened? …
Throughout the 1990s, the independent movement kept growing while Democrats and Republicans warred in Washington. Three independent governors were elected: Angus King of Maine, Lowell Weicker of Connecticut and Jesse Ventura of Minnesota. All spread the same essential reform message: independence from special interests guided by a common-sense balance of fiscal conservatism and social liberalism. …
This is the new mainstream in American politics, and it’s growing among younger voters. More than 40% of college undergraduates identify themselves as independents, according to a summer 2008 survey by Harvard University’s Institute of Politics (IOP). “Half of young Americans do not identify with traditional party or ideological labels — they are the new center in American politics,” says John Della Volpe of IOP.
This trend extends to 30- to 45-year-old Generation X voters as well, says the author of “X Saves the World,” Jeff Gordinier: “Gen Xers tend to be pretty post-ideological and pragmatic, there is less allegiance to any one party or any one way of thinking.”
http://pajamasmedia.com/richardfernandez/
Obama largely motivated the black vote, which is largely socially conservative. Voted against gay marriage in Cali by a roughly 2:1 margin. By contrast, every other ethic demo (Latinos at 51% against I’ll call a toss-up) voted for by very slim numbers.
On the other hand, ssm is basically inevitable, as people under 25 were massively for it.
Did the black population vote for Obama because he’s black??
Hmmm.. Let’s see now. Hundreds of years of slavery, indentured servitude, segregation in all levels of society, KKK, lynchings, taxation without representation, ad infinitum. An entire history of being taken advantage of and abused by whites, and the guys on the other ticket are an old white guy and a redneck crackpot who runs a state where there are no black people.
Ask yourself what you would do.
So let me see if I get Kate’s critique of Obama:
Obama, the black liberal with the Arabic/Muslim sounding name, beat Texan ‘war president’ George W. Bush’s 2004 numbers, while POW/war hero/marverick McCain earned even less votes than Kerry, the elitist effete Liberal from Massachusetts who flip-flopped on the Iraq war.
And your point that somehow Obama’s victory last night is unimpressive can be drawn by….doing what, exactly?
Yeah, that’s some real sound analysis there.
Ann:
Grace and class? Good one…
In addition to Kate’s expected rantings, consider this from Adam Yoshida at the Western Standard’s Shotgun Blog:
Obama represents the greatest force for evil existant [sic] in this world. He’s a symbol, literally, of everything that we’ve ever stood against. His friends are criminals and terrorists.
We must – and we shall – destroy him.
Or this brilliant comment from JP on this very site:
I for one welcome our new black nationalist overlords. And as a white race-traitor myself, I could be useful in rounding up other honkies to work in their underground crack mines.
Maybe you’d prefer the Five Foot Fascist’s spin:
McCain bent over backwards to accomodate Mexicans and they voted for Obama, because his skin is brown. So did the usual guilty white liberals and secular Jews, who also voted for Obama based solely on his skin colour.
Well, slevin, considering that his father was from continental Africa, where slavery is still widely practiced, one would wonder why that issue wasn’t held against him.
/sarcasm
Sorry to rain on your parade but this election was almost broke the record for the most voters as a percentage ever, and it did actually break the record for the most people voting ever. Results so far posted on CBC (which has potential to be inaccurate) are as follows:
“Preliminary projections based on 88 per cent of precincts tallied by early Wednesday and allowance for absentee ballots suggested that 14.2 million more Americans voted Tuesday than the previous numerical record of 122.3 million, set in the 2004 election.”
“The win came as an estimated 64.1 per cent of eligible voters cast ballots — reportedly the best turnout rate in at least 44 years”
The largest was back in 1908 with 65.7% turnout.
Keep on trying, you’ll find something to tar Obama with eventually Kate.
Oh, heck, yes! What went wrong?
Your sickening unAmerican traitorous, racist, money-grubbing, torturing, hateful ideology got struck a death blow and you and your fellow jackal-blowhards are left writhing on the floor, gasping for breath as the final death tremors subside and your bodies stiffen into rigour mortis.
Yeah – that’s what went wrong!
Hey, Ontario Liberal, how is Ontario now being a have-not province working for you? Aint socialism under Liberal McSquinty grand!
Kate, you and your discredited ideology are finished. It was croaked when the market tanked in Sepetmber and all the “free market” types went cap-in-hand to Washington and cleaned out the treasury. Turned out the “invisible hand” holds a tin cup.
I find it rather shallow that a black would vote for another black simply because they share a similar skin pigmentation.
I believe he got a lot of black people motivated to vote because, having the same skin colour, they expect him to dole out loads of entitlements to them because he’s now Da Man.
Of course he will never be able to live up to their unrealistic expectations and we will see
them turning against him in the next year or so, with chages of him being an Uncle Tom and being in the pockets of the corporate elite ( which is code for rich white men.
If McCain had won that would have been proof of a racist America, we were told. By extension, BO won so that would mean racism has been overcome in the US, no? If BO loses the next election to a white guy does that mean Americans are racist (again)?
Gloat, gloat, gloat. The trolls here are engaging in the same sweet “schadenfraude” we enjoyed in 2004. Aah, remember that sweet morning of Nov. 5, 2004?
The wheel will turn. The pendulum will swing. Life goes on.
And I repeat — conservatives will behave far better with Obama than libs behaved with Bush. Obama will get the credit for the calmer atmosphere, but it’s the more level-headed and even-handed conservatives that will deserve it.
Lloyd Fister says “Kate, you and your discredited ideology are finished. It was croaked when the market tanked in Sepetmber and all the “free market” types went cap-in-hand to Washington and cleaned out the treasury. Turned out the “invisible hand” holds a tin cup.”
Lloyd obviously doesn’t know much about economics. If he did, he would know that the “free market” was not responsible for the economic issues now in play. No, that is actually the direct result of policies such as those that Obama wants to implement..i.e., there is a free lunch. You can only sell the family silverware once….when it’s gone it’s gone. The “tin cup” was really in the hands of people who should never have been given loans but were ordered to by ill-founded government regulation. Grow up, Lloyd. You might want to find some reading other than Marx.
But Ann-
Bush is the most hated President in American history.
Not just by “libs”. By everybody. The whole entire country.
His support went south 3 years ago, Ann. Never recovered since. Didn’t you know, Ann?
Ann, that’s what your sweet morning of Nov. 5 wrought.
The majority of americans are “bush-haters”, Ann. In fact, Obama owes much of his stunning victory to that.
So…thanks, Ann, for the Obama victory!
“conservatives will behave far better with Obama than libs behaved with Bush”
Conservatives are doing what they can to dispell that possibility, ann.
It took Bush’s lying to force the US into a distracting war in Iraq and Bush and Cheney ignoring the Constitution before the idiot Democratic hyper-partisans got unhinged by Bush-derangement syndrome.
Obama derangement syndrome has been in full swing for months in the idiot hyper-partisan conservative quarters.
That’s what you think, Floyd. Actually, your observation is wishful thinking. I guess you’ll find out the hard way . . .
slevin: “Hundreds of years of slavery”
Your math is off. The USA was formed on July 4, 1776. The Emancipation Proclamation was declared on January 1, 1863 (87 years later) and the 13th Amendment was adopted on December 6, 1865 (89 years later). Any slavery practiced in Africa before 1776, or after 1865, is not the US’s fault.
What went wrong is America has very few “American’s” anymore. It liberal left wing nuts, who would rather dance half naked in front to children in gay pride parades on one hand and millions of illegal immigrants wanting to kick out “the European invaders” on the other.
Porn shops and liquor stores, that’s the lefty America that voted for Obamba, they want the freedom to sit on their ass’s and smoke crack collecting welfare hoping for a strong socialist man in the Whitehouse to replace the funds that their incarcerated and long gone daddies would not.
It was millionaire movie stars full of white guilt, pushing for a middle class aka “strait and normal America” to fund their getto fans miserable lifestyles, while they bank in offshore accounts and occasionally fly to Africa to adopt a little black kid. Once the guilty fad fades, then they divorce and drop the brat in a private school and move on further into their fantasy worlds. So long as its never on their dime.
America has “changed” that happened back in the 70s. Obamba is simply the icing on the cake. “Hope” yea ok “we hopes that the country that was America doesn’t drag the rest of the world into it’s trillion dollar vacuum of third world welfare support”.
To Gerry Atric
Yes, and I’d like to see how many white bros and sisters voted for Obama because he was a person! (Signed–A white conservative who hated Bush.)
“Hmmm.. Let’s see now. Hundreds of years of slavery, indentured servitude, segregation in all levels of society, KKK, lynchings, taxation without representation, ad infinitum. An entire history of being taken advantage of and abused by whites, and the guys on the other ticket are an old white guy and a redneck crackpot who runs a state where there are no black people.
Ask yourself what you would do.”
Maybe the black community needs to realize that their skin color isn’t the main characteristic that defines who they are and their potential in life. Maybe they need to realize that it hasn’t been the barrier that has prevented them from succeeding in life, but their attitude, because if it were entirely based on skin color, there’d be very few successful blacks in America.
One good thing I see coming out of this election could be the revitalization amongst black youth growing up in suffering black communities. Maybe Obama’s win will put a little bit of extra drive and determination in these kids to work at making a better life for themselves and their communities. It’ll give them a confidence boost which they may not be getting from their peers.
It’s certainly not the government or society’s job to babysit a person their entire lives. It’s up to the individual to work and earn a better life.
Hey, slevin, in that “entire” history of being taken advantage of by whites was one big Civil War with lots of dead white boys ending slavery and all of those whites that pushed for the Civil Rights acts and transfered the biggest amount of wealth to one group in our history.
Sorry to spoil your woefully inadequate summary of black/white US history for us. Voting along the lines or excluding because of skin color, religion, ethnicity isn’t a virtue. It’s the behavior of the tribal and close minded person. If that shoe fits it doesn’t matter what color the foot.
Watch for everything in Iraq to start “going well”
and the shift in tone from the left. Also let us all never forget the 8 years of whining and negativity leading up to this.
Recently, historically speaking, people from the Socialistic/Communistic parts of the world fled to freedom – the USA. And now many of them voted for …. socialism. What gives !?
What gives is, there was no money left in those countries for the free-loaders to grab so they came to where it was being generated. Can you say Golden Goose ?
Discredited ideology ? Connect the dots; Fannie Mae .. Freddy Mac .. Bill no money down Clinton .. No Drill Pelosi .. Barack entitlement Obama .. Dumb Intellectuals .. Useless Professors .. Hollywood Airheads.
It all looks like history is just repeating itself. Kyoto is the catalyst this time.
[Among world leaders, there is almost no one left with the courage and vision to challenge any of this. A rare exception is Czech President Vaclav Klaus, who in the 1980s struggled to free his country from Soviet domination and is now sounding the alarm about the growing global tyranny of climate edicts. Last year he published a short book, Blue Planet in Green Shackles. In the subtitle of this book, he asks: “Which is endangered: climate or freedom?”
It’s a pity that in America, a country built on free speech and free markets, neither presidential candidate seems willing to take a cue from Klaus. By now, the real question on climate is: Which candidate, once elected, is most likely to back off the campaign promises enough to leave America free to breathe?]Forbes
Will someone please address the fact that Kate is lying? The numbers are not correct or accurate at all…and then following my post regarding those numbers being incorrect with direct quotes to a news service, she updates the post heaping more scorn on Obama?
I’m not sure why Kate is insisting on gracing her face with more and more egg…as to the economic downturn, that was the result of bi-partisan greed, both parties are responsible for that mess.
A healthy dose of wilderness time is just what the doctor ordered for a Republican party that has clearly lost its way. The future of America hinges not so much on Obama’s presidency or the Democrat ascendancy in Congress, but rather on what, if any, ideological wine is pressed from these bitter grapes by the Republicans. Another round of “compassionate conservatism”, and “we can spend as much as you” from the elephant people will spend the end of America as we hoped it would be.
C-Span had Peter Pansbridge on doing commentary last night…
I have to go stimulate the economy this weekend and buy a new TV and take the wife out for dinner as amends.
Workboots make excellent blunt projectiles.
SHUT.
DOWN.
CBC!
slevin
I think you are right. Unfortunately what I’ve learned in this election is that only whites are expected to be color-blind. I’ve had numerous people of different colors tell me this election cycle that they would vote for Barak because he is black. I accept this truth, I even think it might just be human, but what I don’t accept is the double standard. No more will people be able to tell me that color doesn’t matter( or gender for that matter). I personally will not vote for someone based on the aforementioned reasons; but, I won’t hold it against people if they do.
The real injustice in my mind, is that what we teach our children is “not true”. I will analogize this to what we teach young men in western society with respect to relationships with women. We teach them that men and women are equal, and that a women’s choices are to be respected and supported when there is a baby; and, if you do this, you as a man/father will be treated fairly. In reality the truth is far different for men. In reality, men need to protect themselves from preying women who will use children and the law to ruin their lives, and reputations(I’m not saying all or most women, I’m saying the potential is there for a woman to do these things). My point is what we’ve (all of us) been indoctrinated with is not true. Race matters, and anyone would be lying is they said other wise, so next time anyone thinks about playing the race/gender/whatever card, please look in the mirror.
Posted by: Chairman Kaga at November 5, 2008 12:42 PM >
“Maybe Obama’s win will put a little bit of extra drive and determination in these kids….”
Yea “maybe” I suppose that’s the “hope” part for America. After all the African American or Africans in general can achieve allot of greatness building a society like they did in, in ____________ you fill in the blank.
Ann wrote:
“And I repeat — conservatives will behave far better with Obama than libs behaved with Bush. Obama will get the credit for the calmer atmosphere, but it’s the more level-headed and even-handed conservatives that will deserve it.”
Like the conservatives treated Bill Clinton, or Stephane Dion?
hey slevin, who freed the slaves? That’s right, the Republicans. Who passed the 15th amendment allowing anybody to vote, regardless of “race, color, or previous condition of servitude”? That’s right, Republicans. Who passed the Civil Rights Act of 1957? That’s right, the Republicans. Who sent troops to Arkansas to desegregate the schools? That’s right, Eisenhower, a Republican. Who founded the KKK? That’s right, the Democrats! Who voted against the 1957 Civil Rights Act? John F Kennedy, a Democrat Icon! Who called Dr. Martin Luther King a “Nigger Preacher”? That’s right, President Johnson, a Democrat! Why was Dr. King a Republican?
bar-jeebus said: “Will someone please address the fact that Kate is lying?”
Ok, I will. She’s not lying. She’s quoting preliminary numbers from a third party source. If you have updated numbers from a better source, I’ll be interested to see them.
If not, you’re an a-hole.