This is good news. It means I can stop agonizing over my failure to reach the heartland, my tonedeafness on matters of faith, and the like, and say, along with millions of fellow New Yorkers, "If you voted for Bush on terrorism, you are either a). wilfully stupid; or b). just fucking stupid."
Thank you. It feels good to get that out of my system.
I've noticed this odd dialectic going on the the blog-o-sphere lately. Liberals have blamed jesus fanatics without lacking a capacity for cirtical thought for Bush's victory, while the conservative blogs, and some commentators here, think we're absurd and that it was a referendum on bush's policies. I think both sides a bit wrong, but i'll now go read this piece and see if it's a little more enlightening.
Naw. It's just not PC to be a bigot anymore. I can't believe that people feel safer with him as President...Unless they think the terrorists will go after him specifically and leave the rest of us alone. Hmmm.
Then again lots of them think that Saddam was responsible for 9/11 which, though stupid, may explain why they think the US is winning the war on terror.
I think Stephanie's on to something. I think the terror factor was a big issue, but I think that most people who voted on that issue don't fully understand it. Many do believe Saddam was part and parcel of 9/11 and that force is the only way to deal with terrorism. If they don't understand their own countrymen who have different "lifestyles" from them, do you think they understand the Islamic world? I don't pretend to understand it myself. Heck, I haven't figured out the whole Palestinian/Israeli conflict. I think terrorism and our response to it is complex, but I think a lot of people feel better bombing the heck out of somebody as a way of dealing with it and that's what Bush offers. Maybe Iraq will turn out okay. I'm not optimistic, but who knows.
The Freedman article is less revealing than it seems. For a fair number of the homophobic right, terrorism and Iraq are the biggest issue this year, just as withy demographic slice of the population. These aren't two distinct sets. Those probably won't be their biggest issues in 2008 and they certainly weren't in 2000. The Jesus Brigade doesn't exist in a vacuum; they watch the news, too.
Here's the issue: the religious right has been delivering for the GOP for 25 years and gotten next to nothing back in return, except for some restrictions making abortion more inconvenient and Ashcroft as AG. They sat on their hands through most of Bush's first term looking at this election. Now that they put him over the top (and they did, at least as much as black voters put Clinton over the top), they'll be looking to cash in their chips. They've been promised that the president is one of their own and they are sick of waiting.
The thing is:
1) "Terrorism" is to a large extent a cultural issue too for many voters. Not so much examining policy and deciding Bush's is better, as liking the military, the flag, Bush's rhetoric about how evil our enemies are, and hating the French, hippies, and liberals.
Go back and find the transcripts and footage from some of the "Support our troops" rallies right before the war. Lots of invocations of Hollywood, lesbians with hairy armpits, etc. I vividly remember the line "we thought California surrounded us, but we surround California!"
Read the lyrics to "Have You Forgotten?" or "Iraq em Up and I Roll". Or just watch Zell Miller's convention speech.
It's not just a gay thing. It's an us v. them thing, an "objective reality is made up by the liberal media and I can only trust Fox News and talk radio" thing. No coincidence that Tom "rampant lesbian in the schools" Coburn and James "outraged by the outrage" Inhofe are from the same state.
2. Which brings me to my second point: gay marriage might NOT be the explanation for the presidential election, but I am pretty sure it is a huge part of the explanation for Coburn, DeMint, Bunning, and Thune's Senate victories.
(Is it a fair generalization that Jewish people tend to be very aware of terrorism, take it very seriously, and are very unsympathetic to weakness in the face of terrorism?
If so, note that Kerry won the Jewish vote by 75%-25%, a margin barely smaller than last time.)
Bush was elected because of Michael Moore.
Any political party that puts Moore and Carter under a spotlight at their own convention is at least being honest.
Moore and Carter, however, are the right wing of the Dean-Green-Mean movement. (i.e. the 'meme' street is way left. Dude).
This is 2 years old but still new:
http://www.denbeste.nu/cd_log_entries/2002/09/MeanGreenMeme.shtml
If you think that many people give a rat's ass about michael moore, you're more delusional than i thought.
The one conclusion I have about this whole post-election analysis thing can be summed up in three sentences:
Nobody.
Knows.
Anything.
(Yeah, I stole it. So sue me.)