Poll-drunk? Prematurely jubilant? Anticipatorily blissful? Let's sober up a moment by looking at the stunning history of our Democratic Party's electoral incompetence since 1860. In that time there have been 37 presidential elections and Republicans have won a whopping 62% of the time!
If that doesn't sound bad enough, consider just how often the cards have not fallen our way:
Since 1860:
* 13 Republicans have won with a majority greater than 50% since 1860: Lincoln, Grant, McKinley, Roosevelt, Taft, Harding, Coolidge, Hoover, Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan, Bush I, Bush II.
Meanwhile, only 3 Democrats have won with a majority greater than 50% since 1860: FDR, LBJ, Carter.
* 3 Republicans have won despite losing the popular vote since 1860: Hayes, Harrison, and Bush II.
Meanwhile, no Democrat has won despite losing the popular vote since 1860.
* 10 Republicans have won an electoral landslide (greater than 70%) since 1860: Lincoln, Grant, Roosevelt, Harding, Coolidge, Hoover, Eisenhower, Nixon, Reagan, and Bush I.
Meanwhile, only 4 Democrats have won an electoral landslide (greater than 70%) since 1860: Wilson, FDR, LBJ, Clinton.
* 3 Democrats, arguably, would not have won without 3rd party help: Cleveland in 1892, Wilson in 1912, and Clinton in 1992. There are, obviously, no significant 3rd party candidates this year.
Further, let's look at the recent history:
* In
1968, Harris surveys gave Hubert Humphrey a 2 point lead over Nixon on election-eve. Harris and Gallup had already confirmed that Humphrey had closed his deficit to just two points the week before. Nixon, despite Humphrey's verifiable momentum, hung on to win with a superior GOTV of his supporters. Sound familiar, John Kerry.
*
1972. Metric ass-ton of FAIL!
* In
1976, Jimmy Carter held a 33 point lead in July against a man who had just pardoned Tricky Dick and had no idea that the Soviets were in Eastern Europe. Carter held on for slim win that left him little mandate to govern.
* In
1980 Jimmy Carter held an 8 point lead three weeks out with a message that the older Reagan was too belligerent and too right-wing to be elected. Sound familiar. Carter lost magnificently.
*
1984. Metric ass-ton of FAIL!
*
1988. Dukakis opens a 17 point advantage and thinks it might be OK to kick up his heels back in Boston while his opponent, a rich boy former fighter pilot, and his intellectually challenged not-ready-to-be-a-hearbeat-away-from-POTUS running mate wandered from flag factory to flag factory. Conspicously false attacks on Dukakis' character, patriotism, and funny-name foreigness insulted the intelligence of the electorate--and it was all delivered with a ruthless helping of good old race-baiting. And yet it worked! Sound familiar?
*
2000. Al Gore is too smart and therefore elitist. Republicans loving the smell of massive voter suppression in the morning . . . Sound familiar.
*
2004. 1/4 cup 1968's humilitation (beat on GOTV) to a 1/2 cup of 1988's humilitation (foreign, hates American) and two tablespoons of 2000's humilation (voter suppression, elitist). Drizzle with a "OMG the exit polls confirm we've won!" and light the whole thing on fire. Spend the next year in fetal crouch.
This time, in 2008, let's give them the medicine they keep giving us. A lesson in history delivered without mercy or relent. I'll have one 1932 FDR Republican smackdown please!
Know this, the Republicans will challenge the legitimacy of any close Obama victory. Take JFK, for example. The Republican spin is so pervasive, many think JFK only won because of mobsters in Chicago stuffing ballot boxes. However, Kennedy did not need the 27 electors from Illinois to become president, so any mob activity real or imagined had no effect on the election.
Memory matters. In 2000, the Republicans claimed Gore should step down for the good of the county just like that poor saintly patriot, Richard Nixon, had in 1960. Yeah, Nixon needed to flip a few more states after Illinois to even get it close, but what a hero for actually abiding by the Constitution! It was a mistake, apparently, that he did not feel like repeating.
This time have a great leader to put in the White House: a true progressive thinker with serious ideas that will change the lives of Americans for the better, and end this jaded neo-McCarthyite politics of fear and smear.
Do anything and everything you can for the next 20 days and not only will we win this election, but we will mark this moment as a time when people came together to find solutions to monumental problems. The Reagan Revolution will be remembered as a hiccup of history, a brief misstep, which led into a generational shift in ideology and the rebirth of the middle class.
We want change not because we are mad at the Republicans, but because we love this country. We are the adults here. Our warnings about deregulation and unwise war were tossed aside as moonbat ravings. The entire county suffered because we did not do more at some point. Every person reading this, hear me now. You are living in Palm Beach County in the year 2000. America's future is in your hands. So get up and fight! Go out there and make history you brave, beautiful, unstoppable, army of patriots.
See the full dismal chronicle of our oh too briefly-interrupted woe, below:
Year: Winner (Party) win % popular and win % electoral; scorecard
- Lincoln (R) win 40% popular and 59% electoral; R 1 D 0
- Lincoln (R) win 55% popular and 91% electoral; R 2 D 0
- Grant (R) win 53% poplular and 73% electoral; R 3 D 0
- Grant (R) win 56% popular and 81% electoral; R 4 D 0
- Hayes (R) win 48% popular (lost popular) and 50% electoral; R 5 D 0
- Garfield (R) win 48% poplular and 58% electoral; R 6 D 0
- Cleveland (D) win 49% popular and 55% electoral; R 6 D 1
- Harrison (R) 48% popular (lost popular) and 58% electoral; R 7 D 1
- Cleveland (D) win 46% poplular (3rd party help) and 62% electoral; R 7 D 2
- McKinley (R) win 51% popular and 61% electoral; R 8 D 2
- McKinley (R) win 52% popular and 65% electoral; R 9 D 2
- Roosevelt (R) win 56% poplular and 71% electoral; R 10 D 2
- Taft (R) win 52% popular and 67% electoral; R 11 D 2
- Wilson (D) win 42% popular (3rd party help) and 82% electoral; R 11 D 3
- Wilson (D) win 49% popular and 52% electoral: R 11 D 4
- Harding (R) win 60% poplular and 76% electoral; R 12 D 4
- Coolidge (R) win 54% popular and 72% electoral; R 13 D 4
- Hoover (R) win 58% popular and 84% electoral; R 14 D 4
- Roosevelt (D) win 57% poplular and 89% electoral; R 14 D 5
- Roosevelt (D) win 61% poplular and 99% electoral; R 14 D 6
- Roosevelt (D) win 55% poplular and 85% electoral; R 14 D 7
- Roosevelt (D) win 53% poplular and 81% electoral; R 14 D 8
- Truman (D) win 49.6% popular and 57% electoral; R 14 D 9
- Eisenhower (R) win 55% popular and 83% electoral; R 15 D 9
- Eisenhower (R) win 57% poplular and 86% electoral; R 16 D 9
- Kennedy (D) win 49.7% popular and 56% electoral; R 16 D 10
- Johnson (D) win 61% popular and 90% electoral; R 16 D 11
- Nixon (R) win 43% poplular (3rd party help) and 56% electoral; R 17 D 11
- Nixon (R) win 61% popular and 97% electoral; R 18 D 11
- Carter (D) win 50% popular and 55% electoral; R 18 D 12
- Reagan (R) win 51% poplular and 91% electoral; R 19 D 12
- Reagan (R) win 59% popular and 98% electoral; R 20 D 12
- Bush (R) win 53% popular and 79% electoral; R 21 D 12
- Clinton (D) win 43% popular (3rd party help) and 69% electoral; R 21 D 13
- Clinton (D) win 49% popular and 70% electoral; R 21 D 14
- Bush (D) win 48% popular (lost popular) and 50.4% electoral; R 22 D 14
- Bush (D) win 51% popular and 53% electoral; R23 D14
- In 8 years, the Republicans will thank us for the beating they are about to receive. Well, some of them will. Some folks you just can't reach.