Myth busted or Kerry not Not-Bush enough?
There is this common knowledge that high voter turnout is good for Democrats. That wasn’t the case this time:
Driven by an intense race for the presidency, a greater percentage of Americans voted Tuesday than at any time in more than three decades.
About 120 million people cast ballots, or just under 60 percent of eligible voters — the highest percentage turnout since 1968, said Curtis Gans, director of the nonpartisan Committee for the Study of the American Electorate. He expected more detailed figures later Wednesday.
It has not been officially called for Bush, but it may as well be. I personally find that surprising as I would think high turn out (i.e., getting the youth vote) would have been good for the Democrats. Also, six states reported record turnout: Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, South Carolina, Tennessee and Virginia. Wait, those are southern states.
The Dems lost this on their own. Kerry was not the best candidate. Period. It has been said that Not-Bush would beat Bush, and that is probably true. I guess Kerry wasn’t Not-Bush enough.
November 3rd, 2004 at 1:12 pm
I just can’t see how the Democrats ever expected Kerry to do anything for them except maybe luring a few of the Naderites back into the fold – while persuading about 100 times as many who would prefer a real conservative or libertarian to hold their noses and vote for Bush anyhow, because Kerry is so much worse, and “none of the above” isn’t on the ballot.
But at least Kerry has moments of contact with reality – like conceding instead of making a bigger fool of himself with lawsuits over every ballot in Ohio. (And I doubt that winning on every single dubious ballot would have put him over the top.) I recently saw an on-line quiz that asked you to distinguish statements by Al Gore from statements by the Unabomber – and except for a couple that I actually remembered, it was just random choice…
November 3rd, 2004 at 1:20 pm
The issue that turned the election was gay marriage. In several battleground states, there were anti-gay-marriage referenda on the ballot. In those states, this drove up voter turnout among the anti-gay-bigot demographic which, conveniently, is most likely to support Bush.
I do wonder: has an incumbent with a lower approval rating ever won re-election? Or is this a first?
November 3rd, 2004 at 1:48 pm
Tom: Bush’s job approval ratings weren’t as bad (based on historical measures) as most people believed. This is from Mark Mellman, Kerry’s chief pollster:
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Bush’s approval ratings are also indicative of the difficulties Kerry faces. It is certainly true that the average incumbent who has been reelected has had a much higher job approval rating — 62 percent. Bush’s approval rating is now about 49 percent. Yet the last time an incumbent was beaten — Bush’s father — just 33 percent approved of his performance. When Carter was defeated, he had an approval rating of only 37 percent. On average, incumbents who have been defeated have only had a 38 percent job rating. Bush is 10 points higher than that.
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He also notes that Bush’s economy numbers were decent. The whole thing is worth reading. In that same article Mellman predicts Bush would get 51.6% of the two-party popular vote. CNN’s reporting 51% of the total for all parties, so he was pretty dead-on.
November 3rd, 2004 at 4:30 pm
This will be the last time you hear the media say this is the most importan eleciton in our lifetime, because it might actucally cause people to vote, and we all know what happens whey that happens.
the dems lose