President Obama Re-Elected

The people have voted and President Obama gets another whack at this thing. 24 hours after the election results I was still trying to figure out what the hell happened. The ‘oh oh’ moment for me came at 5:30 pm Pacific Time. The election results were trickling in and they were much closer than they were supposed to be. Commence sinking feeling.

Yes, the economy was in the tank when President Obama first got into office, but at what point does his name and failed policies get attached it? After five years, six, eight, or does he have immunity? With this complete lack of accountability maybe nobody should be surprised that we’re worse off than before he got into office. What will this country and economy look like after another four years? How are we possibly going to start to dig out from the deficit hole that’ll be awaiting us in 2016?

My first reaction after hearing of the reelection was depression. [‘Now what’s going to happen to this country?’] Next came disgust, disgust with the low-information and/or stubborn populace that can do such a thing as reelect President Obama. The next day brought anger. [‘What kind of people am I circulating amongst that would keep this man in office?’] And on the third day brought a want of fight. No, not fisticuffs, no jail yard scrapping for this guy, but a verbal sparring of ideas. Save the name calling and sloganing, the election is over and I accept the results. But I do not accept that the ideas and policies of the other team are better than my own. Their troops are merely more numerous.

Governor Romney’s concession speech was so classy. It would have been great to have that man and his family representing this country. But no, as a country we chose a divisive smothering micromanaging Federal Government to one that would reward self-sufficiency and try to get out of the way to allow people to become productive again.

So, what the hell did happen? Days leading up to the election it seemed that Governor Romney had pulled ahead in many polls. I believe the results were largely affected by two things:

[1] Hurricane Sandy. In the eyes of some voters this catastrophic destruction made President Obama appear presidential, like the guy to keep in office. Regardless of what he actually did to assist after the hurricane’s destruction, the appearance of being there apparently gave some folks a confidence boost in their president.

[2] Negative ads. The little known fact of negative advertising is that they’re not supposed to make you want to vote for one candidate or the other, but they’re intended to make you not want to vote at all. They make you want to skip the voting process entirely and stay home. Governor Romney received 2,000,000 fewer votes than John McCain got in 2008! That’s odd since people seemed excited about the prospect of a President Romney in a way that McCain never inspired. So how can the drop in votes be explained? The negativism. It worked.

Conservative thinking must move forward. No retreat or defeat, too cowardly would that be. We must aspire for victory. ‘How so, Klem,’ you may ask. For me, this grand disappointment makes me want to improve myself. Sure, I consider myself to be pretty swell already, yet I want more.  My plan is to seek knowledge then victory in the field of conversational challenge. This’ll take practice, especially maintaining one’s train of thought once engaged in the heat of ‘battle.’ When an opportunity is presented it must be engaged calmly, politely and patiently. Never angry, agitated, rude, or hurried. Ask questions of the opposing side, let them try to explain their reasoning. Ask follow up questions as their misguided statements unfold. Can they respond without calling names or attempting to demean my point of view? Then counter with the answer, the conservative solution, and await their challenge. Victory will be measured by who loses patience to the other’s calm.

Can minds be changed? Maybe. But surely I do not want to be relegated to listening to someone’s feeble swill without having a reasonable retort. I aspire to visibly and distinctly separate myself from the trough of humanity that voted for four more years. Not separated with anger or sharp words, but with my own productivity, self-reliance, and well-reasoned disagreement. This I will do for myself without the need for governmental validation.

-klem