Lessons Learned
This was a year where Murphy’s Law went against the Republican party nationwide. Whatever could go wrong, went wrong. With a financial meltdown occurring a month before the general election, Ronald Reagan would have had a tough time winning. That being said, the Republican party has to take the proverbial “time out” and engage in some introspection. For the GOP’s long term survival, it has to recognize mistakes made and capitalize on opportunities staring it in the face.
Part 1:
I. The GOP has to repave the inroads Bush made into the Hispanic Constituency in 2000 and 2004.
A careful read of an article written by Clint Bolick for the Hoover Institute in 2007 will lead one to conclude it was eerily prophetic. In that article he begged the question: “Should Republicans court Hispanic voters? Only if they want to survive.” What he predicted came to roost in 2008. (Listen to Latinos http://www.hoover.org/publications/digest/10678346.html).
Ken Mehlman made a similar pitch in 2007, noting that Republican candidates that followed George Bush’s lead in reaching out to Hispanics fared well. He noted “Smart Republicans who have listened to, and offered solutions to, concerns of Hispanic-Americans have done even better: Sixty percent for former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, 44 percent for former New York Gov. George E. Pataki and 46 percent for former Colorado Gov. Bill Owens in 2002. Even in the tough year of 2006, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger collected 40 percent of the Hispanic vote, while Florida Gov. Charlie Crist pulled in 49 percent and Arizona Sen. John Kyl won 41 percent.”. http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0507/3777.html
What actually occurred since 2004, was a rapid erosion of the Republican brand amongst the Hispanic constituency due in large part to the debate over immigration. What GOP leaders do not realize is that in November 2008, Hispanics knew a lot more about Jim Sensenbrenner and Tom Tancredo than they did about John McCain. While not always the lead topic on ABC, CBS, FOX, and NBC, it was on Univision that has a far larger audience. Republicans further hurt their image when all GOP candidates balked at appearing at a Univision sponsored primary debate. Univision had to cancel the event. In contrast, all Democratic candidates except for one appeared as scheduled. Adam J. Segal, who heads the Hispanic Voter Project at Johns Hopkins University, commented on the absence of outreach by stating “"This [political environment] gives Democrats a huge advantage …they are likely to draw far more Hispanic votes than in 2004 and would gain at least a half-million vote advantage.." . http://edition.cnn.com/2007/US/09/28/hispanic.vote/
Segal’s estimates were far below the reality of November 2008. The nonpartisan National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials estimates that between 9.6 million and 11 million Hispanics voted in the election, compared to a U.S. Census estimate of 7.6 million in 2004. Latinos comprised 9 percent of all voters this year, compared to 7 percent in 2004, according to Associated Press exit polls. This surge of voters was nowhere more pronounced than in key battleground states. In Florida, where President Bush won 56 percent of the Latino vote in 2004, Obama earned 57 percent of the Hispanic vote to McCain's 42 percent. Obama won three-fourths of Latino votes in Nevada, and nearly 7 in 10 favored him in New Mexico, where he would have lost without them.In Colorado, Hispanics supported Obama at nearly the same rate as Democrat John Kerry in 2004 - about 6 in 10 - but they made up 13 percent of the electorate this year, compared to an estimated 8 percent four years ago. http://www.thenewstribune.com/tacoma/24hour/politics/story/533338.html In 2006, Hispanic represented 1.6% of the voting eligible population in Ohio, a state Obama carried by slightly more than 205,000 votes.
A recent article posted on the NDN blog (successor organization to the New Democratic Network) should provide fair warning to all current Republican elected officials and the future of the GOP wherein it states “If These Trends Continue, the National Map Will Continue to Get Harder for Republicans – Of the eight states which flipped from Bush 2004 to Obama 2008, four were heavily Latino states. Just as Pete Wilson’s taking on Hispanics in the 1990s contributed to the transformation of California, home of Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan, from a swing to the bluest of blue states, the demonization of Hispanics by the national GOP is turning very critical battleground states much more blue. ……What should be most ominous to the GOP is what happened in these 4 states heavily contested by the Democrats. In this election, the center-left coalition went after the Hispanic vote as never before. It dramatically increased turnout in the southwestern states, and saw an historic shift of the enormous Florida Hispanic vote from Republican to Democrat. Similar investments in future years in states like Arizona and Texas could very well make these states – home to George W. Bush and John McCain – as blue as New Mexico and Colorado are today. http://ndnblog.org/node/3209
II. Hispanics Are Not the Only Group the GOP Should Be Targeting
Asians are the second fastest growing minority behind Hispanics. And while they may not at first glance be seen as a political titan, all one has to do is look back at the 2006 Senate race in Virginia, when they helped Democrat James Webb defeat incumbent rising GOP star George Allen by .3% of the vote. http://www.aaldef.org/docs/AALDEF2006ExitPollReportMay2007.pdf
Obama won Virginia by slightly over 232,000 votes. Asian voters account for over 160,000 votes in Virginia. In California, Asians make up over 12% of the total vote. Yet once again the GOP dropped the ball by snubbing another constituency. As reported by A Korean member of the Republican Party said, “We have never asked anything of the party, and we do not even have an Asian-American aide.” He expressed his worry over the lack of any real connection between the McCain camp and the Korean-American community. On the Democratic side, Obama recently appointed a Korean aide in charge of public relations. http://www.indypressny.org/article.php3?ArticleID=4187
The Republicans also snubbed the Asian community when failing to recognize, or deliberately ignoring, a new organization known as the 80-20 Initiative. During the Democratic primaries, Hillary was the only one to woo the Asian vote and extend an outreach to 80-20. She won Democratic primaries within the Asian constituency by an almost equal ratio. During the general election, Obama extended the same olive branch and likely pulled in equivalent vote ratios. http://www.80-20initiative.net/
The key issue amongst Asian Americans seem to parallel those of Hispanic Americans. the issues most important to the Asian American community are immigration, family reunification, and language barriers that affect access to things like social services and capital for small businesses. While most discussions on immigration hinge around debates over the Mexican border, deportation of immigrants who have been living in the U.S. -- sometimes for nearly their entire lives -- also splits Asian American families. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/natasha-chen/the-asian-american-minori_b_103190.html
III. Unless the Grand Old Party expands its base, it will go the way of the dinosaurs. As pointed out by Ken Mehlman, “Hispanic-Americans tend to be conservative. Last year, pollster David Winston asked registered voters to rate themselves on a 1 to 9 scale from very liberal to very conservative. He found that, overall, the country was center-right and Hispanic-Americans viewed themselves slightly to the right of the country as a whole.
Hispanic outreach is not only natural for the GOP, it is crucial. The Hispanic community is the fastest growing segment of our country, and it is huge. Univision is the channel where more Americans get their evening news than any other. In Nebraska, one out of every eight people under 35 is Hispanic.” http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0507/3777.html
The GOP’s targeted base is dwindling fast while the fastest growing bases escape their grasps. As noted by Mike Thomas of the Orlando Sentinel, the future of the GOP depends on recruitment of the Hispanic (and I argue, the Asian) voters. http://www.orlandosentinel.com/orl-miket0608nov06,0,6631332.column
IV. There is a Silver Lining in the Clouds
Contrary to what the NDN pundits may portray as a running freight train that will surge through the South and Western states, turning each from Red to Blue, I do not see this as an inevitable outcome.
1. The vast majority of the constituencies they relied on to turn Colorado, Florida, Nevada, New Mexico, and Virginia Blue, were constituencies that overwhelmingly supported Hillary Clinton in the Democratic primaries. They were not buying Barry’s message. http://www.usaelectionpolls.com/2008/exit-polls/race-ethnicity.html
2. In 1979, President Ronald Reagan said, "Hispanics are Republicans, they just don't know it yet." Yet, while I see every “conservative” Republican hearkening back to Ronald Reagan in self-comparison (BTW, no offense, that was a generation ago), they are often the same scribes that descend on the line of NO AMNESTY, something that Ronald Reagan had the common sense to champion. Where the Republicans fail, is following up on Reagan’s attempt to make Hispanics come to a realization that by ideology they ARE Republicans/Conservatives. Coming from an urban area with a sizeable Hispanic population and voting bloc (Chicago), I can tell you that the vast majority of Hispanics do not connect Reagan with amnesty, the vehicle that allowed them to pursue and live the American dream. This is not a fault of their own, but ours. We as GOP need to insure we educate voters, one by one if we have to, if we are to survive as a party. This is particularly true today when it seems all media operates on an agenda other than reporting truth in a fair and impartial manner. Asian constituencies would likely identify more with GOP ideology as they are not only highly entrepreneurial, but also highly self-disciplined, upwardly mobile, and seek the American dream without government assistance or interference. In fact, most escape societies that are Communist, Socialist, or invaded by radical Muslims.
3. The 2008 general election might have provided us some harsh lessons, but it also provides us some new opportunities to forge alliances on some issues of mutual benefit and comparative ideology. The Roman Catholic Church launched one of the most aggressive campaigns on the Right To Life issue than I have noticed in all of my adult life. http://www.usccb.org/faithfulcitizenship/FCStatement.pdf CatholicVote.Com also launched some of the most compelling media prior to the 2008 general election in both English and Spanish. http://www.catholicvote.com/
These faith based initiatives should be viewed as a new opportunity to forge an alliance to keep the campaign(s) alive beyond the campaign.
4. The grumbling has already started. While listening to a Spanish language radio station over the weekend, the commentators already started criticizing Obama. The gist of the criticism was that in the early days after his election, he never once mentioned immigration as an issue high on his immediate agenda (although the Guantanamo detainees were). This is likely a sentiment felt throughout Hispanic and Asian constituencies that are particularly focused on this issue. What this means for the GOP is that it has to be the party that takes the lead and offer a solution. Whatever the ultimate stance might be, get it out of the way early. Just bring in key players into the dialogue (i.e. business, faith-based institutions, ethnic community leaders, etc). The GOP’s failure to do so since 2004 has had obvious repercussions in 2006 and 2008. Leave it on the backburner and it will haunt our chances of regaining lost ground in 2010 and 2012. Perhaps even far beyond that.
5. Seek to connect with those constituencies that feel they have been ignored or taken for granted. There are pockets in many precincts, townships, counties, and congressional districts. The methods of doing so are FAR easier than one might think or forsee (contact me for further discussion on that subject as I prefer not to disseminate it here). These are the same pockets that have been identified and picked off by the Democrats as they turn Red sates Blue.
In summation, this is not meant to be a criticism of the GOP. As I stated in the start, given all that went against the party this election cycle, we fared far better than I might have expected. At the same time, it is hard to ignore how easily we lost North Carolina and Virginia on short out routes while attempting to play a prevent defense guarding Colorado, Florida, Nevada, and New Mexico to an unknown and unvetted commodity. It is hard to ignore that we did not learn from the lessons of 2006, wherein we began to have state assemblymen and senators, state and county secretarys/clerks (those that control the voting process), congressmen, governors, and senators picked off by Democratic snipers.
