HOW THE GOP COULD THROW THE 2012 ELECTION
- AUGUST 5, 2011
Notable & Quotable
Jon Decker on how the GOP could throw the 2012 election.
Senator Harry Reid’s reelection race in November 2010 should be instructive to Republican voters. Despite Nevada’s fourteen percent unemployment rate; despite the highest bankruptcy rate in the country; despite the highest home foreclosure rate in the country; Harry Reid won another six years in the U.S. Senate (and by a comfortable 5.6 percent margin). The reason: Sharron Angle. The Tea Party-backed Republican made no effort to reach out to independent voters or disaffected Democrats. Similarly, if the 2012 Republican nominee is someone who is portrayed by the mainstream media as extreme or overly partisan, Team Obama will have won half the battle. Harry Reid beat the odds and won a fifth term in a state battered by a bad economy. He won because he made Angle the issue, not the economy. Should the GOP have such a flawed nominee as their standard-bearer in 2012, President Barack Obama will likely follow that same Reid blueprint to victory.