Obama, Romney campaign officials dissect 2012 election at Dole Institute
![Barack Obama (left) and Mitt Romney are pictured in this composite. | AP Photos Barack Obama (left) and Mitt Romney are pictured in this composite. | AP Photos](https://webarchive.library.unt.edu/web/20131216214126im_/http://images.politico.com/global/2012/12/08/121208_obama_romney_ap_605.jpg)
LAWRENCE, Kan. — The Republican base saw the president as weak and beatable, but Mitt Romney’s high command struggled to find a winning message.
“The bottom line is that the Obama campaign [had] a candidate that was very hard to lay a glove on because he was somebody that the American people, by and large, had decided that they just liked,” said Romney’s deputy campaign manager Katie Packer Gage.
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This conclusion, and many others, came during a conference sponsored by the Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics at the University of Kansas on Thursday and Friday, which included senior officials from both campaigns.
“It was one of the most frustrating things in our campaign,” Gage added. “In focus group after focus group, when you would sit down with this sort of narrow slice of voters — undecided female voters who had voted for Barack Obama in 2008 — they weren’t ready to vote for Barack Obama yet, but when we would test message point after message point after message point, there was almost nothing that would stick to this guy because they just liked him personally.”
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The Obama campaign representatives, meanwhile, believed they would lose the election if it was a referendum on the president. His team felt they needed to launch an expensive ad campaign attacking Romney immediately after he wrapped up the GOP nomination because the president was already a known commodity.
“We knew we had to make it a choice,” said Jeremy Bird, national field director for the Obama campaign.
(Also on POLITICO: Obama outspent Romney in last days)
Romney national political director Rich Beeson marveled at the customization of the Obama campaign. They tailored advertisements in key media markets to key constituencies, sometimes airing nine different spots on one day.
“We were going after it with a meat cleaver, and they were going after it with a scalpel,” he said.
Here are some other takeaways from the conference:
The Obama campaign believed they needed to add more voters to the rolls.
That required beefing up a massive, costly field operation in 2011. “We had time, and that was very beneficial to us,” said Marlon Marshall, the Obama campaign’s deputy national field director. “We were able to figure out early on in a state like Florida we have to change the electorate in order to be successful. We spent a year, almost a year-and-a-half, registering voters … in order to keep Florida on the map.”
Readers' Comments (66)
He was behind a podium and in a suit when he made the 47% comment
That comment (thanks Rush) and the superior Obama campaign did Romney in
This article is 99 percent BS. It is an perfect example of deliberate obsfuscation. O'Bama won, first of all, because of nation-wide voter fraud. Regardless of what Romney had done, he'd have had a hard time overcoming the fraud which occurred in Pennsylvania, Ohio, Florida, Nevada, and Colorado.
Romney couldn't put together a more effective message because Romney was scared sh99less of being called a racist. While the O'Bama campaign was calling Romney everything except a "White Man," Romney was spooning out his message while wearing a spotless apron and white gloves. Romney, for all the world, acted like a man scared to death he was about to spill his soup down the front of his shirt.
So Romney's primary message was (1) "I'm a decent man," and (2) "I'm more than qualifed for the office."
In the end, Romney's message just wasn't compelling enough to turn out nearly enough voters to overcome the fraud the Obamaites had already programmed into the polling systems of the 5 swing states I've name above in the lst paragraph.
There is much truth here but when it comes down to it, the election came down to trust. Also, right after the election, there were many pundits and analysts talking about about segments of the electorate that won or lost the election based on their race, gender socil status and gender. At that time, I wrote down my feelings as to why I thought the President was re-elected. They are all not exactly germaine to this article but, I think they are still relevent. They are as follows:
It’s post election, the President has been given another four years to finish the job he started to help the country recover from the great recession and embarq on setting the tone for the near and farther reaching future of America. I have been amazed at the pundits, journalists, Analysts, and politicians have in large part been expounding on the cause of Romneys defeat. I read that it’s due to the President getting the Hispanic, Afro-American, Union Members and Womens vote. How the President did “this and that” and that Romney “did not”. That Romney failed to connect with, cater to, identify with, and had contrasting policies with the growing populist vote of these “minorities”. I’ve read all the statistical evidence supporting this premise. Much of their analysis was logical and true, as far as it went. It is hard to argue with those statistics….However, I think they have missed the point. I believe that the President was re-elected because he put the good of the country first. His approach has been to make economic recovery for the working and middle class his priority. It is logical that the more people have jobs, the more taxes are raised and since those people have more money to spend. Demand for product/services will increase. The self stated Political oppositions approach, was to make the President a “one term president”. Despite their four year opposition to just about everything that the President wanted or proposed, with the support of fellow Democrats, the President were able to accomplish much toward the recovery and likely avoid another great depression. The thought occurred to me that this Republican strategy has been a badly misguided and a clearly unpatriotic approach. I would have thought their first priority would have been to help restore the economy and help create jobs. But no, they put themselves before the good of the people and country. For this betrayal to America, I believe the working and “regular” people (The masses) saw through their folly and recognized that the President was doing the right things, in the right way to help the country recover; and re-elect him..
Were Afro Americans, Hispanics, Union Members and Women feeling disenfranchised? I would reply a resounding YES to that question. Did they vote for the President in greater numbers than “other” Americans? YES they did! The point that the analyst, pundits, journalists and politicians missed is that the people who voted for President Obama are the common sense, clear thinking, understanding, empathetic AMERICAN MIDDLE AND WORKING PEOPLE. They recognized that the President is trying to protect the entire country….the wealthy, the poor and everyone in between. They recognized that we “are all in the same boat and that we will sink or swim TOGETHER. They recognize that while the President is not always correct, and that they do not always agree with everything he said, they trusted him. However, they also recognize that compromise is required if we are to return the country to it’s previous economic greatness.
This election was not as many suggested the result of racial , ethnic or gender bias. In truth, the election reflected an awareness or sense of economic fairness. It was the result of more American people believing that the Presidents policies and plans for the future were based in the “trickle up” approach. Providing opportunity for education, jobs, innovation, entrepreneurial endeavors, health care etc. is at least as important for working and middle class people as it is for those who have already achieved status and wealth. Fairness counted in their perspective as to how we would be successful…FAIRNESS should never be underrated.
@3. Well, liberal old guy, you are as logically consistent as the rest of the Obamoronian herd with which you graze.
I've pulled a few chestnuts out of that crucible of a mind of yours:
(1) "Despite their four year opposition to just about everything that the President wanted or proposed, with the support of fellow Democrats, the President were able to accomplish much toward the recovery and likely avoid another great depression."
(2) "Were Afro Americans, Hispanics, Union Members and Women feeling disenfranchised? I would reply a resounding YES to that question. Did they vote for the President in greater numbers than “other” Americans? YES they did! "
(3) The point that the analyst, pundits, journalists and politicians missed is that the people who voted for President Obama are the common sense, clear thinking, understanding, empathetic AMERICAN MIDDLE AND WORKING PEOPLE. They recognized that the President is trying to protect the entire country….the wealthy, the poor and everyone in between.
(4) They recognized that we “are all in the same boat and that we will sink or swim TOGETHER. They recognize that while the President is not always correct, and that they do not always agree with everything he said, they trusted him. However, they also recognize that compromise is required if we are to return the country to it’s previous economic greatness.
Okay, now LOG, let's look closely at what you've written. First of all, if (1) were correct, then (2) does not logically follow. For why would blacks, Mexican, women, and union members feel so disenfranchised if O'Bama had, indeed, recovered the economy?
(3) is ridiculous. How can you possibly think that O'Bama is looking out for the best interests of everybody, including the wealthy. O'Bama has engaged in class warfare since he first went after the WH in 2007. O'Bama has constantly vilified the "rich" (everyone with an income of 200K or better). O'Bama has constantly hammered the "rich" for refusing to pay their "fair share." Yet, you LOG, write that this man, O'Bama, is trying to do the best for everyone? You must be deaf.
Finally, LOG, let's look at the last sentence in (4): "However, they also recognize that compromise is required ....." Compromise with whom, LOG? O'Bama is not about any part of compromise. Just look at how O'Bama is compromising with the Repubs over this "fiscal cliff" business. It takes two to compromise, LOG. O'Bama plays a zero-sum game.
Personally, I can only conclude that people like you, LOG, are either beguiled or just as evil as O'Bama. And, by the way, your remarks about Republicans being "unpatriotic" and "betraying America" are crap--did you get that sh99 from the central committee? Give my regards to Gus Hall the next time you put flowers on his grave there in Chicago.
Can you provide some reporting on this widespread fraud.
I'm sure FoxNews would have done multiple stories on it
If the Republicans and especially the author of this article still can't figure out why they lost, they deserve to be fed to the lions for sheer stupidity. Two days before the election, this same author was talking about Mitt's momentum, swing states are within Romney's reach, blah, blah...
A word of advice. If you want to write about politics in a way that does not make you look and sound like a know-nothing partisan hack, you must never insert your head into a hole in the ground. And for the love of God, turn off Fox News at least one month before the election to allow the neurons to start firing again.
You're welcome.
Hey Unamerican Dave....you keep telling yourself that. Does it make you feel better. The Obama campaign was superior to the Romney campaign and the President won because the majority of the electorate felt that he cared about everyone, not just the 1%. Get over yourself and deal with it. Enjoy the next four years and beyond.
Pretty bitter unamerican Dave.
The election came out precisely the way the aggregate polling indicated it was going. There is no way to successfully sync these two independent measures of the electorate.
You'd have to be stupid to think otherwise.
Democrats enjoy the advantage of representing a broader coalition of Americans, a bigger tent.
Hillary could hold that coalition together.
BTW, AmericanDave... Obama doesn't just win with 'disenfranchised' voters - college-educated and Asians also went his way... Asian minorities by an amazing margin.
Maybe Obama really won. Maybe you're just an angry bigot grasping at any lifeline Fox News and the conservative blogosphere will throw to your self-image. Maybe voter fraud, gifts, and skewed polls aren't the reason Republicans failed to get 50% of American voters in five of the last six presidential elections.
Maybe you're just wrong.
Dave, have you heard the report that Anonymous, the hacking group, claimed they interfered with "Rove's servers"?
Anonymous claimed Republicans interfered with the Ohio vote count four years ago, and wanted to again. (Not that Ohio counted in the end.)
I'd love to hear more about either conspiracy.
I will make this simple so even the right wingers can follow it:
GOP policies suck. They are bad for America - you have all the low information voters - you will never get the educated voters with your appeal to hate, servicing the rich and attacking the middle class.
It has NOTHING to do with running a successful campaign.
FOR REPUBLICANS, Maureen Dowd's Op-Ed. in the New York of December 7-9, 2012 should be a must read before any other Republican self-serving analysis. In fact, I recommend it to every one who cares to know what is really happening with the GOP in today's American political experience.
FOR REPUBLICANS, Maureen Dowd's Op-Ed. in the New York of December 7-9, 2012 should be a must read before any other Republican self-serving analysis. In fact, I recommend it to every one who cares to know what is really happening with the GOP in today's American political experience.
Wow.
Brilliant and spot-on. LINK HERE.
Enjoyable read.
The nut graph: "The Mayans were right, as it turns out, when they predicted the world would end in 2012. It was just a select world: the G.O.P. universe of arrogant, uptight, entitled, bossy, retrogressive white guys."
Earth to dude. Check back in at your earliest convenience. Voter fraud doesn't exist statistically. Mishandled ballots account for anywhere between 100 and 1000 times more incorrectly administered votes. You do realize that since 2000 there have been something like TEN voter fraud prosecutions NATIONWIDE, out of hundreds of millions of votes cast. Last I heard there was not a single conviction. In any given PRECINCT there are likely more than 10 mishandled ballots.
Hey it's over and barry won and so can the subject just go away?
Translation....................
Obama team smart
Romney team dumb
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