Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
After campaign losses, there's a rush to assign blame for what happened. The smart people are the ones who rush into the debate ready with a persuasive case that their pet issue or identity group is the key to understanding the result.
The most hilarious version of this yesterday was when people tried to assign blame to the social conservatives -- the group that had largely been kept quiet by the Romney campaign in favor of campaign manager Stuart Stevens' belief that the "economy" message would win a presidency. If you're going after social cons on a year like this, you are probably just showing your bias against social cons -- not that libertarians aren't great at winning elections and therefore the most sought after in the land for election advice.
(Here's a chart showing, by the way, how conservative positions on social issues outperformed Romney.)
Anyway, while the mainstream media continued to push its meme regarding the "war on women" as a reason for the loss, other groups identified Romney's poor performance among Hispanics. And it really was absolutely dismal.
But let's be careful that we don't hang on our pet issues at the expense of having a broader view of the problem. Just by way of example, Richard Starr at the Weekly Standard was perusing the New York Times exit poll data and noticed that Obama took 62% of the non-married vote. He writes (on Twitter):
I see that "unmarrieds" now 40 percent of voters, up from 34 percent in 2008. Obama's share was +27
"Unmarrieds" as a group are four times the size of Hispanics and growing faster. Why are latter getting four times the attention?
Seems like a bigger problem for GOP, unless marriage rates suddenly reverse.
Unmarried people tend to be younger, less religious and more sexually libertine than others.
Sexual libertinism is a major American cultural value. Americans are willing to do anything to retain it, including subsidize the wreckage (single motherhood, absentee fathers, child delinquency, poverty, literacy problems, etc.) in exchange for the right to have sex whenever and with whomever we want.
How do conservatives reach out to this group, which is growing and will undoubtedly grow all the more as the institution of marriage is further eroded among the poor and middle class?
Picture of young sportswoman via Shutterstock.
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Comments:
Jul '12
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
Don't forget the cultural sacrament of Abortion on the list of things being subsidized by our government to further the aims and goals of the "unmarried".
Mar '12
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
Excellent post.
Jul '12
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
And to add one more thing....
Conservatives who like to mock the social cons need to look in the mirror and wonder if they might have a point about the destruction of the family. Especially it being tied in directly with our broken economy and a necessary focus on the re-establishment of the two-parent home being a prerequisite for smaller government.
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
You have put your finger on the key problem, Mollie -- and no one has an answer. The sexual revolution is the most important legacy of the 1960s, and it is the chief cause of the growth in the administrative entitlements state. In 2011, 40% of children were born out of wedlock. If we do not find a way to address this question, it will sink us.
Jan '11
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
Mollie Hemingway, Ed.:
(Here's a chart showing, by the way, how conservative positions on social issues outperformed Romney.)
Interesting.
I wonder if social issues are more successful when presented a la carte as in these initiatives than when embodied as a whole in a politician; i.e., people might be more comfortable voting for individual socially-conservative positions (gay marriage, abortion, etc) than having to elect someone who will push for the whole package.
Dec '10
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
We have to boldly challenge the assumptions of the unmarried crowd. If I were a national figure I would proclaim the value of marriage and family in the middle of a speech (similarly to Cosby's challenges to the black community). It's something the young rarely hear. I would ask , do you want to be single and childless in your 40s? Government programs are there, but they lack compassion and personal connection. It's horrible to have single childless women walking around who never hear, "what you are doing is stupid!" Everyone is so polite, even to the extreme detriment of their friends and family. After we dealt with infertility I flat out tell everyone who is young and married that they should stop going to bars and taking expensive vacations and start having kids. I hold nothing back. No one warned us about waiting and we almost missed out on children. Marriage is the same way. Why don't we start telling people the truth? When we take our baby out every young woman goes goo-goo over him, but quickly all the adults in their lives say, "but you should wait." What the hell for?
Jun '12
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
Mollie, you are right. We are all in a state of anguish now. We have to lash out, but give it a week or too, we should be more rational. As for single women, it is a hard target. Personally, I took my time to have a family till almost too late. I never knew it was that hard to have children after a certain age. The women vote is much similar to the young vote. I see them as different from the Latino vote (which is inexcusable that we lost them in a time Obama has failed them). The women & young vote is a result of the Liberal Media creating this image of delusional empowerment in Sexual promiscuity and overrated hedonism. We can take them on because they are false and they breed nothing but misery. We need to be organized though, we have no counter force as large as the liberal media. This group see us conservative women as button-up submissive stepford wives. The only way to get to them quick is through Art. We need more Atlas Shrugged, more classical liberal arts, songs, children's books. Create in the name of true Freedom.
Edited on November 8, 2012 at 4:07pmSep '10
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
Neither did Teddy Roosevelt or Mahatma Ghandi, though they tried to warn us.
May '10
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
There is no way to address this question. The Majority of Americans do not want to be responsible. I don't see any way out. People no longer need kids. People are selfish. People are base. People are mean.
Jun '12
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
We also need money to promote our ideas and values. Someone needs to step up and offer a strong leadership to bring all these rich conservatives together with a single aim of targeting the Liberal Media. Enough is enough. In this anti-entrepreneurial times, we can harness a lot of support. I think Mitt Romney and Sarah Palin should get together and make this their mission. Kill the Liberal Media, they are the cancer of our times.
Jul '12
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
Hear! Hear!
Jul '12
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
First time poster here! I agree with Stephen but we need to boldly challenge other assumptions espoused in the culture and mainstream media also. Abortion for example. How many times during this election did you hear anyone try to explain Obama's extreme views on that topic? Was there any discussion about his votes in Illinois on the born alive act? No, too gruesome and ugly, it's not polite to talk about in the mainstream media. How many who are pro-choice and get their news from CBS et al. realize that their hero president ever took such a stand? You don't have to be pro-life to find such an act abhorrent. But spokespeople on the right won't bring up such topics in the mainstream where the Obama voter lives. Voters need to be treated as adults and hear the ugly truths whether they like it or not and not just on talk radio and ricochet. The mainstream media can be used to get the message out if we challenge their premises and speak the unvarnished truth, but in love.
May '10
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
Jay Posts this on NRO:
Really? Way I see it, there is nothing I can to to take back the movies, books and other media. I cannot control the schools. I cannot do anything more than desperately spend all my energy working to support my family and try to protect them from the evil culture.
What, other than turn inward, am I supposed to do? Voting and giving money to the GOP does nothing. We are doomed to slide into a poor nation, in a world dominated by India and China. All because most Americans are children, not adults.
Dec '10
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
The question isn't how do we reach out but why should we? Sexual libertinism is the antithesis of conservatism, and not just social conservatism.
Every leg of the stool is sawed off by this one issue. No, we should not reach out to this culture and be sucked into it. We've done that enough already.
Aug '10
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
Does what you get out of gazing at your navel depend on whether you've got an innie or an outie?
Jan '11
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
On the Editor's "Jack Kemp" podcast, a friend was mentioned who was thoroughly conservative in ideas, but chose to vote for Obama because "he cares about people like me."
I don't know the friend, but my immediate reaction was to say: grow up! The idea that government is supposed to care for you is infantile. Have individuals lost so much self-respect that they need constant "affirmation," even from government?
For instance, government regulates traffic flow.
If that's really how a significant chunk of the public behaves and reacts, then such infantile, childish, and basic unseriousness will be manipulated viciously.
When the bill comes due, hand it to such children. They voted for it. Let them pay for it.
Feb '11
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
It does depend: innie's get lint and outie's get poked in the eye.
Feb '11
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
The King Prawn: The question isn't how do we reach out but why should we? Sexual libertinism is the antithesis of conservatism, and not just social conservatism.
Every leg of the stool is sawed off by this one issue. No, we should not reach out to this culture and be sucked into it. We've done that enough already. · 20 minutes ago
Agreed, reaching out to this culture is not the way to go. We need to throw them a lifeline and convince them that they're in enough trouble that they actually need it.
Sep '12
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
This sounds like more of a doomsday prediction than anything else. There are people who are willing to work a little harder and CHOOSE to sacrifice and take responsibility because of the rewards.
What the culture has allowed is people to opt out of this life, and we're finding that a supermajority seem to be programed to opt out when there is no societal pressure placed on them; they are practically encouraged. We're not allowed to judge people based on their choices and so people are becoming naturally selfish.
So those of us who are happy to reap the rewards of the more challenging life by getting married, having kids, and caring for them the best we can, are going to subsidize those who opt-out both directly through our taxes and by all we spend on raising new taxpayers.
And we're not allowed to resent those who leach off of us.
Edited on November 8, 2012 at 4:47pmJul '11
Re: Let's Make Sure We're Gazing At The Right Part Of The Navel
We run out of money and quit subsidizing them.