THE 2012 ELECTION: A TRIUMPH OF REASON, REALITY & SCIENCE

Republicans mourning the results of the recent presidential election would do well to examine their unwillingness to accept reality, reason, and science.  In the 1850's American political discourse was joined by a nativist group called the "Know Nothings."  The Republican party seems to be the heir to that group's legacy both literally and figuratively. 

The poster child demonstrating my point is Georgia Rep. Paul Broun who announced in a speech on September 27th that evolution, embryology and the Big Bang theory are "lies straight from the pit of hell" meant to convince people that they do not need a savior.  Dr. Broun (the man is a physician, no less) also told listeners he  believes the Earth was created in six days and is about 9,000 years old.  

These views do not make Broun an outlier in the Republican Party.  In fact, many recent Republican candidates for president have expressed doubts about the theory of evolution (among them, Mike Huckabee, Michelle Bachman, Sam Brownback, Tom Tancredo and Rick Perry).  In fact, despite his views (or perhaps because of them) Republicans appointed Broun (a member of the Tea Party caucus) to serve on the House Committee on Science and Technology.   

Another example of the Republican rejection of science concerns climate change.  Scientists knowledgeable in the field overwhelmingly endorse the concept climate change is occurring and change is being accelerated by human action.  But science is not good enough for Republican orthodoxy.   

The "know nothing" wing of the Republican Party similarly continues to believe president Obama was born somewhere other than Hawaii, and holds the rather inconsistent belief president Obama's politics are reflective of the years he spent as a follower of Rev. Jeremiah Wright (a Christian pastor), and yet that he is (simultaneously) a Muslim and an atheist.  He can't be all three.  Donald Trump's post election rant claims the election proves America is no longer a democracy (it has always been a republic, not a true democracy) because Obama was elected despite losing the popular vote (although Obama won the popular vote in addition to the electoral vote). 

Before the election, Fox News political pundits (most notorious among them George Will, Newt Gingrich, and Karl Rove) rejected the cold, statistical, scientific evaluation of  the polls to determine how the election would turn out that was forecast by Nate Silver's 538 blog in favor of predictions based on "gut feeling," "momentum," and years of political experience.  Come the morning after, it turned out the Republican rejection of science concerning political polling was just as crazy as their rejection of other science.  Silver called every single state correctly and "gut feeling" by Republicans was dead wrong. 

But it is not just rejection of science holding Republican's back.  They reject reality too.  Before the election, Republican pundit Dick Morris predicted Romney would win "in a landslide" garnering 325 electoral votes.  In making this prediction, he was rejecting science as did the others noted above.  But where he rejects reality is his comments after the election trying to explain how the election turned out so different than he expected. 

How did Morris characterize what he had just witnessed?  "I've got egg on my face. I predicted a Romney landslide and, instead, we ended up with an Obama squeaker."  The "landslide" Morris predicted was 325 electoral votes for Romney.  Notice how he characterizes an Obama victory with 332 electoral votes (7 more than would have constituted a "landslide" for Romney) as a squeaker?  That is just not understanding the concept of reality. 

Reality hampered the Republicans in the 2012 elections in other ways.  Despite knowing women normally compose about 52% of the votes, Republicans seemed to go out of their way to say and do things to alienate women voters.  Despite knowing Latinos were a crucial, and increasingly large voting block, Republicans did everything they could to alienate Latino voters.  Despite knowing approximately 82% of Roman Catholics reject Catholic doctrine opposing birth control, Republicans attempted to convince them it was an attack on their religion for insurance companies to require coverage for contraception.  

The Romney economic plan was also a bit short on reality.  It offered no explanation how the numbers were supposed to add up.  How could increased defense spending and no tax increases square with deficit reduction?  It couldn't.  It's not complicated math, its arithmetic.  What about the Republican phobia about increasing the top marginal tax rate for fear the richest (the "job creators') would send the economy into a nose dive?  According to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, that is not true.  Raising the top marginal tax rate was also found not to negatively affect job growth.   History confirms it. 

Finally, Republicans ignored reason by abandoning moderate politicians in favor of radical, sometimes lunatic fringe, Tea Party candidates.  This probably allowed Democrats to win elections they may well have otherwise lost.  Which seats am I talking about?  Alan West in Florida.  Richard Mourdock in Indiana.  Todd Aiken in Missouri.  Joe Walsh in Illinois.  Linda McMahon in Connecticut.  Josh Mandel in Ohio.  Sam Wurzelbacher ("Joe the Plumber") also in Ohio,  From the last election cycle, add Sharron Angle and Christine O'Donnell.  Going back 4 years, add Sarah Palin. 

 

If Republicans want to win national elections, they would do well to embrace facts rather than ideology, be more open to women, minorities, and educated individuals and reject the lunatics in their midst.  But instead, it seems they are opting to be even more fervent about everything that brought them to this debacle.  Republicans appear to  believe the problem is their candidates are not pure and "conservative" enough.  This brings to mind the common aphorism often (but probably erroneously) attributed to Albert Einstein.  "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again but expecting different results."  Of course, the scientific method would prevent such a problem.  Too bad the Republicans reject science.