Everyone is conducting a postmortem on the 2022 mid-terms, so why shouldn’t I? The “Red Wave” that we had already taken to the bank bounced due to insufficient funds, but we Republicans can learn some lessons from Nov. 8.
Pennsylvania turned out to be another train wreck for Republicans. I never thought Doug Mastriano had a chance of beating Democrat Josh Shapiro, and Mastriano started out as a long-shot, then compounded his long odds with a campaign that would have been an embarrassment to anyone running for prom king or queen. Mastriano lost big, and likely pulled down the rest of the GOP ticket with him.
As for Dr. Mehmet Oz, he had a chance, but the good doctor’s ambivalence about the issues never inspired any real hardcore support, and he ended up being embarrassed by probably the most beatable Democrat in America, John Fetterman.
Republicans need to learn from Democrats. It was said that Republicans are old school and campaign to get votes, but the Democrats have mastered the art of getting the most ballots.
Now, that isn’t saying that the Dems are cheating, but they use the system to make sure that their voters get their ballots in and counted, while Republicans seem to think that the down and dirty grassroots ballot mining is below them.
A good example is the use of mail-in ballots. I didn’t run the numbers this time, but in 2020, Franklin County mail-in ballots were about 2-1 Democrat, and in some states, those ballots are counted late, leading to lead changes late in the evening or after Election Day.
Too many Republicans eschew mail-in ballots, insisting on waiting until Election Day to vote in person, which is fine as long as you can make it to the polls, but suppose you can’t? It happens a lot. Too many potential GOP voters are all over social media telling people to vote in person and implying their mail-in ballot won’t get counted.
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It’s total nonsense, of course, and Republicans need to embrace mail-in voting and canvass each area to make sure every single Republican vote is cast. After all, it was Republicans who gave us mail-in voting here, so what’s the problem?
We Republicans also need a coherent message and need to get it out. Much of the corporate media establishment and much social media is left-leaning, so we need to go around them.
If you want a fair picture of which way the various media lean, I recommend www.Allsides.com for a totally fair and nonpartisan assessment of the bias, left or right, of media companies and “fact-checkers.” That will help educate voters on what and who to believe on election issues. It isn’t sufficient to say “the other side is bad,” because many voters, especially independents, (who Republicans lost 47% to 45% on Nov. 8) actually want to hear a party’s message before voting for them.
Exit polling, according to the City Journal, published by the conservative-leaning Manhattan Institute, gave a mixed bag of results for both parties. Both parties had nearly identical net-negative ratings of -8 for Republicans and -9 for Democrats, so voters don’t love either of them. Also, 32% cast their votes in opposition to President Joe Biden, but 28% cast their votes in opposition to former President Donald Trump, negating Biden’s low approval ratings.
Republicans turned out more of their voters by 36%-33% over Dems, but lost independents by two points. In states where important Senate races were decided by single digits, it was the independent vote that made the difference. Sen. Ron Johnson is Wisconsin carried independents by two points and won, Oz lost independents by a whopping 20 points and lost. All of the narrow losses by Republicans showed similar results.
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Republicans did get the overall House vote by about 4% nationwide, but will gain only about 10 seats for a slim majority.
Finally, we Republicans need to stop crying about “cheating.” Sure there is always garden-variety cheating here and there in elections and there always has been. But blaming a loss on cheating has the same result as a sports team blaming the refs for a loss. Also, falling back on an excuse like cheating keeps the loser from learning the real lessons from a loss.
The bottom line is that there is a lot to do for Republicans before 2024. We can learn from our poor performance and win, or just make the same mistakes again and lose. It’s up to us.
Dwight Weidman is a resident of Greene Township and is a graduate of Shepherd University. He is retired from the United States Department of Defense, where his career included assignments In Europe, Asia, and Central America. He has been in leadership roles for the Republican Party in two states, most recently serving two terms as Chairman of the Franklin County Republican Party. Involved in web publishing since 1996, he is the publisher of The Franklin County Journal. He has been an Amateur Radio Operator since 1988, getting his first license in Germany, and is a past volunteer with both Navy and Army MARS, Military Auxiliary Radio Service, and is also an NRA-certified firearms instructor.
