2016 Postmortem
Related: About this forumKarl Rove Was Feeding the Romneys False Hope on Election Night
ELSPETH REEVE 12:10 PM ET
The Romneys clung to the belief that they could still win Ohio and the White House late into election night, even though exit polls across the country showed they were toast, as public polls had shown the week before. Karl Rove, too, refused to believe Ohio was lost, even after Fox News' own decision desk called the state for President Obama. Whose fault is that? The old story, reported right after the election, was that Rove was relaying the concerns of the Romney campaign on-air that night. But on Thursday, Ann Romney gave her first solo post-election interview to CBS This Morning, and she said it was Rove who'd been calling them that night, reassuring the Romneys they could still win. "About 6 o'clock we started getting a little worried," Romney said. "Exit polls weren't terrific and at about 8 o'clock the panic button was pressed." But a flicker of hope remained, she said, because of a certain Fox pundit.
Romney: Yes.
King: Who was saying that?
Romney: Karl Rove.
King: What'd he say?
Romney: He's like, 'Don't give up, don't give up. We're gonna win Ohio. And, you know, it's gonna turn around.' And things just didn't follow the way we thought it was going to happen."
full article + video:
http://www.theatlanticwire.com/politics/2013/05/ann-romney-karl-rove-election-night/65728/
leftynyc
(26,060 posts)I'm thrilled to know they had their hopes up and then crushed that night. It's what happens when you live a bubble.
CaliforniaPeggy
(149,308 posts)And they already were.
Mr Samuel Hain
(32 posts)CaliforniaPeggy
(149,308 posts)Welcome to DU, Mr Samuel Hain!
Mr Samuel Hain
(32 posts)CaliforniaPeggy
(149,308 posts)My friends call me Peggy or Peg....
Mr Samuel Hain
(32 posts)My full name is Samuel Richard Haynes, but, being a Wiccan, my choice of username was easy! But I've always gone by just Sam: Even my mother didn't call me Samuel, or even Sammy!
Mr Samuel Hain
(32 posts)Patrick Stewart delivers an excellent response to issues of domestic violence. It gets really intense at the 5:44 mark. Perhaps you, as an established member of the DU community, could post this in the V&M forum, after reviewing it, of course.
samsingh
(17,571 posts)and manipulate the vote but came up short. that's how bad Romney really did. with all the cheating he still lost.
MannyGoldstein
(34,589 posts)But something didn't work this time.
Anonymous?
TlalocW
(15,359 posts)For whatever reason - possibly what they were going to do couldn't be convincingly pulled off because of the numbers coming out of Ohio - they didn't pull the trigger, or someone who was supposed to do something got cold feet.
TlalocW
TheDebbieDee
(11,119 posts)someone videoed their voting machine flipping to Romney after selecting Obama. This person posted the video to Youtube.com where it was downloaded several thousand times.
I too, believe the would be election-stealers in Ohio got spooked - or paranoid, and changed their minds about doing the deed......or maybe they were undercover OBAMA supporters!
Liberal_Stalwart71
(20,450 posts)that even if they got away with stealing a good portion of votes, it wasn't enough to overcome the tsunami of Obama enthusiasts.
The Romneys were overly confident on Election Day. When they traveled to PA over the weekend, Queen Ann did cry. She looked defeated. He looked tired.
But something happened to them the day before and the day of: they became cocky as if they knew something was up with the voting. Somehow, someone or a few people (Dick Morris included) convinced that they would win, even though Romney's own internal pollsters had them losing OH by 5 points.
blm
(112,920 posts).
Zen Democrat
(5,901 posts)Yavin4
(35,357 posts)Rosa Luxemburg
(28,627 posts)MADem
(135,425 posts)DonViejo
(60,536 posts)DCBob
(24,689 posts)Apparently that scheme went awry. I dont remember the details but there was discussion of it here on DU back then.
upaloopa
(11,417 posts)Rove was so sure Romney would win Ohio it almost proves he thought he had it stolen.
southernyankeebelle
(11,304 posts)him realized what was going on and made sure he wouldn't steal the election again. Of course Rove would be shocked because in the end he wasn't able to get the fix in.
leftyohiolib
(5,917 posts)closed. tunnels prbably meant ports - rats some kind of remote access terminal
southernyankeebelle
(11,304 posts)group and they did the right thing.
maidensandiego
(64 posts)What's the old song "Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers!" This is what they sounded like during the campaign and the nite they're asses were TAKEN DOWN "Wahhhhh.....Wahhhhh....Wahhhh. Whyyyyyy us... Ol Lord of KOLOB....why us ?! hahahaha Those 2 idiots and their FOOTBALL FRANCHISE [cause they got about 500 people in their Family] got EVERYTHING they deserved.....NOTHING !!!!!!!.
Shrike47
(6,913 posts)Liberal_Stalwart71
(20,450 posts)It wasn't just about Ohio. That is a false narrative that the corproate media continues to feed us. It was never just about Ohio.
First, Obama didn't necessarily need to win Ohio; he had many other scenarios that could've played out that would've helped him win without Ohio.
Second, Romney DID need Ohio to give him a modicum of a chance.
Third and most important: It was NEVER just about Ohio!! Romney needed to win ALL of the competitive states! All of them. That's why the Obama camp told everyone to go to bed by 11:00. Once Romney started losing the competitive states, the election was over. People were freaking out that night because the other states weren't call. But again, once Romney lost PA and then WI and CO, it was over.
I'm so frustrated by this corporate own media and how they continue to push right wing narratives.
Mr. Romney was going to lose. Period! And he was going to lose not only because he couldn't win Ohio, but because he WOULD NOT win PA, CO, VA, WI, and all the rest of the competitive states accept for NC. It didn't matter! He needed to win ALL of them!! ALL!!!
agentS
(1,325 posts)I recall reading on this board or another board just before the election that R-Money needed to 'draw an inside straight' (a poker phrase).
Just winning NC or VA would not have swung voters in OH or WI, and he needed all 4 to stand a chance.
Obama just had too many EVs "in the bank" (Cali and the NW, NY and the NE) and R-Money had too few (Texas, the Plains and the South) EVs in the bank.
I don't know what Rove was smoking, but Romney should have known better as a businessman and former politician.
callous taoboy
(4,582 posts)That night was almost as good as sex.
Response to callous taoboy (Reply #13)
JustAnotherGen This message was self-deleted by its author.
hrmjustin
(71,265 posts)I was reminded why I do not like her.
dmr
(28,321 posts)And to think she had her hair all done up that night, too.
geek tragedy
(68,868 posts)get the red out
(13,459 posts)Rove doesn't care who he figuratively punches in the stomach. LOL. Romney = SUCKER!
thelordofhell
(4,569 posts)deminks
(11,006 posts)Either they decided not to pull it because of all the scrutiny, or they pulled it and nothing happened.
IMHO.
waterwatcher123
(143 posts)Karl Rove was feeding Romney false hope because he had the election fixed. I happened to be on the Ohio Secretary of State's web site when he had his well publicized melt down. Well, the election results web page went down at exactly the same time. I checked the Huff Post and found that Obama's 3% lead vanished (which I assume was linked to the Ohio web site). Later, when Ohio Secretary of State restored the elections web site, the numbers on both their site and the Huff Post reflected the same 3% Obama lead. I was on the Ohio site taking screen shots because this scenario was all too predictable. You would think that some entity trying to fix an election would have figured out that it is easier to "adjust all along", rather than to meddle with the results at the end.
This is a more sophisticated version of what transpired in Ohio in 2004. The Republicans have and will continue to try to win elections the old fashioned way - by theft. Our political leaders and the public simply have no clue how easy it is to hack these machines, to fix the code and to simply alter the results enough to tip the scales in a few select and unsuspecting locations (Democratic leaning areas would be good places). I just hope that we have a benevolent group of hackers that understand to prevent is much easier than to demonstrate fraud after-the-fact (one only needs to look at the 2004 presidential election as an example).
Cha
(295,926 posts)Welcome to DU
Rozlee
(2,529 posts)Interesting observation. And we owe Anon big if they stepped in. Welcome to DU!
TxDemChem
(1,918 posts)Remind me of the expression, "Arrogance can make you stupid." Even in the face of evidence, they all believed he really could win. Horrible people.
Kber
(5,043 posts)That was a good 5 minutes of TeeVee.
Cha
(295,926 posts)on election night?
thanks DonViejo
unblock
(51,974 posts)Cha
(295,926 posts)more attention to Nate Silver and less to fox screws.
So sad.. all those brainwashed foxtruthers thought they had themselves another pretzeldent.
notadmblnd
(23,720 posts)Somebody sure fooled him.
Arkana
(24,347 posts)all the bullshit just like the teabaggers did? I mean, Occam's Razor would suggest that, right? It certainly wouldn't go to "HE'S HAXORED THE ELECTION, HEAD FOR THE LIFEBOATS".
UCmeNdc
(9,589 posts)It is strange how they route the vote Tally out of state.
Jennicut
(25,415 posts)Also, love that it was an interview with Gayle King. She was a local anchor here in Connecticut for years. I always think of her as that then Oprah's best buddy.
The Time is Now
(86 posts)One word:
DEFIANCE!
(For all of you non Scandal fans out there, Defiance is a town - in Ohio! - that was said to be the scene of voting machine vote flipping that put the fictional Republican candidate over the top to win the presidential election.)
davidpdx
(22,000 posts)But remember until proven it is a CT. I'm not saying it isn't possible. It could be that if Romney had flipped some states doing much better than the polling that Rove had a plan to fix Ohio (and maybe Florida) to put Romney over the 270 EVs needed to win. We just don't know though. Obviously neither would have mattered because without them Obama still would have won.
In terms of Scandal (and I know this is off-topic so I'm sorry I'll never do this again ), I'm still waiting to see when that part of the story ripens. I can't believe Olivia is back with that pinhead.
davidpdx
(22,000 posts)Anyone that listens to that fat bastard isn't that bright.
Response to DonViejo (Original post)
Name removed Message auto-removed
Blue Owl
(49,934 posts)Toss that ham in the klink.
narnian60
(3,510 posts)because I was switching to different channels on election night and when Obama's victory was announced I happened to be on Fox & got so hung up on what was going on with Rove & his nonsense I didn't celebrate like I should have until even Fox said it was over. Never again!