The Fatal Flaw in the Post-Mortem Analyses

[NanceGreggs]

Like everyone here, I have been reading the autopsy reports on Hillary’s campaign. So far, she lost the election due to everything from her choice of high school courses to her last bad hair day.

What is being overlooked by pretty much everyone posting their post-election opinions on political discussion boards is the fact that the average voter doesn’t post on political websites – in fact, most voters don’t even read them, or even know they exist.

The truth is that those of us who do post, here or elsewhere, are political junkies. We follow every move made by anyone connected to US politics. We parse their every statement, we know their histories from their first campaign to their most recent tweet. We can recite, verbatim, every speech they’ve ever made, every word they’ve ever uttered. We can tell anyone interested what scandals they have been even remotely connected to, what positions they’ve taken on every issue since being elected, and what their spouses wore at their last public appearance. In some cases, we can rattle-off the names and ages of their children, along with the names of their household pets.

“Hillary lost because she voted for the Iraq war. She lost because she didn’t address the email issue or Benghazi strenuously enough. She lost because she was once a Goldwater Girl, and people never forgot. She lost because she was friendly with Dubya at a fundraiser, and that turned people off. She lost because of her position on ____" Just fill in the blank with something that happened more than six weeks ago, and you’re delving into history that most people aren’t even aware of, no less based their vote on.

What we all fail to acknowledge is that the average voter doesn’t know – nor care – what HRC, nor any other politician, did before they go to the polls to cast their ballots. For the most part, the average voter can’t name their own congress critters, no less tell you what their position is on anything. The truth is that when asked, the average voter isn’t quite sure that the Civil War actually happened, no less which side won.

Let’s remember that a large part of the population still think that Obama didn’t do enough to keep the country safe when he was president during the 9/11 attacks, or when Katrina happened on his watch.

To cite Hillary’s alleged failings of thirty years ago, twenty years ago, or even six months ago as being her downfall in a 2016 election is the stuff that political junkies cling to as an explanation or an excuse – depending on whose side you’re on – despite the fact that the average voter can’t tell you who the president was on September 11, 2001.

We unfortunately live in a world where the average voter is far more aware of whose single topped the charts in 1960 than who was elected POTUS that same year. They can tell you what movie won Best Picture in 1974, but they can’t tell you why Nixon resigned. They can recite the entire history of every Kardashian ever born, but they don’t know the history of their own country – nor are they interested.

Why did HRC really lose this election? Maybe it was too many poor wardrobe choices, or the wrong tweet at the wrong time.

Or maybe it was because the average voter was too busy binge-watching Boardwalk Empire, Dexter, or maybe The Apprentice, to pay attention to an election that would ultimately impact their access to affordable healthcare, their right to choose, the rights of their fellow citizens to marry who they love – or simply the idea that maybe a bigoted racist should never have had a shot at the presidency in the first place.

Blame it on HRC, the DNC, DWS, the PTB, the NRA, the CIA – and all of the other alphabet soup conspirators. What it comes down to is the FUV – the fucked-up-voter – who couldn’t be bothered to look beyond the bumper-sticker slogans in order to make an informed choice.

So stop thinking that the average voter even knows what Hillary did while First Lady, a NY senator, or Secretary of State. The truth is that the average voter hardly remembers that she ever held those positions – if they ever knew – no less what she said or did while she held any of those positions.

In today’s world, nothing that happened more than three weeks ago has any relevance to the average voter, and attributing Hill’s loss to things like her friendship with Henry Kissinger only leads to one thing: a flurry of Google searches entitled Who is Henry Kissinger?

Ultimately, HRC “lost” because too many of the people who voted for her live in the “wrong states”. It has nothing to do with what she said thirty years ago, things that only political junkies care about, or have any awareness of whatsoever.

This was never an election based on Hillary’s past history. It was an election based on who said what in the three weeks before the election – and whether they said it on a “news” network that was up in the ratings at the time.