November 6, 2012 
Those are painful words to type, but I’m a mature person. If trends continue this will be a popular vote win for Romney and an electoral win for Obama, keeping him our president. You will not, by the way, see me calling for an overturn of the electoral college system and I very much discourage my ideological companions from touching that argument with a ten foot pole.
http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/157173/
America losing touch with economic reality doesn’t change the economic reality facing this country. I’m frankly a little disappointed in my country tonight, but I will persevere.
Tom and I have some humble pie to chew into from today’s show in calling a landslide – perhaps we were picking up on the popular tally, perhaps we fell into the classic political junkie trap: We saw an amazingly strong case against Obama’s policies and stances, we saw so many instances where he outright lied, we’ve seen numerous scandals that colored him in a horrible light, and we just couldn’t see how people could not see those stories, take them to heart, and see that this nation needs a different course.
I’m not certain what this says specifically about the American electorate, but I can say one thing – it seems America’s historical problem of having to take a pounding before it turns around is again playing out before our eyes. We have an economic disaster on the horizon, period. It seems America has done an effective job of convincing itself that the problem is either too harrowing to contemplate or that the fed can happily print money with no consequences. The fantasy that federal money is free continues.
http://pjmedia.com/instapundit/157204/
Obama owns the last four years. A large number of his major policy moves were offset to kick in after the election, and in 2014. I will say it again: America is insisting that it needs a sucker punch before it sees the light of day. Fine. It will come. But I will go on the record – this mess would not have been entirely diverted by Romney. Romney would have given us an emergency landing as opposed to a crash. It could have been side stepped. It could have been cushioned. Instead we’re apparently going to accelerate.
Buckle up, folks. It’s going to be rough ride. Remember: As a country, this is the path we’ve chosen.
And I will still not give up on my country.
I remain, as ever, an optimist. I do, however, despair that this nation is now stepping into a period of history where we have never been so sharply divided politically, and where a campaign oriented around shallow tactics managed to win with classic politics. Obama has always been a master politician, and it’s something I will never deny or contest about him.
I intend to remain active, and bite the bullet and march on. And unfortunately – for my family, this election has direct consequences on our lives, and we’ll be making a number of hard decisions soon. I imagine it’s the same way for many, many other Americans tonight.
I’m feeling much the same way I did when Justice Roberts made the deciding vote to uphold Obamacare. Conservatism as a movement in this country is being given an incredibly trying test. We will ultimately be stronger for it – but damn if it isn’t painful not seeing the ‘easy route’ pan out.
Things to Watch:
- Benghazi
- Precious Metals
- The Federal Reserve (specifically Ben Bernanke)
- Ripple effects of Obamacare solidfying sinking in over the next two weeks
- Overall regulations via the EPA aimed at energy producers firing over next several months, particularly coal
More thoughts from Vodkapundit via PJM that I encourage all of you to read.
Update: Why on earth is THIS my 100th post? Talk about bitter tastes left in the mouth.
ALSO: This piece is linked in one of the instapundit links, but a qoute from a Bom Krumm piece is worth highlighting:
“We are an evenly divided nation between two irreconciable ideologies. On the one side is the collectivist progressive who knows that by centralizing control in the hands of leaders empowered by special powers, that America will be a fairer place. On the other side is the rugged individualist who knows that if he were freed of extraordinary restrictions that he could accomplish extraordinary things and that will make America a stronger place.
This is not a new conflict. In fact, it’s the conflict that gave birth to our nation, when we left and England and an anointed elite behind. But we didn’t leave it entirely behind. And by degree, collectivism has returned. For decades we have been able to paper over the differences between the two camps through the incredible surplusses that we have amassed. But those surplusses are soon to come to an end.”
Additional Reading
- Hugh Hewitt
- Zero Hedge
- Ed Driscoll
- Myself back in July commenting on a Victor Davis Hanson Piece and fretting about a low info voter oriented Obama campaign working
I really ought to listen to myself more often. Sometimes. Back then I was very put off by Romney – my opinion on Romney the man has changed considerably since then.
The Skeptic Conservative 
It’s only a President. Just one part out of three co-equal branches. Speaking as a health care provider, I’m relieved the myth of “clean coal” might be over. I don’t need any more COPD patients that I can’t fix.
The problem is that the country had a chance to say that it didn’t approve of the way that the economy in particular has been handled for the last 4 years, and with the country being more or less evenly split down the middle in the popular vote and in the swing states, we don’t agree on which path is the right one to take. Perhaps they’ll actually find a way to work together to come to a solution, but with all the slander that came out this election season that doesn’t seem very likely.
But you never know
Yes, more people to post on here finally. One good thing came out of this for you. I for one am happy with the results I wanted Obama to win and he did. I do not understand the Benghazi “scandal” or your federal reserve system but I am against coal and for nuclear. I also hope you can make more progress on healthcare.
You and so many others don’t understand the problem that the fed and the national debt pose.
I’m not saying that as a negative remark necessarily, either – that’s what the facts bore out last night across the country, and people are simply going to have to feel the burn of what happens when a government gets out of control before they are motivated to do anything about it. I’ll have more in depth thoughts later, but a here’s a few:
* Debt is spiking, and will continue to spike because big centralized government is wasteful and sees expanding itself as the answer to all problems
* US national debt is currently at 16 trillion. If interest rates ever go up in any way – something the Fed is keeping artificially low by overseeing a situation where the United States is loaning money to itself, interest payments on the debt rapidly consume the overall budget.
* I am for nuclear as well – but coal currently supplies over half of this country’s electrical capacity. Destroying the primary source of power without replacing it will directly lead to standards of living dropping like a rock. We dont -have- nuclear plants lined up ready to start. The democrats only care about solar and wind primarily, which combined still cannot scale to supply a nation of 330 million souls. Coal is cheap, plentiful, and has become more efficient and will get us by until we adopt something else. I fail to see how crippling a nation’s economy just to make environmentalists feels better brings us closer to more nuclear energy.
* Health Care quality is going to plummet. Period. This nation is already in the midst of a doctor shortage, and obamacare’s solution to that problem is to effectively ration care through regulation. The private practice is a dying breed in this country now, and we will see care shift towards clumsy ‘one size fits all’ solutions based on whichever statistics save the most money. That isn’t a moral way to run a healthcare system, and unfortunately we will pay the price.
Expanded big government fails when there is no more money to borrow. The US is going to lose it’s ability to borrow money in short order at the rate of current spending. No one can break the laws of economic reality and borrow money from themselves forever; which is the current cornerstone policy of the US Fed.
Energy – Sadly nuclear is seen as an environmental disaster even though it is not, I would love to see more money being pushed towards developing nuclear energy instead of wind and solar you have the private sector for that. I guess it works better here since coal isn’t big.
Big Government – Big government can be bring in more cash like renationalizing oil here would put large amounts of cash into government coffers or you can take the less intrusive route and find the happy tax medium. An argument I have against limited government is Alberta it’s very Conservative with things like a flat income tax rate, no provincial sales tax, etc. but they have a lot of trouble financially and their deficit just keeps growing despite rising oil revenues.
Healthcare – Again I do not completely understand your healthcare system but you are suffering form the same shortages we are, we are trying to find new ways to improve it while saving money, which right now seems to be decentralize healthcare from hospitals and look more into care away from hospital also making receiving patients more efficient. Though I have my own thoughts on how to make money from healthcare while still maintaining equal quality of care. You can never be profitable but you can offset costs.