In 2000 and 2004 you might say the Republicans had flawed candidates. George W. Bush was a neophyte, a poor speaker, and an intellectual lightweight, while his vice presidential nominee was slightly more congenial than Satan. But the Rove campaign was effective in at least three things: negative campaigning, vote counting, and getting out the vote.
Rove, a disciple of Lee Attwater, the grand master of the smear campaign, was even better at it than his mentor. He was able to marginalize two distinguished politicians, one a sitting vice president and one a war hero, by attacking their strengths. By keeping his own candidate above the fray, allowing him to appear congenial and folksy, and by relying on allies to do the dirty work, Rove managed to get his guy into the White House.
He also knew how to count electoral votes and concentrated on his base, a combination of ideologically fiscal conservatives and evangelical Christians. The first time, Bush won in a squeaker while losing the popular vote, and the second time, with a war being waged and the memory of 9/11 still fresh, he won with a slightly larger margin. But it was never a blowout. Rove never intended it to be. He didn't want his president to be beholden to too many groups. So he relied heavily on evangelical preachers who would whip up anger over things like abortion, gay marriage, and the ghosts of Vietnam to motivate certain groups to come out and vote. And it worked.
But negative campaigning seems to have lost its effectiveness. It's almost as if the people realized they were played for fools in the past two elections, voting for an incompetent man because they really disapproved of homosexual marriage and abortion and because they were fooled into believing lies about Bush's opponent.
This time they seemed to be saying "We don't care about Bill Ayers, or labels like "socialist," and "defeatist," and "tax and spend," and "liberal." We don't care that Obama's middle name is "Hussein," and we don't believe he is a "muslim" or care that he sat in Rev. Wright's church. We're not falling for that again."
And they didn't.
This time they wanted a serious candidate, with serious ideas and a serious temperament.
That's why McCain choosing the ignorant Sarah Palin didn't work, and why the various other gimmicks like Joe the Plumber and "drill, baby, drill" and the persona of a maverick didn't work.
When times are tough, and the man in charge has failed to make things better, and in fact has created the tough times, you don't go to one of his closest associates for the solutions. And you certainly don't go to him if he proves himself to be erratic and unserious in his approach to campaigning and governing.
The American people wanted a problem solver in chief. McCain tried to sell himself by tearing down Obama and testing out advertising slogans. That simply wasn't going to work this time.
