Despite the insistence from the Romney campaign and Karl Rove that Ohio would go their way once the numbers were unskewed, President Obama scored a decisive victory last night – to the point that by the time Romney had conceded the race, the President didn’t even need Florida or Ohio, whose Republican Secretaries of State were still counting votes.
The loss must have been especially hard to take for a number of conservative pundits and paid Republican flacks from Michigan, who had spent the last few months loudly declaring, despite no shortage of evidence to the contrary, that Mitt Romney’s campaign would win in Michigan.
Perhaps the worst offender was the Communications Director for the Michigan Republican Party, Matt Frendewey, who probably wishes he had tempered his enthusiasm a little bit.
A few days ago President Obama’s adviser David Axelrod promised that if Mitt Romney won in Pennsylvania, Michigan, or Minnesota, he’d shave his iconic mustache. The Michigan Republican Party responded by delivering shaving cream to the Obama campaign office in Lansing, promising that Romney would win the state.
The same day, Frendewey told the Capitol news service MIRS that Obama was slipping in the polls, and the president’s campaign purchasing of TV ads in Michigan was a:
“desperate move When they lose Michigan, make no doubt about it, there’s absolutely no way for Obama to win re-election.”
Frendewey was awfully busy last Wednesday. He also talked to MLive, telling them:
“Poll after poll indicates that Michigan is trending in Romney’s favor as voters turn away from the Obama’s failed policies,”
Ouch.
Another offender was Republican strategist John Truscott, who was short in his misguided assumptions and conclusion:
“Whoever thought Michigan would be in play? This shows Mitt Romney’s momentum. I predict he will peak at the right time and will capture the popular vote and an Electoral College victory. The polling will have been proved wrong because the margins will be much greater than expected and well out of the range of a challenge or recount…”
Not to be outdone, failed Senate candidate Pete Hoekstra spoke with reporters as he went door-to-door in Utica with another failed Republican candidate, Tea Partier and Grover Norquist disciple Sean Clark, who lost his race for state House to Henry Yanez last night. Hoekstra acknowledged he was an underdog but said that “Mitt’s performance, Mitt’s agenda is starting to catch on across the country” and claimed that would give him a boost.
Nolan Finley, editorial page editor for the Detroit News, hedged in a November 1 column, saying he wouldn’t bet against President Obama winning Michigan, but Republican consultant Paul Welday couldn’t help himself.
Republican consultant Paul Welday has taken a deep look at the polling, demographic data and party identification and concludes Romney will win Michigan in the narrowest presidential race in the state’s history.
He’ll do it, Welday predicts, on the strength of a solid showing in Oakland County, where both he and his wife, Ann, were raised.
Welday also finds growing support for Romney among Catholics and white males, and weakening numbers for Obama among women and young voters.
A win in Michigan for Romney, says Welday, would be “seismic.”
President Obama won Oakland County by more than 50,000 votes. But naturally on Wednesday morning, Finley blamed the “Obamedia.”
There just isn’t enough time or space here to take you through all the rest of the pundits and flacks who got Michigan’s electorate plain wrong. But if you’re interested, you can check out the others below.
Kelsey Knight, RNC spokesperson for Michigan, called Michigan “a statistical tie.”
Tea Party leaders predict the polls are all wrong and Romney will win by 10 percentage points.
Henry Payne, Detroit News columnist, says that President Obama “is in trouble in Michigan” because “undecideds usually break for the challenger.”