Who’s Got the Numbers?

We have heard a lot since the election from the Republicans that “the people have spoken”. They claim the change in the House shows that the American public have flocked to their philosophy and rejected President Obama’s agenda. They point to the enthusiasm boost the the TEA Partiers brought to their party. But do the numbers actually support their claim? In 2010 the combined total of votes for GOP House candidates was 45,091,248. Which certainly is a large number of the 308,000,000 Americans. However, Obama in 2008 received 69,456,897 votes out of a smaller population. That’s 54% MORE than the entire GOP total two years later. This vote deficit was despite a massive corporate disinformation campaign, thanks to the Citizens United decision, and despite the . So some Obama voters in 2008 have voted for the GOP House candidate in 2010 but certainly not a “mandate” to reverse course and go back to the Bush agenda. To be sure some of the GOP vote was a protest that Obama had not pushed his mandate for “Change” hard enough.

 

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