The Biggest Mistake This Campaign? Republicans Assumed Voters Were Smart

Let’s face facts. Democrats gained in the House of Representatives, the Senate and the chief Democrat in charge was re-elected after one of the worst four year periods in American history, economically and constitutionally. How does that happen?  Republicans/Conservatives (which are not necessarily interchangeable terms — but, we’ll lump them together for the sake of this column) gave voters credit for being smart while Democrats assumed they’re not. Let’s break down what Obama, Pelosi, Reid, the Obama SuperPACs, et all were saying for a year and a half:

• Republicans are prosecuting a war on women
• Romney only cares about his rich friends and Wall Street
• Romney is responsible for the death of a woman by somehow giving her cancer
• Romney specialized in closing down businesses, laying people off and outsourcing jobs — especially to China
• Romney is a liar. All he does is lie. And, after he lies, he lies about the lies he told.
• Republicans are trying to outlaw contraception.
• Republicans are trying to close down Planned Parenthood to stop women from getting cancer screenings
• Republicans want to put all Latinos on buses and send them back to Mexico
• Republicans think rape is okay — and women should just stop talking about it
• Republicans all own stock in oil companies and are forcing gas prices up
• Republicans want to give rich people a tax break and make the poor and Middle Class to make up the difference
• Romney hates half the country (47%)
• Romney will end Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid

Only problem with that list is, not one bit of it is true. Republicans/conservatives assumed everyone hearing this list of Democrat/liberal talking points would know it was completely false. They gave the American people credit for being smart enough to know better. Millions are and do — but, unfortunately, more millions aren’t and don’t. Here’s a list filled with the absolute truth about the last four years:

• Gas prices doubled
• Obama said no to the Keystone XL Pipeline
• Obama sent billions to Brazil to drill there
• Food prices have soared
• Unemployment is higher than the day he took office
• Obama apologized around the world for the United States of America
• His DOJ refused to prosecute voter intimidation by the New Black Panther Party
• Obama promised to cut the debt in half in his first four years — has doubled it
• Obama will now cut military spending
• Obama refuses to answer questions on what happened the night four Americans died in Benghazi
• Obama has used Executive Privilege to continue stonewalling on Fast and Furious
• Obama has bragged about bypassing Congress repeatedly
• Obama has sued states for passing immigration laws
• Obama has sued states for passing Voter ID laws
• Obama and the Dems forced through Obamacare by lying about abortion and raising taxes
• Ran on a platform to raise taxes in his second term
• Obama blew billions on failed energy companies
• Obama has grown government to its biggest size in history
• Obama told Russia he can do more after the election
• Obama flip-flopped on gay marriage
• Obama is forcing religions to offer contraception even if it goes against their beliefs
• Obama is the most vehement supporter of abortion we’ve ever had in the White House

These are all facts. That’s just a short list of what this wannabe dictator has done in four years and Republicans/conservatives know how outrageous this administration has been and made a bad assumption that the American people were smart and would know how horrible these things are and this administration has been. Bad assumptions.

Americans love great actors, entertainers, people who smile and come off as sincere.  They also react positively to pandering — as long as it’s well-disguised.  Romney should have, at every opportunity, called Obama out on that list. He didn’t. Every time Obama called him a liar, Romney should have hit him back with, “are you out of your mind?  You… ” and list the failures and dictator-like moves of the last four years.

What Democrats have perfected is the art of the con job. Obama and his minions are confidence men and women. They con the American public with what most want to hear. They win the election, then do the exact opposite in the hopes of expanding the scope, power and dominance of government over all of us. Time for the other side to do the same thing. Why? Here’s a caller to my show.  She’s admittedly conservative yet an Obama voter. I asked her why — she can’t even explain it.  The con worked:

Caller Reggie to my Houston Show

Romney’s first major mistake was choosing Paul Ryan. I like Paul Ryan and he would have been a great Treasury Secretary.  He’s got an amazing economic and budgetary mind. Romney assumed because the economy is in the tank, that people would know his pick of Ryan was to address that. As I said from the moment we knew Romney was the nominee, Marco Rubio was the right guy to go with. That would have immediately done two things: 1. Locked Florida’s 29 electoral votes in for Romney and 2. Given Hispanics in the US their first opportunity to vote for someone ethnically like them, while voting for the values they believe in.  He’s young, speaks as well as Obama, delivers a speech as well as Obama and is representative of the fastest growing minority group in the country.

The big media was able to hide the speeches by Artur Davis and Mia Love and Ted Cruz from the RNC, they would NOT have been able to hide the VP choice. At the very least, he should have made Rubio the Keynote speaker. Chris Christie?  Really? He not only wasn’t the attack dog we see him to be as he mistreats local NJ reporters, at the end of the day, he turned out to be a great campaigner for Obama.

If we ever hope to get back to traditional American values that made us the shining light of civilization, the GOP has to take a page out of the Democrats' playbook, say what people want to hear and show them what they want to see.  Fact is, they’re not paying attention to anything else.