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Noonan Eats Crow- Gracefully
It is only fair to recognize that after Peggy Noonan’s November 5th forecast of a Romney victory because she could feel it through yard signs and well-attended closing rallies for the Republican candidate- the reality of what occurred on election day has hit home.
With grace and a certain amount of humor, this is the former Reagan speechwriter in today’s Wall Street Journal:
President Obama did not lose, he won. It was not all that close. There was enthusiasm on his side. Mitt Romney’s assumed base did not fully emerge, or rather emerged as smaller than it used to be. He appears to have received fewer votes than John McCain. The last rallies of his campaign neither signaled nor reflected a Republican resurgence. Mr Romney’s air of peaceful dynamism was the product of a false optimism that, in the closing days, buoyed some conservatives and swept some Republicans. While GOP voters were proud to assert their support with lawn signs, Democratic professionals were quietly organizing, data mining and turning out the vote. Their effort was a bit of a masterpiece; it will likely change national politics forever. Mr. Obama was perhaps not joyless but dogged, determined, and tired.
Apart from those points, everything in my blog post of Nov. 5 stands.
Which is to say, there’s not much left of it to stand.
My point in comparing the prognosticating approaches of Noonan and the New York Times’ Nate Silver earlier this week, also stands. And my point was an intentionally narrow one. Data analysis and empirical research trump emotion and “feelings” every time.
And by the way, what works in the world of political forecasting, also works in the rough and tumble world of political campaigning- and specifically, the art of the political ground game. Noonan is absolutely correct when she says Republicans may have been putting signs on their lawns, but Democrats were organizing, data mining and turning out the vote.
The precision and demographic targeting of the Obama campaign amounted to the most impressive GOTV (get out the vote) effort in modern political history. Because they identified their voters and then motivated them to get to the polls through personal and local volunteer interaction, they, in essence, created their own electorate.
Here’s a Time magazine piece on the Chicago bunker where the effort was centered, based always on pain-staking research and a conscious dismissal of all previous ground game assumptions.
By comparison, here are details of the Romney GOTV effort, which was supposed to have been coordinated through new technology that was never actually tested and which literally crashed and burned on election day as Romney volunteers realized their system for identifying which voters had voted and which had not, was simply not working.
The larger point here, is that information is power. Those who ignore it or fail to mine it, sift it, analyze it and understand it, do so at their own peril, whether they are trying to win elections or predict their outcome.
Nate Silver’s Probabilities vs Peggy Noonan’s Feelings
Nate SIlver and Peggy Noonan
As part of the introspection that conservative partisans like Peggy Noonan are engaged in after the resounding reelection victory for President Obama Tuesday, surely one of the aspects of this exercise will be coming to the acceptance of the primacy of facts and research over emotion.
As conservatives started aiming their ire at New York Times numbers-cruncher, Nate Silver, in the closing weeks of the campaign, it is now apparent that all the froth was about what Silver was saying not the way he went about coming to his conclusions. They were shooting the messenger. And with every broadside, it seemed Silver would just keep upping Obama’s victory probabilities until by the final day, they had crested above 90%. And for the second Presidential election in a row, he was spot on, accurately predicting 50 out of 50 states (presuming Florida finishes where it is now).
Over at the Wall Street Journal, former Ronald Reagan speechwriter, Peggy Noonan, seemed to be mocking Silver’s nerdy numbers approach by predicting a Mitt Romney victory based on, among other things, the size of the Republican candidate’s closing crowds, their decibel levels, even her perception of how Romney lawn signs were outnumbering Obama’s.
There is no denying the Republicans have the passion now, the enthusiasm. The Democrats do not. Independents are breaking for Romney. And there’s the thing about the yard signs. In Florida a few weeks ago I saw Romney signs, not Obama ones. From Ohio I hear the same. From tony Northwest Washington, D.C., I hear the same.
She even magically entered the heads of the candidates at the annual Al Smith dinner in New York where she interpreted what she saw as an uncomfortable and distracted Barack Obama as someone who looked like they had just read disturbing data.
But sitting there listening to the jokes and speeches, the archbishop of New York sitting between them, Obama looked like a young challenger—flinty, not so comfortable. He was distracted, and his smiles seemed forced. He looked like a man who’d just seen some bad internal polling. Romney? Expansive, hilarious, self-spoofing, with a few jokes of finely calibrated meanness that were just perfect for the crowd. He looked like a president. He looked like someone who’d just seen good internals.
The remarkable thing about Noonan’s approach to political prognosticating, is that you’d think she’d know better by now. She’s had her hand in the political game for nearly half a century. Not that she’s alone in couching her hopes on imaginary factors she thinks she sees, like massive, noisy, huge campaign crowds at Republican rallies, advantages in political lawn signs, or someone’s demeanor sitting at a dais. It’s natural- it’s human to hope against hope.
Granted I was all of 16 at the time, but I remember feeling such hope for George McGovern in 1972. Surely, polls can be wrong. I mean, wow, 20 thousand people came out for him at one event or another. How could a decorated World War II Air Force veteran with such strength of character be losing to Richard Nixon, for Christ’s sake.
Not too dissimilar, I suppose, from a conservative partisan thinking how such a good, religious, responsible family guy like Romney could possibly be losing to the likes of Barack Hussein Obama, for Christ’s sake.
Well, McGovern, of course, would go on to win only Massachusetts and Washington, D.C. and Mitt Romney would go on to lose every single swing state in the election except for North Carolina (and again, we await Florida).
The lessons here are obvious. Not that it really matters, of course, if pundits get their predictions right or horribly wrong- they are paid to bloviate no matter what. But if one wants to be accurate and be taken seriously again someday- it would be wise to keep emotions out of it.
It would be essential, I think, to not let your observations be colored by your tribal leanings. It might make sense to understand that 21st century polling, for example, is actually a science and that the study of statistical probability actually has an anchor in reality.
The trick for those who want to be in the business of predicting things, is learning to accept that the facts you see may not be what you wish they were. It’s human, even endearing to think that wishing can make things happen. But it’s not very professional.
Newt: Defying Gravity and the GOP Establishment
He is looking more and more unstoppable and the fear and trepidation on the part of establishment Republicans is palpable. But the more they attack the better he does.
Here’s the list of conservative pundits who have weighed in on what they see as the dangers of Newt Gingrich citing everything from ideological inconsistency to a lack of moral compass to psychopathic narcissism:
George Will, Charles Krauthammer , Peggy Noonan, David Brooks, Meghan McCain, Ross Douthat, Ann Coulter, Michael Gerson
Mitt Romney supporter, New Jersey Governor, Chris Christie, warned Thursday without naming names, that Republicans don’t want to nominate a Presidential candidate who might embarrass them.
Other Romney surrogates also piled on. Former New Hampshire Governor, John Sununu and former Missouri Senator Jim Talent tried to level Newt in a telephone conference call with reporters saying he is unreliable and not trustworthy.
Meantime, the Romney camp, while letting others do the heavy lifting on the personal and political attacks on Newt, released a biographical campaign ad highlighting Mitt’s steadiness in marriage. Hint, hint: Newt’s had two affairs and three marriages.
None of this matters to the Republican electorate according to poll after poll after poll that find Gingrich not just surging, but eviscerating Romney in every key primary or caucus state except New Hampshire (Romney’s backyard) and even that race is tightening considerably.
The more the attacks pile on, the more desperate Romney looks. And there’s a good reason for that. He’s desperate. And there are only four weeks before the first votes are counted. It’s become cliché, but Newt is the only thing that can stop Newt now.
This is an election cycle in which it appears Republican voters don’t give two hoots for pundits, commentators, media (liberal or conservative), office-holders, or following the orderly line of succession that has been the party’s previous history.
Gingrich is acting with great self confidence and taking all the criticism with a hearty laugh these days; like a man who knows every scathing column and every attack from current and former members of Congress are all individual badges of honor that can only help the cause.
Garcia Media Life 
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