![](\"https:\/\/BradBlog.com\/Images\/BushFinger_small.jpg\")
It’s only been an hour or two, but the spinning and cynically opportunistic misinterpretation by the zealots of President-Elect Bush’s victory has already begun. As expected.<\/p>\nIt’s only been an hour or two, but the spinning and cynically opportunistic misinterpretation by the zealots of President-Elect Bush’s victory has already begun. As expected.<\/p>\n
Never mind that a man who received a “free” all-expense-paid four-year campaign commercial masquerading as “President” could claim only a slim 1% victory over his contender, with more Americans voting against<\/i> him than any candidate in history, the Right has already begun the spin (as evidenced in comments here) that even the moderates in America support Bush.<\/p>\n
Andrew Sullivan<\/a> quotes Noam Scheiber putting some truth<\/a> to that earliest of lies:<\/p>\n Adding to that, I associate myself with Josh Marshall<\/a> who saw the Bush\/Cheney statements today claiming a “a broad, nationwide victory” as ominous writing on the sleaze-room wall:<\/p>\n “A broad, nationwide victory”? <\/p>\n It would almost be comical if it weren’t for the seriousness of what it portends. This election cut the nation in two. A single percentage point over 50% is not broad. A victory that carried no states in the Northeast, close to none in the Industrial midwest is not nationwide, and none on the west coast is not nationwide.<\/p>\n And yet he plans to use this narrow victory as though it were a broad mandate, starting right back with the same strategy that has already come near to tearing this country apart.<\/p><\/div>\n I’ll have more on that “same strategy” and the ugliness it required to win a 1% majority victory as the day goes on…<\/p>\n CORRECTION 11\/4\/04:<\/b> As pointed out by reader “Jeff”, I said above that Bush “could claim only a slim 1% victory over his contender” I should have said “a slim 1% victory over his contenders<\/b>” since Bush received 51% of the popular vote. As well, “Jeff” pointed out that I said Bush had “more Americans voting against him than any candidate in history”. That was misleading as well. What I should have said was Bush had “more Americans voting against him than any Republican<\/b> candidate in history”. A seemingly good source to check on these matters is right here<\/a>. BRAD BLOG regrets both the errors and the sleepless haze in which they were written.<\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It’s only been an hour or two, but the spinning and cynically opportunistic misinterpretation by the zealots of President-Elect Bush’s victory has already begun. As expected. Never mind that a man who received a “free” all-expense-paid four-year campaign commercial masquerading as “President” could claim only a slim 1% victory over his contender, with more Americans […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-884","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-election-2004","bb-type-bradblog"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/884","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=884"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/884\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=884"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcoauthors&post=884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Not only did Kerry win by an 86-13 margin among self-described liberals, he also won by a 55-45 margin among self-described moderates. So how’d Bush pull it off? He won 84-15 among self-described conservatives, and, more importantly, he made sure conservatives comprised a much bigger chunk of the electorate than they did in 2000. (Conservatives comprised about 34 percent of the electorate yesterday, versus 29 percent in 2000–a huge shift, raw numbers-wise.) Anyone anticipating a conciliatory second Bush term should stop and consider how much Bush owes his base.<\/div>\nThis is the touchstone and the sign. A ‘broad, nationwide victory’? He must be kidding. Our system is majority rule. And 51% is a win. But he’s claiming a mandate.<\/p>\n