Associated Press
Election Day was three weeks ago, but every day, the overall popular-vote totals change just a little as additional results are published. And as of yesterday, we appear to have reached an interesting, albeit largely symbolic, threshold.
Call it irony or call it coincidence: Mitt Romney's share of the popular vote in the 2012 presidential race is very likely to be 47 percent.
Romney's campaign, of course, was doomed in large part by comments made on a hidden camera in which he suggested that 47 percent of the country was so reliant on government services that those people would never vote for him.
The words '47 percent' came to define what was already evident: that Romney struggled to connect with lower- and middle-income voters and with groups such as Latinos. And in the end, it looks like 47 percent also just happens to be the share of the vote that Romney will get.
According to a detailed tally from the Cook Political Report's David Wasserman, President Obama leads Romney 64,811,843 votes to 60,444,303, or 50.86% to 47.43%. Rounded to the nearest whole number, Obama won 51% to 47%.
And that 47% figure is the one number the Republican probably hoped to avoid. (It's true that there are still more votes being tallied, and so the final figures are likely to change, but given where the unreported votes were cast, the most likely result is Romney ending up around 47.2%.)
One other related tidbit: as things currently stand, Obama's popular vote margin of victory is 3.43%. That's close, to be sure, but for all the talk about the razor-thin race and the speculation that this could be the tightest national election any of us have ever seen, Obama's 2012 victory isn't even in the top 10 of the closest presidential elections in American history.
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He got 47%? I did not realize there were that many stupid people reigistered to vote!
Yeah, there are. They're called Republicans.
You havnt been to walmart in a while have you? I voted 3rd party and I think 97% of American voters are stupid.
No i haven't been to walmart in 20 yrs. and won't until they get a union...what 3rd party candidate did you vote for? i didn't know there was one!
Overjoyed that Obama won. But disturbed that Romney even got 47%. That means that just under half the voters out there are ignorant, illiterate, misogynistic, Bible-thumping wackos.
Hel - l - arious......
47 seems to play a prominent part in Romney's life. He was born in 1947, too.
Unfortunately, there are 47% of Americans that are total morons. I have lived in Texas for 6 years. The people in this area are brain dead. They actually voted for Romney and they are the people he called freeloaders. They don't even know that he was talking about THEM. They spew their hatred 6 days a week, go to church on Sunday- pick up their Christianity, sing and praise the Lord for an hour; walk out the door leaving their Christianity tucked neatly in the pew, point their self-righteous noses in the air and go about the task of trying to force their radical version of Christianity down our throats. They will never let a rational thought seep through those closed minds. I am totally isolated in my neighborhood because I put out my Obama/Ryan sign. Don't want any Republican friends anyhow.
Obama/Ryan????
Patsy, I know exactly what you mean. My best friend's parents are the same way. If anything, they would highly benefit from Obama's policies. My street was covered in at least 40 Romney signs and only one Obama sign.
Something no one else has noticed yet? As the provisional ballots are counted, the Democratic tallies continue to rise. That means that the majority of the provisional ballots -- ballots cast by people whose right to vote was challenged -- were cast by Democrats.
If you wanted proof of the partisan nature of voter ID rules, there it is.
Our job is not to care about those 47%, most of whom think 3.43% is "within the margin of error".
BWA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA
Karma - remains undefeated.
47% fell for Romney snake-oil? Yikes!
Elections do have consequences, but the question of the hour is whether the Congressional Democrats can rid themselves from their political scoliosis, then straighten up, and put their backbone into the grand effort it will take to help our President and his efforts to right our economic woes! -Kevo
An even bigger question: Will Obama solve his spine problem, and not cut a bad deal on the austerity slope?
We need to somehow work "47%" in as a new form of wingnut derision (to go along with more descriptive terms like dumba$$, etc.).
Actually, it's very alarming that there were that many people so willing to be lied to and then happy to vote for Mitt Romney (or happy to vote against Obama). Seriously though, I find it difficult to believe Mitty supporters didn't know he was lying, and very much believe they actually wanted the Lyin' Sack of Mitt to lie if it helped fool others into voting for their characterless hero.
The rich voted for Romney because of his financial stance; the other 46% were voting against the "black guy" and yeah, they all knew Romney was lying most of the time.
love that expression "lying sack of mitt" lol
Sah-weeeeeet! I shouldn't, but I laugh at the irony.
Republicans think they can put lipstick on the pig and win in the future. They are wrong. Unless they attract minorities, younger people and women, their losing margins will grow election after election. Since they are convinced that they have to crap on all those groups to keep their old angry white guy base happy they are doomed. There just aren't enough old angry white guys.
Actually, if you look at what the Repubs are saying these, days, they still want to be the White Man's Party, but find new ways to keep everybody else from voting.
They angry old white guy base is dying.
But the angry old white guys that are still alive have stolen everyones money and are using it to b!tch and moan to anyone who will listen. $$= speech, if we learned anything this election its that "We the people" don't have the voice we think we do, or should. Although I post from Utah with one of the lowest voter turnouts so I'm well aware of how angry old white guys can be, trust me.
If the "Angry Old White Guys" controlled all the money, you would have consistantly heard on NBC, ABC, CBS, CNN all the failures of Obama during his 4 years. In case you haven't noticed, the news media outlets are VERY partisan. Fox is VERY Conservative, and the other outlets are VERY Liberal. There is 0 fair reporting. I guarantee had a republican been in office with that attack in Benghazi attack, it would have heard about until Election day. But because it was our Amazing Obama in office, let's sweep that under the rug til the election is over. We have a Socialist POS running our, and we are about to hit the largest tax in our country's history. Hope yall are happy when we are bankrupt and on our way to complete and total financial disaster.
Waaaaaa!
John, CNN is both liberal and conservative, depending on what show you are watching. And what are you talking about Benghazi being ignored until after election day? Obama came out and called it a terrorist attack the day after it happened, if you don't remember the Presidential Debate.
The largest tax in the country's history? So you think we're going to go back to 90% tax rates? Obama has proposed a tax increase of 4.6% on only 2% of the population. The man wants everyone to have health care, to be able to eat, and feed their children. That is such terrible socialism. I am amazed every day at how uninformed and delusional some republicans really are.
Dick Morris and friends ought to be banished from TV after their sorry performance in predicting this election. The world of the vast right wing conspiracy and the Tea Party radicals driving the agenda of the Republican Party really is a fantasyland. Conservatives not only denied the accuracy of their "skewed" polls before the election, they are acting like nothing changed and that President Obama didn't "really" twin a resounding landslide mandate earlier this month. American voters rejected the conservative agenda. Time to move on. pp
Oh but they knew they were going to win....
I don't usually buy into conspiracy theories , but this one makes me wonder
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=REn1BnJE3do
Shorter version here with the anonymous vid
http://m.thomhartmann.com/bigpicture/did-anonymous-save-election-karl-rove
47% is about the percentage of Registered Repubs who always vote Republican. What we have to do is to be sure we get out the vote in the mid-term and take back the house.
Until the Republicans figure out why they lost, and lost badly, it's going to continue to be this way for them. Amazes me how they are still wringing their hands wondering what went wrong...Ask America and find out. I laugh every time I hear how "close" the election was...No hope for them if 47% doesn't tell them something.
First, they're going to have to admit to themselves that they lost badly. Without taking that first step, they'll never figure out the rest.
I love numerology.It's the 53% who can truly hear God.It has to be, Let it be. I think I'll name my baby after that number, 13.
If not for the rigged voting machines and illegal vote tampering, the margin of victory would have been much larger.
All of which goes to prove what I said all along...the "closeness" of the race was hyped by the repubs AND the media. It was never that close. Glad to be proven right on that one. Now let's find out why the polls lied and who the media got it's misinformation from that they then disseminated to the rest of us.
How ironic!!! 47% for Mr. 47%!! LOL!!
I've said this many times, but Romney was conning even his wealthy patrons with his "47%" comments. In 2008, Barack Obama received 53% of the vote, but you can't tell a room full of people that 53% of voters will never vote for you because then, what are you all doing there? Fast-forward to today and Romney's receiving 47% of the vote -- karma's not only a beyotch, but apparently she has a keen sense of humor.
50.86 to 47.43
That leaves about 1.7% for everyone else. Long gone are the days of third parties trying desperately to bump up vote totals just to get ballot access. Here's hoping that the idealists with good ideas have been absorbed into the major parties and the cranks are the only ones left... though I suspect from experience with local party activists that it's the other way around.
When attempting to share this article the pop-up window overlaps with the article (and photo within the article) itself. Anyone else? A Chrome thing?
Regarding Congress. The Dems will have a hard time making a dent in Congress until we can get a handle on Jerry-mandering and controling state legislatures. All you need for proof of that is the re-election, though narrowly nonetheless, of that bat-@!$%# crazy bafoon Michelle Bachman. THAT should be the real wake-up call to the DNC that they need to mobilize for elections in state legislatures. This is where the Koch's and others are concentrating their money and efforts for just this reason.
You nailed it, Paul. The Kochs' real agenda is in controlling the state and local politics, because that's where their influence is most effective. I just watched an interesting biopic on the Koch brothers. (Rachel can be heard in it with some voice-over commentary, BTW.)
One little factoid I learned there is that Charles and Bill make $13 million A DAY! These fellows inherited their wealth from their father--who made it in the Russian oil industry in the '30s, but that's beside the point. At any rate, their current business is an environmental disaster, including Georgia Pacific dumping toxic chemicals onto neighboring lands and interest in the nasty, shale-oil Keystone XL pipeline, so they need political cover to fend off EPA enforcement.
Further, they have long-standing ties to the John Birch Society, hence the efforts at RE-segregation of schools, adherence to evangelical principles, support of the NRA and the conservative agenda in general. They're just two angry white guys, who by accident of birth happen to have a lot of money to throw around and think they should control the political agenda in the United States.
Somebody, please OUT these guys before they do any more damage!
Reinforcing the idea that we need to focus on our education system and mental health programs- because 46% of our voting citizenry is stupid or crazy, of a combination there of. The other 1% can be educated on American ethics and morals through the courts.
I know that as a 20 something voter and having to deal with the Bush era no child left behind, the dumbing down of the citizenry has long been the game plan for the 1% who know nothing of morals or ethics. I agree almost 100% with your post, education, mental health AND the Media machine need to be overhauled in the worst way.
Rember people<<<>>>>what go around----------------comes around<<>>like 47%
Pretty Pease. I wish all this about Romney would just come to an end and we never have to talk about Mitt ever again. He lost. Thank God and Amen.
We should be talking about Susan Rice and how the GOP are acting like the snots they are and how they are acting that they did not lose in the elections and are still trying to make our President (who won fair and square) look bad.
I agree. Susan Rice is a good candidate for Hillary's job. We also need to talk about getting Elizabeth Warren on the senate finance committee.
mandate or not,Obama won big,now he has to own it ,and pass all the infra-structure bills that he was behind at the end of the year.we need it done before we become a third world country. Ecuador has better roads then we do .
Anything over 25% is to high for this charlatan!