What Does The WSJ Consider A Mandate? That Depends.

Click here for an article by Hendrik Hertzberg in The New Yorker entitled Mandate With Destiny on how that Murdoch conservative bastion, The Wall Street Journal, views the matter of what it takes to earn a mandate in a presidential election. Surprise, surprise: Bush won a ringing mandate on his reelection in 2004, while Obama eked out a narrow victory in 2012.

In 2004, the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal, conservatism’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, congratulated President Bush for “what by any measure is a decisive mandate for a second term” and exulted, “Mr. Bush has been given the kind of mandate that few politicians are ever fortunate enough to receive.” This year, examining similar numbers with different labels, the Journal came up with a sterner interpretation. “President Obama won one of the narrower re-elections in modern times,” its editorial announced.

This is despite the facts that Obama in 2012 won the popular vote by more than 4 million, as opposed to Bush's 3 million in 2004; Obama won 332 seats in the electoral college in 2012, as opposed to Bush's 286. (270 electoral college seats are needed to win the presidency.)

Right-wing pundits confidently predicting a Romney blowout included Michael Barone, Peggy Noonan, Dick Morris, Glenn Beck, and George Will. None of these Members of the Conservative Priesthood guessed that Romney would win more than 325 electoral college votes, a number they all considered to be "a landslide." Obama's 332? A pretty shaky margin, apparently.