I'd like to point your attention to an article by Chris Suellentrop which ran a few days ago in Slate as an illustration of how the left doesn't "get it" in ways which should matter to them.

Suellentrop starts by observing conversatives like to make fun of liberals for failing to use "dynamic scoring" when thinking about the economy. In simple terms, this means that conservatives understand that the economy can easily grow or shrink in response to some economic policy (such as tax cuts or raises) and that you can't just assume it is a static entity which sits, unmoved, no matter what policy is embraced.

Chris then extends this idea to the voting population, basicly arguing Karl Rove controls who votes, and Karl Rove is making a mistake by bringing out conservatives who didn't vote in the last election -- that demographic has changed and will oppose, not support Bush. Conservatives don't "dynamically score" the electorial demographic, he argues, and this may be a huge error.

Sounds clever, but this is wrong in numerous ways.

First, while I'd never say demographics are completely static, they don't change the way Suellentrop thinks. The economy can grow and shrink enormously in a single day -- that's what stock market crashes are about. But the shared core values of a group of people don't suddenly change; that takes years, generations even, to happen. You can only erode people's core values so far. After that, you must start working on their children.

For example, he depicts "Rove's" strategy as "appealing to the 4 million evangelicals who didn't vote in 2000". Yet he fails to explain why we should believe the core values of these evangelicals have changed since 2000, nor how Bush's stances would no longer match.

The second problem, and the more important one, I think, is that he projects Democratic (or more accurately, leftist) values upon conservatives.

His analysis is purely top-down. To read his writing, Rove sets the strategy and tone of Bush's message, Rove coordinates action in the field, Rove determines who votes and how. Rove is the Pope of the Church of Bush.

But we're not leftists. And we're often Protestants. We come from traditions which are bottom-up, not top-down, and proceed from our values. Bush doesn't pretend to oppose the use of taxpayer funds for fetal cell research because Rove thinks it will appeal to a certain demographic. Bush opposes funding fetal stem cell research because he feels it's wrong. Bush didn't go into Iraq because he felt it would play well among the 18-29 demographic. Bush went into Iraq because he was felt Saddam was a cruel and dangerous dictator who would ultimately threaten our security if left unchecked.

It's a puzzle, isn't it? As Suellentrop says:

In most states, the Democratic voter-registration program has outpaced the Republican one.

Yes. And on Air America, talking to their friends in the field the night before the election, each was saying, to the person, that they didn't see the Republicans doing nearly as much getting-out-the-vote as they were. They saw this as a positive thing for prospects of winning.

No. It's evidence to the contrary, and a repudiation of the left's self-analysis: It is not they who represent the grassroots movement. The very fact their top people instruct them who to mobilize and how betrays this. Their "message" (which is frequently at odds with their true platform and intent) is chosen at the top, with an eye to the polls. The orders then come down from the top: "Get out the vote" and the command and control begins.

In contrast, we conservatives are largely self-organized; we truly are the "grass roots". We don't run around trying to "mobilize" our contingency. You see almost no organizing going on (and from what a friend tells me, it's pretty badly done anyway), and yet -- presto! -- we turn out in sufficient numbers to get the job done. The high turnout, with lack of good organization, demonstrates this yet again.

This explains the left's Rovian fixation: They work that way. Things are done top-down in their circles. Their party bristles with manipulators and spin doctors like Joe Lockhart and James Carville. But we are not them, we are different. There's a reason "liberal elites" is an oft-used phrase, but "conservative elites" seems almost oxymoronic.

The reason much of the left will not, and I suspect, simply cannot understand this is that it shows they are NOT "the will of the people." They are a coalition of the elite, the apathetic, the uninformed, the misinformed, and the bribed. That's what "Get out the Vote" means. And the fact conservatives don't function that way cannot be apprehended because it would mean admitting their basic nature and organzing principle.

Assuming there are no legal challenges, we didn't "win" this election. I didn't vote as I did to "win", I did it because I think its will be best for not just me, but all of my opponents as well. In the end, this is first about hearts, and minds, and second about keeping people safe, and making the country a better place for everyone (Think New York under Guilani). I personally feel the latter two mean nothing without the former. We "win" only when we accomplish those goals.

That battle still lies ahead.

Now would be an excellent time to love your left-leaning friend or relative unconditionally, share their pain, and be there for them. This is not a time for crowing.

God bless.

UPDATE: Regarding Suellentrop's core assertion -- regarding disaffected voters -- from the comfort of hindsight we can check it out, and Baseball Crank has the numbers:

When you put the numbers in that context, you see that Bush was actually hugely more successful at the margins in his combination of bringing new voters to the polls and convincing more people to switch to him than away from him. Remember that next time you hear that high turnout always and everywhere favors the Democrats.