Chaos: The Presidential Election of 1996

Jasen777

Jasen777

Donor
From the autobiography of Dick Morris -

Colin Powell had just published his memoir. The President was worried. Powell was leading him in the polls, but he was a phantom, presenting nothing that could be attacked.

I was bringing good news however. Powell was pro-choice, for affirmative action, and favored some gun control. He didn't really have a party. Polls showed him way behind Dole in the race for the Republican nomination. "Congratulations," I told the President, "he can't win the nomination and so he can't run in the general - you've just won re-election."

Of course, I had overlooked a possibility...
 
Jasen777

Jasen777

Donor
From Chaos: A History of the 1996 Presidential Election -

Most agree that Powell had been strongly leaning towards not running for the Presidency, as well as declaring himself as a Republican (this despite the fact that he had voted for Kennedy and Johnson). The role of Alma, his wife, in this was well known.

History changed that terrible day in April. Alma was killed in a car accident. Colin, by all accounts, loved his wife deeply and her death hit him hard. He disappeared from public for a month. When he reappeared, it was obvious he was intent on running for President, all unease about seeking political office had disappeared.

His inclination was still to run as a Republican. It is not certain what changed his mind. What is known is that he had a closed door meeting with several influential Republican Party leaders on June. 12th. What happened there is still unknown. Some speculate that he was insulted personally, or perhaps became convinced that as a black man he couldn't win the Republican nomination. There is no evidence for this however.

It seems more probable that he simply took a look at the information. Polls of him running as a Republican against Clinton had him winning. But polls also had him well behind Dole for the Republican nomination. Advisers also warned him about the Bradley effect. Running as a Democrat would have put him up against a incumbent president, an impossible task in a primary.

The prudent thing might have been to wait until 2000 to run. Perhaps if his wife had not died he would have. But he was intent on running in '96.
 
Jasen777

Jasen777

Donor
HueyLong said:
Clinton, Dole, Perot, Powell?
Click to expand...

Probably not.

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From Chaos: A History of the 1996 Presidential Election -

By fall of 1995, the race appeared to be taking form. President Clinton looked like he would be unopposed in the Democratic Primary. Bob Dole was a huge favorite in the Republican race, but he would face a large crowd of challengers. Colin Powell was as yet undeclared, but few doubted that he would run as an independent. Ross Perot was nowhere to be seen. The third parties were their usual irrelevant selves.

On October 1st, the first major nationwide poll with the 3 main candidates was published. The results:

Clinton: 32%
Dole: 30%
Powell: 30%
Undecided/Other: 8%

[FONT=&quot]It was a statistical three-way tie. The stage was now set.




[/FONT]
 
Jasen777

Jasen777

Donor
[FONT=&quot]Authors note: the above poll is closely based on an actual Gallup poll taken a little while before the date given here. It asked who people would vote for in a a race between Democrat Bill Clinton, Republican Bob Dole, and Independent Colin Powell. Here Powell does slightly better due to being more decisive at entering the campaign as well as a small sympathy bump for his wife dying.

Subsequent polls and voting results will be based actual polling data from the time (when applicable), and the candidates favorability ratings from the time period, of which there is a good breakdown between the different groups in the electorate available for each of the main candidates. All [/FONT][FONT=&quot]modified to fit the facts of TTL of course.
[/FONT]
 

Nicomacheus

Well, given the closeness of Powell's relationship with his wife, killing her off could well have profound effects on his psyche.

Look forward to the shenaningans, in any case. I wonder just how many presidents we'll see between 1996-2000.
 
Jasen777

Jasen777

Donor
From the autobiography of Dick Morris -

The President's opinion of me appeared to have dropped as a result of my failure to predict Powell's run as an independent (he hadn't declared, but everyone could now see it coming). Nevertheless, I was still a great asset for him…

Dole had to focus on the Republican primaries; he had even resigned his Senate seat do to so. Powell was still undeclared. With some shrewd media buys and the free press available to an incumbent president, we were able to put out a positive image of the President, especially in what were expected to be crucial states...

The political battle with Congress over the government shutdown also helped. We turned Gingrich into our whipping boy and used him to smear all Republicans with, even Dole who was trying to stay as far away as he could…


From Chaos: A History of the 1996 Presidential Election -

Clinton had clearly benefited from his showdown with Congress, and Dole was losing ground in the national polls as his Republican rivals attacked him. By late January, some analysts were even predicting that the Republican race was meaningless and that come November the election would be a two-man race between Clinton and Powell...

Aggregate Presidential Poll 01/31/96

Clinton: 35%
Powell: 30%
Dole: 26%
Undecided/Other: 9%
 

Nicomacheus

Jasen777 said:
Not sure what you mean here...
Click to expand...

Oh, nothing specific. It just occurred to me that you could have the election go to the House of Reps, an assassination, an impeachment -- all sorts of tomfoolery if you really want chaos.

Nonetheless, I look forward to Powell's campaign. Want kind of on the ground organization will he have?
 
Jasen777

Jasen777

Donor
Nicomacheus said:
Oh, nothing specific. It just occurred to me that you could have the election go to the House of Reps, an assassination, an impeachment -- all sorts of tomfoolery if you really want chaos.

Nonetheless, I look forward to Powell's campaign. Want kind of on the ground organization will he have?
Click to expand...

I only have events up to the election (loosely) planned out. But if there's interest maybe I'll continue past that.

Without a party, his local level organization is going to be very weak many places, he's going to have to rely more on mass media. And he faces the difficult prospect of using moderates and independents as a base.
 
Jasen777

Jasen777

Donor
News Clippings -



Feb. 13rd

Dole Barely Survives Iowa
Strong Showings by Buchanan, Alexander

As expected, Bob Dole won the Iowa Caucus yesterday, gathering 24 percent of the vote. This must be regarded as a disappointing showing for Dole, whose air of inevitability has been critically punctured.

Building on his win in the Alaskan Straw Poll, firebrand Patrick Buchanan came in second with 23 percent of the vote. Perhaps the biggest surprise was the strong third-place finish of Lamar Alexander who pulled in 21 percent of the vote. Steve Forbes and Phil Gramm finished in a practical dead heat for fourth with a disappointing 8% each.

The Dole campaign must be concerned as the race now moves to notoriously underdog favoring New Hampshire…


Feb. 21st

Buchanan wins New Hampshire
Dole second, Alexander third

Pat Buchanan pulled off a surprise victory in the New Hampshire primary yesterday, winning 30 percent of the vote. Bob Dole barely hung on for second place over Lamar Alexander, 24% to 23%.

With Steve Forbes positioned to win the Delaware primary in three days, one wonders what the future of the Dole campaign is…


Feb. 25th

Dole Wins Delaware
Dejected Forbes to announce withdraw

In a surprise victory that supporters hope will reinvigorate his campaign, Bob Dole won the Delaware primary with 34 percent of the vote to Steve Forbes' 28 percent. The Forbes campaign, which had counted on winning the state, is now expected to announce a withdraw from the race shortly.


Feb. 28th

Banner Day for Dole

Bob Dole swept the three primaries today: Arizona, South Dakota, and North Dakota. His campaign now believes they have rebuilt their air of inevitability that was lost in New Hampshire. This is likely premature however, as Pat Buchanan had strong second place showings in all 3 states. It now appears the Republican nomination has become a two-man race.


March 3rd

Buchanan Wins South Carolina

Just when things were starting to look up for Bob Dole, Pat Buchanan has handed him another setback by wining the South Carolina primary. Rhetoric had heated up between the two, and the state saw the hardest campaigning of the presidential season yet. Buchanan's narrow victory, 37 percent to 35 percent, likely means that the race will now become a protracted one. Republicans had hoped to avoid that, as President Clinton has been unopposed, and Colin Powell looms as well…


March 6th

Super Tuesday a Victory for Dole
Buchanan wins Georgia

Bob Dole won seven of the eight states up for grabs yesterday, with Pat Buchanan managing a win only in Georgia. This would seem to all but clinch the nomination for Dole…
 

maverick

Banned
Looks interesting...

Now I wonder...will you do this considering the statistics state by state in order to get the Electoral Vote done right?
 
Jasen777

Jasen777

Donor
From Chaos: A History of the 1996 Presidential Election -

 The strong challenge from Buchanan had been unexpected. With Powell looming over the proceedings, it was thought by many in the Republican base that a true social conservative would be needed in the general election, in order to draw a clear distinction from the other two candidates. This seems to have been what fueled Buchanan's rise. It gave Dole no choice but to move to the right during the Republican campaign.

Dole still had the money and the support of the party bosses to win the longer than expected race. It was clear after Super Tuesday that Dole would win the nomination. It was also clear that Buchanan could keep on campaigning and win a state here or there, and perhaps critically wound Dole for the general election. This likely lead to the deal that saw Buchanan surprisingly drop out of the race two days after Super Tuesday, and not so surprisingly, later receive the Republican vice-presidential nomination.

Meanwhile Colin Powell had shrewdly announced his official candidacy shortly after Dole's defeat in New Hampshire, and had received a round of favorable coverage from the press…

Aggregate Presidential Poll 03/10/96

Powell: 35%
Clinton: 33%
Dole: 24%
Undecided/Other: 8%


From the autobiography of Dick Morris -

I had warned the President that whenever Powell got around to officially declaring his candidacy that he would receive a bump in the polls, but the President was still quite upset. Other of his advisors seized the opportunity to poison the President's mind against me, and forced me out of his inner circle. In effect, I was fired.

It was only natural then that I join Powell's campaign staff…
[FONT=&quot][/FONT]
 

Nicomacheus

Jasen777 said:
From the autobiography of Dick Morris -

I had warned the President that whenever Powell got around to officially declaring his candidacy that he would receive a bump in the polls, but the President was still quite upset. Other of his advisors seized the opportunity to poison the President's mind against me, and forced me out of his inner circle. In effect, I was fired.

It was only natural then that I join Powell's campaign staff…
Click to expand...

That was unexpected. Powell certainly has a leg up now!
 
Jasen777

Jasen777

Donor
From Chaos: A History of the 1996 Presidential Election -

The time from mid-March until the party conventions in August were relatively uneventful, especial compared to what came later. It was too early for the public to pay that much attention to the race, and they were experiencing news fatigue anyways after the Republican primary and the excitement of Powell's entry. Nevertheless, many important events transpired during this time.

Perhaps the most important of these events was Powell's decision to pick Ohio Governor George Voinovich as his running mate. The campaign had hoped to pick a moderate Democrat for the VP slot, but all of the top choices were uninterested. The search then turned to independent and Republican candidates. Voinovich meet many of the campaign's wish items: he was a moderate (or could be presented as one), had solid economic credentials as the man who had turned around Ohio's economy, hadn't taken any real positions on a variety of national issues which left room for maneuver open, and had government, but non-D.C, experience. Of course, being a popular governor of a key state didn't hurt…

It appears that it was during this team that Perot was convinced by advisors that with Powell in the race there was no room for another independent candidate…

Aggregate Presidential Poll 08/01/96

Clinton: 35%
Powell: 30%
Dole: 26%
Undecided/Other: 9%




From the autobiography of Dick Morris -

… Voinovich wasn't a perfect pick of course, there were a few problems. His positions were generally acceptable, but he had taken an anti-abortion stance in the past. We were able to modify this to supporting abortion rights with reasonable restrictions, which of course was the line Powell was taking.

I'm a believer though that the Vive-President pick doesn't matter much as long as he doesn't make any big mistakes. We hoped he could deliver Ohio though…

Powell had dropped in the polls as his honeymoon period ended and the public realized he was a real person and not some sort of political messiah. This was only to be expected, and we launched our "leader with vision and integrity" campaign in hopes of making ground back up.

I was also taking a long look at the electoral map. We really needed to win some big states. Winning the eight largest states (California, New York, Texas, Florida, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio, and Michigan) would get us to 228 electoral votes and almost to the majority. This fit well with our mass-media strength, raising money had been no problem, but local level organization was still lagging. We deiced to focus then on the largest states, California in particular was absolutely critical…
 
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