samcster94
Banned
I Know there is a similar thread of this, but mine is less time constrained than theirs and my demands are smaller. What can be done to get this kind of margin at any point with a POD of 1980(which goes as it does OTL)???
Reagan there when the Ayatollah seized power would be different.Ford or Reagan win in a narrow 76 win, things got much like OTL and added to long term incumbency whichever Dem gets the ticket wins in a landslide
A number of ideas:
1) Bill Clinton. Bill Clinton came very close twice in 1992 and 1996 so I don't see why he couldn't pull it off with some minor butterflies.
2) McCain picks Lieberman for his VP, conservatives don't show up to vote, and Bob Barr runs a less terrible campaign that clears 2% and does especially well in SC and GA. Obama wins Missouri, Montana, South Carolina, and Georgia
3) Obama v Santorum v Johnson. Johnson picks a better VP (Goldwater Jr went to Johnson Rallies, Roemer endorsed him) and Santorum reacts to Todd Aikin and Richard Mourdock very poorly. The Santorum meltdown crossed with a viable third-party Tea Partyesque ticket siphoning votes from Santorum leads to Obama sweeping over 400.
4) Biden-Booker is the 2016 Democratic ticket. Biden plays strong to the rust belt, responds well to Trump's attacks, and Booker boosts youth and African-American turnout. They sweep past 400 electoral votes.
Obama picks Hillary Clinton for VP.
16% of John McCain's vote came from Hillary Clinton voters who were unhappy she wasn't the nomaniee. Just half of them staying Democratic is a another huge boost for Obama that probably gets Obama to 400.
Maybe Mitt Romney is the nomanie. A businessman running during a recession caused by big buisnness. The ads write themeslves,
Bill Clinton picks Ann Richards as VP and takes Texas in 1992. Done.
Hillary 2008 or a more blue dog Hillary 2016
Bill Clinton if the Republicans mess up and nominate Pat Buchanan or Ross Perot doesn't run in 1992 or 1996
I think 2) 3) and 4) are wrong. By 2008-2016 American politics had just become too polarized for any Democrat--or Republican--to get 400 electoral votes. Conservatives would have swallowed McCain-Lieberman to defeat Obama, likewise enough mainstream Republicans would support Santorum, and Trump was never going to be wiped out.
To show how things have changed: In 1992, there were only four states where Bill Clinton was more than ten points behind GHW Bush--and none where he was more than 17.18 points behind. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1992 (I don't think this is mainly because of Perot, who, as exit pols showed, took votes from both major party candidates.) By 2008, there were fifteen states which Obama lost by at least 11.77 points. If McCain just carried all those states which in OTL he carried by 8.41 points or more, Obama would be short of 400. (Moreover, Lieberman might gain as well as lose votes for McCain.)
I think it's misleading to think the reason third party candidates have done poorly lately is that they ran poor campaigns. They may indeed have run poor campaigns, but that's not the main reason. The main reason is that so many people think that the major party that they dislike is not only misguided but evil, and therefore defeating it must be the first prioirity.
Gary Johnson in 2012 didn't even bother to think about asking Roemer to be VP and he had a 2.5 million dollar campaign. In 2016 he had a 10-11 million dollar campaign that was maybe a little bit better run than in 2012 but HRC spent 50 million going after him according to some reports (which in hindsight was pretty dumb considering Johnson and McMullin probably saved Minnesota and New Hampshire for her). Johnson polled up to 7-8% in 2012 and 13% in 2016, both campaigns never really getting that high in name-ID (Johnson never broke 30% name-ID pre-Aleppo). I'm not denying that as you approach the end of the race the numbers will drop (although in 2016 it oddly enough took 4-6 weeks longer than usual for Johnson's numbers to really start dropping below the 7-8% line) but it's a matter of "do better early, hold on to a large chunk of your base, do well by third party standards". I don't think a meltdown of one party's candidate is enough to break 400 in the hyper-partisan age. I think meltdown plus not-terrible third party candidacy is how you get past 400.
Obama was pretty close in 2008. Montana was a 2 point defeat and Missouri was .2%. Barr was from Georgia, so the idea of him campaigning not-crummily (a Barr-Gravel ticket maybe?) and spoiling McCain in that area where Obama lost by under 5 points (especially if Palin is not mobilizing folks) isn't that crazy. Alternatively Ron Paul could just run Libertarian with Barr or Goldwater Jr as his running mate.
Obama - Biden 53.4% (402)
McCain - Lieberman 43.2% (136)
Barr - Gravel 2.4% (0)
Santorum being the 2012 candidate, screwing up *two* abortion-related controversies (he endorsed Aikin after the legitimate rape comment - come on!) and losing the votes of abortion moderates or women to a Johnson-Goldwater/Roemer ticket as well as Obama isn't that nuts. If you throw something like Bob McDonnell being the VP, that's a complete meltdown of a ticket.
Obama - Biden 53.1% (402)
Santorum - McDonnell 41.2% (136)
Johnson - Goldwater 3.9% (0)
In 2016, after the Access Hollywood tape, Trump very effectively turned the discussion into an indictment of Hillary Clinton. Without the sordid background of the Clintons, I just can't see Donald Trump pulling such a thing against another candidate. Biden has the personality in which he could probably hit back against Trump bar-fight style. Biden could play well to the rust belt whereas Booker could boost black turnout. Plus Biden was just much less offensive than Clinton to a large swath of conservative Americans, so you'd see much less of that "we need to defeat Hillary" mentality there. Have Trump make a bad decision and pick Chris Christie for his VP (whom he considered rewarding for his loyalty with the role) and you've got a meltdown.
Biden - Booker 52.2% (474)
Trump - Christie 38.1% (61)
Johnson - Weld 7.27% (3) -Because Alaska doesn't care about normal politics at all