What about his running in 1976? One problem is that there were so many liberals running to the left of Carter (Bayh, Harris, Udall, Church) but if Mondale could do well in the Iowa caucus (and after all IA and MN are neighbors...) and then either win in NH or at least come in second place behind Carter (and ahead of Udall and Harris), he might become *the* candidate of the anti-Carter liberals, and he might have a chance for the nomination. Admittedly, in November, he is going to do much worse than Carter in the South, but there is just a chance he could win enough northern and western states Carter narrowly lost (NJ, IL, CA, IA, OR, ME, NM--maybe WA if he picks Scoop Jackson as his running mate) to defeat Ford. I would say the odds are against him, though; for example, even if he does better than Carter in the Chicago area that could be offset by his doing worse in southern Illinois.