An Early Reagan ; A 1976 Timeline

The RNC 1976
After the votes were cast for Party Nominee in 1976, Ronald Reagan collected enough 'Faithless' delegates to win the convention second round, but the Vice-Presidential vote was hard. Eventually, Nelson Rockefeller was selected by the Vice-Presidential vote. Reagan has told his followers that 'A Rockefeller is better than a Schweiker'.

The DNC 1976
After the votes were cast about 5 ballots were cast, Jimmy Carter clenched nomination. Carter refused to drop out on vote 3, came 2nd in vote 4, and went to win in 5. He nominated Walter Mondale on VP ballot 4.

The General Election

Polls

July 1st:
Reagan: 66% (355)
Carter: 34% (183)

August 1st:
Reagan: 66% (355)
Carter: 34% (183)

September 1st:
Reagan: 69% (371)
Carter: 31% (167)

October 1st:
Reagan: 62% (334)
Carter: 38% (204)

October 31st:
Reagan: 59% (317)
Carter: 41% (221)

General Election:
Reagan: 74% (398)
Carter: 26% (140)

 
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I have a hard time believing Reagan would lead by this big of a margin with Watergate and a weak economy. Does Watergate not happen ITTL?
 
Given that, OTL, the Republican decision between Reagan and Ford came 16-19 August, and given that OTL, the Polls from January to June gave the Democrats something like a 33 point margin over the Republicans, I think you might need to explain how a 33 point Democrat lead became a 30+ point Republican lead at the end of June.

Watergate, Vietnam, disillusionment with Washington corruption, and the perception of Carter as an honest outsider to the Washington circle were powerful factors.

Reagan's problem in the Republican Nomination was that if he didn't go for a liberal Republican as running mate, he wouldn't swing enough liberal votes to overturn Ford. However, choosing a liberal running mate cost him conservative votes. He's really got to increase his base support, which is not going to be easy. Getting Reagan the nomination is possible, if you have Ford making a blunder in the build-up.

However, you've then got Reagan v Carter, both perceived as outsiders to the Washington circle, both perceived as honest. In the aftermath of Watergate, and rather more financial scandals than one would be comfortable with, there was a strong feeling of cleaning out the corruption Big Money had brought to Washington. The choice of Rockefeller as running mate would be really bad news. It would send all the wrong signals.

One of the factors that helped Ford cut Carter's lead was the status of being President at big events; Reagan doesn't benefit from this.

It is not impossible to get a Reagan victory. It is close to impossible to get a Reagan victory on this scale.
 
Reagan's victory is not ridiculous but the margin is. If Reagan wins at all, it will be by a narrow margin, but in any event 74% is preposterous for *any* modern presidential election. Even Harding in 1920, LBJ in 1964 and Nixon in 1972 didn't do better than about 60-61 percent. And even John W. Davis got more than 26% in 1924, even though La Follette probably took more votes away from him than from Coolidge...
 
I think he is calculating the percentage of the electoral vote - which I still believe is too high. But I don't think he's saying Reagan got 74% of the popular vote.
 
Faithless delegates? A Rockefeller is better than a Schweiker? Reagan winning with 74%?
 

Asami

Banned
With all the baggage weighing down the GOP, even if Reagan wins a shattering victory in 1976, the economy and the problems plaguing the US are going to bury him come '80.

MOONBEAM '80?

on second thought maybe Kennedy 1980 because Governor Moonbeam ain't gonna make this country any better...
 
Even 74% of the electoral vote is ridiculous. The Republicans are going to be deeply divided in 1976, regardless of whether they nominate Ford or Reagan, dissatisfaction with the party controlling the White House will still be high--as history shows, this usually hurts the candidate of the incumbent party even if he is an opponent of the incumbent president (see Bryan in 1896)--and overall the GOP will be lucky to win at all, under either Ford or Reagan. I'm not saying it can't be done, but there is no way that 1976 is going to be a GOP *landslide* year.

Moreover, the states where Reagan is likely to be stronger then Ford are mostly western states which Ford carried in OTL (so Reagan's carrying them by larger than Ford's margin will make no difference) or else southern states which Carter carried easily in OTL and which he would probably also carry against Reagan in 1976. (*Even in 1980* Carter carried Georgia and came extremely close to carrying Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Kentucky and the Carolinas. statehttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_election,_1980) Reagan might even lose at least one western state where Ford defeated Carter in 1976--Oregon. (Reagan lost the primary to Ford there 50.31-45.79. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_Party_presidential_primaries,_1976 Incidentally, Reagan also lost the Kentucky, Tennessee, and Florida primaries to ford, so we can't automatically assume he'll be that much stronger than Ford even throughout the South.)

Anyway, if I was confused about whether the original post referred to electoral or popular voters, it was because it kept on referring to the lead in the "polls" Reagan had, and polls (or at least national polls--and state polls were far less common then than now) are used to measure the popular, not the electoral vote. But in any event Reagan is not going to win the electoral vote by 3-1 unless he carries the popular vote by something like eight points at a minimum, and that is extremely unlikely.
 
The reason I keep dwelling on the extreme improbability of a Reagan landslide in 1976 is that it makes a big difference whether Reagan wins narrowly (which I concede is plausible, though I doubt he will even do that) or overwhelmingly. A narrow Reagan victory means that Congress is still heavily Democratic, and very unlikely to go along with Reagan's program as it did in 1981 (when Republicans controlled the Senate and a coalition of Republicans and conservative Democrats had a majority in the House).
 
Your path to victory, for Reagan, would likely include him picking up Texas (26 electoral votes) putting him at 266. Then you can (maybe?) justify Ohio. That'll put Reagan at 291.

However, I would imagine Reagan loses Oregon and Maine. Down to 281.

It becomes hard to justify Illinois, Washington, and maybe even Connecticut, but I can imagine a scenario where Reagan squeaks it out. Alternatively, you could have him lose Illinois (255) and pick up Pennsylvania (282).

Not sure... Definitely doable, but it'll be interesting to see how you do it.
 
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