The 1988 election was the closest Presidential contest since 1960. New York Governor Mario Cuomo defeated Vice-President George Bush by a margin of 280 to 258 in the electoral college, and only 49.6% to 49.4% in the popular vote. What could Bush have done differently to beat Cuomo in 1988?
 

Dolan

Banned
Maybe have Bush not said his now famous (and funny) line about how the Soviet Union will lilely to stay for Next Century, even Reagan facepalmed at that remark.

Soviet Union fall and broke peacefully in 1992 end up being credited to President Cuomo instead of Reagan.
 
Best POD would be a different D nominee. The runner up was Massachusetts governor Mike Dukakis. He was very wooden and uncharismatic, and with how close the election was, you don't need to move very many votes to change the outcome.

If Bush wins in 1988, the Democrats might not be able to field a strong candidate in 1992 due to the perception of the GOP being unbeatable. So he gets two terns, and the Republicans hold the White House until the next inconveniently timed recession. 2000 in OTL but with the butterflies, could be 1996 or 2004.
 
Best POD would be a different D nominee. The runner up was Massachusetts governor Mike Dukakis. He was very wooden and uncharismatic, and with how close the election was, you don't need to move very many votes to change the outcome.

I'm reminded of one of the great ironies of the 1988 campaign. Bush had a genuinely impressive military career - he was shot down in air combat - but he just looked ridiculous posing in that tank. His tall frame hung out of the hatch like a scarecrow, and his ballistic helmet was too small. He looked like a pinhead. It did him no favours. Even today people remember George H Bush posing in the tank, pointing like an idiot and grinning.

Dukakis' military career was very short but he successfully came across as tough, no-nonsense on defence issues. He had that over Cuomo.
 
I'm reminded of one of the great ironies of the 1988 campaign. Bush had a genuinely impressive military career - he was shot down in air combat - but he just looked ridiculous posing in that tank. His tall frame hung out of the hatch like a scarecrow, and his ballistic helmet was too small. He looked like a pinhead. It did him no favours. Even today people remember George H Bush posing in the tank, pointing like an idiot and grinning.

Dukakis' military career was very short but he successfully came across as tough, no-nonsense on defence issues. He had that over Cuomo.

If not for that ad, Bush would have become President. In fact anything could have changed the outcome: not picking Dan Quayle, no 1987 stock market crash, no Iran-Contra, etc. The only reason that election was so close was because of Cuomo's liberalism and rumors of his mafia ties. Bush's campaign manager, Lee Atwater, helped develop a smear campaign against Cuomo's Italian-American background.

If Bush wins in 1988, the Democrats might not be able to field a strong candidate in 1992 due to the perception of the GOP being unbeatable. So he gets two terns, and the Republicans hold the White House until the next inconveniently timed recession. 2000 in OTL but with the butterflies, could be 1996 or 2004.

I think you mean in OTL the incumbent Democratic Party held the White House until 2000, right? Cuomo was re-elected over Bob Dole in 1992. Vice-President Lloyd Bentsen declined to run in 1996, the same year that the Gore/Kerry ticket narrowly defeated the Republican ticket of George W. Bush and John Danforth. Only in 2000 was the Democratic hold on the White House broken by John McCain.
 
Maybe have Bush not said his now famous (and funny) line about how the Soviet Union will lilely to stay for Next Century, even Reagan facepalmed at that remark.

Soviet Union fall and broke peacefully in 1992 end up being credited to President Cuomo instead of Reagan.

I think Bush was trying to say that if Cuomo were elected the USSR would continue for at least the next 15 years, but it came off badly. Bush was generally a worse speaker and debater than Cuomo, which gave the Democrats the edge in a tight race. I agree that Dukakis would have been an easier candidate to beat, and given how Cuomo just barely beat Bush I think the Duke would have lost.
 
If not for that ad, Bush would have become President. In fact anything could have changed the outcome: not picking Dan Quayle, no 1987 stock market crash, no Iran-Contra, etc. The only reason that election was so close was because of Cuomo's liberalism and rumors of his mafia ties. Bush's campaign manager, Lee Atwater, helped develop a smear campaign against Cuomo's Italian-American background.



I think you mean in OTL the incumbent Democratic Party held the White House until 2000, right? Cuomo was re-elected over Bob Dole in 1992. Vice-President Lloyd Bentsen declined to run in 1996, the same year that the Gore/Kerry ticket narrowly defeated the Republican ticket of George W. Bush and John Danforth. Only in 2000 was the Democratic hold on the White House broken by John McCain.

I mean the next recession OTL was in 2000.
 
I'm reminded of one of the great ironies of the 1988 campaign. Bush had a genuinely impressive military career - he was shot down in air combat - but he just looked ridiculous posing in that tank. His tall frame hung out of the hatch like a scarecrow, and his ballistic helmet was too small. He looked like a pinhead. It did him no favours. Even today people remember George H Bush posing in the tank, pointing like an idiot and grinning.

Dukakis' military career was very short but he successfully came across as tough, no-nonsense on defence issues. He had that over Cuomo.

It's one of those odd aspects of politics in the age of modern media that appearance or a single incident can cause bad misperceptions. Bush had an impressive military resume and was a courageous pilot and when he earned his wings of gold he was the youngest pilot in the US Navy yet people viewed him as a wimp for some reason. Similar to Ford - the guy was a terrific athlete. He played football at the University of Michigan and was even offered contracts by NFL teams but because of one video of him tripping and falling people viewed him as a klutz.

A gawky and gangly guy like Abraham Lincoln could never get elected in the modern era simply due to appearance alone.
 
Bush just was never destined for the job. After leaving the vice presidency he spent a lot of his time attacking The Simpsons. Very bizarre.
 
Bush just was never destined for the job. After leaving the vice presidency he spent a lot of his time attacking The Simpsons. Very bizarre.

Then you have his son, George W., who ran for President in 1996. Forgetting that Social Security is a federal program in the middle of a TV debate has got to be one of the most embarrassing moments in political history.
 
Then you have his son, George W., who ran for President in 1996. Forgetting that Social Security is a federal program in the middle of a TV debate has got to be one of the most embarrassing moments in political history.
How he somehow managed to win that election is beyond me
 
How he somehow managed to win that election is beyond me

OOC: We've already covered 1996, and Bush lost the election:

I think you mean in OTL the incumbent Democratic Party held the White House until 2000, right? Cuomo was re-elected over Bob Dole in 1992. Vice-President Lloyd Bentsen declined to run in 1996, the same year that the Gore/Kerry ticket narrowly defeated the Republican ticket of George W. Bush and John Danforth. Only in 2000 was the Democratic hold on the White House broken by John McCain.
 
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Bush's campaign was high-minded, focusing on his tenure as Vice President and his military experience in an effort to project a kindly granddad image that baby boomers weren't particularly enthused by. Perhaps he should have taken a page from Nixon's smear campaigns and portrayed Cuomo's New York as a den of crime, corruption, and violence.
 
Bush's campaign was high-minded, focusing on his tenure as Vice President and his military experience in an effort to project a kindly granddad image that baby boomers weren't particularly enthused by. Perhaps he should have taken a page from Nixon's smear campaigns and portrayed Cuomo's New York as a den of crime, corruption, and violence.

The thing is, I couldn't shake the fact throughout the whole campaign he really didn't want to win and was only running because he was expected to. Watch his concession speech on YouTube sometime, his face is the face of a man who just had the weight of the world removed from his shoulders.
 
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