Reagan pulling a Nixon?

TNF is 100 percent right on all counts. I wouldnt blame the Democrats for chasing wall street, but they did lose a huge part of their base.

Gore also forgot about a little thing we call math. Had he won New Hampshire, he would've won the election. He should have spent more time there, because he had 266 without it.

Completely agreed on Dukakis and the 1980s.

On a note, in regards to New Liberalism and McGovern and all, the Democras can't win with a limousine liberal. Since the inception of the modern limousine liberal in 1968 (not saying Humphrey was one because that would be mental, but the hippies and all), the Democrats have won a single election with one of those candidates: 2008. They also would have been quite awful opposition if they lost that one. This year, we see a more populist, more labor liberal Obama, and it's no surprise he's doing well in the polls despite a shitty economy. When the Democrats stay true to their roots as the New Deal party, they win. If they try to become the liberal elite party, they get killed. We can unite ivory tower intellectualism and rust belt populism, they most certainly aren't mutually exclusive.
 
And as for the debates, Carter actually won mos of them in regards to policy. They were just hollow wins because Reagan spun them better.
 
Had Carter actually campaigned on the issues, rather than simply attacking his opponent, he might have won. Prior to the debates, Carter held a strong lead over Reagan. The South was very close. Had Carter flipped enough states in the South, and won enough of the North, he'd have beaten Reagan, albeit by a smaller margin than he won in 1976.


I disagree - it didn't matter who was running against Carter in 1980 (Reagan, Ford, Bush, Dole, etc.) Carter was going to lose. He was more lackluster than Mondale and he called for the reversal of most of Ford's Domestic programs (which were actually turning the country around and would have given us record low unemployment by '78, a balanced budget by '79 and a surplus by '81) and the result was record unemployment, record deficit (even though Reagan tripled it), record high interest rates, and an Energy Crisis.


We wouldn't be having this discussion right now if we would've been smart and elected Ford in '76. I'm a Reagan fan, but Ronnie would've retired as a former actor and ex-Governor, if we had Jerry.
 
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