Was thinking about 2000 again so was drawn back to this thread. Bush/Danforth, aimed to be moderate, ended up with OTL+Iowa - it came down to Florida and I still didn't win the popular vote. Prior to the DUI coming out I was leading in the rust belt, New Mexico & Oregon too.
Pissing off the south on normal is certain to end in defeat - but here's one where it is somewhat close at least. Bryan does about 1% better in the popular vote than OTL, losing by just about 3.5%, and with McKinley being denied a popular vote majority. A 3.502% swing from this would give Bryan the win
Click to see the Electoral College map from my game, and then try it yourself!
www.americanhistoryusa.com
And an outright win is possible on easy. Here, despite McKinley taking advantage of Democratic division to take the upper south, Bryan is able to win the popular vote by nearly 3% and win just 2 electoral votes less than McKinley won OTL, meaning a pretty solid win
Just got potentially the best Clinton win on normal, the thing says it's higher than 100% and its 10 electoral votes higher than the max of the range on the results thing, though the "hall of fame" doesn't seem to be loading so idk for sure. At any rate, its a margin of 15.4%, Clinton winning 56.4-40, with the popular vote being 74.5 million to 54.2 million, an ovre 20 million vote margin. Electoral votes being 445-93
Click to see the Electoral College map from my game, and then try it yourself!
www.americanhistoryusa.com
Speaking of perfect 1968 wins... bringing back my old '68 landslide, an 18 point Humphrey win, with Nixon doing worse even than Alf Landon did in 1936, and Humphrey doing better in the electoral college than LBJ did, losing just 5 states
Pretty sure I just gave Lyndon Johnson a heart attack on election night. Played as Nixon/Dirksen, ran as a moderate-conservative, huge pro-civil rights, pro-national defense Republican, and smashed the Democratic ticket. Like. Hard. 319-204-14. I won Texas 50.6 to 49.4, Illinois 51 to 49, Pennsylvania 50.5 to 49.5. Lost Nevada 50.5 to 49.5, South Carolina 51 to 49, North Carolina 52.5 to 47.5, And Nixon came within 0.2% of winning both Minnesota and Michigan. Lost the popular vote by 0.30%.
(Not shown; Alabama split electoral votes - 5 EVs to JFK/LBJ, 6 EVs to Byrd/various)
Nixon/Dirksen: EV (319), PV (49.57%) Kennedy/Johnson: EV (204), PV (49.87%) Byrd/various: EV (14), PV (0.56%)
EDIT: And this is what the map would look like had there been a 3-point swing in favor of Nixon/Dirksen:
Nixon/Dirksen: EV (406), PV (53.57%) Kennedy/Johnson: EV (117), PV (46.87%) Byrd/various: EV (14), PV (0.56%)
(Not shown; Alabama split electoral votes - 5 EVs to JFK/LBJ, 6 EVs to Byrd/various)
Massive inroads into the South, sweeping most of the East Coast, and coming incredibly close to winning New York State. 50.83% JFK/LBJ to 49.17% Nixon/Dirksen.
Click to see the Electoral College map from my game, and then try it yourself!
www.americanhistoryusa.com
The election was decided by wafer-thin wins in South Dakota and Montana. Won South Dakota by 1,181 votes, if Bush had won that it would have been a 269-269 tie. Montana was won by 2,541 votes.
Click to see the Electoral College map from my game, and then try it yourself!
www.americanhistoryusa.com
Ran as Ford in 1976, with Howard Baker as running mate. Without Ford's debate gaffe about Eastern Europe, result was 272-266 in Carter's favour, thanks to Carter winning Wisconsin by 236 votes.