WI: Bill Clinton nominated for President in 1988

What if the Democrats nominated Bill Clinton instead of Michael Dukakis in 1988? What would the campaign have been like? Could Clinton have defeated Bush at the time?
 
Clinton would've ran a better campaign than Dukakis, but would still lose to Bush in a closer election than OTL.
 
The problem is that there already was a southern "new Democrat" in the race--Al Gore. There wasn't room enough for two.
 
I could see him winning tbh. There are plenty of metrics by which Dukakis was stronger than Bush early in the race, and I do think his loss can ultimately be pinned on a lousy campaign. Assuming Clinton has a team with as much say as OTL 1992, he could definitely pull it off.
 
Clinton got a lot of help from Perot in '92, so I don't see him winning in '88. And if he loses, I'm not sure who goes in '92, but it may be a tough road if they can't campaign.
 
This is a myth. Perot took about equal number of votes from both major party candidates.

Possible, though I've also heard Perot could have won if he knew how to campaign.

That said, I don't see him pulling it off in '88. He was a better campaigner than Dukakis but he kicked Bush while he was down in '92. I see Bush winning a tight contest and probably losing another in '92 depending on who his opponent is.
 
Clinton got a lot of help from Perot in '92, so I don't see him winning in '88. And if he loses, I'm not sure who goes in '92, but it may be a tough road if they can't campaign.

I don't think the difference was Perot--exit polls showed he took votes about equally from Bush and Clinton and from those who would not have voted at all (Perot was one reason there was a spike in turnout, a temporary reversal of the trend toward declining turnout). The real differences were (1) there had been a recession in 1990-91, and though it was theoretically over by November 1992, unemployment as usual was a lagging indicator--it was 7.4 percent in November 1992 compared to 5.3 percent in November 1988. https://fred.stlouisfed.org/data/UNRATE.txt (2) Clinton's lack of foreign policy experience didn't hurt so much in 1992 as it would have in 1988 because the Soviet Union no longer existed by 1992 and the world seemed to be a less dangerous place, (3) the mere fact that the Republicans had been in the White House for four more years created a greater mood for change. Also, (4) while some still considered Bill Clinton too young and inexperienced in 1992, he was at any rate four years older and more experienced than he had been in 1988...
 
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I agree that Bill Clinton would face an uphill climb. He'd be going up against the popularity of Reagan, and Lee Atwater. Questions: would allegations of extramarital affairs arise like they did in 1992? And who would Bill pick to be his running mate?
 

Towelie

Banned
The Atwater factor is a big one here. Clinton was shady as fuck as things were, and mud would have been slung all over the place.

But structurally, Bush had the advantage as it was with a popular President and a decent economy.

Clinton does better than Dukakis, but not by that much.
 
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