Hypothesis on the nature of this election: 1980 redux
Hackneyed pols often trot out the example of 1980 and Ronald Reagan as key to understanding the effect of debates.
In that election, RR was tied or trailing Jimmy Carter for months until the debates "showed" that RR wasn't a complete corpse on stage. It
assured the public (or so we are told) that Reagan was ready...and people fell in line to vote for him.
A lot of people have been presuming this to be the template for the current election...believing that HRC is carter and Trump is Reagan.
But what if this is wrong? Clinton's numbers are the most elastic: she passes 50% frequently in the polls, when not under press attack.
Trump NEVER does. People want to vote for her over Trump, but are concerned about the bad press she has gotten.
So maybe this means that people are waiting for a reason to get on board with Hillary. Maybe SHE is Reagan in this scenario.
Just a thought.
= new reply since forum marked as read
"Obama will lose just like Jimmy Carter did because undecideds always break for the challenger."
I guess they usually do, until they didn't.
Another one you often heard was "no sitting President has ever been reelected with unemployment above 7%." The rationale there being that since it was 7.5% in September 1980 and 7.6% in September 1992 (when the incumbents lost), a 7.8% reading in September 2012 meant Obama was done for.
The big difference there being that unemployment had actually risen in 1980, from an average of 5.8% in 1979 (which was pretty good considering that the Baby Boomers were flooding the labor market at the time); it was likewise higher from '91 to '92.
Obama, on the other hand, faced 10% unemployment in his first year in office, such that 7.8% actually looked pretty good (thanks Obama).
Carter's reelection chances were doomed as early as April 1980, when his rescue attempt failed; the polls from that year all reflect that (he was as much as 20 points behind Reagan at the low point, in July). August was a good month for him, with an economy on the mend and fairly good convention - especially his "two futures" speech, which he delivered by heart b/c the teleprompter went down without anyone noticing (a Bush/Casey August surprise?).
But he consistently trailed Reagan in the final stretch - especially after that fateful debate, where the telegenic Reagan won the coin toss, unfortunately, and spoke last. His access to Carter's debate notes certainly didn't hurt Ronnie either.
Getting back to inflation, Carter might have at least not had such a trouncing had he not made the mistake of trying to tackle inflation during an election year (a cardinal sin in politics). He did this by way of a brief but draconian credit control period - in the deeply recessive Spring quarter in '80 - sandwiched between spells of 20% prime interest rates (early in '80, and then again in December).
To this, of course, we should add that constant black cloud over the '80 race - the hostages. No one seriously doubts that Carter would have won in an upset had he succeeded in securing their release - as he almost did on several occasions once that kleptocrat the Shah died in July.
Their release, of course, release always seemed to fall through for no apparent reason. But then, Republicans and hostages are seldom too far from one another - especially before a tight election.
