This election is a lot like 1980

[quaoar]

In 1980, foreign policy was a mess -- the Iran hostage crisis, the Soviets in Afghanistan resulting in us boycotting the Moscow Olympics that year.

In 1980, the economy was in the crapper -- inflation and interest rates both raging out of control.

In 1980, the incumbent president was seen as bumbling.

In 1980, voters were unsure they could trust the challenger and the incumbent attacked him as too risky.

In 1980, Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan were neck and neck in the polls into late October. Carter even had a slight lead in some polls in October. Reagan won with 51% to Carter's 41% and Anderson's 6.6%. Reagan carried 44 states and won 489 electoral votes to Carter's 49. Republicans seized control of the Senate.

Eight days before the election, in the only debate between the two candidates, Reagan clinched the deal with two devastatingly effective lines: "There you go again" and "Are you better off now than you were four years ago?"

[fertilizeonarbusto]

1. I SO agree.

Over and over again, I'm reminded of '80 this year. I think it will end similarly too.

[WI_DEM]

2. I see your point but it pains me

because Jimmy Carter was alot better president than he is given credit for and much more intelligent than Bush.

[quaoar]

4. All the more reason

Why Bush will lose.

[calico1]

5. Yes, he was a much better President.

Which should give you even more reason to be optimistic.

[abrock]

3. YES, great line!

Clinton, too, used that line in his adverts in 1992. "Its 4 years later... how you doing?" Kerry needs to use it, too. Clinton defeated Bush Sr with it and Kerry will defeat Bush Jr with it.

[MadMichDem]

6. If Carter could have

gotten the hostages released from Iran, he would have won in a landslide. I still think the whole hostage thing stinks. Too "convenient" for them to be released at Reagun's inaguration.

[quaoar]

7. I don't think it would have helped him that much

Carter still would have lost, though probably not by as much.

[yellerpup]

8. This is the reminder I use with friends who suffer poll fatigue

and jitters. Kerry/Edwards is going to shock the smirking one out of his shorts on November 2.

[DemMother]

9. And I think Carter was leading at this point

Seems to me I read recently it was 44 to 40. And, I think even with an earlier hostage release he would have lost. I liked Carter then, and like him even more now, but people had had enough. They'd given him a shot and wanted someone new. Not unlike now--most of the polls show a high percentage of people who want a change, or think we're going in the wrong direction.

Very similar to 1980.

[noonwitch]

10. Carter is a good man, but was not a very good president

Let's face it-to be an effective president, one has to practice a little chicanery now and then. Carter was not capable of that kind of thing-if he was, he wouldn't have told the Playboy reporter that he lusted in his heart after women.

The economy was bad during his presidency, but Reaganomics worked for enough americans that it was considered a success. Yeah, the homeless were everywhere during his term and crack devastated inner cities, but my small-business owning father made a small fortune during the Reagan years, and increased it even more during the Clinton years, when he sold his company for 10 times what he bought it for.