Why Romney Won’t Be Reagan This Year
With the President leading in polls, GOP spinners are positing 2012 as 1980 again, when a late Reagan surge swept a Democrat from the White House. That lead balloon won’t float, for numerous reasons:
Obama is no Jimmy Carter. Despite all the venom from the Radical Right, today’s President is far more popular than the former peanut farmer ever was. In 1980, Democrats deserted him in droves—-among them, Leon Jaworski, the Watergate prosecutor, and Eugene McCarthy, who had challenged LBJ over Vietnam in 1968. He called Carter “the worst president we’ve ever had.”
Romney is no Reagan. Behind in the polls at the time, the former actor demolished a sitting President with folksy charm in the October debates, smiling and sighing at Carter’s attacks, “There you go again.” Can anyone picture Romney out-charming Obama that way? Has anyone ever used “charm” and “Romney” in the same sentence before?
Iran can’t control American voters. In the final weekend of the 1980 campaign, Iranians torpedoed Carter by announcing they wouldn’t release their American hostages, depriving him of an “October surprise.” They waited until Reagan took office to do so, but they have no such leverage today.
Looking back at 1980, the political landscape then would unrecognizable today. John Anderson ran as an Independent moderate Republican and pulled 6.6 percent of the national vote.
The Libertarians had their own slate, drawing one percent, with a vice-presidential candidate, David Koch of the Koch brothers, who now fund the Tea Party in its attempt to take down the U.S. government.
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Iran may be out of the picture but there’s no dearth of other flash fires that may erupt; the closer to the election, the more influence they will have. I’d say it has to be a Mexico eruption or another terrorist attack to exceed that Iran burr under the saddle.
I didn’t know about Koch’s VP candidacy, but I did happen to vote for John Anderson that year. Having lived under a Reagan administration in California, I convinced my parents (non-discriminating Republicans) to not vote for him. Maybe they didn’t vote at all.
I don’t think the Tea Party wants to do away with government completely, they want it to be the way it used to be when white, middle class, real Americans could find a good job and, if the kids couldn’t be convinced they’d be better off learning a trade, be able to help put them through college. Then they could retire and spend 6 months with the grandchildren and 6 months in a sunny clime. Those days are gone forever and it’s no wonder SOMEONE IS UPSET!
Reagan could have made them contented, if not happy, with their lot, but neither Obama nor Romney will ever acquire that soothing touch.
Yeah, I voted for John Anderson too. He seemed like a good guy to me and a reasonable alternative to the other guys. Of course Carter has done a lot of good since leaving office and Reagan mythology far outweighs any actual good he did. Btw, he (Reagan) would be jettisoned by the TP’ers in a heartbeat if he was around today.