The New York Observer’s Politicker blog compares the current campaign to the 1976 election:
An unelected president, Ford had barely secured the Republican nomination against a fierce challenge from Ronald Reagan, leaving the party’s conservative base dispirited and even more distrustful of Ford than they already had been. And the stench of Watergateâ€â€and Ford’s politically damaging pardon of Richard Nixonâ€â€stubbornly hung in the air. After eight years of Republican rule, an amorphous but potent yearning for change had taken hold.
At the Vail strategy session, the Ford team zeroed in on the chief vulnerabilities of their Democratic opponent, Jimmy Carter: His lack of experience, his lack of accomplishments and his lack of specificity on the issues. These had to be exploited mercilessly.
And they were. Ten weeks later, Ford came within an eyelash of a political miracle. After trailing by 33 points around Labor Day, he was edged out by a handful of electoral votesâ€â€and just two points in the popular vote. If the campaign had lasted even a week longer, many believe, Ford would have won.
***
(T)he ’76 example tells us that criticisms that don’t stick during the primary season can still work in the general election. Day after day in fall campaign, the Ford forces pounded away at the experience question and painted Carter as a political illusion, an affable-seeming politician who was terrified of expressing his opinion on any controversial topic.
***
The media eventually caught on too, scrutinizing Carter with a daily intensity that was absent in the primary season, and Carter’s lead steadily eroded.
There are differences also, of course. Nevertheless, it is worth noting that Ford would have won but for two states he lost by no more than 5,600 votes – Ohio and Hawaii.
Indeed, we have had a recurring 16-year cycle of “change” elections for a while now, with many similar features. In 1960, the “change” candidate was JFK — to whom Obama is often compared, despirte Kennedy having more experience in Congress than Obama. In 1992, there were two change candidates — H. Ross Perot, who popped like a bubble stock, and Bill Clinton, another candidate whose invocations of Hope and Change are echoed in the Obama campaign.
Obama might find some comfort in the fact that all of those candidates won. However, the 1960 and 1976 elections were exceedingly close, while Bill Clinton won in 1992 with only 43% of the popular vote.  Once in office, JFK, Carter and Clinton all had difficulty moving their agendas through Democratic Congresses. And they were perceived as weak by our foreign adversaries, with serious consequences for US foreign policy that often outlasted their terms in office.
November is an eternity away in politics. Even a left-leaning media will eventually report on such things, just as they did in 1976. Such issues will be forced, not only by the McCain campaign, but also by the demands of a 24/7 news cycle.
(h/t HotAir.)
And there were no blogs, etc. forcing the issue back in ’76.
hmm, true, Karl, good observation.
16 years indeed.
I wonder if there is any scientific or cultural basis to that…
sashal,
Strauss & Howe did studies on generational politics that do not directly support a 16-year cycle, but might be worth a look, if it interests you.
I’ll try, thanks…
I believe the 16-years argument was recently advanced by Michael Barone.
Interesting that there was no corresponding “change” trope, as such, in the intervening Democrat-to-Republican turnovers. In 1968 there were specific issues, particularly Vietnam, that drove LBJ out of the election campaign before the primary season had run its course. In 1980 the overriding issues were the economy and the Iran hostage crisis.
In 2000 the issue was almost as nebulous as mere “change,” but there was also a very real fatigue with the Clinton soap opera.
Why do you suppose it is that Democrats get into the White House by shrieking “change” as if it were a meaningful platform?
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