Who is most responsible for Gore's loss in 2000?

[Bo]

Gore himself.

[phk]

Either Gore or Lieberman.

[Conservative frontier]

Al Gore

[RIP Robert H Bork]

Gore himself.

[Guderian]

1. Ralph Nader and his voters.

2. Electoral college system.

3.  Butterfly ballot.

4. Clinton's libido.

5. Gore himself.

...

825. Lieberman.

Idea that Gore commited an electoral suicide and pulled the defeat out of the jaws of victory is wrong, in my opinion. People often try to blame everything on the candidate, it seems like every losing candidate in last 200 years blew an election by campaigning poorly or picking the wrong running mate (which is always the most overanalyzed campaign decision that rarely makes the difference between winning and losing). As a matter of fact, Gore ran a solid campaign and managed to beat Bush by 550,000 popular votes after trailing in polls against him since mid-1999. It was a bizarre and unrepeatable set of circumstances that prevented him from becoming President, and if those circumstances haven't been in place, he'd be praised for Truman II comeback. Sure, he made some mistakes, but almost everybody does. Bush made even more of them, in my opinion.

Now I'm going to take a shower because I feel dirty after defending Al Gore.  

[Χahar]

Butterfly ballot

[Bo]

Butterfly ballot

That was designed by a Democrat.

[Senator Ben]

Gore, without a doubt.  This should have been the map:

[Bo]

Gore, without a doubt.  This should have been the map:

Give TN to Bush and OH+NV to Gore. That should have been the map. (I would anticipate Gore losing TN since he flip-flopped on abortion and gay rights after he left the Senate.)

[Χahar]

Butterfly ballot

That was designed by a Democrat.

OK.

[Sibboleth]

It was so close that any reason anyone names can be argued to be the reason. He should have given more attention to Arkansas and West Virginia, he should have gone for Ohio rather than Florida, he should have carried his home state, he shouldn't have sighed... or its Nader's fault, it's the fault of minor Trot parties in Florida, its the fault of the ballot design in Florida, the fault of the blacklist in Florida, the fault of the Supreme Court, the fault the electoral system, fault of the fault of the fault of the fault...

But, basically, Guderian is right. Gore did very well - a few minor mistakes and various weird events (most of which no one could have ever predicted) where what cost him the election, not major errors. Most fightbacks don't quite make it at this level; as HHH and Ford could tell you as well.

[You kip if you want to...]

Gore. He to way to much for granted. Although, I still say Bill could've helped a bit more than he did.

Ralph Nader should've been an option in this poll!

[xavier110]

The Supreme Court

[phk]

Gore. He to way to much for granted. Although, I still say Bill could've helped a bit more than he did.

Ralph Nader should've been an option in this poll!

Gore told Bill not to help and if Gore had run a good campaign he could have made Nader irrelevant.

[useful idiot]

If you're going to say Nader, then you might as well say it was Bush. 50,456,002 people voted for him. Only 2,882,955 voted for Nader.

[Bo]

Gore. He to way to much for granted. Although, I still say Bill could've helped a bit more than he did.

Ralph Nader should've been an option in this poll!

Gore told Bill not to help and if Gore had run a good campaign he could have made Nader irrelevant.

I agree with this. Bush Sr. didn't need Reagan's help to win a landslide victory, so Gore shouldn't have needed Bill Clinton's help to do the same.

[Sibboleth]

If you're going to say Nader, then you might as well say it was Bush. 50,456,002 people voted for him. Only 2,882,955 voted for Nader.

Actually if you're going to say 'Nader' you might as well say 'Clinton'... there's a reason why nearly three million voted for a fringe candidate despite the election being close...

[hcallega]

TIPPER!!!!!!

[Bo]

TIPPER!!!!!!

Why?

[I left.]

If you're going to say Nader, then you might as well say it was Bush. 50,456,002 people voted for him. Only 2,882,955 voted for Nader.

Actually if you're going to say 'Nader' you might as well say 'Clinton'... there's a reason why nearly three million voted for a fringe candidate despite the election being close...

How do you know Clinton caused all those voters to vote for Nader?

Is his point that hard to comprehend?

[justW353]

Ralph Nader

[shua]

I'm always amazed he came as close to winning as he did.

[Derek]

Let's see, he lost his home state of TN, Clinton's home state of AR, an WV which had been a locked in democratic state since the civil war.  Another mistake was OH which Gore pulled out of 6 weeks before the election because of polls showing him down by double digits and it turned out to only be by a few points.  Any of these states would've helped.  His positions on guns hurt him in all 4 of those states too.  Going into that election I had Bush winning 51-45 anyhow so I was surprised to even see it that close.

[JoeyJoeJoe]

Butterfly ballot

That was designed by a Democrat.

OK.

A Democrat in name only, who used the term "Democrat Party", and later switched parties.

[JoeyJoeJoe]

The Supreme Court

Correct.