Worst-run presidential campaign

[Suburbia]

Which presidential campaign or presidential ticket was the worst you know of or remember?

[Sumner 1868]

Alf Landon's 1936 campaign was quite awful, as reflected by results.

[Ebsy]

Romney's campaign is considered pretty terrible.

[Mr. Smith]

McGovern '72 or Dewey '48.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Which presidential campaign or presidential ticket was the worst you know of or remember?

Bush 1992

[bobloblaw]

Al Gore 2000.

Lost an election with 3.8% unemployment, a $200b surplus and no wars. No other campaign is close. Bush didnt run a great campaign other. He was a gaffe machine.

Gore should have won by 5-7 points minimum

[bobloblaw]

Romney's campaign is considered pretty terrible.

Romney ran probably the best losing campaign since 1960. The incumbent won fewer absolute votes and a smaller percentage of the vote than the first time. The losing party got one million more votes than in 2008. The incumbent won the third closest re-election in US history.

[bobloblaw]

Who ran the worst winning campaign?

Id say a tie between Carter 76 who went from 30 up in July 1976 to win by less than 2 in Nov and Bush in 1988 who ran on nothing but the flag, the pledge and the ACLU leaving him with no mandate. You might also say Nixon as well but it wasnt the outward campaign that did him in but the behind the scenes tricks.

[Beet]

Al Gore 2000.

Lost an election with 3.8% unemployment, a $200b surplus and no wars. No other campaign is close. Bush didnt run a great campaign other. He was a gaffe machine.

Gore should have won by 5-7 points minimum

The crazy thing is, Gore started almost 20 points behind and ended up winning the popular vote by 500,000.

[bobloblaw]

Al Gore 2000.

Lost an election with 3.8% unemployment, a $200b surplus and no wars. No other campaign is close. Bush didnt run a great campaign other. He was a gaffe machine.

Gore should have won by 5-7 points minimum

The crazy thing is, Gore started almost 20 points behind and ended up winning the popular vote by 500,000.

Gore was never 20 points behind. The polls switched back and forth most of the year. There were points at which both candidates were 10 points up, but never 20.

[TheElectoralBoobyPrize]

I believe Gore was about 20 points behind during Clinton's impeachment and in the immediate aftermath. These same polls, of course, were showing a big lead for Democrats in the generic congressional ballot. People wanted change both ways but as it got closer to election day and the country was doing well, they were having second thoughts...
'
I agree bobloblaw that it's more interesting to consider the best losing campaigns and the worst winning ones. You're right, too, about Romney 2012...considering the 47% remark and the boost Hurricane Sandy gave Obama, he didn't lose that badly. Hell, he broke two records among losing presidential candidates: highest ever percentage of white vote and most number of counties.

[bobloblaw]

April 1999, Gallup Poll Bush 54 Gore 41.


But I discount polls like this and tend to focus on the "Fundamentals"

Clinton 60% approval ratings,
GOP lost seats in 1998,
No War,
No Recession,
Economic Fundamentals Strong: Inflation, Unemployment, Fiscal Budget.

Gore should have won by 5-8 points like Daddy Bush in 1988.


One of the worst winning campaigns was also Nixon in 1968. He sat on a 15 point lead for much of the summer and almost blew it.

Id rate the best losing campaigns in no order as:
Romney 2012 (really made no public mistakes, got more votes than the GOP in 2008 and won 2 ore states).
Ford 1976 (his debate gaffe may have cost him, other than that ran a strong campaign considering where the GOP was in the 1974-76 time frame).
Humphrey 1968 (Came from 15 points down in an absolutely awful year for Dems).
Nixon 1960 (He could have called out JFK on the missile gap lie, but would have had to reveal classified info to do so).

[Liberalrocks]

1964 Goldwater: Would have lost regardless but made perceived offensive statements that helped  lose states that were solidly republican at the time. He could have won at least 100 electoral votes and many more states even if a loss was all but certain. However with the public perceiving him to be an extremist and Goldwater aiding and allowing the Johnson campaign to portray him that way he lost in a blow out of epic proportions. No televised debate this year.

1972  McGovern: Similar to above image problems as a candidate, only on the left hand side of the aisle. Additionally there were also issues with not properly vetting his VP candidate. He also never got the chance to debate Nixon in a televised debate after the first one occured in 1960.

1976 Carter: ironically despite this being a winning candidacy Carter was up like 30 points on Ford the summer before the election. Ford closed the gap to 2 points on election day. Many pundits have concluded a few more days campaigning and moderate Ford would likely have won this one.

1984 Mondale: Similar to Goldwater and McGovern he never would have won this race but he did not help his cause by claiming he would raise taxes perhaps helping to lose a few solidly democratic states. He also did not run as positive a campaign and his ads did not create a warm environment or a strong call to action as to why to drop Reagan.

1988 Dukakis: One of the worst campaigns ever, really. This race was winnable unlike 1984. Dukakis lead in the summer by double digits, he allowed the Bush campaign to negatively define him without a decisive response. He then went into the debate and gaffed majorly on a death penalty question, he was robotic and unlikeable.

2012 Romney: Simply put similiar to Dukakis as one of the worst campaigns ever. Romney lost an election that on paper favored him to win. The economy had been recovering but not fast enough unemployment was high as was the misery index for most people. However Romney was very unlikeable and suffered the same robotic and unlikeable image issues. Then came the 47% remarks that only amplified the publics distaste. Dukakis and Romney both ironically being Massachusetts politicians and although not mentioned Kerry suffered a similiar image flaws in his campaign. As a democrat I must say Romney would have won this one if he ran a decent campaign and came off likeable/respectable, and the Obama campaign did hit Romney on this however Romney gave them and the media the ammo to do it.

[SWE]

I can only assume Mitt Romney genuinely did not want to be president. It's the only explanation for his joke campaign.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Dukakis regrets not responding to the attacks more. He says that the tank thing wasn't that big a deal, though.

[Sumner 1868]

John Kerry's 2004 campaign could have done many things much better.

[Blair]

Was Dukakis really that bad? It seems to be that 1988 was going to be a republican victory unless some tapes or something big came from Iran-Contra. I get that Dukakis had image problems but could any other candidate of done much better?

[TheElectoralBoobyPrize]

To those saying Carter '76 was the worst-run winning campaign, don't you think his going from 20 points ahead to just 2 points had more to do with Ford perhaps running a good losing campaign and other factors beyond his control (improving economy, GOP-friendly electorate)?

[Sumner 1868]

To those saying Carter '76 was the worst-run winning campaign, don't you think his going from 20 points ahead to just 2 points had more to do with Ford perhaps running a good losing campaign and other factors beyond his control (improving economy, GOP-friendly electorate)?

No. Ford's campaign was as badly disorganized as Carter, but it seems "devil you know" factor played a role. Not surprising, as the events of ten years prior were bound to make people suspicious of anybody claiming to represent change.

[bobloblaw]

To those saying Carter '76 was the worst-run winning campaign, don't you think his going from 20 points ahead to just 2 points had more to do with Ford perhaps running a good losing campaign and other factors beyond his control (improving economy, GOP-friendly electorate)?

James Baker did a good job running Ford's campaign.

I disagree about Romney's campaign being bad, it wasnt at all. He wasnt a gaffe machine like Bush was in 2000. Unemployment had fallen from 10% to around 8%. That is why Obama won.

Carter in 76 sat on a lead and tried to run out the clock.

[Indy Texas]

Alf Landon's 1936 campaign was quite awful, as reflected by results.

Consider how much harder it was back then to gauge public opinion and disseminate information.

I read somewhere that Landon's campaign staff were confident he would win because of telephone polls showing him leading Roosevelt by comfortable margins, despite the fact that the only people who had telephones in their homes back then were middle- and upper-income people who were already more inclined to vote Republican.

[Clarence Boddicker]

1988 Dukakis was the first one that popped into mind.

[Sumner 1868]

Alf Landon's 1936 campaign was quite awful, as reflected by results.

Consider how much harder it was back then to gauge public opinion and disseminate information.

I read somewhere that Landon's campaign staff were confident he would win because of telephone polls showing him leading Roosevelt by comfortable margins, despite the fact that the only people who had telephones in their homes back then were middle- and upper-income people who were already more inclined to vote Republican.

Even then, the number of errors he made is astonishing. Landon campaigned as if there was no Depression at all and basically targeted rich people. Well, it worked, but it was a horrible strategy during the Depression. He was also horrible with radio.

[Mechaman]

Dole 1996 seems to be a contender, given that his opponent hardly had a campaign to begin with and he STILL lost.  And badly at that.

While the Duke was a bad campaigner, at least he has the excuse that HW Bush had run a pretty nasty and downright dirty attack campaign against him.  You can't say the same of Bill TEN MILLION NEW JOBS Clinton.

Though my all time answer to this question is probably Dewey '48.  I mean damn he blew it.  Big time.  I mean I am pretty sure that Truman was less popular than polio at one point in 1948 and (probably based off of past experience in '44) Dewey's playing it safe was just dumb beyond measure especially considering that Truman should've been bleeding off votes left and right simply due to the State's Rights and Progressive tickets running that year.

My two cents.

[Senate Minority Leader Lord Voldemort]

Dole 1996 seems to be a contender, given that his opponent hardly had a campaign to begin with and he STILL lost.  And badly at that.

Reminds me of SNL with Darrell Hammond as Clinton rolling out lines like "when Bob Dole first came around I barely noticed" and "I was in the middle of a reelection campaign and I... did... not... care... at... all."