Strongst past president vs. weakest 2016 candidate of each party

[President Johnson]

It just came to my mind, what would happen of the weakest 2016 candidate of each party would run against the strongst past-president of the other party in 2016. At least the strongest of the past 100 years (Washington and Lincoln for example are too much non-partisan for our times.)

So that's those two races:

Most admired GOP President in the past 100 years: Ronald Reagan
vs.
Weakest 2016 Democratic candidate: Lincoln Chafee



Most admired Democratic president in the past 100 years: FDR
vs.
Weakest 2016GOP candidate: Ted Cruz

[NHI]

Reagan finally gets his fifty state sweep. Lincoln Chafee is a joke and unelectable.

√ Ronald Reagan: 538 (63.2%)

Lincoln Chafee: 3 (36.7%)

Ted Cruz performs better than Chafee, and erodes FDR's support in the south, but fails to dent his strength in the Northeast and midwest. FDR is able to portray Cruz as an extremist and thereby wins comfortably.

√ Franklin D. Roosevelt: 382 (53.9%)

Ted Cruz: 156 (44.7%)

[Sir Mohamed]

Chaffee and Cruz are cooked by the two former presidents.

Ronald Reagan/Susanna Martinez: 385 EV. (58.5%)
Lincoln Chaffee/Heidi Heitkamp: 153 EV. (40.0%)

Franklin D. Roosevelt/Martin Heinrich: 402 EV. (59.0%)
Ted Cruz/Carly Fiorina: 136 EV. (40.0%)


In the case of a Cruz/Chaffee cotest I'll give a close one the Chaffee, unless Cruz has a strong running mate like Scott Walker, then I'll give a close one to Cruz. In the case of a FDR/Reagan contest I'll give it to FDR by a margin similular to the 2012 election.

[OSR stands with Israel]

Reagan 463    61%
Chaffe   75      38%

FDR 428 60%
Cruz 110 39%

[Sir Mohamed]

Reagan would not win California today, even against Chaffee; while FDR would not win Arkansas and West Virginia.

[Orthogonian Society Treasurer]

Cruz is far from the weakest GOP candidate.

Ronald Reagan - 396 EV
Lincoln Chafee - 142 EV

Franklin D. Roosevelt -342 EV
Ted Cruz - 196 EV

[JonathanSwift]

Former President Ronald Reagan (R-CA) / Governor John Kasich (R-OH): 59%; 489 Electoral Votes
Former Governor Lincoln Chafee (D-RI) / Former Attorney General Martha Coakley (D-MA): 39%; 49 Electoral Votes

Former President Franklin Delano Roosevelt (D-NY) / Senator Sherrod Brown (D-OH): 64%;508 Electoral Votes
Neurosurgeon Ben Carson (R-MD) / Former Governor Bobby Jindal (R-LA): 34%; 30 Electoral Votes