I was only a high school freshman at the time, but looking back its kind of disappointing. Obama won big in post-1992 electoral terms, but it wasn't a electoral landslide that a 7.26% should had resulted. yes the GOP vote was resilient, losing three million votes but still having the bulk of their 2004 vote. But its quite upsetting that even with a collapsing economy, Obama only got 7.26%
I think the 2008 election was really the first election which showed the level of polarization which had set in to the electorate, despite Bush only having a 26% approval rating, McCain only got 2 million fewer votes then Bush and still got 46.3% of the 2 party vote, more then what Bob Dole managed in 1996 and Obama got fewer electoral votes then Clinton did in either 1992 or 1996.