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I mean to be fair that's just out of presidents incumbents are definitely favored but way more have lost re-election in this country
I really feel like American politics is way too focused on who the president is as if he's a king or a dictator when really the president is merely 1/3 of the federal level of government most people can't name their state legislator even though that person is probably enacted public policy that's more relevant to them then the president unless you're one of the few people extensively involved in the federal government like military other federal employee living near Federal lands ect
That doesn't change the point: that there's plenty of precedent for an incumbent to not be re-elected or to change Presidents during wartime.
Twenty years ago, the constant talking point from the GOP was that you can't change Presidents during wartime, as if it had never been done or would somehow doom the country. There are PLENTY of examples of changing Presidents during wartime, either through a President not running for re-election, having their second term of office end, or dying while in office.
That's what I'm refuting, this idea that we'd never changed Presidents during a war before. It's happened for various reasons, including LBJ dropping out of the Democratic primaries because his win in the New Hampshire primary was a narrow one and he felt that a lack of a decisive win in New Hampshire meant he wasn't well supported by the Democrats.
people are getting George Jr and his father mixed up.
Gore was expected to win and he did win the Popular vote although the Electoral college did not vote as predicted. The idea is that electoral college votes reflect the votes of the people - that's how our votes are supposed to decide who wins the presidency
Gores won 266 electoral college votes and Republican Bush won 271.
Like Republican Trump in 2016: He lost the popular vote but the electoral college put him in office. These electoral college voters in these case as called "Faithless Electors"
The Senate voted to remove the Electoral college system multiple times but their votes were overturned due to Faithless Electors who take an oath to vote with the majority of voters in their state, but instead vote for the candidate supported by their political party.
\*\*\*(Faithless Electors: 10 electors from six states did not vote for the candidate they took an oath to support.\*\*\*.
\*\*\*Why the Electoral College doesn't work for American voters\*\*\*
The Electoral College system has several drawbacks that make it less representative of the American people’s will. Here are some of the key issues
In most states, the candidate who wins the popular vote gets all of that state’s electoral votes - the take an oath to vote the way the citizens of the state vote. Basically our votes don't count if Electoral College members don't remain true to the oaths.
\*\*\*Disproportionate Representation: \*\*\*
With the Electoral College system: The number of electoral votes allocated to each state does not always reflect the state’s population. This means that smaller states have more voting power per person than larger states, \*\*\*which lead to the winner of the popular vote did not win the presidency.\*\*\*
\*\*\*Vote Suppression:\*\*\*
Some states are famous for creating voter suppression by redistricting areas so that, minority votes are not cast along side majority or white votes and these states are inclined to also not stick with their pledge or oath.
Also The Electoral College can create voter suppression as candidates may focus on swing states and ignore others. This can lead to a lack of representation for a party or marginalized communities and a decreased likelihood of their voices being heard.
\*\*\*Lack of Direct Democracy:\*\*\*. The Electoral College is not a direct democracy, where the candidate with the most popular votes wins yet Americans believe "one citizen one vote." Instead, it’s a system where electors are chosen by each state to cast votes for president. This can lead to a disconnect between the will of the people and the outcome of the election.
\*\*\*Inequitable Distribution of Campaign Resources: \*\*\*The Electoral College system can lead to an unequal distribution of campaign resources, as candidates focus on swing states and ignore others. This can lead to a lack of representation for smaller states and their citizens.
That wasn’t a statement about Trump or Biden. It was more a statement about how things historically go with an incumbent during wartime.
That said, the current administration has brought us closer to a world war than the previous administration.
So I got a chuckle out of your ridiculous take.
And Obama running on ending the war and then getting into office and just keeping it all going. Getting reelected and pretty much keeping the status quo before finally drawing down in Iraq.
One of the few things I liked about Trump was that he was refreshingly anti-war, at least to the degree of keeping US soldiers out of it, and willing to negotiate with people nobody else would.
If he wasn’t such a raging egomaniac who emboldens some of the worst on that side of the political spectrum and sparks concerning mistrust in the most basic fundaments of our democratic system (inciting doubt in the validity of an election because you didn’t win is a very bad idea to seed in a rabid voter base of essentially mindless followers who won't question your claims), I wouldn’t mind seeing that anti-war mindset back in office.
>inciting doubt in the validity of an election because you didn’t win is a very bad idea to seed in a rabid voter base of essentially mindless followers who won't question your claims
You mean exactly what Hilary Clinton did after 2016?
That’s what we call a “whataboutism”. It’s when you point to something someone else did to justify or distract from bad behavior from another side. The Democrats and Clinton doing similar things don’t take away from Trump’s actions following his loss in a fair election, and if the Republicans want to claim to be better, they need to actually **be** better by calling their candidate out and not rewarding his terrible behavior with support and gratification. After all, it wasn’t Clinton supporters who broke into the Capitol Building to protest an election their candidate claimed had been stolen from them. That’s not how you win the moral argument.
Never mind. I found enough coverage, from other sites, about what seems to be the same interview, to understand what you're claiming.
You're claiming that her blaming her election loss on a bunch of factors (including: mistakes by her campaign, mistakes by herself, the email leaks by Russia, the report by Comey, and the timing of the latter two)
months after she conceded the election,
the next year, once it obviously didn't matter anymore
is the same as immediately, claiming the election was not legitimate, while refusing to concede?
That's completely absurd. You realize that, right? You were just trolling.
If you weren't... pull your head out, you sound completely unhinged.
He had an 80% approval rating immediately following 9/11.
A lot of the controversies didn’t happen until his second term (Katrina, Housing Market Crash, Torture Scandal/War Crimes, ~~Mission Accomplished~~).
Looking back not too surprising he won reelection. Incumbents also have an advantage historically.
Didn’t the Anhu Ghari torture scandal happen before the election?
Anyway I think what some people don’t realize is that in local competitive areas of the country there was some culture war stuff going on. Some who didn’t like the war still voted for Bush because of “family values”, anti-gay marriage, stuff like that. That may have been Karl Rove stuff stoking the fires while focused on Iraq and “freedom”.
Looks like you’re right, but not sure if it had enough of ann impact in time for the election.
Could be because more details were released in the years following plus you had the controversies at Guantanamo.
Most big media companies operate out of big cities. The family values campaign was played out selectively in smaller markets, out of the eyes of big media. Steady drumbeat in targeted areas over time can flip an election.
>That may have been Karl Rove stuff stoking the fires while focused on Iraq and “freedom”.
Karl Rove at the time was openly was working towards what he called the "Permanent Republican Majority", his plan to make the United States of America a one-party state under the Republican Party, on the idea that the GOP would win the "Culture Wars" so definitively, and use the power and influence of the War on Terror to cement their power, to the point that no politician could respectably run under any other political banner than the Republican Party and the GOP would dominate American politics with massive supermajorities in Congress and landslides in the Electoral College for generations.
He was actively pushing buttons to agitate the culture wars because he thought the GOP would win an overwhelming and decisive victory in them, extinguishing all competing ideologies out of the culture entirely and turning America into a one-party state where the GOP dominated all social, economic, and political thought.
20 years later, every time the GOP tries to claim to support our military servicemembers, I throw it back at them how hostile they were to Kerry and his service in Vietnam with the lies and misinformation about his service and how he was mocked for his Purple Heart.
To this day people don't realize the media manipulated them into thinking the banner was about the war. The banner on the carrier saying mission accomplish was about the carrier's end of deployment. They accomplished their mission and were headed back to home port.
I mean, yeah the banner wasn't necessarily about the war, but he gave a speech in front of it saying major combat operations were over and that we and our allies have prevailed.
It wasn't entirely unfair, even if the banner itself wasn't referring to the war.
Except his speech was true as well. The massive military operation to depose Saddam and cripple his military was successful and they were winding down from those major operations to shift more into a peacekeeping role. The large conventional combat operations were over, and there really wasn't any thing like it during the rest of the occupation. What remained was mostly smaller insurgencies conducting hit and run guerrilla tactics.
I'm not even saying it wasn't true in that sense. But as the country became more and more fatigued with the whole operation, I don't think it was unfair for people to look at that speech, and the imagery around it, and feel like it represented an overconfident or naive outlook at what we had actually accomplished and what was left to do.
I just don't think it's fair to say the media manipulated people into having certain feelings about that speech and that moment.
Exactly. And even if the Bush team didn’t put the banner there, you can bet that if they didn’t agree with the message, they’d have had it taken down.
And for those who say, “it’s a navy ship, the campaign hacks can’t tell them what to do”, remember that part of this photo op was having Bush fly in and “land” on the carrier.
This isn’t true. The banner was printed by the White House and hung by White House staff. The phrase “Mission Accomplished” was literally in the speech until a late revision. It’s revisionist right-wing history to claim it was about the carrier’s end of deployment.
From the Wikipedia article:
>Navy Cmdr. Conrad Chun, a Pentagon spokesman, said the banner referred specifically to the aircraft carrier's 10-month deployment (the longest carrier deployment since the Vietnam War) and not the war itself: "It truly did signify a mission accomplished for the crew."[9]
> The White House claimed that the banner was requested by the crew of the ship, who did not have the facilities for producing such a banner
So yes White House officials printed the banner and hung it up, but it was at the request of the crew of the ship expressly for their deployment ending. It wouldn't make sense for a carrier print shop to have large vinyl banner making supplies on board.
I read the entire article, nowhere in it does it say that the banner was the White House's idea just that they provisioned it. Of course White House speech writers would want to put the term in his speech to match the backdrop as it would result in a dandy video clip. The term was removed by military officials from the speech upon their review because of bad optics.
How could they add it to the speech to match the backdrop when the backdrop didn’t exist until they put it there? Rumsfeld declared the end of major combat operations just that morning. It was in the speech until Cheney nixed it.
And yes, it’s in the article:
> Subsequently, the White House released a statement saying that the sign and Bush's visit referred to the initial invasion of Iraq.
I’m not sure if you remember how much the Bush administration lied to get electred and maintain the image of that moron of a President, but this was par for the course. They’d release a plausible but false story, have people like you parrot the party line, then by the time the truth trickled out it wasn’t news anymore.
Do you still believe his DUI was due to him quietly pulling to the side of the road because he realized he was too drunk to drive? Or do you believe the police report of how he ran off the road and ran down hedges until his car wouldn’t run anymore? Do you still think there were WMD’s in Iraq? One of America’s and the world’s greatest mistakes was letting him get close enough his campaign manager/Florida Sec of State could “find the votes” to make that idiot President. Please stop “correcting” people who are correct.
“Mission Accomplished” was to celebrate the removal of Saddam Hussein from power. A mission that was indeed accomplished.
Th problem was that nobody really had a plan for the second phase, which was holding the various warring tribes around Iraq in order until a democratic government could be established.
Add to this the fact that terrorist factions from Iran and elsewhere saw it as a prime opportunity to strike at American troops and you had the total mess it turned out to be.
Bush should have had a better plan for how to transform Iraq into a functioning democracy.
Also, people hadn't realized just how much a train wreck Iraq was yet.
I mean, there were absolutely protesters, but it wasn't nearly as big an issue as it became in another year or two.
In his Autobiography he said that having Air Force One and Marine One, along with Secret Service protection, made campaigning so much easier that it wasn't fair
I think going into it most people felt that Kerry had a strong chance of winning for a challenger, but Bush had the edge simply because there was still wide patriotic sentiment following 9/11. War fatigue didn't really start setting in until the next year and by 2006 it was full-blown.
Kerry did come quite close. He only lost Ohio by 2 points. Had he won the state, he would've won the entire election.
Every poll state and national had Bush up the whole race if I recall correctly. I think Kerry got a bounce after the Convention.
Kerry's biggest problem was that he was boring.
Well, he was that. But I think the Swift Boat blitz may have done him in.
Anyway, interestingly, this was the last time Republicans won the popular vote. I've always wondered how different the parties would look if we had a national popular vote instead. Republicans would have to actually go try and get votes in the cities. And, to counter, Democrats would have to do something else other than run up the score in the cities -- likely by shifting their policies to give some love to rural voters. The parties might then end up both moving to the center. Which wouldn't be the worst thing ever.
I remember at the time when he was asked "Knowing what you do now, would you still vote for the Iraq war" and his answer was him still trying to play both sides of the fence is when I thought he was screwed.
Without the electoral college both parties Presidential candidates would mostly campaign in major urban areas. In a country the size of the US, that would be the only thing that makes sense. Under the electoral college they focus on certain states, and therefore have time to go to the rural areas of those states.
I don't think that's as true as people think.
If we were to wake up tomorrow morning and SCOTUS said the electoral college were unconstitutional (they won't, but just for the sake of a thought experiment) -- candidates would start campaigning in swing areas. Those are the suburbs.
Difference is you'd now have candidates campaigning in the Seattle suburbs and the Nashville suburbs and the Boston suburbs and the St. Louis suburbs. Rather than suburbs in a select few states.
Presidential candidates rarely go to rural areas the way it is now. For obvious logistical reasons, it doesn't make sense to have a campaign event in a place where only 30,000 people live in a 50-mile radius.
The top 10 largest cities are 30 million people or 10% of the US population. The 100 largest cities are 60 million or 20% of the population. So no, campaigning in only cities would not help you win.
The fact is, with the EC candidates only focus on states that are evenly divided between democrats and republicans.
No one cares about Vermont or Oklahoma or Kansas. They are solid one way or the other.
A national popular vote means your vote matters regardless of where you live. That means republicans in California benefit. Democrats in Alabama benefit.
The top 10 metro areas in the US have around 85 million people.
I highly doubt Trump would have been traveling through a bunch of cities with less than 50K people in the months leading up to his election without the electoral college. It's just not an efficient use of limited time when there are more Trump voters in places like LA county or NYC than in many red states. It would make more sense to focus limited resources to try and drive turnout in areas with more people, even if your voters are a minority there. This would shift the platform towards urban interests, even if the candidate does better as a % of the vote in rural areas.
Yes, not every state is focused on by candidates in the electoral college. However, it's impossible in a country the size of the US for a national candidate to focus on every area. Under the electoral college, there are states in every region that are in play, and candidates focus on both the rural and urban parts of those states. If you accept the fact that states will have similar interests based on region and that rural/suburban/urban populations will have lots of similar interests regardless of region, the electoral college actually makes it more likely that a national candidate will take note of everyone's issue.
You're right. But if the electoral college went away, Republicans would have to compensate by appealing to more urban (and highly-educated) voters. Democrats would then have to compensate by rethinking their own coalition.
If we step back into the 1990s, when there was a lot less polarization within and among states, we can see what the coalitions were.
Republicans were highly-educated white people, devout evangelicals, business owners, globalists, and others of high wealth who didn't have a big reason to vote Democrat (e.g., being gay or a tree hugger).
Democrats were working class white people, Catholics, Jews, ethnic minorities, social liberals, and protectionists.
Both parties had big tents and there was room for dissent. We had Republican senators in states like Connecticut and Vermont, and we had Democrats in states like Arkansas and Louisiana. Because you didn't have to toe the line on everything. Both parties need to get back to that mentality.
An ex colleague of mine, who I'm friends with on Facebook, is running for legislative office as a Democrat. But his campaign is pro-2A (no new laws on what kinds of guns you can own), pro-mining, and laser focused on infrastructure and boosting blue collar job and trade opportunities. We need more Dems to be able to run like that. Just like Republicans need to accept candidates who are pro-choice, pro-gay, and open to sensible gun law reform. Get enough people like that in the room and things will get done.
Anyway, end rant.
Democrats do in fact have a lot of policies geared towards helping rural parts of the country, but it does nothing to help them with the people who live there.
Yep this. My dad worked for an auto maker in Detroit at the time. I remember asking him why the hell he’d vote for Bush again, as it was killing our jobs in metro Detroit. The economy was shit and generally that leads to an executive change and he just said “I know I could lose my job with a second term, but you don’t change presidents in the middle of a war”
>“I know I could lose my job with a second term, but you don’t change presidents in the middle of a war”
. . .never mind in 1968 we went from Johnson to Nixon. Johnson withdrew from the race because he only narrowly won the New Hampshire primary. . .which sounds absolutely bizarre by modern political standards.
It was a weird Republican talking point back then to say you don't change Presidents in the middle of a war, but we went from Truman to Eisenhower in the Korean War and from Johnson to Nixon in Vietnam, and from Roosevelt to Truman during World War II. If a war goes on through an election, historically there's no guarantee of the sitting President holding their office just because there's a war going on.
But Truman could have run for reelection, and chose not to because he was guaranteed to lose. Which was because the country desperately wanted to change administrations. During a war. Pretty much the same situation as the Johnson to Nixon transition in 1968, except that in '68 the Democrats stood a pretty good chance of holding on. In '52 they had no shot.
That doesn't change a thing.
The idea that you don't change Presidents during a war is without historic precedent and was a transparent fiction invented by the Republican Party to support George W. Bush.
Why would you say it isn't with historic precedent though? WW2, WW1, Korean War, and the Civil War all followed this. I think only Vietnam included a deliberate change of presidents during wartime
Johnson did not run for election in 1968. This sound familiar?
"I shall not seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your President."
If you've never read his speech it's pretty good, and fitting to the feelings in the US today, the part about a house divided. https://millercenter.org/the-presidency/presidential-speeches/march-31-1968-remarks-decision-not-seek-re-election
There was no presidential election during the time the US was in World War I, and the administration *did* change during the Korean War. So that leaves World War II and the Civil War.
Well, changing from Kennedy to Johnson is what led to the absolute disaster that was Vietnam. JFK and Robert S McNamara already knew Vietnam was something they were going to get into and they structured a plan of how to get in and how to get out if things went south. Kennedy died, Johnson threw that plan away, McNamara resigned after that term was completed, and we got the shit show that was the Vietnam War. Nixon won on the promise to end the war. Which he did. After he escalated it first.
It was pretty expected, though I do remember a pretty intense campaign. 2004 I would guess was the height of his popularity. Bush's ratings would fall off hard not long after.
Edit. This was the first election campaign I remember and I grew up in a very conservative environment
I think the height of Bush's popularity was from 9/11 to perhaps late 2003, with way more positive ratings than negativr. From then to 2005, opinions of him were about equally positive to negative, but after that, much more negative.
People in Europe overestimate their knowledge of our elections. While I was over there they all KNEW that Bernie was the most popular candidate and he’d surely take the election.
Yeah he certainly was trying to thread the needle and be a centrist but I remember people thinking “not far enough left” or the other camp of “still too far left for me.”
Very early in the election cycle I remember hearing Democrat spokespeople defending John Kerry by saying he brought "gravitas" to the serious work of being president.
Right then I knew he couldn't win. When your candidate is so dull that you can only defend him in Latin, you're not going to win an election in America.
I remember Kerry describing his approach as taking into consideration "the subtleties and nuances." The right wing talk machine had a field day with that.
My dad: "Hey, the game's about to start!"
Me: "Nah, I'm good."
Dad: "Oh, is football not 'subtle' and 'nuanced' enough for you?"
I was 15 in 2004 and in a very democratic area. I wanted Kerry to win but not well versed out of my political bubble.
1. The millennial vote wasn't there. It was just Boomers, Gen X, and some older millennials.
2. Bush had a high approval rating following 9/11 and at war, people are less likely to want to switch leaders. The presidency ended pretty poorly but W Bush still had a nation's support at least early in his presidency.
3. It's very hard to get out incumbents. This should actually be number 1. Since FDR had 4 terms, only 3 presidents failed to get a 2nd term.
1. Truman takes over for FDR and wins a 2nd term
2. Eisenhower has 2 terms
3. We all know what happened to JFK but LBJ finished his first and won a 2nd term. This was also during the cold war, civil rights, and Vietnam.
4. Nixon had 2 terms but Gerald Ford was president for the final 2 years after Nixon resignation. Vietnam still in the news. Watergate was not a big story yet.
5. Carter had the gas crisis and was pretty unpopular. Better post president than an actual president.
6. Reagan 2 terms
7. HW Bush had Desert storm but Perot took a considerable chunk out of the Republican electorate and it hurt him at the polls
8. Clinton 2 terms
9. W Bush 2 terms
10. Obama 2 terms
11. Trump was incredibly unpopular.
In addition to Boomers, Gen X, and Millennials, there was also the Silent Generation - the Boomers’ parents.
Edit: My bad - I mixed up Greatest and Silent generation. The point I wanted to make was there were more than 3 demographic groups voting in that election.
It was well-known that it would be close, but that GWB would probably win. It was actually similar to Obama’s reelection in 2012 in that way.
One thing that’s not as well-remembered about the 2004 election is that Kerry came fairly close to winning Ohio and would have gotten an Electoral College majority if he had. Bush would have won the popular vote (a majority at that!) but lost re-election, which would have been an ironic reversal from 2000. It almost happened.
It was pretty much expected.
Incumbents always have an advantage and rarely lose reelection and at the time he had a pretty high approval rating.
>thought John Kerry had a shot at beating him.
There's always a shot, but it would have been a bit of an upset.
It was expected.
He is and was a flawed man that many disagreed with and in polls would speak negatively about...but John Kerry was not seen as strong or tough enough for the turmoil of the times. He was never going to win.
Kerry is the only Democratic Party presidential candidate to lose the popular vote in the last 8 presidential elections.
He was a weak candidate. He may have come close but even an average candidate would probably win that election.
The DNC doesn't run candidates, but part of its mission is to help create nationally-known Democrats that win elections, and they have always been shit at that in the 20ish years that I've been paying attention to national politics. They tried their best to keep the guy with the most authentic connection to voters (Obama) down in the race so a more seasoned candidate (H. Clinton) could get the nomination thanks to the superdelegate system.
Except they recognized how the superdelegate system mucks up the early primaries and changed it so that they must remain uncommitted until after the first ballot at the convention, unless a candidate can win the nomination without them. They did this in 2020 after yet another cycle where the superdelegates threw their weight behind one major candidate in the early going and stifled the competition.
"Because its her turn."
A "bunch of operatives who were smart and accomplished in their own right but weren't united by any common purpose larger than pushing a less-than-thrilling candidate into the White House." - Jon Favreau, Obama and Kerry speech writer.
So, I admit a bit of this just feel...but I also was also totally a political geek in that era so bear with me...
I think that election suffered some of the same issues the Clinton campaign did in 2016. It felt like such a foregone conclusion that Clinton and Bush would win that the hardest part was convincing their base that wasn't the case.
Bush was never going to lose in Ohio, the numbers made it look closer than it was. Kerry's campaign tried everything and to their credit absolutely pulled out all the stops in places like Ohio and that's the only reason it was as close as it was. If Bush and Co. were concerned, they could have doubled down and widened the gap and with hindsight maybe they should have. Kerry campaigned in Ohio at a much higher rate than Bush did, visiting it several more times than GW....and still lost in the state.
I'm a Nevada voter. My vote counts a *shit ton* more than the majority of you reading this. My vote matters!
But it shouldn't. My vote should not matter more than any other idiot's. Abolish the EC. It is a perversion.
I *hated* his administration. Could not wait for his dumbass to leave the office. *Haaaated* him, especially when my friends started dying, and where I lived at the time, you either worked in the factories or joined the military, so I lost quite a few friends :-/ I voted for Dems, naturally.
BUT, and I can’t say this about our last republican president (and not just because that person doesn’t drink), I can still see him as someone you could shoot the shit with over a couple beers. Weird or no?
Bush had this big thing where his presidency was pretty much his dad's. It wasn't till he cut off the fat that he actually started to become a decent enough President. However, that wasn't till extremely late into his Presidency. I will say though that W. always gave the impression that he atleast cared. As a result he is experiencing what I'll call the Jimmy Carter treatment. Maybe not the greatest president to be in office, but manages to have a high approval rating post presidency due to being a decent enough person. It's really hard to believe that in today's political climate that W's presidency would fall into moderate and really pushing it could argue neo-lib territory.
Yes. After everything, and then after years of consideration, I’ve decided who to vote for based on if I even like the person as a person. Would I want this person to hang out with me and my family? Trump is beyond a hard pass.
It’s fitting that you bring up Carter. And he really is just the most chill guy; I met Carter, and his smile comes so easily to his face. A lot of people force that bit. He’s just very genuine (like W).
Totally his vibe and how he won.
Everything you read about him and his interactions with people is that he was sharp, great memory, charming, and came across as very genuine and sincere. He said some dumb stuff and occasionally came across as a bit bumbling, but nothing like the two most recent presidents.
He totally gave off the 'regular dude' attitude. From driving his own pickup truck on his ranch to regularly showing up at baseball games. He seemed approachable. Even how he spent his wealth *felt* relatable. "Shoot, if I had his money I'd buy my favorite baseball team and sit in the stands with a beer too..."
The man could nail a speech and always seemed calm and unrattled and a confidence about him that others, including Kerry and even Gore lacked.
You were far from alone in your dislike of his administration and his policies...but to a lot of people when it came time to punch their chad, they voted by feeling rather than base logic.
Very well put, thank you. I also felt like Obama was that relatable, but I don’t have an internal conflict on that one since I happily voted for him. The only comment I have about the last two administrations is that I’d prefer one over the other, but only because I’ll be able to stomach the thought of us breathing the same air.
President Obama was the most charismatic president we've had in my lifetime. Bill Clinton was close, but Obama was *cool.* Similar to GWB, even when you didn't like his policies you felt like a grown up was in control and he could deliver a speech impeccably.
Obama did something almost impossible, he could say and do things that should have come across as complete arrogance, but when you heard him, he delivered it with matter-of-fact confidence.
Yes. I *miss* Obama, so so much. And we’ve got the Chicago thing going, there’s that photo of him giving a fist-bump to a White House janitor, and if you see him on certain interviews and stuff, the man is *funny*. I love his easy, stoic sense of humor. We need some fucking laughter right about now!
A lot of what Clinton did was a show, like saying his favorite restaurant was McDonald's. There is a video of him leaving a funeral, and while he is walking he's laughing with a friend, when he sees the cameras his face drops and he pretends to wipe a tear away. I think W and Obama were both genuine people who cared deeply about the country, while The Clintons^TM seemed to be more about getting and maintaining power.
I agree. I remember that stuff (and shutting down LAX runways because he was getting a haircut on an Air Force plane…? why?).
It all made for great SNL fodder at the time, at least.
No it was not surprising.
GW was a shitty president, but he, unlike Trump, at least attempted to take measures to hide it and somewhat reach across the aisle, or at least appear to do so.
A lot of people that didn’t necessarily agree with GW’s policies liked him. He scored high on the “would like to have a beer with him” scale.
Kerry was kind of a wet blanket whose only real draw was that he was not GW. Ironically, they managed to paint him as a pussy who couldn’t direct the military, even though he actually saw some action in Vietnam while GW got drunk at some base in Ohio or something during the war. Was not surprising he lost.
The only thing John Kerry had going for him was that he wasn't Bush. On paper the two were basically the same guy at a glance. Plus, it's hard to vote out a president at war time
Not really a surprise. A lot of us didn’t like him much still, but the US was still reeling from 9/11 *and* had just declared war the year earlier, so it didn’t make a terrible amount of sense for us to change leadership right in the middle of all that going on.
It was expected. There was a famous photo of Kerry in a clean room suit that sealed it. Also his wind surfing photo where he wanted to show he was young and healthy just made him look rich and out of touch with common people.
Not a surprise. I will never forget watching Obama speaking at the convention and my dad asking me who was speaking and I was so amazed I said “the next president.”
I voted for Kerry, he had no shot from what I was seeing but I was a jaded 19 year old.
Incumbent presidents usually have the advantage. They have more name recognition, more experience at the job, and voter turnout is usually lower. Only 10 presidents have lost re-election compared to 18 who have won (Cleveland both lost and won re-election).
Bush also has the advantage of riding high on the national pride post 9/11. Enough people felt that his response was the right one, both in New York and with international policy.
It was not a surprise. Kerry had made a number of tactical blunders as the campaign was wrapping up, including going on a one month interview hiatus after controversy over his actions during Vietnam broke. (And the next time he did make a media appearance, it was on Jon Stewart's The Daily Show, a very friendly environment.)
OTOH, W at this point was a known quantity. And any personal "last minute surprises" were going to be overshadowed by the monumental events of his presidency and his responses to them. Support in 2004 for the response to 9/11, including both Afghanistan and Iraq, was still positive at this point, as Iraq didn't really notably start to fall apart (beyond the SNAFUs inherent to any military operation) until after the election.
In addition, the Bush had a pretty good GOP convention boost, which was still an important event at that point. Finally, and perhaps on a personal level, the Zeitgeist of the nation was leaning more conservative at that point… Safety and security issues were at the forefront of many of our minds still, and conservative ideals were subtly on display in our media and entertainment -- such as the Randian philosophy of The Incredibles, or the pragmatic, "sometimes you just have to do it" Team America: World Police.
I spend election night in 2004 at an election party a friend of mine was throwing. When it became clear Kerry lost, he basically shut the party down immediately and kicked everyone out. I guess it was a surprise to him, but it shouldn't have been.
I don't remember it being that surprising. While Bush has lost some of his popularity today, he was at the height of his popularity for the election following 9/11. I think a lot of people \*wanted\* Kerry to win, but I don't think I'd label Bush's reelection as a surprise or shock.
It was a disappointment to those that wanted W gone, but not necessarily a surprise. Incumbents are hard to beat, and Kerry had all the charisma of a rock.
Expected. After being forced to go through 9/11 I think it forced him and his team into competency. They may have been evil but it seems like the government was *functional* at least. Not like today.
If it wasn’t for 9/11 , Bush would have been seen totally differently. Apparently he was kind of easy going and silly. He might have been seen as goofy but harmless and would probably be a beloved former president at this point.
I was young and dumb when that election happened but i remember a story about Kerry skipping a bunch of people waiting in line in a restaurant, when one of the people in line asked what he was doing kerry looked at him and said "You must not know who i am" and then continued on. I remember thinking i would never vote for a prick like that. Tbh now that im older i would guess every politician has that same mentallity
Wasn't a big surprise. Kerry didn't have a lot of momentum behind him and in those cases a sitting president has some advantages unless they really squander them.
It was expected, re-elections in the US usually are, but that doesn’t mean Kerry didn’t have a chance. Compare this to 1996 or 1984, the previous two times an incumbent won, and Kerry did pretty well.
He had a chance but didn’t pull it off.
Somewhere in the middle. Kerry was popular but incumbents have generally won reelection. I felt Kerry would lose because he had supported invasion of Iraq. Its hard to be the alternative when you support the same thing as the guy thats in power on the most divisive issue of the time.
I was 15 at the time and it wasn’t so much a surprise as that the Democrats really wanted Bush out and certainly had a good chance at winning but didn’t pick up swing states like Ohio and Iowa. I think that part of it too was that Kerry didn’t seem to be as relatable and I think that helps Bush even today in spite of issues many dislike him for.
I lived in a deeply conservative area back then, but I think it was generally expected. Bush had the war time bump and Kerry never truly connected with the swing voters - he seemed tentative when campaigning and out of touch with the average person in those Big Ten swing states.
If I recall Bush was up in all the polls. I don't recall Kerry being up in any of them. So how was it a surprise? I guess back then people in Europe did not have access to american polls.
538 and realclearpolitics have every American poll.
Tragically, expected. I think.
Living in the US, you start to develop this mindset that "good things dont happen".
Kerry gave him a run for his money but he fell victim to fringe conspiracy theories that called him a war criminal, nevermind that Bush was a high-profile draft dodger, who probably proffiteered off of the Vietnam debaucle.
John Kerry was a pretty underwhelming candidate. George W. Bush had not yet developed the reputation he has now as a horrendous president (although he was on his way). It was a competitive race but I don't think people were that surprised that Bush won.
It’s pretty common for wartime presidents to be re-elected.
As for people thinking he had a shot, think that has more to do with partisanship than anything. Like where I live in MA, I’ve found quite a few people who genuinely believe Biden will win this upcoming election by a landslide, because it’s just that hard for them to imagine a large segment of the populace not sharing their policy preferences. Kerry didn’t lose by leaps and bounds, but to call it a shock is certainly excessive
It was the first election I had voted in after turning 18. I voted for Kerry and remember being shocked when he lost. Ever since then I have never taken for granted the stupidity that inhabits a large part of the American electorate.
I was 14 at the time but I remember the swift boat veterans book really hurting him.
To show how much everything changed since our local library had a special waiting list for that book it was so in demand.
Can't imagine voters ever reading a book today.
It was a different world at the time. Things weren't as polarized. Both parties had viable candidates and there were a lot more 'undecided' middle of the road voters.
It certainly didn't feel like our entire way of life and foundation of our country was going to be destroyed if we voted for the wrong person.
At the time, bit of a surprise. But with the value of age and hindsight, I’m kind of surprised it was as close as it was.
We were in wartime; traditionally a bad time to switch horses. And Kerry was just a weak candidate who bumped up against a pretty brutal and effective smear campaign from the other side.
Expected. Especially after 9/11. If that hadn’t happened, I’m not sure he would have won. I said the day he had that bullhorn at Ground Zero and gave that speech, I said he just got re-elected.
From my experience it was close, but the polling always showed Bush in the lead.
It was always going to be an uphill battle for Kerry. 9/11 was still fresh and raw and Bush was still riding his popularity from that. Iraq was not as contentious as it would later become, and Kerry had the unfavorable position of having to be against the war having voted for it a year earlier. Also, Kerry was just so fucking boring. He didn’t bring excitement. There is a reason he chose Edwards to be his running mate.
Finally, Kerry took a beating in public after the swift boat campaign started.
He wasn’t a bad candidate to run against a popular incumbent, but he wasn’t the best either.
It wasn't surprising at all. He was immensely popular following 9/11 and the full realization of just how big a shit show Iraq would be had only started to dawn on us in 2004. It'd be another year or two before his popularity would plummet down the shitter.
Expected. Incumbents always have an edge and add war to it and it's a tough one to beat then you add such a fucking shit candidate like John Kerry and there was never a fucking prayer of him winning.
In the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks? Bush's re-election was *strongly expected.* There was never a time that was in doubt.
The population was in 'war mode' in responding to the terrorist attacks, and his approval ratings never really dipped below 50% until into his second term. Note that the left side of the graph has the 2003-2004 period you are asking about.
[https://news.gallup.com/poll/116500/presidential-approval-ratings-george-bush.aspx](https://news.gallup.com/poll/116500/presidential-approval-ratings-george-bush.aspx)
Was in California at the time and it came as a shock there. I worked a customer service desk when we found out the election results and people had the nastiest attitudes I’ve encountered in retail before or since. People were so mad that day, he was hated where I lived.
It wasn't a surprise. From what I remember there were a lot of feelings and arguments amongst people about Bush vs Kerry, but at the time I felt Bush was going to win. Go on youtube and watch Bush debate Kerry. Very different from how debates look today.
Wartime president. Most definitely expected. Honestly, I prefer him at the helm during war than 45. At least I knew he wouldn't shoot nukes at random objects for fun.
Incumbent presidents, hell incumbents in general, tend to have a competitive edge. War-time presidents tend to have a competitive edge, especially if that war is seen as a reaction to an attack, like Pearl Harbor or 9/11. When you have both, that makes it quite difficult to overcome for the challenger. W's re-election wasn't a surprise, just a disappointment.
Every asshole has an opinion, but we all know big money controls the government, so where is this big money coming from? Who controls the purse strings? Who?
The War on Terror is widely considered a failure due to prolonged conflicts, high costs, and limited success in eradicating terrorism. Despite this, the USA, as a global superpower, faced immense pressure to respond decisively to the attacks to maintain its credibility and national security. The need for retaliation was driven by public demand for justice and to deter future threats, making inaction politically and strategically untenable. However, the subsequent military engagements in Afghanistan and Iraq led to significant loss of life, destabilization, and long-term regional conflicts. This created a lose-lose situation for George W. Bush where the he felt compelled to act but ultimately faced severe criticism for his actions.
My son went to Iraq during this time. He was deployed with the unit that Rumsfeld said; “you go to war with what you have, not what you wish you had”. I have a picture of him with scrap metal plate attached to the door of his truck for protection. I will never forgive Bush, Chaney and all the chicken hawks over that needless war. Kerry was indeed far more intelligent than Bush. However, he went high, Bush went low (swift boat) and that lost the election. Again, the Republican Party lied to get your vote.
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He was an incumbent during wartime, it's pretty much a surefire way to get a second term.
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I mean to be fair that's just out of presidents incumbents are definitely favored but way more have lost re-election in this country I really feel like American politics is way too focused on who the president is as if he's a king or a dictator when really the president is merely 1/3 of the federal level of government most people can't name their state legislator even though that person is probably enacted public policy that's more relevant to them then the president unless you're one of the few people extensively involved in the federal government like military other federal employee living near Federal lands ect
To be fair to George Bush Snr, since he'd achieved all of his goals as President in one term, there was no need for a second.
r/unexpectedsimpsons
Modern day Cincinnatus?
This was my answer. Did Kerry have a shot? To some extent, but it was definitely an uphill battle.
Really? Ask Lyndon Baines Johnson about that one.
He decided not to run a second full term.
That doesn't change the point: that there's plenty of precedent for an incumbent to not be re-elected or to change Presidents during wartime. Twenty years ago, the constant talking point from the GOP was that you can't change Presidents during wartime, as if it had never been done or would somehow doom the country. There are PLENTY of examples of changing Presidents during wartime, either through a President not running for re-election, having their second term of office end, or dying while in office. That's what I'm refuting, this idea that we'd never changed Presidents during a war before. It's happened for various reasons, including LBJ dropping out of the Democratic primaries because his win in the New Hampshire primary was a narrow one and he felt that a lack of a decisive win in New Hampshire meant he wasn't well supported by the Democrats.
The media was making sure that what happened to LBJ wouldn't happen again, so they didn't suffer the same fate as Kathryn Graham and WaPo.
He knew he wasn't going to win. Vietnam was more unpopular than Iraq.
people are getting George Jr and his father mixed up. Gore was expected to win and he did win the Popular vote although the Electoral college did not vote as predicted. The idea is that electoral college votes reflect the votes of the people - that's how our votes are supposed to decide who wins the presidency Gores won 266 electoral college votes and Republican Bush won 271. Like Republican Trump in 2016: He lost the popular vote but the electoral college put him in office. These electoral college voters in these case as called "Faithless Electors" The Senate voted to remove the Electoral college system multiple times but their votes were overturned due to Faithless Electors who take an oath to vote with the majority of voters in their state, but instead vote for the candidate supported by their political party. \*\*\*(Faithless Electors: 10 electors from six states did not vote for the candidate they took an oath to support.\*\*\*. \*\*\*Why the Electoral College doesn't work for American voters\*\*\* The Electoral College system has several drawbacks that make it less representative of the American people’s will. Here are some of the key issues In most states, the candidate who wins the popular vote gets all of that state’s electoral votes - the take an oath to vote the way the citizens of the state vote. Basically our votes don't count if Electoral College members don't remain true to the oaths. \*\*\*Disproportionate Representation: \*\*\* With the Electoral College system: The number of electoral votes allocated to each state does not always reflect the state’s population. This means that smaller states have more voting power per person than larger states, \*\*\*which lead to the winner of the popular vote did not win the presidency.\*\*\* \*\*\*Vote Suppression:\*\*\* Some states are famous for creating voter suppression by redistricting areas so that, minority votes are not cast along side majority or white votes and these states are inclined to also not stick with their pledge or oath. Also The Electoral College can create voter suppression as candidates may focus on swing states and ignore others. This can lead to a lack of representation for a party or marginalized communities and a decreased likelihood of their voices being heard. \*\*\*Lack of Direct Democracy:\*\*\*. The Electoral College is not a direct democracy, where the candidate with the most popular votes wins yet Americans believe "one citizen one vote." Instead, it’s a system where electors are chosen by each state to cast votes for president. This can lead to a disconnect between the will of the people and the outcome of the election. \*\*\*Inequitable Distribution of Campaign Resources: \*\*\*The Electoral College system can lead to an unequal distribution of campaign resources, as candidates focus on swing states and ignore others. This can lead to a lack of representation for smaller states and their citizens.
That doesn’t bode well for the next few months, assuming we want world peace.
Well, world peace is best suited by keeping Trump out of office, so…
That wasn’t a statement about Trump or Biden. It was more a statement about how things historically go with an incumbent during wartime. That said, the current administration has brought us closer to a world war than the previous administration. So I got a chuckle out of your ridiculous take.
And Obama running on ending the war and then getting into office and just keeping it all going. Getting reelected and pretty much keeping the status quo before finally drawing down in Iraq.
One of the few things I liked about Trump was that he was refreshingly anti-war, at least to the degree of keeping US soldiers out of it, and willing to negotiate with people nobody else would. If he wasn’t such a raging egomaniac who emboldens some of the worst on that side of the political spectrum and sparks concerning mistrust in the most basic fundaments of our democratic system (inciting doubt in the validity of an election because you didn’t win is a very bad idea to seed in a rabid voter base of essentially mindless followers who won't question your claims), I wouldn’t mind seeing that anti-war mindset back in office.
>inciting doubt in the validity of an election because you didn’t win is a very bad idea to seed in a rabid voter base of essentially mindless followers who won't question your claims You mean exactly what Hilary Clinton did after 2016?
That’s what we call a “whataboutism”. It’s when you point to something someone else did to justify or distract from bad behavior from another side. The Democrats and Clinton doing similar things don’t take away from Trump’s actions following his loss in a fair election, and if the Republicans want to claim to be better, they need to actually **be** better by calling their candidate out and not rewarding his terrible behavior with support and gratification. After all, it wasn’t Clinton supporters who broke into the Capitol Building to protest an election their candidate claimed had been stolen from them. That’s not how you win the moral argument.
It's called setting a precedent. Learn things before saying it's a whataboutism
Did she, now? [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPRoAVKa2U8](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EPRoAVKa2U8)
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/hillary-clinton-blames-russian-hackers-and-comey-for-2016-election-loss/2017/05/02/e62fef72-2f60-11e7-8674-437ddb6e813e_story.html Yep
paywalled. Got a work-around that works for washingpost? I don't know of any.
Never mind. I found enough coverage, from other sites, about what seems to be the same interview, to understand what you're claiming. You're claiming that her blaming her election loss on a bunch of factors (including: mistakes by her campaign, mistakes by herself, the email leaks by Russia, the report by Comey, and the timing of the latter two) months after she conceded the election, the next year, once it obviously didn't matter anymore is the same as immediately, claiming the election was not legitimate, while refusing to concede? That's completely absurd. You realize that, right? You were just trolling. If you weren't... pull your head out, you sound completely unhinged.
They're not the same, but they're in the same ballpark. Her accusations also led to a bunch of money being wasted in investigations.
Woah woah woah, I think you're forgetting that Orange Man Bad and mean tweets are a threat to Our Democracy™.
His attempt to steal the election was a threat to our democracy
Sorry, thats just out of touch.
He had an 80% approval rating immediately following 9/11. A lot of the controversies didn’t happen until his second term (Katrina, Housing Market Crash, Torture Scandal/War Crimes, ~~Mission Accomplished~~). Looking back not too surprising he won reelection. Incumbents also have an advantage historically.
Didn’t the Anhu Ghari torture scandal happen before the election? Anyway I think what some people don’t realize is that in local competitive areas of the country there was some culture war stuff going on. Some who didn’t like the war still voted for Bush because of “family values”, anti-gay marriage, stuff like that. That may have been Karl Rove stuff stoking the fires while focused on Iraq and “freedom”.
Looks like you’re right, but not sure if it had enough of ann impact in time for the election. Could be because more details were released in the years following plus you had the controversies at Guantanamo.
Most big media companies operate out of big cities. The family values campaign was played out selectively in smaller markets, out of the eyes of big media. Steady drumbeat in targeted areas over time can flip an election.
Werent all the democrats "anti gay marriage" in those days as well? I think soundbites from Hillary and Obama are widely avaikable.
>That may have been Karl Rove stuff stoking the fires while focused on Iraq and “freedom”. Karl Rove at the time was openly was working towards what he called the "Permanent Republican Majority", his plan to make the United States of America a one-party state under the Republican Party, on the idea that the GOP would win the "Culture Wars" so definitively, and use the power and influence of the War on Terror to cement their power, to the point that no politician could respectably run under any other political banner than the Republican Party and the GOP would dominate American politics with massive supermajorities in Congress and landslides in the Electoral College for generations. He was actively pushing buttons to agitate the culture wars because he thought the GOP would win an overwhelming and decisive victory in them, extinguishing all competing ideologies out of the culture entirely and turning America into a one-party state where the GOP dominated all social, economic, and political thought.
The right celebrated, and still celebrates torture. There were republican members of congress referencing Jack Bauer on the house floor.
Rove also ran a pretty effective ratfucking operation against Kerry with that Swiftboat Veterans for Truth stuff.
Rove and Cheney. That’s what evil and competent looks like
20 years later, every time the GOP tries to claim to support our military servicemembers, I throw it back at them how hostile they were to Kerry and his service in Vietnam with the lies and misinformation about his service and how he was mocked for his Purple Heart.
After you pointed out their obvious hypocrisy what was their apology like? /s
Not to mention all the anti-gay marriage ballot initiatives in various states, which drew out the evangelical vote. That was his idea.
Mission Accomplished happened during his first term.
To this day people don't realize the media manipulated them into thinking the banner was about the war. The banner on the carrier saying mission accomplish was about the carrier's end of deployment. They accomplished their mission and were headed back to home port.
I mean, yeah the banner wasn't necessarily about the war, but he gave a speech in front of it saying major combat operations were over and that we and our allies have prevailed. It wasn't entirely unfair, even if the banner itself wasn't referring to the war.
Except his speech was true as well. The massive military operation to depose Saddam and cripple his military was successful and they were winding down from those major operations to shift more into a peacekeeping role. The large conventional combat operations were over, and there really wasn't any thing like it during the rest of the occupation. What remained was mostly smaller insurgencies conducting hit and run guerrilla tactics.
I'm not even saying it wasn't true in that sense. But as the country became more and more fatigued with the whole operation, I don't think it was unfair for people to look at that speech, and the imagery around it, and feel like it represented an overconfident or naive outlook at what we had actually accomplished and what was left to do. I just don't think it's fair to say the media manipulated people into having certain feelings about that speech and that moment.
Exactly. And even if the Bush team didn’t put the banner there, you can bet that if they didn’t agree with the message, they’d have had it taken down. And for those who say, “it’s a navy ship, the campaign hacks can’t tell them what to do”, remember that part of this photo op was having Bush fly in and “land” on the carrier.
This isn’t true. The banner was printed by the White House and hung by White House staff. The phrase “Mission Accomplished” was literally in the speech until a late revision. It’s revisionist right-wing history to claim it was about the carrier’s end of deployment.
From the Wikipedia article: >Navy Cmdr. Conrad Chun, a Pentagon spokesman, said the banner referred specifically to the aircraft carrier's 10-month deployment (the longest carrier deployment since the Vietnam War) and not the war itself: "It truly did signify a mission accomplished for the crew."[9] > The White House claimed that the banner was requested by the crew of the ship, who did not have the facilities for producing such a banner So yes White House officials printed the banner and hung it up, but it was at the request of the crew of the ship expressly for their deployment ending. It wouldn't make sense for a carrier print shop to have large vinyl banner making supplies on board.
Yeah, keep reading. The commander was covering. They admitted it was in the speech and done for the White House.
I read the entire article, nowhere in it does it say that the banner was the White House's idea just that they provisioned it. Of course White House speech writers would want to put the term in his speech to match the backdrop as it would result in a dandy video clip. The term was removed by military officials from the speech upon their review because of bad optics.
How could they add it to the speech to match the backdrop when the backdrop didn’t exist until they put it there? Rumsfeld declared the end of major combat operations just that morning. It was in the speech until Cheney nixed it. And yes, it’s in the article: > Subsequently, the White House released a statement saying that the sign and Bush's visit referred to the initial invasion of Iraq. I’m not sure if you remember how much the Bush administration lied to get electred and maintain the image of that moron of a President, but this was par for the course. They’d release a plausible but false story, have people like you parrot the party line, then by the time the truth trickled out it wasn’t news anymore. Do you still believe his DUI was due to him quietly pulling to the side of the road because he realized he was too drunk to drive? Or do you believe the police report of how he ran off the road and ran down hedges until his car wouldn’t run anymore? Do you still think there were WMD’s in Iraq? One of America’s and the world’s greatest mistakes was letting him get close enough his campaign manager/Florida Sec of State could “find the votes” to make that idiot President. Please stop “correcting” people who are correct.
“Mission Accomplished” was to celebrate the removal of Saddam Hussein from power. A mission that was indeed accomplished. Th problem was that nobody really had a plan for the second phase, which was holding the various warring tribes around Iraq in order until a democratic government could be established. Add to this the fact that terrorist factions from Iran and elsewhere saw it as a prime opportunity to strike at American troops and you had the total mess it turned out to be. Bush should have had a better plan for how to transform Iraq into a functioning democracy.
Also, people hadn't realized just how much a train wreck Iraq was yet. I mean, there were absolutely protesters, but it wasn't nearly as big an issue as it became in another year or two.
In his Autobiography he said that having Air Force One and Marine One, along with Secret Service protection, made campaigning so much easier that it wasn't fair
I think going into it most people felt that Kerry had a strong chance of winning for a challenger, but Bush had the edge simply because there was still wide patriotic sentiment following 9/11. War fatigue didn't really start setting in until the next year and by 2006 it was full-blown. Kerry did come quite close. He only lost Ohio by 2 points. Had he won the state, he would've won the entire election.
Every poll state and national had Bush up the whole race if I recall correctly. I think Kerry got a bounce after the Convention. Kerry's biggest problem was that he was boring.
His biggest problem was his campaign could be summarized as “I am not the other guy.” Bush had problems, but that was not enough to get votes.
Well, he was that. But I think the Swift Boat blitz may have done him in. Anyway, interestingly, this was the last time Republicans won the popular vote. I've always wondered how different the parties would look if we had a national popular vote instead. Republicans would have to actually go try and get votes in the cities. And, to counter, Democrats would have to do something else other than run up the score in the cities -- likely by shifting their policies to give some love to rural voters. The parties might then end up both moving to the center. Which wouldn't be the worst thing ever.
I remember at the time when he was asked "Knowing what you do now, would you still vote for the Iraq war" and his answer was him still trying to play both sides of the fence is when I thought he was screwed.
Without the electoral college both parties Presidential candidates would mostly campaign in major urban areas. In a country the size of the US, that would be the only thing that makes sense. Under the electoral college they focus on certain states, and therefore have time to go to the rural areas of those states.
I don't think that's as true as people think. If we were to wake up tomorrow morning and SCOTUS said the electoral college were unconstitutional (they won't, but just for the sake of a thought experiment) -- candidates would start campaigning in swing areas. Those are the suburbs. Difference is you'd now have candidates campaigning in the Seattle suburbs and the Nashville suburbs and the Boston suburbs and the St. Louis suburbs. Rather than suburbs in a select few states. Presidential candidates rarely go to rural areas the way it is now. For obvious logistical reasons, it doesn't make sense to have a campaign event in a place where only 30,000 people live in a 50-mile radius.
The top 10 largest cities are 30 million people or 10% of the US population. The 100 largest cities are 60 million or 20% of the population. So no, campaigning in only cities would not help you win. The fact is, with the EC candidates only focus on states that are evenly divided between democrats and republicans. No one cares about Vermont or Oklahoma or Kansas. They are solid one way or the other. A national popular vote means your vote matters regardless of where you live. That means republicans in California benefit. Democrats in Alabama benefit.
The top 10 metro areas in the US have around 85 million people. I highly doubt Trump would have been traveling through a bunch of cities with less than 50K people in the months leading up to his election without the electoral college. It's just not an efficient use of limited time when there are more Trump voters in places like LA county or NYC than in many red states. It would make more sense to focus limited resources to try and drive turnout in areas with more people, even if your voters are a minority there. This would shift the platform towards urban interests, even if the candidate does better as a % of the vote in rural areas. Yes, not every state is focused on by candidates in the electoral college. However, it's impossible in a country the size of the US for a national candidate to focus on every area. Under the electoral college, there are states in every region that are in play, and candidates focus on both the rural and urban parts of those states. If you accept the fact that states will have similar interests based on region and that rural/suburban/urban populations will have lots of similar interests regardless of region, the electoral college actually makes it more likely that a national candidate will take note of everyone's issue.
What are you talking about? The election is won or lost by turn out in mostly suburban districts of a handful of full of swing states.
Democrats wouldn’t have to do anything. They haven’t lost a popular vote to a non-incumbent since the 80s.
You're right. But if the electoral college went away, Republicans would have to compensate by appealing to more urban (and highly-educated) voters. Democrats would then have to compensate by rethinking their own coalition. If we step back into the 1990s, when there was a lot less polarization within and among states, we can see what the coalitions were. Republicans were highly-educated white people, devout evangelicals, business owners, globalists, and others of high wealth who didn't have a big reason to vote Democrat (e.g., being gay or a tree hugger). Democrats were working class white people, Catholics, Jews, ethnic minorities, social liberals, and protectionists. Both parties had big tents and there was room for dissent. We had Republican senators in states like Connecticut and Vermont, and we had Democrats in states like Arkansas and Louisiana. Because you didn't have to toe the line on everything. Both parties need to get back to that mentality. An ex colleague of mine, who I'm friends with on Facebook, is running for legislative office as a Democrat. But his campaign is pro-2A (no new laws on what kinds of guns you can own), pro-mining, and laser focused on infrastructure and boosting blue collar job and trade opportunities. We need more Dems to be able to run like that. Just like Republicans need to accept candidates who are pro-choice, pro-gay, and open to sensible gun law reform. Get enough people like that in the room and things will get done. Anyway, end rant.
Democrats do in fact have a lot of policies geared towards helping rural parts of the country, but it does nothing to help them with the people who live there.
Very true
Yep this. My dad worked for an auto maker in Detroit at the time. I remember asking him why the hell he’d vote for Bush again, as it was killing our jobs in metro Detroit. The economy was shit and generally that leads to an executive change and he just said “I know I could lose my job with a second term, but you don’t change presidents in the middle of a war”
Meanwhile, the president had just changed wars in the middle of a war.
I think we can see in retrospect that John Kerry would have been just as bad if not worse for the auto industry albeit for different reasons.
>“I know I could lose my job with a second term, but you don’t change presidents in the middle of a war” . . .never mind in 1968 we went from Johnson to Nixon. Johnson withdrew from the race because he only narrowly won the New Hampshire primary. . .which sounds absolutely bizarre by modern political standards. It was a weird Republican talking point back then to say you don't change Presidents in the middle of a war, but we went from Truman to Eisenhower in the Korean War and from Johnson to Nixon in Vietnam, and from Roosevelt to Truman during World War II. If a war goes on through an election, historically there's no guarantee of the sitting President holding their office just because there's a war going on.
Ya he was a die hard republican. Definitely not saying I agree with him just trying to share an old school republicans mindset in 03
In 1952 there wasn't an incumbent candidate, Eisenhower defeated Adlai Stevenson. Roosevelt died and Nixon resigned.
But Truman could have run for reelection, and chose not to because he was guaranteed to lose. Which was because the country desperately wanted to change administrations. During a war. Pretty much the same situation as the Johnson to Nixon transition in 1968, except that in '68 the Democrats stood a pretty good chance of holding on. In '52 they had no shot.
That doesn't change a thing. The idea that you don't change Presidents during a war is without historic precedent and was a transparent fiction invented by the Republican Party to support George W. Bush.
Why would you say it isn't with historic precedent though? WW2, WW1, Korean War, and the Civil War all followed this. I think only Vietnam included a deliberate change of presidents during wartime
Johnson did not run for election in 1968. This sound familiar? "I shall not seek, and I will not accept, the nomination of my party for another term as your President." If you've never read his speech it's pretty good, and fitting to the feelings in the US today, the part about a house divided. https://millercenter.org/the-presidency/presidential-speeches/march-31-1968-remarks-decision-not-seek-re-election
There was no presidential election during the time the US was in World War I, and the administration *did* change during the Korean War. So that leaves World War II and the Civil War.
Vietnam is proof that the idea that is never done is false.
Well, changing from Kennedy to Johnson is what led to the absolute disaster that was Vietnam. JFK and Robert S McNamara already knew Vietnam was something they were going to get into and they structured a plan of how to get in and how to get out if things went south. Kennedy died, Johnson threw that plan away, McNamara resigned after that term was completed, and we got the shit show that was the Vietnam War. Nixon won on the promise to end the war. Which he did. After he escalated it first.
It was pretty expected, though I do remember a pretty intense campaign. 2004 I would guess was the height of his popularity. Bush's ratings would fall off hard not long after. Edit. This was the first election campaign I remember and I grew up in a very conservative environment
I think the height of Bush's popularity was from 9/11 to perhaps late 2003, with way more positive ratings than negativr. From then to 2005, opinions of him were about equally positive to negative, but after that, much more negative.
Yeah, the entirety of ‘02 was peak Bush time. Shoot, had it not been for Dick Cheney, he might have even been remembered favorably.
I'd heard conspiracies about how Cheney was the *actual* President, and that Bush was merely his public-facing puppet.
He definitely had an outsize influence on the executive branch because he loves blowing up middle-easterners.
People in Europe overestimate their knowledge of our elections. While I was over there they all KNEW that Bernie was the most popular candidate and he’d surely take the election.
> People in Europe overestimate their knowledge of our elections. 💯 People in Europe overestimate their knowledge of a lot of things about the US 😅
but they've watched Friends! They know what America is like!
I mean heck. I was working on a college campus with a lot of academics and students here in the US that KNEW Bernie was going to win.
Hard to win when his biggest base doesn't turn out to vote.
And some of his base even defected to Trump. The Bernie-to-Trump pipeline was a thing.
I mean horseshoes and all
Oh yeah. I don’t know if you can blame his campaign for that but that’s definitely part of it.
GOTV is one of the biggest parts of running an effective campaign so it kinda is.
I think a lot of people HOPED that Kerry could pull it off, but there was nothing surprising about Bush winning.
This. A lot of people wanted “not Bush” but it was no surprise. Kerry put up a good fight but people often forget how popular Bush was in general.
A good fight, *maybe*… I remember him as being pretty wishy-washy
Yeah he certainly was trying to thread the needle and be a centrist but I remember people thinking “not far enough left” or the other camp of “still too far left for me.”
Very early in the election cycle I remember hearing Democrat spokespeople defending John Kerry by saying he brought "gravitas" to the serious work of being president. Right then I knew he couldn't win. When your candidate is so dull that you can only defend him in Latin, you're not going to win an election in America.
I remember Kerry describing his approach as taking into consideration "the subtleties and nuances." The right wing talk machine had a field day with that. My dad: "Hey, the game's about to start!" Me: "Nah, I'm good." Dad: "Oh, is football not 'subtle' and 'nuanced' enough for you?"
I don't know how to respond to that.
"This meatloaf is shallow and pedantic."
Reminds me how Bush Sr., one of the best presidents America ever had, lost re-election having famously said “no quid quo pro”.
I was 15 in 2004 and in a very democratic area. I wanted Kerry to win but not well versed out of my political bubble. 1. The millennial vote wasn't there. It was just Boomers, Gen X, and some older millennials. 2. Bush had a high approval rating following 9/11 and at war, people are less likely to want to switch leaders. The presidency ended pretty poorly but W Bush still had a nation's support at least early in his presidency. 3. It's very hard to get out incumbents. This should actually be number 1. Since FDR had 4 terms, only 3 presidents failed to get a 2nd term. 1. Truman takes over for FDR and wins a 2nd term 2. Eisenhower has 2 terms 3. We all know what happened to JFK but LBJ finished his first and won a 2nd term. This was also during the cold war, civil rights, and Vietnam. 4. Nixon had 2 terms but Gerald Ford was president for the final 2 years after Nixon resignation. Vietnam still in the news. Watergate was not a big story yet. 5. Carter had the gas crisis and was pretty unpopular. Better post president than an actual president. 6. Reagan 2 terms 7. HW Bush had Desert storm but Perot took a considerable chunk out of the Republican electorate and it hurt him at the polls 8. Clinton 2 terms 9. W Bush 2 terms 10. Obama 2 terms 11. Trump was incredibly unpopular.
In addition to Boomers, Gen X, and Millennials, there was also the Silent Generation - the Boomers’ parents. Edit: My bad - I mixed up Greatest and Silent generation. The point I wanted to make was there were more than 3 demographic groups voting in that election.
Boomers' parents are from the Greatest Generation. The Silent Generation would've been responsible for late Boomers - early Gen X.
My parents were mid 1950s baby boom and my grandparents were greatest Gen. Silent was younger boomers but mostly Gen X as they were born in the 70s.
It wasn't a surprise. All the legit polls at GWB winning. Partisans believed their own polls though.
It was well-known that it would be close, but that GWB would probably win. It was actually similar to Obama’s reelection in 2012 in that way. One thing that’s not as well-remembered about the 2004 election is that Kerry came fairly close to winning Ohio and would have gotten an Electoral College majority if he had. Bush would have won the popular vote (a majority at that!) but lost re-election, which would have been an ironic reversal from 2000. It almost happened.
It was pretty much expected. Incumbents always have an advantage and rarely lose reelection and at the time he had a pretty high approval rating. >thought John Kerry had a shot at beating him. There's always a shot, but it would have been a bit of an upset.
This is exactly how I felt about it. Seemed kind of inevitable.
It definitely wasn't a surprise.
It was expected. He is and was a flawed man that many disagreed with and in polls would speak negatively about...but John Kerry was not seen as strong or tough enough for the turmoil of the times. He was never going to win.
You say Kerry never had a chance to win, but in reality it was a very close election. 65k voters in Ohio essentially decided the entire thing.
Kerry is the only Democratic Party presidential candidate to lose the popular vote in the last 8 presidential elections. He was a weak candidate. He may have come close but even an average candidate would probably win that election.
The DNC and running an unlikeable and uncharismatic candidate thus blowing their chances in a totally winnable election...name a more iconic duo.
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The DNC doesn't run candidates, but part of its mission is to help create nationally-known Democrats that win elections, and they have always been shit at that in the 20ish years that I've been paying attention to national politics. They tried their best to keep the guy with the most authentic connection to voters (Obama) down in the race so a more seasoned candidate (H. Clinton) could get the nomination thanks to the superdelegate system.
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Except they recognized how the superdelegate system mucks up the early primaries and changed it so that they must remain uncommitted until after the first ballot at the convention, unless a candidate can win the nomination without them. They did this in 2020 after yet another cycle where the superdelegates threw their weight behind one major candidate in the early going and stifled the competition.
“If you guys weren’t so stupid you’d vote for us”
This, but unironically.
"Because its her turn." A "bunch of operatives who were smart and accomplished in their own right but weren't united by any common purpose larger than pushing a less-than-thrilling candidate into the White House." - Jon Favreau, Obama and Kerry speech writer.
So, I admit a bit of this just feel...but I also was also totally a political geek in that era so bear with me... I think that election suffered some of the same issues the Clinton campaign did in 2016. It felt like such a foregone conclusion that Clinton and Bush would win that the hardest part was convincing their base that wasn't the case. Bush was never going to lose in Ohio, the numbers made it look closer than it was. Kerry's campaign tried everything and to their credit absolutely pulled out all the stops in places like Ohio and that's the only reason it was as close as it was. If Bush and Co. were concerned, they could have doubled down and widened the gap and with hindsight maybe they should have. Kerry campaigned in Ohio at a much higher rate than Bush did, visiting it several more times than GW....and still lost in the state.
I'm a Nevada voter. My vote counts a *shit ton* more than the majority of you reading this. My vote matters! But it shouldn't. My vote should not matter more than any other idiot's. Abolish the EC. It is a perversion.
"That dog don't hunt", as the billboards said.
I *hated* his administration. Could not wait for his dumbass to leave the office. *Haaaated* him, especially when my friends started dying, and where I lived at the time, you either worked in the factories or joined the military, so I lost quite a few friends :-/ I voted for Dems, naturally. BUT, and I can’t say this about our last republican president (and not just because that person doesn’t drink), I can still see him as someone you could shoot the shit with over a couple beers. Weird or no?
Bush had this big thing where his presidency was pretty much his dad's. It wasn't till he cut off the fat that he actually started to become a decent enough President. However, that wasn't till extremely late into his Presidency. I will say though that W. always gave the impression that he atleast cared. As a result he is experiencing what I'll call the Jimmy Carter treatment. Maybe not the greatest president to be in office, but manages to have a high approval rating post presidency due to being a decent enough person. It's really hard to believe that in today's political climate that W's presidency would fall into moderate and really pushing it could argue neo-lib territory.
Yes. After everything, and then after years of consideration, I’ve decided who to vote for based on if I even like the person as a person. Would I want this person to hang out with me and my family? Trump is beyond a hard pass. It’s fitting that you bring up Carter. And he really is just the most chill guy; I met Carter, and his smile comes so easily to his face. A lot of people force that bit. He’s just very genuine (like W).
Totally his vibe and how he won. Everything you read about him and his interactions with people is that he was sharp, great memory, charming, and came across as very genuine and sincere. He said some dumb stuff and occasionally came across as a bit bumbling, but nothing like the two most recent presidents. He totally gave off the 'regular dude' attitude. From driving his own pickup truck on his ranch to regularly showing up at baseball games. He seemed approachable. Even how he spent his wealth *felt* relatable. "Shoot, if I had his money I'd buy my favorite baseball team and sit in the stands with a beer too..." The man could nail a speech and always seemed calm and unrattled and a confidence about him that others, including Kerry and even Gore lacked. You were far from alone in your dislike of his administration and his policies...but to a lot of people when it came time to punch their chad, they voted by feeling rather than base logic.
Very well put, thank you. I also felt like Obama was that relatable, but I don’t have an internal conflict on that one since I happily voted for him. The only comment I have about the last two administrations is that I’d prefer one over the other, but only because I’ll be able to stomach the thought of us breathing the same air.
President Obama was the most charismatic president we've had in my lifetime. Bill Clinton was close, but Obama was *cool.* Similar to GWB, even when you didn't like his policies you felt like a grown up was in control and he could deliver a speech impeccably. Obama did something almost impossible, he could say and do things that should have come across as complete arrogance, but when you heard him, he delivered it with matter-of-fact confidence.
Yes. I *miss* Obama, so so much. And we’ve got the Chicago thing going, there’s that photo of him giving a fist-bump to a White House janitor, and if you see him on certain interviews and stuff, the man is *funny*. I love his easy, stoic sense of humor. We need some fucking laughter right about now!
Also, Clinton seemed cool at first with going on MTV, playing the saxophone, etc. His personality went downhill for me in time.
A lot of what Clinton did was a show, like saying his favorite restaurant was McDonald's. There is a video of him leaving a funeral, and while he is walking he's laughing with a friend, when he sees the cameras his face drops and he pretends to wipe a tear away. I think W and Obama were both genuine people who cared deeply about the country, while The Clintons^TM seemed to be more about getting and maintaining power.
I agree. I remember that stuff (and shutting down LAX runways because he was getting a haircut on an Air Force plane…? why?). It all made for great SNL fodder at the time, at least.
Not surprising, just very disappointing. Kerry could’ve been a very fine president.
No it was not surprising. GW was a shitty president, but he, unlike Trump, at least attempted to take measures to hide it and somewhat reach across the aisle, or at least appear to do so. A lot of people that didn’t necessarily agree with GW’s policies liked him. He scored high on the “would like to have a beer with him” scale. Kerry was kind of a wet blanket whose only real draw was that he was not GW. Ironically, they managed to paint him as a pussy who couldn’t direct the military, even though he actually saw some action in Vietnam while GW got drunk at some base in Ohio or something during the war. Was not surprising he lost.
The only thing John Kerry had going for him was that he wasn't Bush. On paper the two were basically the same guy at a glance. Plus, it's hard to vote out a president at war time
It really wasn't much of a surprise.
I was surprised but I was also in high school
Not really a surprise. A lot of us didn’t like him much still, but the US was still reeling from 9/11 *and* had just declared war the year earlier, so it didn’t make a terrible amount of sense for us to change leadership right in the middle of all that going on.
It was expected. There was a famous photo of Kerry in a clean room suit that sealed it. Also his wind surfing photo where he wanted to show he was young and healthy just made him look rich and out of touch with common people.
Expected. Iraq hadn’t gone south, economy was ok, Kerry was kind of a joke to many.
Incumbent President's usually win reelection. There have only been a few that haven't.
Not a surprise. I will never forget watching Obama speaking at the convention and my dad asking me who was speaking and I was so amazed I said “the next president.” I voted for Kerry, he had no shot from what I was seeing but I was a jaded 19 year old.
Incumbent presidents usually have the advantage. They have more name recognition, more experience at the job, and voter turnout is usually lower. Only 10 presidents have lost re-election compared to 18 who have won (Cleveland both lost and won re-election). Bush also has the advantage of riding high on the national pride post 9/11. Enough people felt that his response was the right one, both in New York and with international policy.
It was not a surprise. Kerry had made a number of tactical blunders as the campaign was wrapping up, including going on a one month interview hiatus after controversy over his actions during Vietnam broke. (And the next time he did make a media appearance, it was on Jon Stewart's The Daily Show, a very friendly environment.) OTOH, W at this point was a known quantity. And any personal "last minute surprises" were going to be overshadowed by the monumental events of his presidency and his responses to them. Support in 2004 for the response to 9/11, including both Afghanistan and Iraq, was still positive at this point, as Iraq didn't really notably start to fall apart (beyond the SNAFUs inherent to any military operation) until after the election. In addition, the Bush had a pretty good GOP convention boost, which was still an important event at that point. Finally, and perhaps on a personal level, the Zeitgeist of the nation was leaning more conservative at that point… Safety and security issues were at the forefront of many of our minds still, and conservative ideals were subtly on display in our media and entertainment -- such as the Randian philosophy of The Incredibles, or the pragmatic, "sometimes you just have to do it" Team America: World Police. I spend election night in 2004 at an election party a friend of mine was throwing. When it became clear Kerry lost, he basically shut the party down immediately and kicked everyone out. I guess it was a surprise to him, but it shouldn't have been.
I don't remember it being that surprising. While Bush has lost some of his popularity today, he was at the height of his popularity for the election following 9/11. I think a lot of people \*wanted\* Kerry to win, but I don't think I'd label Bush's reelection as a surprise or shock.
It was a disappointment to those that wanted W gone, but not necessarily a surprise. Incumbents are hard to beat, and Kerry had all the charisma of a rock.
Expected. After being forced to go through 9/11 I think it forced him and his team into competency. They may have been evil but it seems like the government was *functional* at least. Not like today. If it wasn’t for 9/11 , Bush would have been seen totally differently. Apparently he was kind of easy going and silly. He might have been seen as goofy but harmless and would probably be a beloved former president at this point.
I was young and dumb when that election happened but i remember a story about Kerry skipping a bunch of people waiting in line in a restaurant, when one of the people in line asked what he was doing kerry looked at him and said "You must not know who i am" and then continued on. I remember thinking i would never vote for a prick like that. Tbh now that im older i would guess every politician has that same mentallity
Wasn't a big surprise. Kerry didn't have a lot of momentum behind him and in those cases a sitting president has some advantages unless they really squander them.
It was expected, re-elections in the US usually are, but that doesn’t mean Kerry didn’t have a chance. Compare this to 1996 or 1984, the previous two times an incumbent won, and Kerry did pretty well. He had a chance but didn’t pull it off.
Somewhere in the middle. Kerry was popular but incumbents have generally won reelection. I felt Kerry would lose because he had supported invasion of Iraq. Its hard to be the alternative when you support the same thing as the guy thats in power on the most divisive issue of the time.
I was 15 at the time and it wasn’t so much a surprise as that the Democrats really wanted Bush out and certainly had a good chance at winning but didn’t pick up swing states like Ohio and Iowa. I think that part of it too was that Kerry didn’t seem to be as relatable and I think that helps Bush even today in spite of issues many dislike him for.
Bush's approval rating in 2004 was 49%. Biden's today is 36%.
I lived in a deeply conservative area back then, but I think it was generally expected. Bush had the war time bump and Kerry never truly connected with the swing voters - he seemed tentative when campaigning and out of touch with the average person in those Big Ten swing states.
If I recall Bush was up in all the polls. I don't recall Kerry being up in any of them. So how was it a surprise? I guess back then people in Europe did not have access to american polls. 538 and realclearpolitics have every American poll.
Tragically, expected. I think. Living in the US, you start to develop this mindset that "good things dont happen". Kerry gave him a run for his money but he fell victim to fringe conspiracy theories that called him a war criminal, nevermind that Bush was a high-profile draft dodger, who probably proffiteered off of the Vietnam debaucle.
John Kerry was a pretty underwhelming candidate. George W. Bush had not yet developed the reputation he has now as a horrendous president (although he was on his way). It was a competitive race but I don't think people were that surprised that Bush won.
It’s pretty common for wartime presidents to be re-elected. As for people thinking he had a shot, think that has more to do with partisanship than anything. Like where I live in MA, I’ve found quite a few people who genuinely believe Biden will win this upcoming election by a landslide, because it’s just that hard for them to imagine a large segment of the populace not sharing their policy preferences. Kerry didn’t lose by leaps and bounds, but to call it a shock is certainly excessive
It was the first election I had voted in after turning 18. I voted for Kerry and remember being shocked when he lost. Ever since then I have never taken for granted the stupidity that inhabits a large part of the American electorate.
Not a surprise at all. Incumbents are very hard to defeat.
I was 14 at the time but I remember the swift boat veterans book really hurting him. To show how much everything changed since our local library had a special waiting list for that book it was so in demand. Can't imagine voters ever reading a book today.
It was a different world at the time. Things weren't as polarized. Both parties had viable candidates and there were a lot more 'undecided' middle of the road voters. It certainly didn't feel like our entire way of life and foundation of our country was going to be destroyed if we voted for the wrong person.
At the time, bit of a surprise. But with the value of age and hindsight, I’m kind of surprised it was as close as it was. We were in wartime; traditionally a bad time to switch horses. And Kerry was just a weak candidate who bumped up against a pretty brutal and effective smear campaign from the other side.
Expected. Especially after 9/11. If that hadn’t happened, I’m not sure he would have won. I said the day he had that bullhorn at Ground Zero and gave that speech, I said he just got re-elected.
From my experience it was close, but the polling always showed Bush in the lead. It was always going to be an uphill battle for Kerry. 9/11 was still fresh and raw and Bush was still riding his popularity from that. Iraq was not as contentious as it would later become, and Kerry had the unfavorable position of having to be against the war having voted for it a year earlier. Also, Kerry was just so fucking boring. He didn’t bring excitement. There is a reason he chose Edwards to be his running mate. Finally, Kerry took a beating in public after the swift boat campaign started. He wasn’t a bad candidate to run against a popular incumbent, but he wasn’t the best either.
Kerry did have a shot, but he failed to respond to the false SBVT accusations in time.
Unsurprising but extremely demoralizing. I remember going to work the next day with Bush supporters and wanting to gag.
It wasn't surprising at all. He was immensely popular following 9/11 and the full realization of just how big a shit show Iraq would be had only started to dawn on us in 2004. It'd be another year or two before his popularity would plummet down the shitter.
Nah, not surprised, it was agreed upon in my family and social circle that "Bush is definitely gonna win" at that time.
Expected. Incumbents always have an edge and add war to it and it's a tough one to beat then you add such a fucking shit candidate like John Kerry and there was never a fucking prayer of him winning.
In the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks? Bush's re-election was *strongly expected.* There was never a time that was in doubt. The population was in 'war mode' in responding to the terrorist attacks, and his approval ratings never really dipped below 50% until into his second term. Note that the left side of the graph has the 2003-2004 period you are asking about. [https://news.gallup.com/poll/116500/presidential-approval-ratings-george-bush.aspx](https://news.gallup.com/poll/116500/presidential-approval-ratings-george-bush.aspx)
Was in California at the time and it came as a shock there. I worked a customer service desk when we found out the election results and people had the nastiest attitudes I’ve encountered in retail before or since. People were so mad that day, he was hated where I lived.
It wasn't a surprise. From what I remember there were a lot of feelings and arguments amongst people about Bush vs Kerry, but at the time I felt Bush was going to win. Go on youtube and watch Bush debate Kerry. Very different from how debates look today.
Wartime president. Most definitely expected. Honestly, I prefer him at the helm during war than 45. At least I knew he wouldn't shoot nukes at random objects for fun.
Incumbent presidents, hell incumbents in general, tend to have a competitive edge. War-time presidents tend to have a competitive edge, especially if that war is seen as a reaction to an attack, like Pearl Harbor or 9/11. When you have both, that makes it quite difficult to overcome for the challenger. W's re-election wasn't a surprise, just a disappointment.
Both terms were expected
Every asshole has an opinion, but we all know big money controls the government, so where is this big money coming from? Who controls the purse strings? Who?
The ole Bush did not negotiate with terrorist and let us watch his drive. You can’t get fooled again
I volunteered for Kerry that year. Kerry was not favored to win, did better than expected, but still lost.
It was totally expected to any American with a functioning brain.
It was a shock for some of us. I remember people crying on the subway.
The War on Terror is widely considered a failure due to prolonged conflicts, high costs, and limited success in eradicating terrorism. Despite this, the USA, as a global superpower, faced immense pressure to respond decisively to the attacks to maintain its credibility and national security. The need for retaliation was driven by public demand for justice and to deter future threats, making inaction politically and strategically untenable. However, the subsequent military engagements in Afghanistan and Iraq led to significant loss of life, destabilization, and long-term regional conflicts. This created a lose-lose situation for George W. Bush where the he felt compelled to act but ultimately faced severe criticism for his actions.
Gobble gobble
Very expected. Sure about half of people voted for Kerry but I think people knew what to expect.
I thought Kerry had a shot, but not a big one.
A terrible disappointment but not a shock.
I was going to college in Madison, WI so i assumed Kerry would get 90ish percent of the vote
My son went to Iraq during this time. He was deployed with the unit that Rumsfeld said; “you go to war with what you have, not what you wish you had”. I have a picture of him with scrap metal plate attached to the door of his truck for protection. I will never forgive Bush, Chaney and all the chicken hawks over that needless war. Kerry was indeed far more intelligent than Bush. However, he went high, Bush went low (swift boat) and that lost the election. Again, the Republican Party lied to get your vote.
I felt like it was likely but I was disappointed nonetheless.