Why did McGovern lose?

[T Roosevelt]

I'm putting together an LTTE defending Kerry...

[robbedvoter]

1. A lot of good people did not vote

Seems to be the consensus.

[WI_DEM]

2. Nixon had a banner year in 1972

He visited China and the Soviet Union--establishing himself as a "peacemaker" and architect of detente. He also was bringing home troops from Vietnam--and putting in more air power rather than ground troops and thus fewer casualties. It blunted McGovern on the war and peace issue.

[YankeeFan]

25. He Did Too

I once had a very "Interesting" conversation about Nixon. To cut to the chase, he was a Leader. Clinton, I was told, was not a Leader; he just followed what was the most popular of what was going around, irregardless of how much sense it made.

Why else did his "Impeachment" go so far?

Nixon did everything that WI-Dem said. He even did things to bring inflation under control. How many remember the Wage/Price freeze he imposed?

And I was told that if it wasn't for Watergate, Nixon would have gone down in history as one of America's better Presidents. He did what he thought was right, even if it wasn't popular. When I force myself to look back with cold logic, it is hard to prove him wrong.

[leyton]

27. Seems to me Nixon is responsible for the EPA as well.

Frankly, Watergate and integrity problems aside, I really don't much of a problem with Nixon. The Republican party embraces Reagan, but frankly I think Nixon was the most recent Republican to do a decent job.

[sangh0]

3. McGovern promised to raise taxes

.

[Feanorcurufinwe]

4. McGovern was seen as an extemist.

For instance his proposal for a guaranteed minimum income for all Americans.

[amazona]

6. Nixon made that proposal...

I thought Nixon was the one who suggested a guaranteed dole of around $10,000. Or do I dis-remember?

[amazona]

5. one scare story I heard

A rumor was put around that McGovern was going to legalize drugs. At least that's the story I, as a mere infant at the time, heard around the schoolyard. Come to think of it, if the parents really believed this rumor, you wonder why they wouldn't vote FOR McGovern in the privacy of the voting booth. Hmmm.

Another fear was that McGovern would yank the troops out of Vietnam, leaving the South Vietnamese to be slaughtered by the Communists. Hmmm again.

[Frances]

7. McGovern's first pick for vice president

cost votes.

I've forgotten the guy's name, but it turned out that he had taken medication prescribed by a psychiatrist.

Back then if you had seen a psychiatrist you were classified as a loony. McGovern dumped the guy but that decision looked bad too.

[Mikimouse]

12. Eagleton?

n/t

[No2W2004]

15. Yep, Thomas Eagleton

McGovern shot himself in the foot seriously because at first, it wasn't a problem, then it was, then it wasn't, then Eagleton was gone. Made George look like he couldn't handle making the decision.

BTW, Eagleton had shock therapy & the issue was if he was "stable" enough to be VP. (I know...compared to Agnew....)

[pop goes the weasel]

20. that's it exactly

I was in junior high at the time, and I distinctly remember how put off people were by McGovern first saying he was behind Eagleton 1000%, and then canning him. Really, I think it exemplifies what has become the defining trait of Democratic presidential candidates: not standing up for anything or anyone. The big exception to that rule was Clinton.

[Minstrel Boy]

29. That was it.

I was a 12-year old Canadian, but I knew that was the election right there.

Eagleton was at serious fault for not having disclosed shock treatment, but the whole thing was awful optics for McGovern. Sad situation, poorly played. Nixon didn't need dirty tricks after that.

[denverbill]

8. Because Nixon stole his #1 issue: peace.

After 4 years of escalation, Nixon announced peace was at hand.


In late March nineteen-seventy-two, North Vietnam launched a major offensive. In May, Nixon ordered increased bomb attacks against roads and railways in the North. By the end of August, the Communist offensive had been stopped. Yet many lives had been lost. The pressure to withdraw American forces grew stronger.

For the next five months, the Nixon administration continued a policy of official talks, secret meetings, and increased military action. Finally, the president announced that an agreement had been reached at the peace talks in Paris. There would be a ceasefire. And negotiators from the United States, South Vietnam, North Vietnam, and the Viet Cong would sign the official agreement.


http://www.manythings.org/voa/02/021107mn_t.htm

[AP]

22. A variation on that theme: because N. pulled a 'rope a dope' on M. w/'Nam

Nixon made the war the central issue. He was bad on 'Nam and encouraged a mood wherein everyone was thinking about 'Nam for all of '72. M. didn't try to run on anything else. He didn't try to run on Democratic strengths. He was happy to make the war the issue. He started swinging really hard on that issue and on no other issue.

This was a problem for a couple reasons. The first reason is that Republicans have a natural born advantage when people think about war and national security. No matter how much more dangerous Republicans make the world, people are willing to give Republicans a big advantage on this issue. So M. allowed a mood to exists wherein he said, 'yes, the Republicans are right about the world -- the war is the most important issue.' Voters said, 'well, if the Republican world view is right, maybe we should stick with Republicans even if they don't seem to have their shit together with this particular war.

Another way to think about this is that voters have a whole host of issues they vote on. What happens on election day isn't so much that they average out all their issues and pick the guy who is better, on average. What they do is ask themself, 'what is the most important issue today?' and they pick the guy who ranks number one on that issue. Therefore, a candidate can come in second on every issue except one, but if that one issue is the issue that voters care the most about on election day, then that candidate will win. (I remember reading that Bush came in second to Gore in just about every issue of voter concern except people thought he'd lower their taxes more -- somehow, Bush got a lot of voters to move that issue to the top of their list of concerns and vote on it in 2000.)

Furthermore, a candidate's problem isn't so much trying to come up with strategies that win every vote. They're just trying to win 50% + 1 vote. So you're not always worried about moving up your strength to the top of the opposite sides' list. You want to hold together your own coalition.

For example, when McGovern made the war the number one issue, he might have found some people in the middle who were willing to come over to his side. But he was also reaffirming for a lot of people on the right that the war was important and therefore a vote for Nixon was right. If M. hadn't acted like the war was THE issue, he might have found that some people on the right wouldn't have made national security their top issue, and would have voted for him because he ranked at the top of the list of some other criteria that would have replaced the war as the top concern. In other words, he was helping Nixon hold together his coalition of right wingers who were not doves at all.

The second problem with M. making the war the number one issue is that it was an issue that was totally and utterly within the control of the Republican party in 72. Some issues aren't in the president's total control (although everything, more or less, is within some sort of control of the president -- including the economy). However, the conduct of military action--well, the president IS the commander in chief. Other than a declaration of war and getting money to do what you want, there isn't much that the congress or anyone else can tell you to do when it comes to moving your pawns around on the chess board of military action. The president is in TOTAL control of that issue.

So M. made the war the issue. What did Nixon do? Well, he said the draft would end. Unfortunately, that was probably the biggest reason many young people even cared about Vietnam. They didn't care about imperialism or fascism or even comunism. They cared about getting drafted and getting shot before being able to go to law school or business school. When it sounded like the draft wasn't going to be an issue any longer, a lot of young people probably checked out.

The next thing Nixon did was pretend that he was going to pull out troops from Vietnam. He didn't even need to do it. He just needed to say he was going to do it (and after he won, he did the opposite).

So there you have it: you make the war the number one issue. You pretend that you're going to pull out, you let people know there won't be a draft (after having one, or pretending that you were going to have one) and you do this a couple months before the election. Voters think, 'why change horses in midstream during such dangerous times?' and 'so, if I'm happy about the direction the war seems to be going, was there some other reason to vote for the challenger?' In '72 they answered those questions with, "no, let's not change horeses," and "the challenger didn't give me any other reason to vote for him other than this war" and they voted for the Republican.

Sound familiar?

[FloridaPat]

9. It's been a long time - the first guy he picked as VP had been

McGovern's reforms in party procedures and rules helped secure him the Democratic presidential nomination in 1972, but these changes also alienated many old-line Democrats who switched their support to Nixon. McGovern first chose Senator Thomas F. Eagleton of Missouri as his running mate, but the campaign was damaged when it was revealed that Eagleton had been hospitalized for mental health problems in the 1960s. McGovern replaced Eagleton with Sargent Shriver, the former director of the Peace Corps. But in one of the worst defeats in United States political history, McGovern and Shriver lost the election to Nixon and Spiro T. Agnew.

[DerekG]

10. That was not one of the shining moments for the American people...

Most of our elections seem to involve a choice between Tweedle-dum and Tweedle-dee, but in 1972 the American people were given the opportunity to cast a vote for either Christ or Satan.

AND THEY PICKED SATAN????!!!!!!????!!!!!!

[bedtimeforbonzo]

11. it was Nader!

sorry :)

[MissMarple]

13. The Party became divided. McGovern was seen as extremist.

It's one reason the neocons bolted toward the Republicans. We had riots in the streets in Chicago at the Democratic convention 1968. It scared people. Many in the country thought things were getting out of hand. And maybe they were. The war, the war protests, hippies. And social security was beginning to kick in. People with a conservative bent became alarmed. Humphrey was more in line with Truman and Roosevelt. But the party was dividing and McGovern won the nomination. Win the battle lose the war. Chalk it up to growing pains. Now, we're doing it again, it's just coming from a different direction.

"The Party of the People" by Jules Whitcover is a good source, as is Michael Lind's "Up From Conservatism". :D

[Piperay]

19. Also the Democratic Convention of 72

was very complicated, all kinds of new rules among the delegates. Each plank in the platform had to be argued and then voted on and it went far far into the night and into morning. It was way after midnight before McGovern got to give his acceptance speech, probably the best speech of his career "Come Home America" and few people heard it. :-(

[AP]

23. Furthermore, the violent protests made law and order Repubicans and mod-

erates really happy to vote for the Republican party.

I think people don't appreciate how much the protests HELPED Nixon.

Protests are important, but I think the protests in '72 did way more to help Nixon than hurt him.

[MissMarple]

30. The new rules came from the left liberals who supported McGovern.

The Daley and moderate Dems were shut out because of they didn't have enough minority representation, as prescribed by the newly instituted rules. The left liberals shut out the moderate Dems. That has had both positive and negative effects. I think the same has happened with the Republicans. The extremes are running the parties. Except George&Co are outside the parameters. They are not in the usual American democratic tradition. They are very different.

[IronLionZion]

14. because he was an independent thinker

just like Goldwater. The establishment can't have that, so they knock em down hard.

The real reason Howard Dean was knocked down right in the primaries was because HE COULD HAVE WON THE GENERAL ELECTION!!! But the establishment can't allow that.

said establishment is neither Democratic nor Republican.

[elperromagico]

16. He didn't just lose; he was savaged.

Richard Nixon - Republican - 60.67%
George McGovern - Democrat - 37.53%

Nixon won 49 states to McGovern's 1 (plus D.C.), 2,980 counties to McGovern's 131, 520 electoral votes to McGovern's 17.

I would tie McGovern's loss to two things: apathy and the perception that McGovern was an extremist liberal.

Also, the much-vaunted youth vote failed to materialize for McGovern; in fact, the majority of 18-29 year olds went with Nixon.

Additionally, this was the first election in American history where the entire Old Confederacy went for the Republican. Goldwater had carried several Southern states, and so had Nixon in '68, but the Democrat had always managed to carry at least a few Southern states. Here was Nixon's "Southern Strategy" brought to full fruition.

[KamaAina]

17. 'Cause he was a drug-addled Commie peacenik (sarcasm)

to hear Nixon tell it, anyway.

The repuke "Big Lie" strategy has deep, deep roots, I'm afraid.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

18. Even though McGovern was a straight arrow type himself

and a decorated WWII hero, the media always showed him surrounded by countercultural young people.

To put the era in context, the political spectrum was totally different than it is today. If Nixon tried to run as a Democrat today, the DLC would call him too liberal. I'm not kidding.

Even so, as one who was in college in that era, I was very aware that my parents' generation was shell-shocked by all the social changes that had occurred in the previous eight years. If you think socially conservative people are upset about gay marriage now, imagine these same types of people suddenly having to deal with equal rights for all races--and black militants on TV, women questioning their traditional roles, and especially young people unashamedly having premarital sex, listening to incomprehensible music, smoking marijuana, refusing to go to war, and dressing and wearing their hair in outlandish ways.

Look at a Life magazine from 1964 and see that even the student protestors were young men in suits and ties and young women in dresses and beehive hairdos. Look at a Life magazine from 1972 and see the protestors wearing what younger people think of as "sixties" fashions.

If I had had a dollar for every time I heard an older person complaining that young people had no morals, I could have put myself through college.

Absolutely everything changed in eight short years. Voting for Nixon was the expression of Middle America's fears that society was spinning out of control. It was their plea to go back to the 1950s.

[bobbieinok]

21. and the republicans still want to go back to the 50s

actually to the 1890s - robber barons rule, no unions, no fed regulation, no national park system. ETC

DESTROY THE REFORMS OF TEDDY ROOSEVELT

[David Zephyr]

24. Because the American People Voted for Nixon---Overwhelmingly.

Just as 50% of the American people actually voted for this moron that's currently in the White House.

There is really only so much a political party can do, that a candidate can do, that the Left can do.

When one comes to grip with the stubborn fact that 8 out of 10 Americans actually believe that the world was "created" in 6 days, then one understands what a truly difficult chore it is to get any progressive candidate elected to high office.

A new poll out today shows that a majority of Americans still believe that Saddam Hussein was involved with the events of 9/11.

[JI7]

31. "8 out of 10 Americans" ?

"8 out of 10 Americans actually believe that the world was "created" in 6 days"

i knew the numbers were high in america, but 8 out of 10 is just scary. more americans would vote against someone for not believing in god, yet they have no problem with someone not believing in evolution(gwbush).

[NewDemOrder]

26. Because more people voted against him

Why did Carter lose? Same reason.

[Piperay]

32. More people voted against chimp

but he is squatting in the Whitehouse, votes are one thing but REASONS for the vote is another matter. :think:

[GreenPartyVoter]

28. In McGovern's own words

"In 1972, my campaign for president was buried in a landslide. I lost everywhere except Massachusetts and the District of Columbia. Richard Nixon was reelected with more than 60% of the vote.

But have I ever wanted to trade places with him? Not for one minute. Were the voters of the 49 states who went for Nixon wiser than the people of our national capital and Massachusetts who voted for me? Not in my book.

These days, my name is back in the news. I'm being held up as some kind of sober warning to Democratic candidates. Don't be another George McGovern, the warning goes. Don't be too liberal. Don't be too outspoken. Watch what you say and play to the middle, so that you don't end up losing 49 states, too.

It may not surprise you that I regard this as political baloney. I said exactly what I believed in 1972. I told the truth while my opponent betrayed the American public and violated the law repeatedly, engaging in campaign finance dishonesty and illegal wiretapping, invading the confidential files of a doctor, urging the CIA to halt an FBI investigation — to say nothing of running unethical and unlimited campaign advertising that distorted my positions on major issues. These kinds of tactics got him elected — but they also made him the only president in our history forced to resign in disgrace."

Rest of article here: http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0713-01.htm

[fujiyama]

33. Fuck Nixon

McGovern's a decent guy and a genuine American hero.

I hope the country is smarter and will dump the ass clown we currently have in office. The country made a big mistake then.I sure as hell hope it does not make it again this year.