Most inept general election campaign in the past 30-odd years...

[ZombieNixon]

Why?

[blackcat77]

1. The inmates were running the asylum in '72

Unfortunately, I remember it well.

[Ken Burch]

2. Sadly, I'd have to say McGovern/Shriver

...which, first of all, should have stayed McGovern/Eagleton, and should also be called the most unjustly victimized campaign of all time.

McGovern's primary campaign was brilliant, and then the party regulars kneecapped him. There was no excuse for Humphrey{who McGovern campaigned hard for in the fall of '68), Kennedy, Muskie and everyone else that McGovern asked to be his running mate to snub him. McGovern also made the fatal mistake of caving into the ignorant bigots who couldn't forgive Thomas Eagleton for having the courage to face his mental health issues and overcome them.

The Scoop Jackson types(who later went on to found the DLCdid everything they could to help Nixon in the fall, (because of their deep love of the murder of Asian peasants) and a few future lights in the party, like Bill Clinton and Gary Hart, did piss poor work in the fall and maintained no proper organization or consistency of campaign theme.

The failure of that campaign drove idealism and hope out of American politics, where it has not yet completely returned. Since then, we've just had hacks at the top of the ticket.
With a solid campaign,(like the people's anti-Bush campaign of this year) George McGovern, a great moral leader and a courageous champion of peace and justice, should have had a good chance of defeating Nixon.

[Ken Burch]

3. This year's effort should be considered the best campaign with

the least competent candidate.

[LSdemocrat]

7. Umm, I don't think you can blame 1972 on state coordinators

McGovern doomed himself when he flip-flopped in a matter of DAYS on his Vice-Presidential nominee, claiming to support him "100 percent" and then a few days later asking him to step down. If he had asked me to be VP, I would have turned him down.

[Ken Burch]

10. I included the Eagleton flipflop. Still

There would have been no flip flop to make had Teddy done the right
thing and accepted the second slot. Or Muskie.

There was no excuse for them all to treat the nominee with that much disrespect.

And the flip flop did come as a result partly of heavy pressure from Democratic "regulars."

[WI_DEM]

12. Correction on Hart and Clinton

Hart managed a very effective primary campaign but didn't have the same status in the general election that he had in the primaies. Larry O' Brien, a democratic regular, came on as the official campaign manager. Second, Bill Clinton was put in charge of running the McGovern campaign in Texas. All indications from people who saw him in action and from McGovern himself was that Bill worked very hard, but lets face it--George McGovern wasn't going to win Texas in 1972. It would have been interesting if Bill had been put in charge of say, Illinois or Wisconsin to see what would have happened.

[PATRICK]

4. What a list!

Too sickening to choose one though I don't think Kerry deserves to be on that list except for the inability to overcome unfairness in many large areas, though they did make a huge, underrated effort at some.

The devastating impression created by this is how BAD American campaigns are. Small wonder the public and even contributory media(equally bad if not part of the obstacle) has grown so turned off. Yet Kerry and Edwards were not as bad as any on that list with the exception of committing the cardinal sin, staying in the box until it has been nicely giftwrapped and kicked into the ocean with the missing ballots.

All of those campaigns seemed furiously active trying to go through the motions with blinders on and trying to cover up the lack of charisma of the woefully unrepresentative bureaucrats trying to turn on the American public while fogging up tough issues.

It is at once discouraging and chillingly eye-opening that the field seems wide open to a large populist charismatic candidate who won't go lockstep into the night. If only the voting system were not so bad. A vast
unmistakable lead overcoming the media and pollsters would still suffer incursions from GOP vote fraud. It is very late in the game to expect ANY great campaign to win. The ground of fair voting, fair media must be prepared by we the people, not he/she the candidate.

Times they have been a-wasted.

[Lizzie Borden]

5. Although I voted in this poll,

for some reason it wasn't recorded and my comment wasn't either. Anyhow, it was in defense of the McGovern campaign. Am I still pissed at the rest of the country for voting for that paranoid crook Nixon? You bet. I think you had to be there to get it. The country was tearing itself apart over the war. There were daily batttles in the streets here-Students vs. the WI. National Guard. Also it was a time of idealism. People thought the world could be changed.

[darkism]

6. Damn, who left the Triad code in the board polling function? n/t

[Ken Burch]

18. Please, Lizzie, do not take my comments as a slam on McGovern

He was one of my early heroes(along with Eugene McCarthy, Cesar Chavez, MLK, RFK)and in that year(I was in sixth grade in '72)I was the only kid in my class who didn't support Nixon. Well, at least I have nothing to be embarassed about.

McGovern was the victim of very bad karma.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

8. Toss up. Gore/Lieberman or Kerry/Edwards

Both should have won, but both sold out to the right wing.

[darkism]

9. Correction

Both DID win, but were CHEATED by the right-wing.

[0007]

20. Please explain that remark?

[WI_DEM]

11. Without a doubt McGovern in '72

George McGovern was and is a great man and would have been a great president, but he ran a terrible campaign or I should say he was the product of terrible luck.

First his convention, In '72 some of the delegates who came into the party and took over the convention nominated 49 people including Mao to be Vice President. That took the balloting late into the night and McGovern didn't give his acceptance speech until "prime time in Guam."

Second, his choice for VP. He couldn't get many of the people he wanted and had to settle for Tom Eagleton and didn't have enough time to do a background investigation and unfortunately Eagleton wasn't upfront about his mental problems when asked if there were any "skeletons" in his closet.

Third, "I'm behind you 1000%" saying that one day and then a couple of days later removing Eagleton was a mistake which made McGovern look like the ultimate flip-flopper.

Fourth, Finding a replacement for Eagleton was bad publicity as one prominent dem after another (Ted Kennedy, Gaylord Nelson, Ed Muskie, Hubert Humphrey and others) turned him down. Finally he took Sargent Shriver--his eighth choice or so.

[Rockerdem]

13. My saddest vote was in 88 for Dukakis

I went to the poll knowing that he had no chance. Also cursing that he had a huge bounce that he squandered to an opponent who was not a good campaigner himself . . . and Quayle to boot.

OTOH, McGovern ran a principled campaign against a ruthless opponent who triangulated his main issues, including the Vietnam War. By the time that November rolled around, people thought that Nixon really WAS bringing peace with honor.

McGovern never stood a chance. Dukakis had the lead, and blew it. He took every lame punch willingly, and rather than responding, smiled for the cameras. Kerry's campaign was stolid by comparison.

[WI_DEM]

14. yes, Duke would be my second choice

he did have a 17-pt lead after Dem convention then basically took the month of August off thinking "nobody pays attention to politics until after Labor Day" and let Bush and company set the agenda.

I'm now beginning to rethink my top choice of McGovern because Duke could have won--but blew it, where it was uphill all the way for McGovern.

[Rockerdem]

16. I think that Dukakis' personality was too laid back

I dont think that he will ever be accused of being a tireless worker like Clinton. He was also a bad debater - he always came out looking wishwashy and deferential, despite the fundamental correctness of his positions. His lack of defense of his wife was the worst moment in presidential debate history. Compare that to the bruising that JFK applied to AWOL 3 different debates.

[JVS]

15. Candidate Walter Sobchack turned this into a Vietnam referendum and...

still lost. Despite his heroic war record, despite Bush's draft dodging and then failure to report for National Guard, despite all the stuff that has happened since then, despite the fact that Robert Macnamara admitted it was a mistake, despite the fact that our economy is in the tank, despite the fact that we are stuck in a quagmire. John Kerry reporting for duty indeed, but sadly asleep at his post. If you have to bring up an issue from the past for your campaign to run on MAKE SURE YOU COME OUT AHEAD ON THAT ISSUE

[blm]

19. Well, imagine we had a real news media in this country. Who would win?

And by what margin?

Gore and Kerry had a reality they had to deal with that no other Dem campaigns had....a media that was DOMINATED by the corporations that owned them and driven almost solely by GOP spin.

[William Bloode]

17. I went with.....

Dukakis/Bensten, it was a pretty unmemorable affair. Gary Hart was the big Democratic star that yr, due to the Ms. Rice debacle.

I almost chose Mondale/Ferraro. The reason may sound sexist to some, but i thought it was foolish too choose a woman. Now i don't feel a woman can't be V.p., President, or anything else for that matter. I in-fact hope i get to live long enough to see a President of the opposite sex and/or of color. I just knew in my heart at the time the country was not ready in it's mind(Hell i don't think we are there yet :( ). A ticket with a "yankee" woman on it had no chance. I was rooting for them myself, and saw it as a nice precedent, and hence did not factor that in on my decision.