Did people "vote against Carter" in 1980? I'm trying to find some

[Crazy Guggenheim]

references that 30% of the voters were voting against Carter and not for Reagan. If that's true then ABB is not so bad and the Democrats have to figure out how to handle that! Anyone have information on this?

[Rosemary2205]

1. Carter stunk as a president.

The R's could have put up Gilligan (3 hour tour) and the nation would have gone landslide for it. Carter is an incredible human being but IMHO he wasn't nasty and evil enough to handle Washington DC or some of the snakes in charge around the world.

[Mass]

2. All presidents had a strong anti-opponent votes. It is the media that

insisted that it was particular to 2004.

[jerry611]

3. It's like that today

This is the problem with out political system. People don't vote for who they want, they vote against what they don't want. That is a very big difference.

Many people voted for Bush not because they like him. I know conservatives that hate him. But they voted for him why? Because they didn't want a liberal to control the White House. Just like I am 100% sure that in 2008, even though you may hate the nominee, you will vote for them just because you don't want a conservative in the White House.

And this is what is literally killing this nation.

[evlbstrd]

7. Bingo.

We need public election financing and verifiable voting. Then we'll get more responsive government. It shouldn't get to this point, where voters want anything but what we have now.

[evlbstrd]

4. I voted for Carter.

It was as much a vote for him as a vote against Ray-Gun. And Carter has gotten a raw deal as far as the assessment of his Presidency is concerned.

[Stardust]

10. I loved Carter then and still do...what did he do that was so bad?

[Starlight]

12. People who claim he was a bad president are never able to back up that

claim with any real facts.

[evlbstrd]

15. Hmmm.

Tax credits for alternative energy comes to mind. But I guess it was his fault that OPEC decided to embargo the U.S. Oh, and it was his fault that the Shah of Iran, a longtime U.S. puppet, was toppled in an Islamic revolution and many of our embassy personnel were held prisoner. But the Republicans came to the rescue by trading arms for the hostages, and running a dirty war in Central America and enabling the crack epidemic of the eighties to pay for it.

Oh, and he inherited high inflation and interest rates from Nixon and Ford. Remember Ford's "Whip Inflation Now" buttons?

Yeah. Jimmy Carter was a terrible president.

[uppityperson]

5. a parent did, didn't like Carter's domestic policies

said Carter had great foreign policies, but domestic ones stunk. And yes, parent very much regretted getting Reagan/bush team in.

[Crazy Guggenheim]

6. I'm actually trying to find the information that says something like that.

BTW, I don't think Carter was so great though I voted for him.

[saltpoint]

8. Ted Kennedy challenged Carter for the 1980 nomination.

The more-left wing of the party were generally receptive, feeling that Carter was not representing their interests on some issues. Carter described the feeling in the country as "a malaise" in one address, and while it was unintended, it became the tone of his presidency, at least in some quarters.

"If Ted Kennedy runs, I'll whip his ass," Carter was quoted as saying.

Carter turned back the challenge pretty handily. Some folks believe now that Kennedy's challenge was a calulated entry to revive ties and loyalties within the party to withstand a GOP assault at the polls in November. In any case, Carter went on to win re-nomination and lost by landslide totals to Ronald Reagan.

Factions within the party have been there a long, long time.

[saltpoint]

11. Here is Ted Kennedy's campagin brochure from 1980 in that race;

http://www.4president.org/brochures/tedkennedy1980brochure.htm

[Scribe]

14. I still have a convention button about striking rule F3C

At the end, the Kennedy forces last hope was to 'open' the convention and that was the party rule which prevented it. Governor Hugh Carey of New York was one of the Kennedy backers who believed that the delegates actually preferred Kennedy over Carter by that point. Of course they lost.

But, it does reinforce my memory that by the time of the convention, a lot of democrats were afraid Ray-Gun was going to beat Carter. The pin has a robot with F3C on his chest and a red circle with a slash through it.

[bluestateguy]

9. Carter had lower approval ratings in 1980 than Bush in 2004

Carter was in the low 30's. Bush on the other hand was running in the mid-40's. An incumbent president with ratings in the mid-40's can win if he has an opponent who runs a crappy campaign. If the incumbent can appeal to just a small number of disapprovers by suggesting that the challenger is an unacceptable alternative.

Clearly Bush would not be able to win today. Even if Kerry ran exactly the same campaign again.

[saltpoint]

13. The Citizens Party in 1980 ran Barry Commoner and LaDonna Harris.

Its convention was in Cleveland, Ohio, where many in labor unions were very receptive to Commoner's message.

LaDonna Harris was the wife of former Democratic Senator Fred Harris, a Democrat, from Oklahoma. It seems so strange to type "Democrat" and "Oklahoma" that close together these days.

Anyway, they were a damned refreshing duo.

[Parrcrow]

16. Locking

at the request of the original poster.