The New Campaign Trail

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Been playing around with the New Campaign Trail; but this will be the first time I've posted results. I decided to try the 1984 mod as Walter Mondale with Gary Hart as my running mate.

I ran a somewhat "safe" campaign (not going with Mondale promising to raise taxes; limiting Jimmy Carter's appearances though winding up in a lose-lose situation regarding Jesse Jackson {to meet or not to meet}) and though Mondale lost (no surprise) by a 341-197 margin he did surprisingly well given Ronald Reagan as an opponent.

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Decided to go with playing the 1988 Bush vs. Jackson mod as Jesse Jackson, with Patrick Leahy as his running mate.

Bush won; but Jackson managed to carry all the real-life Dukakis states except West Virginia plus California, Illinois, Michigan and Vermont (Jackson in this scenario ended up winning Hawaii by only a little more than 700 votes; while Bush won Missouri by about 5000 votes).

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Here's what happened when I played the 1996 mod as Bob Dole going with the "original formula" and running with Jack Kemp.



This time around, Dole still lost but picked up 20 more electoral votes than in real life (flipping Arizona, Nevada and Kentucky). Among the other tidbits, in this scenario Clinton carried Tennessee by just 629 votes (while Ross Perot got just over 90,000 there)

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

2004 Bush vs. Dean scenario where Howard Dean is the only playable option. For his running mate I went with Dick Gephardt.

Ultimately, the results were essentially a McGovern-style plastering (carrying only Massachusetts and D.C.; barely managing to avoid losing Massachusetts at that)

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Trying the Viva Kennedy 1964 scenario as JFK with Terry Sanford as his running mate against Barry Goldwater.

As expected; JFK won re-election in this scenario but it was not the landslide the real-life 1964 race (with the "win this for Jack's memory" effect), and with Texas (home of deposed VP LBJ) being the last state to check in; with a large number of the states (particularly for Goldwater) being fairly tight.

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Trying out the 1924 mod where Warren Harding is still alive as Harding with Calvin Coolidge as Vice-President (and beginning with having Harding rest over the summer of 1923) and trying to avoid having anything to do with Teapot Dome sticking to him, only for records of bribes to be discovered as the election's October Surprise.

Despite the October Surprise, Harding managed to get re-elected by 373 electoral votes to 136 for John W. Davis and 22 for Robert LaFollete (most of Davis' states in this scenario had a stronger showing than in real life; while Harding underperformed Calvin Coolidge's real-life showing in a number of states).

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Decided I'd give the "Peace with Honor" 1972 mod a try. As Nixon, I elected to dump Spiro Agnew in favor of John Connally but then admitted that the Watergate burglars worked for the White House while denying any knowledge and had to go through the secret bombing of Cambodia being revealed and despite peace talks being announced late Nixon ended up losing by a fairly significant amount (sweeping the South but not doing particularly well in the Midwest {barely hanging on to Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Nebraska and Virginia})

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Trying the 1956 mod as Adlai Stevenson. The VP spot ended up going to JFK.

How did the ticket do? Short answer: They got swept, losing every state and finishing behind Dixiecrat Thomas Andrews in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and failing to even get a single vote in Virginia.

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Tried out the 1920 mod. Originally I was playing as Warren Harding, but decided to have him contest the few primaries (which ended up giving the GOP nomination to Frank Lowden).

In the end, Frank Lowden ended up comfortably defeating Democratic nominee William G. McAdoo (thus no "Battle of Ohio") along with Socialist Eugene Debs; Parley Christensen of the Farmer-Labor Party and American Party candidate James "Pa" Ferguson despite Lowden narrowly losing Illinois and underperforming a number of states Harding carried in real life.

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Played the 1964 Nelson Rockefeller mod; largely played it safe in terms of strategy in order to unite the Republicans (and managed to take the lead in most states following a strong debate performance) and it paid off with Rocky winning over LBJ and a third-party run by Strom Thurmond.

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Tried out the 1972 Nixon vs. Wallace mod and the results were about as expected: Nixon winning re-election while Wallace only marginally did better than McGovern (with Eugene McCarthy finishing with just over 12% of the vote as an independent and finishing 2nd in a handful of states such as New Jersey and Rhode Island); even losing D.C.

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Played the 1980 mod as Ronald Reagan but with the candidate most of the conservative delegates preferred as a running mate in Jack Kemp.



As you can see, while Reagan won in a landslide (big surprise there); Jimmy Carter doubled his real-life showing in 1980, including holding on to most of the South - in particular the Deep South by keeping Arkansas, Tennessee (the last state to check in when I played and in real-life one of the narrowest Reagan wins), Kentucky, Mississippi, Alabama and South Carolina in addition to Carter's native Georgia.

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Played the 1980 mod as Ronald Reagan but with the candidate most of the conservative delegates preferred as a running mate in Jack Kemp.



As you can see, while Reagan won in a landslide (big surprise there); Jimmy Carter doubled his real-life showing in 1980, including holding on to most of the South - in particular the Deep South by keeping Arkansas, Tennessee (the last state to check in when I played and in real-life one of the narrowest Reagan wins), Kentucky, Mississippi, Alabama and South Carolina in addition to Carter's native Georgia.

Is the new 1980 on the mod loader?

It is. I happened to stumble across it looking for a different mod to try.

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Tried the 1968 mod where Bobby Kennedy survived the attempt on his life and managed to win the Democratic nomination with former North Carolina Governor Terry Sanford as his running mate,

However, having a Southern convention walkout and LBJ ramp up troops in Vietnam to spite RFK was too much to overcome in this scenario, as Nixon won in a rout. This is how bad things went.

The one question on everyone’s mind is how? Sure, the Democratic Party was fractured due to the Vietnam War and Nixon could have easily won, but your incompetence somehow handed him a landslide? Lyndon Johnson is furious and is currently threatening to strangle you to death. There’s no way the Democratic Party is going to let you anywhere near the Presidency ever again after the stunt you pulled and the Republicans have gained a trifecta...Joe Sr. is refusing to even speak to you after this and even Ted seems hesitant. There’s no way you’ll be able to continue your political career after such a huge loss. It seems that the only thing to do is to settle down with Ethel somewhere and start your memoirs. Camelot is dead.

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Decided to try the 1992 Redux mod playing as Bill Clinton with Bob Graham (who passed away yesterday at the age of 87) as his running mate. I largely played it similar to real life (though Graham did get trounced by Dan Quayle in the Vice-Presidential debate).

The Clinton/Graham ticket ended up winning (California put me over the top), though in the Electoral College it was much closer than real life (Bush won Ohio {in real life, the state that put Clinton over the top} while winning Louisiana by about 2000 votes. Clinton in this scenario won Montana by 297 votes).

[ClassicElectionEnthusiast]

Results of when I tried the Gary Hart mod as Hart with Dale Bumpers as my running mate.

While Hart did a lot better than Dukakis in real life, in the end George H.W. Bush still won by a fairly comfortable margin (notably Hart carried Arkansas while narrowly losing his home state of Colorado).