Talk Elections

Basically the opposite of the other thread.

2004, 1988, 1976 (as it turned out, anyway, as Carter looked good at the time), 1964

1976, 1980, 1988, 2004.... At least in my opinion.

1852, 1856, 1868, 1908, 1936, 1976, and 2000.

1980, 1936, 1924, 1920, 1908

PBrunsel went all the way back. I tried just to focus on the modern era. By the way, True Dem, most historians think Cox would have been a magnificent President. Just thought I'd share.

Cox would have been a fine President, but saying "President Cox" just makes me feel uncomfortable. ;)

Not all of us have our minds in a gutter, Paul, lol. Now that you say it, I now must find that I need to laugh at his last name, lol.

You think Kerry would have been a good President?

He may have been indifferant Alcon, or supported Bush to a greater extent.

He said that both Bush and Gore would make poor Presidents since he included 2000, but didn't include 2004, which would indicate that he thinks Kerry would make a better President.  I doubt he does, though.

Possibly he was using his thinking in 2000

I said 2000 baecuase I felt Governor Bush was too inexperienced and Vice-President Gore was simply a beurocrat's dream coke true. In 2004 I felt both men would be unpopular presidents, so that one was nulled.

2004, 1980, 1964

There are few modern election with fewer than three bad candidates.

I forgot about 1984.

2004, 1988, 1984, 1968, foreign-policy wise 1964, 1924, 1920, 1908, 1900, 1896... etc, etc, etc.

Lessee... 1832, 1844, 1848, maybe 1860 (unsure), 1868, 1876, 1912 (counting Debs), 1948, 1960, 1968, 1972, 1976, maybe 2000 and 2004.

Bad candidates or people who would have been bad Presidents?
Kerry was clearly a bad candidate who would have been a good President.

1984

At the time...

1832, 1856, 1872, 1896, 1900, 1964 (as much as I like Goldwater, I can't actually imagine him as President), 2004 (maybe)

1992, 1996, 2000, 2004.

1988, 1972, 1968, 1964

It's really scary when I agree with Tweed.  Nonetheless, I will here.

2004, 1988, 1984, 1972, 1928

I'm going to revise my old one now:

2004, 1984, 1980, 1920, 1908

In my lifetime, I would have to say 1972 and 1976.

McGovern was nuts and Nixon was evil.

Carter and Ford (dumb and dumber).

The seventies were nightmare years.

I have to agree 1972 was definitely an electon between two bad candidates.

McGovern was a far left loonie whacko, and Nixon was already enmeshed in subverting the constitution and breaking his oath of office.

What a pathetic choice.

I reject the notion that McGovern was a "far left loonie whacko"

1856, 1936, 1964 (far and away the worst), 1972 and 1976.

2004, 1948, 1908, 1876, 1872, 1856, 1828

2004, 1988, 1984, 1972

1964, 1972, 1988, and 2004, though Kerry was still far better than Dubya.

I don't like how so many have listed 1964, I liked both candidates that year.

Aside from Vietnam, Lyndon Johnson was a good president.

Aside from appealing to racists (and he didn't openly appeal to them, they gravitated to him) Barry Goldwater was a good candidate who would have been a good president.

1964 is one of my favorite elections. I love looking at that sea of red counties :)

2 Bad Candidates Since 1900:

1908, 1920, 1928, 1980, 1984, 1988, 2000, 2004 (although Gore and Kerry would have been good presidents)

Aside from the Holocaust, Adolf Hitler was a good chancellor.

(the message is that the game isn't played that way.  LBJ is directly responsible for the 55000+ enslaved americans that came home in a bodybag)

Only elections in which there were no good candidates on the ballot at all: 2004, 1964.

I would have voted for a third-party (for the time) candidate in 1924, 1912, 1892, 1848, and 1836.

I would have thought you were much more likely to have voted third party in 96, for the gold democrats, than for Weaver's populist candidacy in 92, Q.

In the best South Park traditions, every election since the introduction of the television camera?

1932, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 2000, 2004

1924 is the only one that really comes to mind, and even then, there was a good third party choice in LaFollette.

There were certainly some years, such as 1984, 1988 or 2004, in which the choices weren't stellar, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that they were bad.

1924 was pretty bad if you exclude LaFollette. Other than that, 1852 and 1872 stand out. In 1852 you had Franklin Pierce, who turned out to be one of our worst Presidents, against Winfield Scott, who was a great general but absolutely unskilled as a politician, leading the last remnants of the Whig party. In 1872 you had Ulysses Grant, also a great general but perhaps our very worst President, against Horace Greeley, also totally unskilled in politics, a lifelong Republican nominated by the Democratic party because they couldn't find anyone better.

1972 1988 1980 1976 2004

Those ones jump to mind.

1848, 1852, 1856, 1868, 1872, 1920, 1928, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988

There's a lot of them, but the following modern ones really stick out in my mind:

1964, 1976, 1980, 1984, 2004

Especially the last two.

There have been quite a few of them.

1812- Madison was a great man but a poor President, and Dewitt Clinton was no great shakes either.
1840- Van Buren was one of the most important people in the history of American politics, and one of the founders of the modern Democratic party, but not very good as a President. Harrison was so unqualified that his death after one month in office was probably just as well for the country (although it gave us Tyler as President, who may not have been much better).
1852- Franklin Pierce vs. Winfield Scott: two men with vastly different temperaments, yet each temperamentally unqualified for the Presidency.
1876- Perhaps the worst pair of major-party candidates in American history. Ulysses Grant, totally out of his element and blithely willing to be manipulated by the monied interests, versus Horace Greeley, running under the banner of the party he had spent a lifetime as a newspaper publisher reviling.
1920- Warren G. Harding, a fatuous nonentity advanced as Presidential candidate by a party cabal looking for a pliable puppet, versus James Cox, an honorable man but one woefully inexperienced in the rough and tumble of politics and painfully inept as a candidate. (The Vice-Presidential candidates were much better.)
1972- Richard Nixon, the prince of paranoia at his mendacious peak, against George McGovern, a walking caricature of bleeding-heart liberalism.
1980- Jimmy Carter, a great man but one who unwittingly found himself, as President, in the wrong job, vs. Ronald Reagan, perhaps the emptiest suit ever to be pumped full of ideological hot air and floated before the American public. Extra added attraction: John Anderson, a nondescript House careerist who allowed his ego to be inflated into the delusion that he was doing something noble by running as an independent.

1796: John Adams had become an increasingly aristocratic and partisan president. The Alien and Sedition Acts was a most blatant attempts at destroying the (Democratic-)Republican opposition. Jefferson is overrated in my opinion. He continued to pay tribute to three Barbary nations even after defeating the Tripoli pirates. The Embargo Act to defend harassment of US ships was a huge disaster which harmed the US more than it did the UK or France. For this election I would have preferred Alexander Hamilton's idea of electing the Federalist vice-presidential candidate, Charles Pinckney, to the presidency.

1872: One of the worst elections in history, candidates-wise. Grant's administration was exceedingly corrupt, but Greeley's "Liberal Republicans" were against civil rights for blacks and would have turned a blind eye towards Southern terrorist organizations such as the KKK. (Greeley originally supported equal rights, but now relinquished this position in exchange for Democratic support.) At least Grant offered some protection to blacks in the South, so I would've probably reluctantly voted for him.

1900: William McKinley was a true imperialist and advocated ridiculously high tarriffs. William Jennings Bryan was a populist who would've made a horrible president. And he was on the wrong side in the Scopes trial. 1896 also features these two bad choices, but at least there was a good third party candidate, Bourbon Democrat John McAuley Palmer.

1972: Richard Nixon was ruining his presidency by participating in the cover-up of Watergate, the sole reason I would not have voted for him. McGovern was worse, a "walking caricature of bleeding-heart liberalism" as gorkay aptly calls him. I would've voted for John Hospers, the Liberarian candidate.

The elections of 1840 and 1852 also had pretty bad major-party candidates yet there were Free Soil candidates in both these elections.

In my last post I erroneously gave the date of the Grant-Greeley election as 1876, when of course it was 1872. My apologies.

1848, 1872, 1876, 1920, 1924, 1928, 1976, 1988, 2004

Without hindsight: 1864, 1888, 1892 (Excluding Weaver), 2004, 2016

1844, 1852, 1856, 1920, 1924 [excluding LaFollette], 1928, 1960, 1972, 2000, 2016, 2020.

It’s absolutely wild to see how Democrats, who now praise Carter used to recognize that his presidency wasn’t good.

That's an indictment of all his successors.

But he's largely been vindicated on a lot of things too.

Every single one of his successors, with Trump as an exception, was a better president. And he hasn’t been vindicated by anyone other than left-wing hacks.

Simmer down, ayatollah

1848, 1852, 1884, 1920, 2016, and 2020 come to mine, though there were solid third party choices in 2016 and 2020.

1980 and 1996 come to mind. 1992 with hindsight.

1896 and 1900 quickly come to mind.

The 1952 Vice Presidential matchup was a nightmare mode election