Mondale. He had the charisma of an oyster.
True, but at least he didn't scare people like McGovern or Goldwater.
On second thought those two were probably the worst. Both lost many areas that their parties had never lost before, at least not in 100 years or more.
I'd still pick Dukakis as honorable mention as the worst candidate who could've or should've won. McGovern and Goldwater would've never been nominated in the first place if their parties had any chance at all of actually winning those elections in the first place. A good Democratic candidate could've beaten Bush in 1988 or at least come close. Dukakis tried to pretend not to be liberal when he had really no moderate positions at all (at least by the standards of the day). That combined with his total lack of charisma and emotion enabled him to epically fail at connecting with most voters.
Gore's campaign is in my opinion the worst. Yes, he had a great grassroots turnout operation, but he managed to lose when the incumbent President had a 60 percent approval rating. All he had to do was run as Clinton's 3rd term, but instead chose to "be his own man" and distance himself. Commendable in some ways as I'm sure he wanted to feel he had earned the Presidency on his own rather than it being handed to him but still....ya gotta win above all else.
