5% swing to loser (major party) in every election since 1960

[King]

I was bored:

1960


Nixon 476
Kennedy 42
Other 19

1964


Johnson 440
Goldwater 98

1968


Humphrey 398
Nixon 95
Wallace 45

...more later...

[Redefeatbush04]

Great idea

[Josh/Devilman88]

2004-



What really happen

[King]

1972


Nixon 492
McGovern 46

1976


Ford 443
Carter 95

1980


Carter 297
Reagan 241
 

[King]

1984


Reagan 418
Mondale 120

1988 - WOW


Bush 269
Dukakis 269

1992


Bush 350
Clinton 188

1996


Dole 282
Clinton 256

[Gabu]

1980


Carter 297
Reagan 241

Wow, that's interesting.  Guess it was actually closer than it looked.

[Erc]

Wouldn't Perot technically win in Maine in '92?

[minionofmidas]

1980


Carter 297
Reagan 241

Wow, that's interesting.  Guess it was actually closer than it looked.

I've been telling that to people for ages, but spinsters will continue claiming Reagan won a landslide. Nonsense.

[Platypus]

same with Dukakis.

[DanielX]

1980


Carter 297
Reagan 241

Wow, that's interesting.  Guess it was actually closer than it looked.

I've been telling that to people for ages, but spinsters will continue claiming Reagan won a landslide. Nonsense.

You must have a very strict definition of 'landslide', then. To me, anything over 400 ev (out of 538, or 535, or a similar number) is a landslide. Thus, 1952, 1956, 1964, 1972, 1980, 1984, and 1988 were landslides.

Here's my scale (assuming 48 or more states, 520 or more EV's):
400+ : Landslide
300-400: Run-of-the-mill victory (examples: 1948, 1960, 1968, 1992, 1996)
minimum needed - 300: Close victory (examples include 1976, 2000, and 2004).

[minionofmidas]

The EV is a very bad gauge of a landslide...too much influence of geographical distribution of voters, too little influence of their actual numbers. 1980 was actually pretty much like 1996 in actual numbers (though Reagan did cross 50%+1 vote).
Of course, that national states map is existly where the misapprehension comes from. I guess you could call it a landslide in the EV...but who cares how individual electors vote as long as it doesn't change the overall outcome?

[Gabu]

Looking at this, it would seem to me that a good definition of a landslide is, "an election in which even a 5% swing to the loser would still have left the victor with a comfortable margin".  Then only the huge ones like 1964 and 1976 would qualify and ones where the person just won a deceptively large number of states wouldn't.

[Sam Spade]

In 1980, Reagan won most of those Southern states (and New York) by very small margins.

Doesn't surprise me at all.

Same type of thing happened in 1988, btw.

[minionofmidas]

Looking at this, it would seem to me that a good definition of a landslide is, "an election in which even a 5% swing to the loser would still have left the victor with a comfortable margin".  Then only the huge ones like 1964 and 1976 would qualify and ones where the person just won a deceptively large number of states wouldn't.

1976? Don't you mean 1972?

[Gabu]

Looking at this, it would seem to me that a good definition of a landslide is, "an election in which even a 5% swing to the loser would still have left the victor with a comfortable margin".  Then only the huge ones like 1964 and 1976 would qualify and ones where the person just won a deceptively large number of states wouldn't.

1976? Don't you mean 1972?

Oops.  Yes, 1972.

[BobOMac2k2]

That's depressing.

[King]

2000


Gore 392
Bush 146

[Jake]

1912



Wilson  391
Taft        41
Teddy R 99

[True Democrat]

Here's all the elections in more detail, this is based on popular vote only (see Alabama 1960).  Also, I couldn't do 1992 or 1968 because of the states being won by less than 40%.

1960


1964


1972


1976


1980


1984


1988


1996


2000 (I did swings to Bush and Gore)

5% swing to Bush:


5% swing to Gore:

[minionofmidas]

1912



Wilson  391
Taft        41
Teddy R 99

Swing from where to where?

[The Vorlon]

Wow.... if Goldwater gained 5% he would have been only utterly crushed, instead of totally utterly crushed...

Wow.... if Mondale gained 5% he would have been only utterly crushed, instead of totally utterly crushed...