It was the only time a party got kicked out of White House after just one term in the last 100+ years.
And 1988 is the only time in my mother's lifetime that a party kept the White House for more than two terms.
So it does seem that 1980 and 1988 can be considered two elections the Democrats should have won. Instead, Republicans won 425+ electoral votes both times.
It was during the Republican realignment. Now we're under the Democratic realignment. These surges last for some 30 year, then another one starts, usually. The 1980 was the peak of the Republican era. The peak of the Democratic era is just around the corner I believe. Probably 2016 or 2020 will be that year, just like 1984 was the one for Republicans.
This post is exactly correct.
One can argue back and forth about the electoral college, but there is no question that in this current era, Democrats have a major advantage with regard to winning the popular vote, which the original poster was discussing...
Democrats can count on racking up huge margins in at least 3 big states: California, New York, and Illinois.
Republicans can only count on a large margin in one: Texas.
The last really big state, Florida, will continue to split its vote pretty evenly.
Republicans simply don't have a region to offset Democratic vote totals right now. The Southeast votes Republican but by small margins overall because of the 30-40% floor that Democrats get with black voters.
Appalachia is really the Republicans best bet to rack up huge margins, but that region isn't heavily populated and is at least offset by New England and the mid-atlantic, where Democrats rack up pretty big margins in (non-New York) states like Massachusetts, New Jersey and Maryland.
The great plains states deliver a bunch of votes but they are also sparsely populated.
The next biggest population center would seem to be the upper Midwest, where Republicans can probably compete in in the future, but they won't deliver solid margins for the party.
So, that to me seems like the main reason the GOP consistently is losing the popular vote. The map just doesn't favor them. I don't think it's a candidate issue as much.
For them to win the popular vote they would absolutely have to limit the Democratic margin in New York + California + Illinois to less than 4 million votes total in my opinion.
