How did George Bush win New Jersey so handily in 1988?

[America's Sweetheart ❤/𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕭𝖔𝖔𝖙𝖞 𝖂𝖆𝖗𝖗𝖎𝖔𝖗]

I was also surprised to see how close Massachusetts was in this election. Why did Dukakis, the incumbent Governor of Massachusetts, only win his home state by about 8%?

I'm not exactly sure, but one of the most interesting facts about the 1988 election is that Dukakis only under-performed George McGovern in one state - and that state was Massachusetts.

[America's Sweetheart ❤/𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕭𝖔𝖔𝖙𝖞 𝖂𝖆𝖗𝖗𝖎𝖔𝖗]

Because back then it was suburbanites who were racists and unreachable by the Democratic message, whereas now it's rurals.

To be fair, outside of West Virginia and Iowa, Bush soundly won rural America.

This isn't really true. Dukakis did well in places like Northern Alabama, East Kentucky, Western PA... In fact, I'm pretty sure that a slight majority of counties he won were rural.