If John Kerry had picked Dick Gephardt, the former House Democratic Leader, the man he had wanted to pick all along before picking John Edwards, as his running mate, would they have won Missouri?
He wouldn't have won MO, he would have improved Kerry's margins in IA, NM and OH and WI
I am inclined to agree though I might replace IA with NV. But if so, its interesting that the D party leaders had a major impact on the 3 most recent open elections due to perceived electability, and ended up making the wrong choice 2 of those times. In 2004, they made Kerry pick Edwards. In 2008, Reid drafted/encouraged Obama because he thought Hillary unelectable. And 2016 of course was a concerted effort to clear the field at first and later make sure the unelectable Bernie didn't win after his early ties/wins.
Yeah, and I also think in the last 20 years the Democrats arguably lost 3 times due to the choice of running mate (running mates matter in very close elections, of which we've had 3 in the last 20 years):
2000: Al Gore would have probably won had he picked somebody like Bob Graham instead of Lieberman. Although Gore was just a weak candidate, period. With how well the country was doing in 2000, the Democrats should have won that election. Gore lost because of Gore (although Bush was probably the GOP's most formidable nominee since Reagan).
2004: I think Kerry would have won had Gephardt been the running mate. He would have brought more to the ticket than Edwards.
2016: Tim Kaine was a very weak running mate who brought nothing to the ticket. Hindsight is 20/20, but even with the risk of losing the OH Senate seat, I think Hillary would have won with Sherrod Brown as her running mate. Also, Hillary was just a very weak nominee. I think Biden would have beaten Trump, and possibly Bernie too.
