Since 1968, did each loser come off as more elitist?

[Del Tachi]

1968, 1980, 1988, 2020 and arguably 2000 and 1984 buck this “trend”

[Del Tachi]

A lot of this also sounds like the claim that the more “charismatic” candidate always wins.  Such assessments are only ever formed with the value of hindsight - we backwardly project traits onto candidates to explain away their wins/losses.

[Del Tachi]

Obama also kinda gave off an "elitist" vibe tbh. Not as much as Romney, but maybe more than McCain.

Also IDK if I'd call McGovern or even Humphrey more "elitist" than Nixon in any meaningful sense.

I get what you're saying but I still think "charisma" is the big factor in this period more than anything else. Even then, Nixon is kind of an exception. And in 1988, neither candidate was charismatic.

Obama seemed more “personally elitist” than McCain (wow, we’ve gotten into really strange terms here, lol), but his campaign/person certainly wasn’t.  I mean, the GOP literally couldn’t get away from the image of “pro-business party causes Great Recession” no matter how hard they tried, and Obama definitely leaned into it.

McCain was more fiscally elitist, Obama socially elitist