Biggest reason G.H.W. Bush carried California in 1988

[sg0508]

1) Law & & Order suburban vote swamped Dukakis like it did in other midwestern and northeastern suburban states

2) The final gift from Reagan as they called it

3) The economy was still churning

4) The election was over reasonably early that night and thus, many Dukakis may not have bothered to vote in the last hours (Bush won by 300K votes).

What's your biggest reason, keeping in mind that the pacific northwestern states laid out a future cornerstone for the Democrats that night, one that lasts through today.

[Liberalrocks]

I would say it would be a combination of 3 and 4 from above. I think Dukakis could have won here even with Reagan in the white house.

Dukakis certaintly tried hard for California with consistent multiple appearances up and down the state and invested ad money. One of his last rallies before the election was at UCLA.

California was definetly a swing state back then, with a slight Republican tilt. At the time it had a Republican governor and a senator. Dukakis came up short by a few points, had he carried the 47 electoral votes the EC wouldnt have been as lopsided.

[Redban]

California was still a lean R state. The general environment was good for Republicans, so California went for Republicans. California didn't become titanic-Democrat until recently. Even Bush in 2000 and 2004 lost within 12%, which is a relatively small deficit (compared to how Cali votes now).  I disagree that Dukakis could have won here.

[Mr. Smith]

It's number 1 and maybe a little of 4 too.

He wasn't able to keep the numbers down far enough in the OC, nor to get an outstanding run in the Bay Area [but he did do better than Carter there] specifically because of the "Law and Order" thing.