2008:Kerry vs Romney

[Judge Phil]

If Kerry won in 2004, how would he have done against Romney in 2008?

[Adjective-Statement]

A Kerry who won in 2004 would be better able to share the blame for Iraq and the recession, unlike Bush. Either Romney is seen as an good-natured moderate with the business experience necessary to save the economy or he has a hard time shaking off the "evil businessman" image, and I'm leaning a little more to the latter. His border hawk stuff would be a double-edged sword in New Mexico. But then there's probably VP Edwards retiring- either in a scandal, because he demonstrated that behavior IOTL and might do something like it here, or less controversially wanting to spend time with his dying wife. Still definitely a Republican victory but not the mandate Obama had against the Republicans.


President John Kerry (D-MA) / Senator Barack Obama (D-IL)
Fmr. Governor Mitt Romney (R-MA) / Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) ✓

Give or take Pennsylvania.

[Non-consecutive Two Term Floridian]

Biden's win in 2020 is the closest we can get to Kerry winning in 2004: a poisoned chalice.

Kerry 2008 would go really, really poorly for the Dems.

[Adjective-Statement]

Kerry 2008 would go really, really poorly for the Dems.

Have to disagree. A big part of the 2008 landslide was the feeling of realignment: Obama was sold as the ticket to a more progressive future free of the social backwardness, greedy excess, endless wars, and polarization many believed increasingly characteristic of the Reagan Era. The War on Terror and the Great Recession are still going to be the biggest issues in 2008. They're not going to be pinned entirely on the incumbent, who presumably won in the first place because of discontent with Bush, and his failure to solve those issues isn't going to make a majority run back to a platform they feel failed. Turnout would just be low. That's not to say Kerry wins or does well, obviously, but it's not the blowout that Obama vs. McCain was.

It's more like if Reagan won in 1976 then lost in 1980: the zeitgeist is still in the Republicans' favor, or in the case of Kerry '04, the Democrats'.