2016 Postmortem
In reply to the discussion: Ted Kennedy, Bernie, and history repeating itself right now [View all]mythology
(9,527 posts)The comparison to 1980 is wrong for many reasons. One Carter was an unpopular president. Obama is unpopular with Republicans, but he's still above water in terms of his popularity.
Two, the demographics of the presidential year electorate greatly favor the Democrats as the percentage of the voting population is white male drops (nothing against white males, it's statistically true that most of my demographic votes Republican).
Three, Trump is a walking nightmare for a campaign. He's great at winning the Republican primary. Look at how well Ted Cruz did and Ted Cruz is so unpopular in his own party's establishment that somebody joked about killing Cruz. But Trump saying ban all Muslims or women bleeding out of their wherevers will Todd Akin himself and further increase Democratic turnout.
Four, while Republicans used to have the edge in terms of generating turnout, Democrats have been able to take the lead there in the last two presidential elections and Republicans have floundered.
Five, Democrats have managed to secure a number of states that at least lean Democratic making the path to winning the presidency much easier.