It didn’t make sense plot wise. Bush’s popularity went soaring after 9/11 and people viewed him as a flip flopper- not the strong, decisive leader needed after 9/11
Broad-Part9448 on
Lichtmans keys have the answer
Serious answer: Bush’s decisions on Iraq hadnt gotten out of control yet. And he has incumbency.
This_Caterpillar5626 on
Bush’s popularity didn’t really crash till 2005ish with Katrina and Iraq finally becoming more and more unpopular.
CallofDo0bie on
Swift boating and the GOP doing everything they could to denigrate his service which made the average voter view him as weak and untrustworthy.
MonkeyKingCoffee on
Google “Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.”
Add to that an electorate that completely supported W “kicking ass” against the people who attacked us on 9/11. We picked a fight with Iraq for no better reason than W had daddy issues. But we were dropping bombs and that’s all that mattered to most voters.
Bush won the popular and electoral votes. If Ohio had swung the other way, it would have been a Kerry victory. Swift-boating was proven to work. And Democrats courageously dealt with the problem by backing down and sulking for four more years of war.
ReOsIr10 on
“What went wrong” is that he ran against an incumbent in a good economy whose favorability ratings were higher than they would otherwise be due to a terrorist attack.
meloghost on
Popular incumbent
dareka_san on
Because he was a liberal wiener
SouthernSerf on
Because Bush was popular and Iraq didn’t go to shit until after the election.
cogentcreativity on
Gay marriage was the trans issue of the day (in that people were absolutely losing their minds) and it was salient enough that there were referendums outlawing gay marriage iirc that may have pushed Ohio and other states into the R column.
Also, will just say elections never come down to just one thing
10 Comments
It didn’t make sense plot wise. Bush’s popularity went soaring after 9/11 and people viewed him as a flip flopper- not the strong, decisive leader needed after 9/11
Lichtmans keys have the answer
Serious answer: Bush’s decisions on Iraq hadnt gotten out of control yet. And he has incumbency.
Bush’s popularity didn’t really crash till 2005ish with Katrina and Iraq finally becoming more and more unpopular.
Swift boating and the GOP doing everything they could to denigrate his service which made the average voter view him as weak and untrustworthy.
Google “Swift Boat Veterans for Truth.”
Add to that an electorate that completely supported W “kicking ass” against the people who attacked us on 9/11. We picked a fight with Iraq for no better reason than W had daddy issues. But we were dropping bombs and that’s all that mattered to most voters.
Bush won the popular and electoral votes. If Ohio had swung the other way, it would have been a Kerry victory. Swift-boating was proven to work. And Democrats courageously dealt with the problem by backing down and sulking for four more years of war.
“What went wrong” is that he ran against an incumbent in a good economy whose favorability ratings were higher than they would otherwise be due to a terrorist attack.
Popular incumbent
Because he was a liberal wiener
Because Bush was popular and Iraq didn’t go to shit until after the election.
Gay marriage was the trans issue of the day (in that people were absolutely losing their minds) and it was salient enough that there were referendums outlawing gay marriage iirc that may have pushed Ohio and other states into the R column.
Also, will just say elections never come down to just one thing