'Landslide' Victories in US Presidential Elections: Obama vs Reagan

I’ve covered Obama compared to Reagan before at here:

• Employment: What Reagan Achieved in 8 Years, And 3 Presidents Maintained Over 18 Years, Obama Has Destroyed in Under 4 Years

• Whenever Obama Blames the Mess Inherited From Bush and Compares Himself to Reagan, He Shoots Himself in the Lazy Foot That’s Lodged in His Own Big Mouth.

As well as other mentions of that great President.

Now I’ll rehash an old comment of mine that was in response to a naive Obama worshipper who mistakenly thought that Obama’s 2008 victory was anything close to a ‘landslide’.

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First, we look at the percentage of votes as follows. Wikipedia: United States presidential election, 2008:

Barack Obama vs John McCain
Electoral vote 365 vs 173
States carried 28 + DC + NE-02 vs 22
Popular vote 69,456,897 vs 59,934,814 (116:100 ratio)
Percentage 52.9% vs 45.7%

Not a very impressive map, really.

Compared to Wikipedia: United States presidential election, 1980:

Ronald Reagan vs Jimmy Carter vs John B. Anderson
Electoral vote 489 vs 49 vs 0
States carried 44 vs 6 + DC vs 0
Popular vote 43,903,230 vs 35,480,115 vs 5,719,850 (124:100:16 ratio)
Percentage 51.6% vs 41.7% vs 6.70%

Lookit that sea of red!

1980 Reagan’s 489 electoral votes clearly outstrips Obama’s 365 electoral votes. But fair enough, Reagan got 51.6% of the popular vote against Obama’s 52.9% – though one could argue that the Independent contender John B. Anderson’s 6.70% would other wise have gone to Reagan (using Anderson’s 0 electoral votes as precedent) to give the Gipper a total of 58.30%.

And a 58.30% is not a wild fantasy, because now let’s look at the even more incredible Wikipedia: United States presidential election, 1984:

Ronald Reagan vs Walter Mondale
Electoral vote 525 vs 13
States carried 49 vs 1 + DC (Head to the link and look at the map! It’s almost entirely red!)
Popular vote 54,455,472 vs 37,577,352 (145:100 ratio)
Percentage 58.8% vs 40.6%

Now even the last few blue holdouts have almost all surrendered!

So in 1984, Reagan got a far higher ratio of the electoral vote, states and popular vote than Obama in 2008. Obama is a featherweight compared to what Reagan achieved!

And note that Reagan was running for a second term, which means people voted for his 4 years of proven policies – very different from the untested Obama benefiting from anti-Bush sentiment and a crony media that refused to vet him.

In fact, adjusting for total votes cast (2008′s 129,391,711 which is 40.59% more than 1984′s 92,032,824 or 52.04% more than 1980′s 85,103,195) due to expanding population, if Reagan’s popular votes percentages were adjusted to 2008′s voting population, 1984 Reagan would have gotten 76,558,948 votes – 7,102,051 more than Obama ever managed!

And if the 2010 elections are anything to judge by:

Then 2012 will see an even more massive landslide for the Republican nominee – just as 1980 saw Reagan first elected on the back of Carter’s failed Democrat policies!