Yeah, it was pretty much a foregone conclusion. I'm doing this from memory, but RR had a lead of about 20 in the last polls before the election and pretty much had that type lead from the Republican convention on. The only slightly scary moment from a Republican point of view came after Reagan's first debate performance, which was pretty shaky. If I recall, his lead dropped to about 12 after that, but Reagan then came on strong in the second debate to regain his huge margin.

There weren't as many polls then as now, but there were quite a few (both national and state), and they were widely reported in the media, so you had a pretty good idea of who was ahead.

We knew Reagan would win, but no, it didn't seem like it would be such a blowout. That was around the time when they first started playing games with the polls, but the average person didn't know it yet. So it looked much closer than it was.

Also, I think when the news started reporting the early returns on the East coast dejected Democrats stayed home, making the difference more than it otherwise would have been.

The romp was not a surprise. Mondale was close in a couple of states not more than 5-6, but he carried only Minnesota and DC.
I recall California Republicans being upset that the election was called for Reagan, before the polls closed in California - maybe costing the Republicans a couple of Congressional races.

Mondale was dull compared to Reagan, heck even VP Bush was more exciting than Mondale.
Ferraro's husband was linked to underworld activity in NY.

Mondale, not the most "in tune" with the concerns of the average voter:

"By the end of my first term, I will reduce the Reagan budget deficit by two-thirds. Let's tell the truth. It must be done, it must be done. Mr. Reagan will raise taxes, and so will I. He won't tell you. I just did."

- from his nomination acceptance speech.

I'm pretty sure Reagan did not, in fact, raise taxes. But I'm definitely sure that voters decided not to give Mondale the chance....

Is it just me, or does is seem like every Democratic Nominee (other than Clinton, who was more of a DINO anyway, at least by modern standards) has actively tried to avoid winning...

I leaned heavily Democratic in the 1980s, but I knew Mondale blew it when (like Mark Poling), in an attempt at 'down-to-Earth-honesty' he acknowledged that if elected, he would raise taxes.

And perhaps it was 'honest' of him, but the economic pain of the Carter disaster, just 4 years past, was still too raw in people's memories.

"Mr. Reagan will raise taxes, and so will I. He won't tell you. I just did."

Hahaha! That's awesome. What a bonehead.

Behind my 2nd grade class picture stands a bar graph of all the kids that would vote for Mondale and those that would vote for Reagan. Reagan won the poll by a landslide.

I'm not sure if the country knew it would be a blow out but 7 & 8 yr olds knew it was a lock...

This thread would not be complete without "Morning in America", one of the greatest political ads ever.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EU-IBF8nwSY

Bah. This just proves old people have bad memories.

Reagan did in fact raise taxes. "Look, Reagan was no Reagan" - Karol. Does this post mean you're coming around to my "huge blowout one way or another" mindset?

My guess: it's still Obama's election to lose, but he's a single big gaffe away from being blown out. (He's not totally stupid; he's backed way off Palin. OTOH, he insists on pushing the "Dishonorable" meme about McCain, which strikes me as about as smart as launching and infantry march on Moscow in December....)

Does this post mean you're coming around to my "huge blowout one way or another" mindset?

Nope, I still think it's a nailbiter with all eyes on Ohio.

I remember how uncool it was to support Reagan, but I don't remember expecting a landslide.

Is ACORN active in Ohio? Voter fraud is the thing that is making me bite my nails this year.

Nope, I still think it's a nailbiter with all eyes on Ohio.

I sincerely hope not. I'm tired of listening to crackpots running on about hanging chads and Diebold. Eight years was quite enough.

It was clear Reagan would win, with one exception: He did poorly in one debate and for a couple days thereafter it looked like Mondale had a real shot.

I was a state campaign manager.

The perception was that Reagan was likely to win, but the margin surprised us all.

Remember, the media was in the tank for Mondale, so they did everything to try to convey the impression that Mondale was the better candidate, with a better organization [took that a little personally, I tells ya.]

So the perception, pushed by the media, was that it was closer than it actually turned out to be.

"Reagan did in fact raise taxes"

Bullshit. You constantly want to prove your idiocy, but are you simply so ignorant?

Even Bruce Bartlett couldn't make this accusation stick when he wrote a column some time back about this. The fact is that Reagan raised a few taxes, but overall slashed taxes. The hike in payroll taxes was necessary for the federal government to perpetuate the Social Security Ponzi scheme, but that and a couple of others were more than offset by cutting income tax rates.

Some people are aware that JFK was quite a supply-sider: "It is a paradoxical truth that tax rates are too high and tax revenues are too low and the soundest way to raise the revenues in the long run is to cut the rates now." At the time he cut the top rate from 91% to 70%. But Reagan cut it even more, 70% to 35%.

The unfortunate thing was that Reagan played ball with the Dems, who would go along with tax cuts so long as Reagan signed their social spending bills.

Ed Rollins & Lee Atwater ran the national campaign for Reagan. Aside from the first debate glitch, there wasn't any doubt that the electoral college vote would be big for Reagan, and it was. Mondale's organization paled next to Reagan's.

I was too young to vote, but I remember that Reagan was favored to win. Not 49 states though. That was just crazy.

It speaks to how bad a candidate "Fritz" Mondale was. He was ugly, a poor speaker and he was about as out-of-touch liberal as one could be.

Reagan, in retrospect, had clear vulnerabilities that a compotent opponent could have exploited. Mondale just wasn't up for the job.

Obama is a better candidate in just about every way than Mondale was, but the liberal stripes on his lapels are exactly the same. The Democrats just have a better package now for their kook-load of ideas.

It's worth stating too, that Reagan was loved by a lot of Americans by 1984. He had to decide whether to beat the Russians in the cold war, or the Democrats on the budget. He chose the greater good.

I recall Saturday Night Live had a segment in which Modale's political team were writing off everwhere else and drawing up a strategy to take Minnesota. ("Local boy runs for higher office!")

I also recall conspiracy theory posters all over Manhattan accusing Mondale of deliberately blowing the election.

There were two incidents during the campaign that told anyone with a brain that Reagan would win. The first, as mentioned by other comments, here, was when Mondale openly stated that he would raise taxes. The second incident was during the second debate. Reagan's age was a huge issue in people' minds. Reagan put that to rest with his comment: "I am not going to exploit for political purposes my opponent's youth and inexperience.": Although Mondale joined in the laughter, the look on his face told the tale. He knew it was over. From that moment in time, the outcome was a foregone conclusion.

The huge margins were only surprising if you actually trusted and believed the polls.

(I was a sergeant in the Marine Corps at the time.)

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