So at Christmas dinner I heard a young fella say, "Well at least Obama won't get re-elected," and I laughed and said, "Sorry to disappoint you but I think he will."
I do not think this is true because I am voting for him. I do not think this is true because the republicans are putting up a bunch of roadkill, stiffs, scary old guys, dudes wearing foil hats and guys almost smart enough to be a lamp.
I think this because a sitting president is already 78.8% re-elected. I mean we already voted the guy in once and barring a total collapse of... well everything, he is going to be reelected.
In the history fo the USA there have been 44 presidents and 15 were not re-elected. Of those W H Harrison, Taylor, Garfield, Harding and Kennedy died in their first term leaving nine. Out of those nine; one, Grover Cleveland, was president during what was probably the worst depression in the history fo the country and so was defeated by republican Benjamin Harrison who did so poorly in handling the crisis that he then was defeated by the same Grover Cleveland who became the only man to not be re-elected twice.
This does not include Andrew Johnson who, having inherited the office after Lincoln's death, was never elected but was impeached and did not seek re-election. Joining him in holding the office but not having been elected to it is Gerald Ford who pardoned Nixon... enough said.
So out of the remaining nine we have John Adams who was so paranoid he oversaw the passage of the alien and sedition acts while having Thomas Jefferson (who was a democrat and in the other party) constantly undermining him because Adams refused to enter the French Revolution. This led to Adams being so wildly unpopular and universally hated that he lost the election in a landslide and retired from political life.
John Quincy Adams' presidency was racked with scandal and he was defeated by Andrew Jackson and a populist swell whose policies caused the collapse that sank...
Martin Van Buren who was president three months when the collapse of 1837 happened because of unscrupulous credit practices which caused the economy to collapse. Incidentally the Great GREAT Depression of the late 19th century happened for the same reason as did (in large measure) the Great Depression in the 1930's
Gee 4 times in 175 years and we still haven't figured out this is a bad idea.... but I digress.
Taft lost to Wilson because Teddy Roosevelt started a third party.
Herbert Hoover... well Great Depression anyone?
Jimmy Carter was president at a time when the economy was so bad that inflation was up and the economy was shrinking. That actually shouldn't be able to happen as expanding economies drive inflation and shrinking economies, well... shrink it. And we boycotted the olympics. Iran hostage crisis. And Reagan ran... again.
Perfect storm.
Aside from that is George Herbert Walker Bush. This guy failed to win a war, the economy was crap, Dan Quayle was his VP, "No new taxes!", he only won because the Democrats put up Dukakis who couldn't have beat Hoover (and Hoover was dead), and still he lost his bid for re-election because Perot started a third party (basically) and carried 19% of the vote and many swing states including Ohio, Wisconsin, New Jersey, and Iowa Clinton won by fewer than 5% with Perot taking 18-20% of the vote.
In other words, without Perot... wait for it... Clinton may not have beaten George H W Bush. Clinton for pity's sake.
And why? Cuz Bush was the guy already there and people fear change.
44 presidents and five died, one is sitting, two chose not to run again, two lost because of splits in their own party and Cleveland did get re-elected... eventually. Meaning out of the 33 remaining 26 got re-elected good or bad. That's a .788 winning percentage and that means that guy already there almost always wins.
Don't believe me?
We re-elected W.
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