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2020-11-19 Home Front: Politix

Flashback - Carter's Acceptance of Defeat in 1980

[Townhall] In 1980, Democratic President Jimmy Carter lost in a landslide to Ronald Reagan, 489-49 in the Electoral College. So naturally, Democrats concluded that Reagan had committed treason in order to steal the election, to wit: His campaign had conspired with Iranian ayatollahs to prevent 52 American hostages from being released until after the election.
Sound familiar?

And who can blame them? Carter's economic policies had produced a 21% interest rate, a 17% mortgage rate and a 15% inflation rate in the coveted "hat trick" of presidential incompetence. His brilliant strategic ploy of abandoning the Shah of Iran had led to a 154% spike in oil prices and Islamic lunatics seizing our embassy and holding Americans hostage in Tehran, where they remained for 444 days, until Carter was safely removed from office.

With all that going for them - plus that old Mondale magic -Democrats were dumbstruck that they lost the 1980 election. What other than a dirty trick could explain it?
I guess I should warn some of you - this is Ann Coulter. So I'll keep it short.
In other words, liberals believed the Islamo-fascist cutthroats who had been toying with Carter like a cat with a ball of yarn wanted Carter replaced by someone stronger, like Reagan. How else to explain the fact that, minutes after Reagan's inauguration, the hostages were released?

A more plausible theory was given in a Jeff MacNelly cartoon showing Khomeini reading a telegram aloud: "It's from Ronald Reagan. It must be about one of the Americans in the Den of Spies, but I don't recognize the name. It says 'Remember Hiroshima.'"

At the conclusion of the House's investigation, Rep. Lee Hamilton, the House Democrat who had chaired the October Surprise Task Force, wrote an op-ed in The New York Times, saying: "The task force report concluded there was virtually no credible evidence to support the accusations."

On the same day, the Times published a rebuttal op-ed by Gary Sick.

And that, kids, is how you concede a presidential election with grace and dignity.

Posted by Bobby 2020-11-19 11:07|| || Front Page|| [8 views ] Top

#1 Give Jimmy Carter credit for at least this other thing:

He said that voting by mail was highly susceptible to fraud.

Posted by Lord Garth 2020-11-19 11:57|| 2020-11-19 11:57|| Front Page Top

#2 ^ so did Liz Warren and Amy Klobuchar. And the US State Department and ...

Posted by Betty Thrush9410 2020-11-19 12:21|| 2020-11-19 12:21|| Front Page Top

#3 Both Pubs and Dems didn't like Carter.

Posted by JohnQC 2020-11-19 14:41|| 2020-11-19 14:41|| Front Page Top

#4 The real lesson of the carter acceptance of defeat was that he conceded so early that they believe it convinced a lot of Dems in California to not go out to vote and thus the GOP did really well on ballots and lower level stuff. I think both parties noticed that and came up with don't concede until later policies even if it's obvious.

Posted by rjschwarz 2020-11-19 14:48|| 2020-11-19 14:48|| Front Page Top

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