The RepubliCONS would like you to believe it was Nader or hanging chads or Florida Dixiecrats or Amish RepubliCONS.

But it was NONE of those things. It was stolen straight out by the unholy and corrupt union of the Dancing Supremes and RepubliCON bushes.

However you count votes, Al Gore won the election.

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2007/111207a.html

The lying, thieving, scoundrels on the Supreme Court decided your votes don't count when it comes to electing a president. Only their 9 votes counted. Nader had nothing to do with it.

And there needs to be as much diversion and conflict as possible between now and then.

I know that's uncomfortable but it's accurate.

Bryant

Florida was rigged long before Nader threw in his hat. W's brother made sure of that. Then they bribed some Supremes (I would never call then justices because they don't believe in real justice) and waited. The RepubliCON also gerrymandered, suppressed votes, purged make believe felons, caged and rolled out their electronic voting machines in as many states as they could get away with. RepubliCONS can never win real honest elections. There aren't enough stupid people, yet. So they lie cheat and steal in order to win. It's their only way.

And I'll bet you think I'm exaggerating. But you forget, they are corrupt and liars for Jesus. So, since they manage to mix in religion they get real fanatical about it all. And fanatics have no moral compass. It's very similar to how the KKK operated in the South during Jim Crow. Only with the bushes, it became a national KKK organization.

Nader is a distraction to keep you from looking too closely at how corrupt and soulless the RepubliCONS really are.

Besides Nader, there was: Dixiecrat voting for RepubliCONS in Florida, the Jewish vote turning away from the Democrats, Amish voting RepubliCON in Pennsylvania, and having a beer with W. All of it was nonsense. All of it was done to steal the election away from Al Gore.

...had Nader not run. I don't accept this as being necessarily the case.

For one, I think Nader votes were really a protest against the 2-party system, which Nader has been campaigning against for decades. People were disgusted with it, as they're disgusted with it now. And let's face it, Gore is a Corporate Democrat - liberal (maybe), but by no means progressive. Quite frankly, I hated the man, and hated the fact that he was the only viable option to go up against the Repubs.

The problem is, that we have a political system that is set up to only accept two viable options for the national seats. Having multiple parties involved would be more democratic and encourage more participation, but would require fundamental changes to our election system, such as instant run-off voting (which, I think, would have been a more productive use of Nader's time and energy.)

As far as being "close enough to steal" - if anything, Nader's candidacy pointed out the very flaws in our electoral system that should have been fixed by now (and might have , if 9-11 didn't happen.). It took Nader's candidacy to point out the rot.

So I don't fault Nader for running - as a citizen, he has every right. I fault SCOTUS, the people running the Florida election, the Republicans for being behind the whole mess, and the Democrats for not standing up as they should have.

...I (like many others) have been put in the position of having to vote for people I have despised, countless times. This, again, is a consequence of the two-party system.

I'd like to know where the Nader candidacy made a difference? Can you name the states?

Yes, the complete recount taken after the Supreme Court suspended the count did show that Gore won if every vote in Florida would have been re-counted.

In any case, it would have only taken a fraction of Nader's votes in Florida in 2000 to have allowed Gore to have won the presidency without challenge. With those electoral votes, we would have had the most pro-environmental President in US history and we never would have invaded Iraq, and hundreds of thousands of people would not have been killed or maimed.

There also is a very high chance that President Gore wouldn't have gone back to clearing brush when he was handed intelligence saying "Bin Laden determined to attack inside the US."

The sad thing is - this situation was clearly evident in the weeks before the election. People begged Nader to suspend his campaign in Florida, but instead he redoubled his efforts. Then a system was set up to allow vote trades over the internet. People who wanted to vote for Gore in solid blue or red states would agree to vote for Nader. In return, the Nader supporters would vote for Gore in the swing states. This system was widely publicized and was intended to allow the Nader supporters to still be heard without causing a Gore loss. Nader publicly condemned the effort.

The seeds for a lot of the problems in the Bush administration were laid during the Clinton administration.

We need a new approach to these problems now.

We need to have a 21st century Glass-Steagall bill, a fairer tax code that does not exempt so much capital gains income (thank you, Thomas Piketty), more enforcement and a modernization of our anti-trust statutes, repeal of RIFRA or RFRA (the First Amendment is clear enough), revision of our drug laws so that they put treatment first and punishment second, as you pointed out, very strong environmental laws and far more investment in alternative fuels, revision of the laws on the Fed, checks on charter and other private schools, more funding for education including more generous laws that forgive student loans in exchange for public service and a host of other thins. Government support for interstate highways instead of toll roads (that is a national security issue). There is such a long, long list of policies we need to adopt. And our Democratic Party is just panting behind the ridiculous Republicans and their insane theories rather than leading on these issues.

It would not really be that scary and outrageous to talk about better antitrust laws in this Walmart era. It would not be bad to question our addiction to foreign imports in this time of international terrorism.

Nader at least brought up issues that made people think. I did not vote for him. I voted for Gore, but at least Nader brought up new ideas. The Democratic Party doesn't even staunchly support labor any more. Labor built the modern Democratic Party.

What happened in 2000 happened. Let's start thinking about how the Democratic Party can keep more people, more intelligent people under its big tent and not go back and blame just those who felt left out of the tent in 2000. Let's make the tent larger in the future. Let's hold fast to policies that will keep intelligent, well informed Nader-type voters voting Democratic.

and his stances on issues during the Clinton administration to include those who agreed with Nader.

You assume that the Nader voters (I was not one of them) would have voted for Gore. Maybe they wouldn't have. In fact, there is a good chance that many of them would not have.

Clinton signed a lot of bills that were very pro-Republican. We forget that.

During the Clinton era, a lot of traditional Democratic values were neglected. We forget that.

And Obama has repeated some of Clinton's mistakes -- even employing some Clinton leftovers like Larry Summers.

Don't blame Nader voters for voting their consciences. The Democratic Party needs to stand up for Democrats like union members and teachers and nurses who vote for Democrats but then get treated very badly when Democrats take office.

Obama's appointment, Arne Duncan, is likely to alienate a lot of teachers' votes. If they have to put up with No Child Left Behind, being judged by the scores their kids get in a time of high unemployment and upheaval and economic distress in many families and on top of that Arne Duncan, can you really expect them to be very enthusiastic about voting Democratic? Who is backing up teachers and their unions? Certainly not our Democratic president.

Votes have to be earned. The president does not have the power to pass laws. But he does have the power to make appointments to regulatory agencies. And that is where Clinton and Obama have made their worst mistakes. Unfortunately, presidential appointments by recent Democratic presidents tell a bleak story.

If we want to get Democrats out to vote, we have to tell an inspiring story. President Obama could do better in that regard. Sorry. And Clinton should have done a lot better in that regard. Nader would not have run if those who voted for him had liked Clinton.

I was not a Nader voter, but it makes not sense to blame Nader voters for what were the mistakes of the Clinton administration.

You dance with the one what brung you. And for the Democratic Party, that means working people. The leadership of the Democratic Party forgets that at the peril of losing elections.

Had Gore picked Graham instead of LIEberman for VP we wouldn't be talking about Nader now. Graham was and possibly still is the most popular politician in Florida. There were a lot of missteps and betrayals to Democratic ideals during the Clinton years. That is what gave rise to Nader. I didn't vote for Nader, but I understood the resentment of the base. President Obama really has not done much better in this regard. How often have we heard of someone in his administration talking down or outright disrespecting the liberal base voters? I may disagree with republicans on almost everything, but I have to hand it to their base that they keep the establishment politicians scared and in line. If we did that, things would be different. We would elect politicians that closer reflect our ideals. But, we as a whole spend too much time living our lives rather than paying attention to politics. Then at the very end we decide to jump in to see who's there and it's usually the one with the most money that got through the primaries.
Nader tapped into the fact that liberals were really pissed off and it cost the country a great deal, just like what happened in 1968 and 1980. In 1968, liberals wanted McGovern and stayed home. We got Nixon. In 1980, liberals wanted Kennedy and stayed home. We got Reagan.
We need to focus on electing more and better Democrats. But if our preferred candidate does not make it out of the primaries, we should still vote to elect the Dem in the general and then keep pushing. One thing the republicans are showing us is that we need to keep our side scare of what we will do to them if they cross us. Right now, they are not afraid of us because we don't teach them a lesson in the primaries. Our mistake is we either go home and don't vote or we vote for a third party that will not win anyways. Ok!!! I'm rambling too much. Later peeps!

Well said.

you know what the ultimate margin of "victory" in Florida in 2000 was? 537 votes.

The Socialist Workers' Party candidate, James Harris, who was on the ballot in Florida, got 562 votes.

Monica Moorehead, candidate of the Workers' World party, got 1804 votes in Florida.

It may be easy to blame Nader; it's also wrong.

Something no-one mentions; there wasn't much compelling reason at the time to believe Gore was or would have been a better choice for a disaffected leftist to vote for; not when his running mate was Joe Lieberman, not when Gore was a strong supporter of things like NAFTA, not when Gore was associated with the policies of the Clinton administration like financial deregulation and welfare reform and free trade and DOMA. In hindsight? Sure, a lot of people would have voted differently.

that is all this was ever about.

By election time I realized that Nader was more about Nader than moving progressive values forward and/or obstructing the right wing. In fact I had discussions with radical Nader supporters who said it would be ok if things got really bad for people in this country because sometimes that is what it takes to start a revolution. Really, that's what these folks were going for. They never expected to win, just wanted to increase the support of their party, WHATEVER THE COST TO ACTUAL PEOPLE.

Yes, the Democratic Party is flawed, and some Democratic candidates are DEEPLY flawed, and in some cases should even be opposed, particularly if there is a viable third party candidate who can win (ahem, Vermont). That latter situation is not likely to happen for the presidential race any time soon.

That said, anyone who truly thinks there's not a dime's worth of difference between the parties, and supports intentionally undermining the Democratic presidential candidate, does not belong posting at DU.

This is why many of us despise Nader - not because he "bucks the system." Nope, in 2000 he played that system for his own ends, rather than to help the country.

What Nader and other radicals fail to realize is a) radical change hurts actual people (maybe some of whom you consider "scum" and don't give a shit about, but also real people who matter - to most of us); b) in some cases the "win" is stopping the evil of the right wing. For example, 9/11 and the follow-on wars would probably not have happened if Gore had become president, the Bush tax cuts and fellating the supply-siders would not have happened during Gore's term, and we would have made more progress on climate change and alternative energy. For just a few. Take away the massive expenses and revenue loss of those things and even if an economic crash had occurred - and I don't argue that at least a downturn would have happened - there would have been more money for food stamps, school lunches, and unemployment benefits, and fewer wounded veterans to be abused by the VA's incompetence and/or lack of funding. Again, just naming a few. The list is endless. And yes, there would have been stuff to grit our teeth about too. But in hindsight, doesn't that all pale next to 9/11, the wars, and all the other destruction brought on by BushCo?

Yeah, "Nader bucks the system and they hate him for that" is a bit too simplistic. Nader's approach to "bucking the system" HURTS PEOPLE WHO DON'T DESERVE TO BE HURT. And he's too much of an egotistical sot to see it. That's why we hate him.

Without Nader's votes, Gore would have had a recount-proof margin. Winning by a tiny number of votes is what sent the whole thing into the court system, and with the SCOTUS 5-4 against him, there wasn't much Gore could do.

Tiny third parties wouldn't have made much difference here. OK, you can argue that Monica Moorehead or whoever else also contributed slightly -- like I said, events have multiple causes -- but Nader was the big one.


And, yes, there was plenty of reason at the time to believe that Gore was much better than Bush. Even on issues where Clinton turned conservative -- deregulation, welfare reform, etc. -- it was obvious that the GOP was much further right than Gore. On other issues, like the environment, or supreme court nominations, it was more obvious still. Bush campaigned on tax cuts for the rich, drilling in ANWR, school vouchers, etc. Bush was pro-life. To argue at the time that there appeared to be no difference is like arguing that there appeared to be WMDs in Iraq. It only appeared that way to people who were willfully ignorant.

Those people may not have voted at all, or may have voted for another third party candidate (Socialist, or Libertarian, or a different Green Party nominee).

The GOP understood this, that's why they ran pro-Nader ads. Nader also understood this, but he didn't care.

Why the focus on Nader? It's frankly absurdist. For that matter if 600 of the 308K registered Democrats in Florida who voted for Bush had voted for Gore instead, he'd have won.

Even under the unjustified and likely false assumption that 100% of Socialists would have turned out for Gore.

The reason to focus on Nader is that there is plenty of Nader-esque rhetoric floating around today about how the Dems are corporate sellouts and not worthy of being voted for. There was even a highly recced OP about not voting in 2016. Nader drew disaffected Democrats away from the party, convincing enough of them to throw away their votes to make Florida steal-able.

they were not willing to vote for Gore or Bush (or any of the several candidates to the right of Bush). There's a lot of good info on this thread, but you choose to ignore or dismiss all of it to cling to your victim story about Nader, a man who, ten years into his career, had done ten times more good for average Americans than most do in a lifetime.

His wiki is jaw-dropping.

But, of course, that was all before he brutally slaughtered 100,000 Iraqis.



I saw briefly, but have not wandered to thread yet, that he's supposedly called for Obama's impeachment and praised Libertarians or some such, so I need to find out about that. Also, candidly, I was not crazy about his suggestion about wealthy candidates for President, either, though I read it totally out of context. So many things to look into, so little time.

"A lot of people probably would have just stayed home."

I can't say for sure what would have happened in an alternate universe.

from your link:

Why are we only focusing on the votes he didn’t get from the much smaller Nader pool, than the votes he didn’t get from the much larger Bush pool?
And why are the Dems who voted for Nader expected to “do the right thing” and vote for Gore, more so than the ones who voted for Bush? Why isn’t the party condemning Dems who voted for Bush as turncoats and sell-outs, instead of simply bashing those far fewer who went for Nader? Answer: the Democratic Party is much more comfortable with their members who lean right, than those who lean left, and bashing the former might cost them in future elections, while bashing the latter is seen as safe, because, after all, we have “nowhere else to go.” In fact, Gore lost seven-and-a-half times more Democrats to Bush, than he lost Democrats and Independents combined to Nader.

Read the truth here:

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2007/111207a.html

to protect the sacred cows on the SCOTUS.
gotta have faith...

I don't know if it's to protect the SCOTUS. I think it's to terrorize people who may be thinking of voting Green or not giving their unconditional support to Hillary in 2016. (Like Gore, she was a co-founder of the DLC.)

The USG yells "terra" every now again to terrorize us into submission and some on DU yell "Bush2" every now and again to terrorize us into submission.

Be it Al Qaeeda, the USG or DU, I'm so over being terrorized, it isn't funny.

Fuck all would be terrorists. I'd rather die than let them skeer me.

the freedom of having nothing left to lose.
if people grokked what terrorism does, they
would cease perpetuating it before it knocks on their door.

One death is plenty for me, thanks anyway.

Which is all any of this is about. Pure and simple deflection.

I saw it in my young kids a lot when I'd get mad at them for doing something. Then they'd turn around and go "But....so and so over there did THIS!!!!! and that's worse!!!!!"

Of course my kids don't do this any more since they passed the ages of say 5 or so, because they understand that it's a ridiculous way to discuss something and to solve a problem.

Maybe one day these folks on DU and elsewhere will be as mature. Doubtful since it's been 14 years and they are still going on about it. But one can hope.

That's a big assumption. Some of them would have stayed home or voted for candidates of other parties. I voted for Gore, but in retrospect, I'm not sure I did the right thing. The mistakes of the Clinton presidency have taken a big toll on the country. NAFTA? the repeal of Glass-Steagall? the reappointment of Greenspan to the Fed? welfare reform (we don't hear much about that one's effect on poor women during this economic recession but it has to be hurting)? RFRA or RIFRA (and now Hobby Lobby and who knows what is coming)? increased deregulation (our banking scandal)? The Telecommunications Act? What was his policy with regard to NSA surveillance? Did that really just start under Bush? The list of questionable bills signed and policies and appointments that really didn't help the country as much as a more independent president's actions might have is pretty long.

And how would a Nader presidency (impossible as it was) have affected the country? Does anyone bother to ask that question?

I repeat. I voted for Gore, but I'm not sure that I was right. I like Gore, but what would he have done in his presidency? More deregulation? CAFTA??? Would Gore have been willing to regulate banks enough to prevent the 2008 crash? I'm not sure.

Enough for a recount-proof victory in FL and a Gore presidency.

Most likely, Nader's voters would have voted for Gore. Let's pretend Gore did awful with them, and only got 10% of Nader's votes. That's about 9000 votes.

Harris, the SOCTUS, the "Brooks Brothers riot", and all the rest moved the results by about 2000 votes.

If Gore won by 9537 instead of 537, that 2000 vote shift would not have mattered.

Something like 40% of Nader voters in Florida voted Republican in down-ticket races. You can't assume, absent Nader, that all of those voters, or even most of them, would have voted for Gore instead.

And you still ignore the more than 2000 votes for socialist/workers' party candidates that would have shifted the election for Gore if they'd gone to him instead.

If you had tried reading, you'd discover I only gave Gore 10% of Nader's voters, despite polling showing the majority of Nader's voters would vote for Gore if Nader wasn't on the ballot.

and I'm not really persuaded that the outcome would have been different. There were too many variables in play; Bush and Gore were not the only candidates. (You can also make a case that if Pat Buchanan hadn't been on the ballot in Florida, Bush would've won decisively.) And unlike some, I happen to believe in the democratic process; if a major-party candidate can't make a compelling case to voters, who instead vote for a third-party candidate? They have every right to do so.

I'm saying they should take a minute to think about the result of their decision. Again, vote like an idealist in a primary. Vote like a pragmatist in the general.

If you're not? You should stop going on about how people exercising their right to vote for the candidate of their choosing "cost Gore the election". You may think it's more pragmatic for people to vote for a major-party candidate in a general election; insisting on it is still fundamentally undemocratic.

That doesn't mean I can't advocate for them to make a different decision.

One of the most perplexing things about the ire directed at Nader is the way it serves to excuse both Gore's shortcomings as a candidate and the malfeasance of Republicans.

Gore's lousy campaign was another. The media's irrational hatred of Gore was another. Republicans breaking every law they could was another. And so on.

Take away any of those pieces, and the Republicans can't steal it.

And with all of the anti-Nader posts popping up all of a sudden just after another Supreme Court decision it seems that the most likely reason is to divert attention from yet another disastrous Supreme Court decision. Or are the Nader haters saying the makeup of the 2000 Supreme Court was also Nader's' fault?

How does anyone justify blaming Nader for causing Gore to lose by taking too many votes away from him when Gore didn't lose but actually won?

It's all starting to look like a diversion to me, maybe the Republicans are planning to steal some major elections again this year.

about 20 consecutive posts of his. I guess it's a favorite tactic.

Sorry for the interjection. I'll leave you two alone now.

What a joke.

The point where we can steer the party is in the primaries. Saying "I'm gonna vote third party!!" just makes the Democrats ignore you. It's easier in the general election to pull in some people from the right than to win your vote. So that's what they'll do in a general election.

In a primary, they can't do that. Because the only voters are Democrats (in most states).

The teabaggers understand this, and have used it to turn the Republican party into something that would reject Reagan. We are smarter than the teabaggers, but far too many of us don't understand that.

No good primary candidate? Then run. Or recruit someone to run. You don't have to win to change the party. Lots and lots of teabaggers have lost primaries while turning their party to the right.

This is our problem to solve. Stop demanding someone else solve it for you.

The point where we can steer the party is in the primaries. Saying "I'm gonna vote third party!!" just makes the Democrats ignore you.

The teabaggers understand this, and have used it to turn the Republican party into something that would reject Reagan. We are smarter than the teabaggers, but far too many of us don't understand that.

No good primary candidate? Then run. Or recruit someone to run.

Stop demanding someone else solve it for you.

You said I was pointlessly whining. And I gave you that as a tit for tat re: my calling you disingenuous.

But then you also claimed--and for the second time--that I was not only whining pointlessly, but also demanding that other people fix things for me. And that was a total lie both times. You know, more than "just" disingenuous: flat out, made up lie. As I said in a prior post to you, I never demanded anything of anyone.

More to the point, why do you think I am fixing those problems?

It demonstrates that you keep operating in a framework where someone else is taking action and you're just an observer.

Thrre are states Gore could have won easily without him in the race. Nader was a contributing factor.

That's the basic math. If he didn't run Gore won. Period. That is not open to any rational level of argument.

You can cite the tiny modifiers that, WITH NADER HAVING SHIFTED THE VOTE SO LARGELY THAT GORE AND BUSH WERE THEN NECK AND NECK, fell within that resulting tiny little margin. But that 500 something or 1800 something votes are absolutely insignificant next to Nader's 100,000 or so Florida votes. THAT is what sealed the deal. Almost all of those would have been Gore's if Nader hadn't insisted on running, which puts Florida to bed out of any possibility of shenanigans with recounts or Supreme Court decisions.

THAT is what cost Gore Florida, and gave us a Bush Jr presidency. Denying that is childish.

Trying to point to those other tiny factors is like saying "Well sure I poured gasoline and lit a match... but it was also 5 degrees hotter than the seasonal average the day that forest burned down!!!!!"

[b]He had enough votes to win but they were NOT counted.[/b] He won the election in Florida and therefore is/was the rightful president. Nader had absolutely NOTHING to do with the counting of Florida ballots.

http://www.consortiumnews.com/2007/111207a.html

"Editor’s Note: Six years ago on another Veterans Day holiday, eight news organizations published the findings of their unofficial recount of Florida’s disputed ballots. The recount had discovered that Al Gore would have won the decisive Florida election if all legally cast votes were counted.

However, just two months after the 9/11 attacks, the news organizations chose to conceal the obvious “Gore Won” lead, apparently putting their sense of “patriotism” over journalistic professionalism.

Rather than tell already-shaken Americans that the wrong man was in the White House, the big news outlets – including the New York Times, the Washington Post and CNN – structured their stories around hypothetical recounts that would have excluded some legal votes and thus still would have resulted in a Bush “victory.”"

Here is part of the original story:

"So Al Gore was the choice of Florida’s voters -- whether one counts hanging chads or dimpled chads. That was the core finding of the eight news organizations that conducted a review of disputed Florida ballots. By any chad measure, Gore won.

Gore won even if one doesn’t count the 15,000-25,000 votes that USA Today estimated Gore lost because of illegally designed “butterfly ballots,” or the hundreds of predominantly African-American voters who were falsely identified by the state as felons and turned away from the polls. [Some later estimates put this number of disenfranchised blacks well into the thousands.]

Gore won even if there’s no adjustment for George W. Bush’s windfall of about 290 votes from improperly counted military absentee ballots where lax standards were applied to Republican counties and strict standards to Democratic ones, a violation of fairness reported earlier by the Washington Post and the New York Times.

Put differently, George W. Bush was not the choice of Florida’s voters anymore than he was the choice of the American people who cast a half million more ballots for Gore than Bush nationwide. [For more details on studies of the election, see Consortiumnews.com stories of May 12, June 2 and July 16, 2001.]"

There is more at the link if you want to know the absolute TRUTH and who really won the 2000 Presidential election.

NADER Had Absolutely Nothing to do with it.

for Bush than for Nader.

He was (still might be) a single issue candidate--he hates any form of gun control. But he's also, he says, an environmentalist. He told me he voted for Bush, as opposed to Gore, because of the assault weapon ban. When I said that Bush would be terrible for the environment, he countered with "Even Ralph Nader says there's no difference between Gore and Bush. He called Gore a 'faux environmentalist.'" So--he voted for Bush.

Hopefully he learned from his mistake (haven't talked to him in years) but I wonder how many others there were out there like him.

it came down to 536 votes

Choice point purged over 100,000 voters

the butterfly ballots cost over 3,000 votes

the choice of Lieberman is surely worth at least 536 votes

you dismiss Gore's terrible campaign with an etc. - ultimately it was his race and his responsibility to earn votes

The Bush team pulled every dirty trick in the book

Gore could have fought harder but gave in early

The SCOTUS pulled a notoriously sketchy move with their bullshit one-time non-precedent setting decision - illegal as hell - but hey, no higher court to appeal to

Nader ran on a legal 3rd party ticket - which will never happen again because of the whining and scapegoating that is forever attached to it - 2 party system forever

His platform is similar to libertarian - which probably siphoned from votes from Bush as well

Too many big factors involved to oversimplify like this

*I did vote for Nader in CA - Gore easily took that state - Was not impressed him at the time and wanted to support someone with different ideas even though I knew he couldn't win - In short Gore didn't earn my vote

And at the end of the day, without Nader, Gore is inaugurated president in 2001.

you and every other buyer and seller of this anti-anti-establishment meme would simply be
BLAMING PAT BUCHANAN.
with some sort of interesting progressive/liberal bashing twist Im sure.

But, I put Gore's uninspiring campaign as first in the reasons why he lost column.
It was a campaign that bordered on incompetent.