President Bush Chasing Ronald Reagan's 1984 Popular Vote Record

[Dynasty]

There may be one last piece of drama to follow tonight.

In 1984, Ronald Reagan got more votes than any Presidential candidate before or after. 54,451,521 people voted for Ronald Reagan to be re-elected. Reagan had 58.8% of the vote.

George W. Bush has a chance to break that record due to this year's massive turnout. As I make this post, Bush has 51,467,232 votes (51%). I have no idea what % of the national vote has yet to be counted.

Edit: FoxNews just said 85% of the national vote is in. That means Bush is projected to get about 60 million votes. Of course, since California probably represents a lot of that vote, Bush may not get there.

It's interesting that Senator Kerry is also projected to break Reagan's record with more than 56 million votes

[SinCityGuy]

It looks like he's going to break Reagan's record.

A great performance by the Bush campaign, holding serve (except New Hampshire), and putting Kerry on the defensive in all of the battleground states won by Gore.

Also, he will get over 50% of the popular vote, which hasn't happened in 16 years.

[lorinda]

I have no idea what % of the national vote has yet to be counted.

Over 140m turned out I think I heard some hours ago when I was still semi-sane.

Lori

[lorinda]

Of course, he's still only -3300 to win this thing /images/graemlins/tongue.gif That's 97% or so.

Lori

[craig r]

All I saw was "1984" and got really nervous /images/graemlins/tongue.gif!

craig

[Dynasty]

President Bush just passed Ronald Reagan's 1984 popular vote. He's at 54.5 million and counting.

A spin tactic of the White House will definitely be "More people voted for George W. Bush to be their President than any other man in the history of this nation."

[SinCityGuy]

[ QUOTE ]
A spin tactic of the White House will definitely be "More people voted for George W. Bush to be their President than any other man in the history of this nation."

[/ QUOTE ]

They might.

It's kind of funny, but before this election, Al Gore had the second most popular votes in history (behind Reagan).

[pc in NM]

[ QUOTE ]
There may be one last piece of drama to follow tonight.

In 1984, Ronald Reagan got more votes than any Presidential candidate before or after. 54,451,521 people voted for Ronald Reagan to be re-elected. Reagan had 58.8% of the vote.

George W. Bush has a chance to break that record due to this year's massive turnout. As I make this post, Bush has 51,467,232 votes (51%). I have no idea what % of the national vote has yet to be counted.

Edit: FoxNews just said 85% of the national vote is in. That means Bush is projected to get about 60 million votes. Of course, since California probably represents a lot of that vote, Bush may not get there.

It's interesting that Senator Kerry is also projected to break Reagan's record with more than 56 million votes

[/ QUOTE ]

As of the writing of this post, Bush has 59,019,598 and Kerry has 55,437,243, so they BOTH beat that so-called record. But it's meaningless, becaue it's just a reflection of population growth. - the only meaningful measure is to use comparable data - Bush now has 51% of the total, and that's nowhere near any record....

However, we can expect to see many touting the raw numbers as "the greatest total in history" to promote the illusion that Bush has an overwhelming mandate from the voting public to enact whatever agenda he so chooses - and a mathematically-challenged public will probably lap it up - "big time"!!

[Dynasty]

[ QUOTE ]
But it's meaningless, becaue it's just a reflection of population growth.

[/ QUOTE ]

It's also a reflection of 2004's big turnout.

[SinCityGuy]

[ QUOTE ]
As of the writing of this post, Bush has 59,019,598 and Kerry has 55,437,243, so they BOTH beat that so-called record. But it's meaningless, becaue it's just a reflection of population growth. - the only meaningful measure is to use comparable data - Bush now has 51% of the total, and that's nowhere near any record....

However, we can expect to see many touting the raw numbers as "the greatest total in history" to promote the illusion that Bush has an overwhelming mandate from the voting public to enact whatever agenda he so chooses - and a mathematically-challenged public will probably lap it up - "big time"!!

[/ QUOTE ]

Reagan's wins, especially in 1984, were true mandates and landslide victories. In 1984, he got 525 electoral votes and 60% of the popular vote.

Bush has a clear win this year, but the victory margin is relatively modest in historical terms. It is comparable to Jimmy Carter's victory over Gerald Ford in 1976.

[jesusarenque]

While it is true that both Bush and Kerry will receive more votes than any other previous candidate, it is also true that both of these guys received more votes AGAINST them than any other candidate in history.

[Dynasty]

60,000,000 and counting for President Bush.

Can anybody provide a link which shows the total votes for every candidate?

[Michael Davis]

Lori,

Can you really make this bet somewhere, and wouldn't it be worth it to take out a huge loan?

-Michael

[PITTM]

another piece of info linking the bush administration with 1984. /images/graemlins/tongue.gif

rj