Except 2012 was that bad, too.,.worse, in fact, than 1980 in my opinion.
And America didn't learn.
Despite the rants of some of my fellow FREEPers, I do not believe Mitt Romney was worse than Obama. I do believe that Obama is significantly worse than Jimmy Carter.
A demographic change? I don't know. I somehow believe with George W Bush that ALL people--no matter their race, age, educational level--want to be free. And not "free" to be a dependent, but free to pursue their dreams.
I think the fundamental difference between 1980 and 2012/16 will be a spiritual one.
The people of God, those who claimed the mantel of Christianity and/or Judeo-Christian ethics, helped Jimmy Carter win (barely) in 1976. He claimed to be a Southern Baptist Sunday school teacher and a born again Christian. He admitted his faults in a famous Playboy interview. He seemed to be real...but then, given the opportunity, he governed miserably.
1980 came along, and Ronald Reagan sensed the need for someone who didn't exude the outer facade of Christianity (he never claimed to be a Sunday school teacher and in fact was a denizen of Hollywood--gasp!) but was appealing in his positions to a more moral code.
Our spiritual life as a nation, alas, has deteriorated in the years between then and now.
Needed today is a true--and I mean true--spiritual awakening.
We are like Jerusalem in 586 BC...or Rome in 476 AD...we are rotten on the inside, and a bare shell holds us together. Our leadership, corrupt to the core, reflects the citizenry that has forgotten the Creator. Jerusalem had had a history that recalled Him--Rome had a bare knowledge of it that was beginning to take hold, but the accumulation of centuries of perverted thinking was still around.
America, 85 years ago or so, began to denigrate the idea of hard work and shifted to a "Nanny State" mentality. Families of all kinds--black and white--began to fall apart, secure in the "knowledge" that government would care for those that were abandoned.
Then 40 years ago or so, this nation began to repeat the sin of slavery under another form. Instead of thinking of blacks as property to be used in any way the "owner" saw fit, the mantel was passed on to unborn children. Babies were mere "tissue" if still in the womb, and the cry from so-called feminists was that a woman could do anything she wanted to her body at any time.
And in the past 20 years or so, we have started to deteriorate the very meaning of "family" and "marriage". From Bill Clinton's efforts to change the military's makeup and morale to the current desire to crush religious freedom in the name of tolerance, we are turning our back on the Almighty.
There is hope for those who turn to Him. And America ought to do that.
Ted Cruz in his annouchment speech believes that God is not finished with America yet.