Early in the crisis it was a rallying point for the electorate as a whole and that usually shows up as a bump up for the President in office. As the crisis dragged on and it became clear that Carter was incapable of dealing with it effectively, people lost confidence in him and Reagan's reassuring performance in the debates sealed the deal. Throw in the lousy economy and Carter was perceived as a failure in three different ways. If Obama avoids a repeat performance and the economy picks up to the point of the (reported) unemployment rate dropping into the 6-7% range, it will be a different ballgame than 1980.
I said in '08 that Obama was a dangerous candidate and we underestimate him at our peril. I think it will be that way in '12. He'll have the power of incumbency and a media that is even more of an obsequious lickspittle lapdog than it is now, if that's possible. But there is one parallel to 1980 that is valid. Like with Reagan, whoever we nominate will have to have a broad national appeal, run a pretty much flawless campaign, and avoid making stupid statements and doing foolish things that hand the 'Rats and the media more hammers they can use to beat them to a pulp.
Reagan said any number of things the press perceived as gaffs during the 1980 campaign. He was ridiculed and pilloried relentlessly. Books were written about what a fool he was — “Ronald Reagan's Reign of Error,” etc. Reagan was advertised as a terribly weak candidate, a patsy tailor made for Carter. He was the nominee of a divided party with a “moderate” Republican running as a third party candidate because his appeal was supposed to be so narrow. The left was uniformly of the opinion that Reagan had embarrassed himself in the debates. He won anyway because Carter was a failure.
What was the difference between Reagan and Goldwater? Was it that Goldwater was a poor campaigner and Reagan was a good one? Hardly. “Extremism in the pursuit of liberty is no vice” is among the best phrases ever deployed by an American politician. It fell flat, along with the rest of the Goldwater campaign, because in 1964 America was still in the grip of a progressive consensus left over from the 1930’s. We weren't ready for an alternative. By 1980 the progressive consensus had broken down. The smart guys had failed, comprehensively. It wasn't just stagflation or the hostage crisis or even the combination. The left had promised that it would make everything work smoothly and everything was falling apart.
Every election with an incumbent President running is a referendum on the incumbent. Reagan won in 1980 because he convinced most people that he was a plausible President and Carter, having been weighed in the balance and found wanting, no longer was. When the President fails the challenger has a low bar to clear. When he doesn't the challenger's bar is out of reach.
Anybody who can win the Republican nomination will easily clear the plausible president bar when the time comes, whatever the polls say now, just as Reagan did. Trying to pick the most electable candidate is a fool's game. Electability will depend on circumstances beyond anyone’s control.
Obama is looking at a perfect storm of inflation, low growth, high unemployment and diminishing American influence around a very dangerous world. When people next give any thought to whether they want him in the White House, most are likely to conclude that they don't. Until they think about that question asking them what they think about it will not yield any useful information.
Support the candidate that you think would make the best leader for the conservative movement, the Republican Party and the country. Electability isn't worth another thought.