For the last year I’ve watched media commentators discuss the uniqueness of this election. They bring in the political analysts and experts who say that this year is proving that anything can happen and that the American people are ready for a change. Trump is an outsider and it’s the year of the outsider. Hilary is an insider who continues to thrive, notwithstanding her personal and professional scandals. This election season has broken all the rules! No one knows what will happen. If, however, you pay attention to history, it has a way of repeating itself.
The year was 1992. George W.H. Bush was the sitting president running for re-election. The economy under his leadership was hurting and the words from his famous speech “Read My Lips” loomed over his head as the people were frustrated that he had broken his promise not to raise taxes. His challenger for the Republican seat, Pat Buchanan had no trouble reminding everyone of Bush’s wishy-washy move and won over a large percentage of republicans in the primaries. Though Bush managed to secure the nomination, it wasn’t without a great bruising to his candidacy. It was hard for many people to move on from the disappointment of not seeing the popular conservative commentator take the nomination and save their party.
Meanwhile, a ladies man from Arkansas by the name of Bill Clinton became the Democratic nominee--in spite of being disbarred in Arkansas and having had a scandalous affair with Gennifer Flowers for years. Understandably, many voters were frustrated with both parties and a third party bid would become enticing. Ross Perot, a self-made billionaire, ran on and off as an independent that year appealing to both democrats and republicans. He even made it to the debate stage! He managed to secure nearly 19% of the vote making him the most successful third party candidate since Theodore Roosevelt. Clinton won with 43% of the vote to Bush’s 37.4%.
Fast forward to the election of 2016. Self-made billionaire Donald J. Trump is running as a Republican during a time when our nation is in deep debt and Social Security is about to go bankrupt. He has his own style. He tells it the way he sees, politically incorrect, he is NOT a politician which is what his supporters love about him! He only recently converted to the Republican Party and isn’t exactly seen as a conservative by many. His top challenger for the Republican slot was Ted Cruz, a tea party favorite and constitutional conservative. The race between Trump and Cruz became deeply personal and insulting leaving each’s loyal supporters frustrated and the party split and wounded. The field was also very large during the primaries and by the time it was over and Trump secured the nomination, more 60% of conservatives had voted for other candidates and are sorely disappointed to have him representing the party.
On the democrat side, Hilary Clinton has secured the nomination in spite of her scandals. It was widely believed during the primaries (and later confirmed by the director of the FBI) that as Secretary of State she used an unsecured email server to view classified information which may have led to the attack at the American Embassy in Benghazi and the death of four Americans. She also had a stiff challenge from socialistic democrat Bernie Sanders whose supporters are deeply bothered by her and Trump’s candidacies. Now so many Americans are dissatisfied with the last standing candidates that there is a movement for the third party. Gary Johnson describes his platform as being “fiscally conservative and socially liberal” and while the two traditional party candidates are both seen as unstable, scandalous, untrustworthy, and have cloudy dispositions he in contrast appears stable. Voters now debate over social media taking stances such as, “Not voting for Trump is a vote for Clinton,” and “I can’t in good conscience vote for either of them so I won’t!” Currently Real Clear Politics polls have Clinton 41%, Trump 37%, Johnson 10%, and Stein 4%.
Do you still think this election is one of a kind? I feel like history is slapping me in the face with how similar the election of 1992 was to today. For Pete’s sake, we even have another Clinton running! Will Trump or Johnson shatter the system, or are we facing another Clinton era?
