Word: humphreyism
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...have far-reaching side effects. For instance, no one knows how many voters last month were swayed by a tendency to jump aboard a Nixon band wagon. Leading pollsters, including Gallup, unequivocally reject the notion that there may be a so-called "band-wagon effect." They cite Hubert Humphrey's dramatic comeback as evidence for their view. Still others feel that the polls may actually have helped Humphrey by generating an "underdog" sympathy vote. Whichever of these effects was dominant, it seems obvious that in an election where only a few hundred thousand votes out of more than eighty million...
Financially, Humphrey felt the polls had hurt him. He remarked several times that he received fewer donations at the outset of his campaign because the polls had marked him with the stigma of defeat. A more direct danger, however, is that polls can be deliberately manipulated by office holders and office seekers alike to influence public opinion...
Initially, Humphrey thought Richard Nixon would be an easy target. The Chicago debacle changed his mind. In retrospect, Humphrey believes that he might have made more headway with Eugene McCarthy's dissidents if he had spoken out sooner on Viet Nam. Even before the convention, he had a speech ready saying that he might try a bombing halt if elected. But he was persuaded to wait until the end of September by advice from Paris that an earlier announcement might have hampered the peace talks. Humphrey, unlike many supporters and pollsters, does not believe that a few more days...
Doubtless Humphrey will discuss these points in his memoirs, which Doubleday plans to publish next year. In the meantime, Humphrey will probably lecture at the University of Minnesota, lay plans to replace McCarthy in the Senate if the donnish dove does not run again in 1970, and spend the next two years helping Democratic National Chairman Larry O'Brien recoup the party's $5,000,000 to $7,000,000 campaign debt...
...running gag in Maryland throughout the presidential campaign had it that if Hubert Humphrey won the election, local Democrats would immediately demand a recount. For the Democrats were well aware that when the Republican Party won the White House, it lost the statehouse. When Vice President-elect Spiro Agnew resigns his governorship some time after the Electoral College makes his election official on Dec. 16, Maryland's general assembly is certain to choose a Democrat to succeed him for the remaining two years of his four-year term...