But you are forgetting the Iran hostage crisis and his feeble response to it which largely ensured he would not be reelected.
Originally Posted by NiceGuy53
No, I'm not "forgetting" about that. It certainly was a factor that worked against Carter, but you may recall that even so, he was running almost neck-and-neck with Reagan shortly before the election. I think the condition of the economy, especially with respect to food and gasoline prices, greatly outweighed perceptions of his foreign policy fecklessness. In most voters' minds, economic conditions trump everything else. Likewise, if Hillary (or some other Democrat) loses the 2016 election, it won't be because of Libya or any other possible foreign policy failure. It will be due to economic factors.
Another point I would make is that if oil prices had been falling rather than rapidly rising during the late 1970s, the Iranian Mullahs might not have felt quite so emboldened. In such an environment, they might have been less eager to poke us in the eye, since they would have suddenly found that their oil-dependent economy was in a bit of a stranglehold.