Trying to remember

Hello again, blogfans!

I'm certainly not the oldest registered voter in the country (50), but I have been voting for President for a number of years now. The first election I voted in was the '76 race between Ford and Carter. Inflation, unemployment, and energy were big issues (recall that we had just come through an Arab oil boycott) and trust in government in the wake of the Watergate scandal was at an all-time low.

I don't remember Carter (Ford was incumbent) going off on an international jaunt for some reason.

I also voted in the 1980 election between Carter and Reagan. Carter had taken a teetering economy and pushed it over the edge. Interest rates were positively STUPID and, to add insult to injury, Iran had taken a group of Americans hostage.

I do not recall Reagan making a trip to Jerusalem before the nominating convention.

In 1984, after the Reagan tax cuts and a moderate recovery from the malaise of the Carter years, Reagan had no real challenge from Walter Mondale or his first-ever female running mate, Geraldine Ferraro. In those days, no one with a brain in their head ever really considered voting Democrat; four years of Carter had nearly ruined the place and NO ONE wanted to go back to that!

Despite the wonderful image-booster it surely would have been, I can't recollect old Fritz doing any globe-trotting to boost his international image before the convention.

In '88, Dukakis challenged the heir to the golden Reagan years, George HW Bush. Who can recall Mike wearing his little tanker's helmet, driving his tank to show his military saavy? It was ridiculed relentlessly and little Mikey went down in inglorious defeat despite having the corpse of that party titan, Lloyd Bentsen, on the ticket!

I don't think Mikey drove his tank across the water to the G-8 summit or took it to Kuwait for a preview of Desert Storm.

In '92 and again in '96, Bill Clinton was the Democratic nominee. Even THAT camera hound, that "never met a soundbite I didn't like," spinmaster never took an overseas trip during his campaign.

I've been a student of history, especially presidential politics, for as long as I can remember. Not in any campaign that I know of has an American presidential candidate taken his show "on the road" in an attempt to sway world opinion (ostensibly) about his candidacy.

At least, not until Obama came along.

I don't know what Obama's up to, but taking a campaign stroll like this one, especially before the nominating convention, in unconventional to say the least.

I wonder who's paying the bill?