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The 1992 Presidential Election in Ohio, a close win for Arkansas Governor Bill Clinton over incumbent President George H.W. Bush in a state no Republican has ever won without helped seal the deal on H.W.'s elected political career.
Because of the presence an angry electorate demanding change during a time of economic stagnation, Ohio Voters ousted the elder Greatest Generation Bush in favor of the youthful Baby Boomer Clinton whilst they enshrined Term Limits into the Ohio Constitution.
However, despite and because of this clamoring for Change, Three Term Senator John Glenn was elected to a fourth term over then Lieutennant Governor Mike DeWine—Constituting only one of two losses in DeWine's career.
Here, both candidates resorted to Negative attacks, with DeWine successfully attacking something once seen as untouchable—Glenn's character
This was because of a recycling of the attacks used in 1986 with regards to the financing of Glenn's 1984 presidential campaign, in addition to Glenn's relationship with Jailed Savings and Loans swindler Charles Keating
This combined with the National anti-Incumbent Mood, and Glenn's lack of knoledge as to how to respond to personal attacks helped DeWine Narrow the gap against the once comandingly popular senator.
But while these attacks helped Narrow the gap, they also provided an opening for Glenn to keep them open, as some of the ads used mechanical astronaight to attack Glenn this allowed Glenn to remind people of his backround.
That being of how he, a plumber's son from Columbus Ohio, was the first American to Orbit the Earth.
As a result of all of this, despite the general anti-incumbent and pro-change sentiment in the Country, Glenn was able to beat back Dewine in an 8.7% win; making the later appear to voters as a phony agent for change.
- Data and Shapefile from Harvard's Record of American Democracy: https://dataverse.harvard.edu/dataset.xhtml?persistentId=doi:10.7910/DVN/ANFWC7&version=1.0
- https://www.newspapers.com/image/295327966/
- https://www.newspapers.com/image/412135482/
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