Carter was a good man but a poor president. The US was rocked by years of inflation brought on by the oil crises (Arabs embargoed USA for supporting Israel) an

Carter was a good man but a poor president. The US was rocked by years of inflation brought on by the oil crises (Arabs embargoed USA for supporting Israel) and deficit spending (Vietnam War). The average citizen did not believe Carter had any solution to the economic turmoil. With hindsight, we can debate if Reaganomics actually worked; but that is besides the point. The voters believed in it; unfortunately, they didn't believe in Carter. You can contrast this with FDR who was president during the Great Depression. FDR was more pragmatic. He said he was willing to try anything if it helped the average American. That was what voters wanted to hear. About FDR, one of America's most successful presidents. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/03/04/how-the-deal-went-down https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/03/04/how-the-deal-w... Roosevelt was neither self-reflective nor a deep thinker voters trusted Roosevelt to lead the country through eight years of economic desolation As Kennedy emphasizes in “Freedom from Fear,” there was no master plan, no guiding philosophy, for the reforms that Roosevelt oversaw. Some were his idea; some were Congress’s; some were left over from the Hoover Administration. Roosevelt was >>improvising<<.