Most campaigns fail. Barack Obama is arguably the best politician in recent history, but if we reran the 2008 campaign 100 times, Obama would probably lose at least 90 times. Campaigns are often victims of circumstances beyond their control. This is often referred to as an October Surprise. The final stretch of the 2008 campaign was rocked by a historic financial crisis sparked by the collapse of major banks such as Lehman Brothers. In 2012, the attack on a US diplomatic facility in Benghazi and Hurricane Sandy upended the final days of the campaign, and in 2016, FBI Director James Comey’s
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