@1 -- I was alive, and remember that race very well. The Willie Horton ad was the turning point in the race. The ad, and Dukakis' response to the ad had as much to do with Bush winning as anything. Candidate's like Dukakis usually only have one chance to define themselves, and Bush did it (as a soft on crime liberal). While it was an electoral landslide, the overall vote was much closer. If Dukakis has managed to swing another 5%, then he would have carried the latter, and presumably the former.



The author of this piece simply used it as an intro to this movie, and it is a good one, in my opinion. There are still a lot of people who know the name "Willie Horton", even though he was a two-bit criminal. He would have been unknown if not for Bush, and the implication that criminals like him should never be paroled (an idea that this movie shows is way too simplistic).