Disagree. Carter was going to be a one-term President from the very first “Sweater” fireside chat.
The initial feeling of the public when the Desert One was blown, was that Carter was at least TRYING to something, besides talking to whackjob muslims, to get our people BACK.
The one who SCREWED himself OUT of the Presidency was Teddy “The Swimmer” Kennedy when he went out and immediately denounced Carter to the press.
Ted flopped every time he came to Iowa during his “exploration” for the presidency against a sitting Democrat president.
On one occasion in SW Iowa, Kennedy was visiting a grain elevator and a group of farmers had been invited to hear him speak. Ted looked down the railroad tracks leading into the elevator and barked, “How’s the service out here on the Wabash ?” (As if to suggest that if he heard complaints about those railroad robber barons, by golly, he’d hold hearings and demand action...)
This had a rather stunning effect on the farmers and press corps because it had been nearly 100 years since the mighty Wabash railroad had served Iowa.
It later turned out that a campaign worker had looked up “Iowa” at his local library while planning for Ted’s trip and had fed the senator with some very old data.