Well, yes, if by “long ago” you mean 2008.
According to the formula, GWB was supposed to be red both times (once as challenging party and once as incumbant party). McCain should have been blue as incumbant, and Romney should have been blue as challenger.
If you look at the history of what happened, I don’t think the abandonment of the alternating convention was deliberate on the part of the media or democrat party, nor was it a matter of republicans being too stupid to fight back. It was really quite understandable:
What happened was that before 2000, the formula had coincidentally resulted in republicans being blue for every race except George Bush senior’s first race. Ford, Reagan (twice), Bush (second race) and Dole were all blue on the map, so Republicans (like me) were raised thinking Republicans were always blue (I remember thinking it was a mistake when Bush’s 1st race had Republicans red on the map).
Then the Bush/Gore electoral college squeaker had the entire nation preoccupied with maps and the terms “red state” and “blue state” were born. The formula called for red to switch from the challenging party in 2000 (republican) to the incumbant party in 2004 (republican), which reinforced the new red state blue state meme, so that it became set in stone that red equals republican. There were probably only a few old media codgers that even knew about the formula and it was forgotten. I don’t like it, but I can sort of see how it happened.
Even if someone wanted to reassert the red blue formula, 2016 wouldn’t be the year to do it, because Trump would have been red anyway, as the challenger. Same in 2024, when red switches to the incumbant, also Trump!
Maybe in 2024, when the incumbant republican (Pence) equals blue, we can reestablish the formula, but I’m hoping Trump will have taught republicans how to focus on the important things!
Correction: second to last sentence should read “Same in 2020, when red switches to the incumbant, also Trump!”