Also, to give you and answer that isn't predicated on "how bad Jimmy Carter was" let me add this:
Throughout the 1970's I read essays by Ronald Reagan, and each one convinced me "he's the man we need to get in the White House." Others have said it better, but Reagan was a man who believed in the goodness of America, and Americans. Rather than the opposite, which you can hear an echo of today from a lot of the European press.
I was in high school when Reagan was elected.I was a mushy unfocused liberal.A friend at the time gave me some writings by Reagan and convinced me he was nothing like the left wingers portayed him.My friend was a refugee from Czechoslovakia and an ardent anti communist.He along with Reagan and Thatcher convinced me that the USSR was an evil empire.I also read some of the books that inspired them Road to Serfdom,etc