Jim Geraghty does a good job deconstructing Terry McAuliffe’s rather nostalgic embrace of the original “October Surprise” conspiracy theory (short version: some people still believe that the Iranians and the Reagan campaign colluded into having the hostages released after the Reagan Inauguration); but I don’t know if logic and reality will work on those people who still cling to the aforementioned theory. Alas, some people don’t want to hear that Jimmy Carter was feckless, that everybody in the world was contemptuous of him by the end, and that the Iranian regime needed no prodding to humiliate him and the USA for as long as they could do so safely (which is to say, up to about five minutes or so in the Reagan administration). Carter was simply weak. It happens.
No excuse for Terry, of course. Then again, there never was.