Is there a statute of limitations for mistakes, or poor judgement in your world? Would you denounce anyone who voted a certain way in the past, instead of encouraging them to vote in the future? Your comment shows a serious lack of consideration. Many people have done things with good intentions, or even with bad intentions, and either learned from them, or changed their minds on the wisdom.
Look at the election of 1980 again. Not from what Reagan did, but from the issues facing the people. On one hand, you have President Carter who many will tell you has been spoken of me in the highest terms possible on this very board. I admired his personal integrity, and his willingness to put himself on the line at Three Mile Island. His honesty led him to tell us about the Malaise that he saw gripping the nation. There was, we needed to have faith, and strive for a better future. Unfortunately, his honesty did not play well compared to Reagan's pie in the sky everything will be grand if you elect me speeches.
Reagan offered plans, which were asinine, but they were plans for the future that the public wanted to see, a better nation, a stronger nation. President Carter was more realistic, and that was not the image people wanted especially with the idea that America could be great again, if only we wanted to, and all that had to be done was elect Reagan. The US Hockey Team had touched this desire to beat the Soviets earlier in the Year.
So as an oversimplification, which is what many people tend to do with things, they saw Carter as more suffering, more pain, and more shortages. They saw Reagan as hope, and abundance, and strength. Then in 1984, Reagan's brilliant (I have no idea who came up with the line, but it was bloody brilliant) line about refusing to use his opponents youth and inexperience as an issue won the election. It really did. Because it defined the election in a way that no other single thing did.
So what do you do? Do you blame someone for falling for the hype about the superiority of a product? If it was me, and some how the subject of the President more than thirty years came up, I'd turn the subject to the topic of the next election, and tell them the superiority of the Democratic Candidate.
But you can keep fighting the election of 1980 if you want to. Lot's of people do that sort of thing. Civil War re-enactors for example, love to fight battles from one hundred and fifty years ago. In another decade, folks who want to refight the battles of 1980 may dress up the same way, in period costumes, and speak in arcane ways as they pretend like they are actually there. Let me know when you want to fight the battles of the Iowa Caucus. I probably won't show up, but I'd like to know anyway.
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: "you should vote for the me because my opponent is an ex-movie star." Nothing about what they had done or would do for me and my country but because of the opponent's former profession. I don't feel too bad about my choice based on what the democrats were selling. 
