In 1979, former President Jimmy Carter inflicted significant political damage on himself in an extraordinary address to the nation on the energy crisis.

Carter listed criticisms of his presidency and painted a picture of a listless nation caught in moral and spiritual chaos.

Ultimately, Carter couldn’t get the speech out of his head, making it easy for opponents, not least Ronald Reagan, to portray him as a pessimistic and uninspiring leader.

Nevertheless, in the late 1970s it seemed conceivable that Carter’s leadership in foreign policy at the height of the Cold War would give him a good chance of a second term.

But a surge in revolutionary Islam — heralding a trend that would confuse future presidents — conspired to drive him from the White House.

The Iran Hostage Crisis: In October 1979, the United States allowed the Shah of Iran, Reza Pahlavi, who had been overthrown by the Iranian Revolution a few months earlier, to enter the country for medical treatment. This enraged Islamic revolutionaries, who viewed him as an oppressive US puppet and wanted him sent back to Iran to stand trial.

On November 4, a year before the US election, students supporting the Islamic revolution occupied the US Embassy in Tehran and took 66 Americans hostage.

The 444-day standoff captivated the nation and dampened the national mood with each passing day as television news reports reported how long the hostages had been in custody. It gradually dashed Carter’s hopes of a second term.

His fate was also marred by a daring and ultimately disastrous rescue attempt in which a US special forces helicopter crashed in the desert, killing eight US soldiers.

At the same time, the Cold War was approaching a crucial point. After the Soviets invaded Afghanistan in December 1979, Carter decided to boycott the Summer Olympics in Moscow and asked the Senate to delay ratification of SALT II.

As November 1980 approached, a sense of Soviet belligerence and the ever-prolonging humiliation of the hostage crisis created the impression of a beleaguered U.S. power. Carter wrote in his memoirs that his fate was out of his hands as the election approached, but prayed that the hostages would be released.

“Now my political future could well be determined by irrational people on the other side of the world over whom I had no control,” he said.

“If the hostages were released, I think my election would be assured; If the expectations of the American people were to be disappointed again, I would have little chance of winning.”

Throughout the campaign, Reagan lambasted Carter as an ineffective leader who was plunging America into eternal decline.

“A recession is when your neighbor loses his job. Depression is when you lose your own. And recovery is when Jimmy Carter loses his,” Reagan interjected.

On Election Day 1980, the former actor and California governor achieved a landslide victory, winning 489 electoral votes. In the final humiliation for Carter, Iran released the hostages on January 20, 1981, 20 minutes after Reagan’s inauguration.