The United States presidential election of 1964 was largely decided on the issue of war, as incumbent President Lodge had gotten the US involved in the Korean War in 1961, largely seen as a proxy war with the Soviet Union. The War had already begun to be seen as unwinnable and unpopular, and fiery liberal Hubert Humphrey ran a platform of getting out of the war and finishing Kefauver's normalization of Soviet relations. William O. Douglas, meanwhile, carried Henry Wallace's flag into battle, arguing for extensive civil rights reforms, an end to all overseas entanglements, and universal health care. As in 1956, the incumbent Republican came in third place to the liberal alternatives, and Hubert Humphrey became the president.