The Butterfly Lies Heavy: A Timeline

[DSS]

Prologue


Update Soundtrack



From the Diaries of Jack McCain


January 4 2031


Today was an exciting day – I got a new job, working for Meg!

I was at work in the office at 11:30, and I was just about to leave for lunch when Meg called, asking if I wanted to have lunch with her in the Oval. I said yes. I drove to the White House, where I was graciously accepted by the WH staff and received by my sister in the Oval Office.

I guess I've always had a hard time accepting the fact that Meghan actually became President. I mean, I knew there was a possibility of this happening back in '28, while on the campaign trail. I knew it well before I stood on a stage at the Republican National Convention with my sister that year. But you always saw pictures of your President walking around, sitting down in, or doing whatever in the Oval Office. For me to see my sister occupying that office is very strange for me.

We had a nice joke going when I came in. “Mrs. President,” I said in a deep voice, “The Secretary of Defense has just informed me that the Reds have just invaded Manitoba. President Romney is requesting military aid from the United States, and he requests a nuclear strike on Havana. If you launch the nukes, you get impeached by the Democrats. If you don't, you get impeached by the Republicans and the conservative Democrats. What do you do?”

“Very funny, Jack,” she laughed. My sister – President Meghan McCain, as I sometimes refer to her – was sitting at that famous desk of hers, and she motioned for me to sit down on the other end. “The cooks are making lunch – grilled cheese, I know you like grilled cheese. Now Jack, we've got some business to settle.”

I sat down. “How's the job going? We haven't talked for years!”


“Jack, I think you've gotten the details of my job so far. I think your source is called the media, correct?”

“Too correct, I'm afraid,” I said.

“So how goes the work at the bar? It was nice of you to apply for a job as a lawyer here in D.C., by the way,” she added.

“Pretty well – very successful, actually. I just convicted a murderer on twelve counts, got him sent to prison for life.”

“I know.” She winked.

That's when I realized something. Something very important.

She wasn't having me over for lunch for no reason. No, not this time.

She was going to offer me a job. It made so much sense. Meg always has serious conversations with people over lunch. It's her way of doing things in her office. Of course I've been to lunch with her before, but the circumstances were different here. She just hinted that she knew my record as a lawyer very well.

And then I realized another thing. The Attorney General had said last year that he was going to resign this month. Meg was looking for a replacement. She needed someone who had experience as a lawyer, someone who knew politics and the law, and someone who she really trusted. Like her brother.

Just then, she made the offer. “Jack, I would like to give you the opportunity to work as my...”

“I'll accept!” I said eagerly. I felt very warm on the inside. Dad had been so proud of Meg when she was elected President. And now, his son was about to become the next Attorney General of the United States.

She grinned. “Jack, you thought I was offering you Attorney General?” She asked slyly.

She knew me too well, and I knew what was coming.

“I'm afraid it's not that,” she continued. “Don't get me wrong, Jack; you would be good for the job. However, I've got a better job for you. You're better for this job, because you know politics so well.”

Her grin grew wider. “Jack, how would you like to run my re-election campaign for next year?”

She was right. I wanted this more – I had always wanted to manage a political campaign. I had come close when Meg decided to run back in '28, but a “more experienced” applicant was accepted (though I think it was really because Meg had a grudge against me back then). But her '28 manager had died last year – two days apart from Dad – and now she needed a new one.

“I would love to,” I told her. I changed my future.

She grinned. “Wonderful,” she said. “It'll make for some good family time between us, don't you think?”

I laughed. “Yes.”

We finished lunch, and then she motioned for me to sit down on the Oval Office sofa (which I have always found very comfortable, and I'm always dying to sit in it – and Meg knows that), to talk a bit more about the upcoming campaign.

“When do you want to announce?” I asked her.

“Very soon. I have no doubts that Palin will challenge me in the primaries, so I want to preempt her challenge. I want to make the statement powerful as well.”

“Understandably. And speaking of Governor Palin, have you already thought about the specifics of beating her in the primaries?”

“No doubt that she's built up a huge base over the past few years. In fact, I'm convinced she started earlier than this. She knows that it will be difficult for her to succeed, especially after her mother's campaign back in 2012. But even with it, I'm convinced she can't beat me. I may be below 50% in the approval rating polls, but hell, Turtledove was under 50% back in '03, and Gingrich didn't beat him.”

She sipped from a glass of water sitting on the sofa table. “Anyway, I'm convinced we can dynamite her out of the way. As soon as she makes a gaffe, we can go all out. And knowing Mrs. Palin, that will happen very soon.”

That's a funny thing I've always noticed about Meg. Ever since she was elected, she's developed a sort of political ruthlessness that has always reminded me of Huey Long. Back when Long was President, he was vicious in getting his legislation passed. Unfortunately, unlike Meg, he succeeded most of the time. Meg's had a tough time these last few years, but she's never lost her ruthlessness.

I agreed with her, and then I asked about what she thought of the Democrats.

“I'm a little worried about them,” she admitted. “They're unified behind Castro, no doubt about that. And so they should be – I would be very upset if the GOP didn't stand 100% behind Minority Leader Baskin. And Castro's a tough one. He's been both a moderate and a liberal at the same time, he's Hispanic, and he's a veteran of Texas politics. And I know Texas politicians. If you can survive Texan politics as a Democrat, and then do what Castro did with San Antonio back in the 2010s, you can survive anywhere. He'll be much tougher than Palin.”

“I'm sure there are ways to beat him,” I assured her. “We'll figure out something.”

We didn't talk much about the state parties that are all too likely to pop up next year. Normally, I would say the Kentucky Labor Party would run a candidate, but so far, that party has stood behind Castro very solidly. I even think Castro has a good shot at Kentucky. And of course, Meg was endorsed by Chafee's Rhode Island Moderate Party back in '28, and I'm certain they'll endorse her again next year. But the most worrying third party that will come up, undoubtedly, is a Conservative Party. There's no doubt they'll run a candidate. I'm just worried that Palin will have enough sense to accept their nomination or not. It'll be the end of her political career in the GOP if she does go third-party, but it will also be the end of Meg's, and we want to avoid that.

It's going to be difficult, but I'm convinced we can do it.

[Aero]

Love it! Eagerly awaiting the next update.

[DSS]

Woops! Forgot the soundtrack for the update, as promised. It's in now.

And thanks Aero!

[New Patomic]

Meghan McCain as President? Facing a potential primary challenge from a Palin? You've peeked my interest, DudeAlmighty.

Very nicely written.

[historybuff]

Sounds awesome!

[Cathcon1]

I think I've read other timelines where there's a Turtledove Presidency. Why?

Anyway, besides that, seems cool. I wonder what the other politicians of the future are, and if there are people outside of extablished poltiical families.

[CCA]

Yess excited to read more

[DSS]

Just to clarify, this timeline isn't set in the 2030s. In fact, the prologue takes place about 100 years after the POD.

The Pre-TL Discussion Thread for this TL is here. You can read about the POD in that thread.

[DSS]

Part #1: Before the POD


Update Soundtrack



Taken from the Introduction to The Transformation of America, by Robert McElvaine, 1984


… Although this book's detailing of the political and cultural transformation of America starts with the Democratic National Convention in 1932, it is needless to say that the actual roots of said transformation truly reach all the way back in history to the beginning of time. It was because of the beginning of the universe that civilization rose in Mesopotamia, and it was because of these first civilizations that other civilizations throughout the Mediterranean arose thousands of years before Jesus Christ; and it was because of these new civilizations that the Roman Empire was founded; and it was because of the Roman Empire that the world began to transform itself politically, culturally, and literally throughout a period of nearly two thousand years that led to the world's situation in 1932.

However, for the sake of length, we will not review the past two thousand years. Instead, we will only review the facts necessary to understand the global situation in 1932, and therefore, we travel back to the year 1914.

The history of the world was truly altered on June 28, 1914, when an anarchist by the name of Gavrilo Princip assassinated the Archduke of Yugoslavia and heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary, Franz Ferdinand, in Sarajevo. Ferdinand was a popular figure in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the nation was outraged when it was discovered that Princip was a Serb. Relations between the Austrians and the Serbians reached a boiling point immediately, and war was declared within the month. Germany under Kaiser Wilhelm aligned with the Austrians, while the British Empire and the French aligned with the Serbians.

And thus began the First World War on July 28, 1914. Although the war centered in Europe – notably the western section – war was waged worldwide. The Germans would invade France, where the British and the French fought to repel the Germans. War would be fought on the front lines in France for four years, until Austria and Germany were forced to surrender in November 1918.

World War I was the genesis of three types of warfare: Trench, biological, and air. Throughout France, the Allies dug trenches into French soil. In these trenches, soldiers both Allied and Central would wait for an offensive from their enemies, and when the attacks came, the trenches would protect these soldiers as they shot and murdered their opponents. Biological warfare saw its first appearance in this war when, as a counter to the protection of the trenches, gas with the capacity to kill and/or blind the enemy was released into opposing trenches. And air warfare was invented when the Germans first armed their aircraft (and notably, the aircraft had been invented only eleven years before the start of the First World War) with machine guns, with the intention of shooting and destroying Allied recon aircraft while in mid-flight. The Allies did the same, and by 1917, the sky over France constantly buzzed and rang with the sounds of swooping canvas, rattling machine guns, and both the victory cries and the screams of fiery and fearful pain.

World War I affected the world not just in a military sense, but also in a political sense. With Germany's defeat, the Allies held a conference at Versailles, where military and political limits and setbacks were placed upon the defeated nations. President Woodrow Wilson of the United States established a League of Nations which, although a failed organization by its demise in 1946, was a forerunner to the United Nations which exists to this day. And in the largest political ramification of the war, Russia under the Tsar (which joined the Allied cause in 1914) underwent a Bolshevik Communist revolution in 1917. Tsar Nicholas II was overthrown and exiled, and was succeeded by the lead revolutionary, a figurehead of the Socialist/Communist movement, Vladimir Lenin.

The Communist revolution in Russia was the first in a series of Communist uprisings and revolutions worldwide. In nearly every nation, including powerful nations such as Great Britain and the United States, Communist parties were formed by the supporters of the socio-political theorist Karl Marx. Although most nations recognized the new Communist government in Moscow, the United States under President Woodrow Wilson, President Warren Harding, and President Calvin Coolidge throughout the 1920s refused, instead claiming the Tsar still held authority over the Russian state.

Although the economy was mainly prosperous in the early- to mid-1920s, the global economy crashed in October 1929. Although the economic ramifications extended worldwide, the period known as the Great Depression is most notable in the United States. President Herbert Hoover, a moderate Republican who had taken office as the nation's 31st President only seven months earlier, struggled to find a solution to the economy's woes. To his own woe, however, President Hoover discovered that he could not possibly “fix” the economy before the end of his first presidential term in 1933, or even before the likely end of his presidency in 1937. Although President Hoover was hardly at fault for the crash, nearly every citizen in the United States personally blamed the state of the economy on the Hoover Administration. In the 1930 congressional elections, the Democratic Party under Representative John Nance Garner of Texas and Senator Joseph Robinson of Arkansas won a landslide after running in opposition to the Hoover Administration. President Hoover's approval ratings dropped dramatically, and it was widely assumed by everyone that Hoover would not be re-elected to the presidency in 1932.

Although President Hoover announced that he would run for re-election in 1932, Wisconsin Senator John Blaine arose to challenge Hoover for his own party's nomination, an action rarely seen in American politics before 1932, and a plethora of Democrats announced their candidacy. They included the cousin of Theodore Roosevelt and the two-term Governor of New York, Franklin D. Roosevelt; the Speaker of the House, John Nance Garner; the Governor of Maryland, Albert Ritchie; and the infamous Democratic nominee in 1928, former New York Governor Al Smith.

And so it was that the Democrats went into their national convention in Chicago in June 1932 to nominate a candidate for President, less than two weeks after the Republicans held their convention and renominated President Hoover despite Senator Blaine's challenge. While the party leaders treated the convention the same way they did their previous conventions, every member of the Democratic Party knew that this convention was no ordinary convention. In all likelihood, the Democrats could nominate anyone they chose, and their nominee would defeat President Hoover in the November election. “I believe we could have run Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck in '32, and we would have won,” remarked John Nance Garner in 1937. However, the nomination was much more serious than a cartoon. The nominee they selected would propose the policies his administration and the nation would adapt, and the party would be forced to endorse those policies come the next election in 1936. Simply put, the Democratic nomination was a metaphor for the path of the Democratic Party: If a conservative such as Speaker Garner were nominated and elected, the party would remain to its roots in conservatism, and if a liberal such as Governor Roosevelt or Governor Ritchie were selected, the party would adapt a more liberal future.

And as history played out, the convention would become a battle of the ideologies …

[DSS]

Originally Posted by Cathcon1

I think I've read other timelines where there's a Turtledove Presidency. Why?

Anyway, besides that, seems cool. I wonder what the other politicians of the future are, and if there are people outside of extablished poltiical families.

I haven't seen any TL with a POTUS Turtledove, besides my own previous attempt at one entitled "The Man With the Iron Heart."

[historybuff]

Hmmm, wonder who they're gonna nominate.

[Errnge]

nice backstory. waiting for the POD

[Unknown]

How long will this timeline be?

Good work so far.

[Cathcon1]

Originally Posted by President DudeAlmighty

I haven't seen any TL with a POTUS Turtledove, besides my own previous attempt at one entitled "The Man With the Iron Heart."

I may be mistaken, but I think I remember a TL titled "The Game" that diverged in 1968 with Teddy running after Bobby's death or something like that. In either a flashforward or a prologue it has some future election where President Rubio or Palin goes down to Julian Castro or something, Jimmy MacMillan is former New York State AG, and they refer to a former President Turtledove. That's if I'm not mistaken.

[Shadowlord]

Awesome start! Interesting to see that you are merging your previous timeline ideas together into one with the references to Long and Turtledove. I really liked your other timelines, particularly the one with Huey Long. Looking forward to the next update!

[Plumber]

Originally Posted by Cathcon1

I may be mistaken, but I think I remember a TL titled "The Game" that diverged in 1968 with Teddy running after Bobby's death or something like that. In either a flashforward or a prologue it has some future election where President Rubio or Palin goes down to Julian Castro or something, Jimmy MacMillan is former New York State AG, and they refer to a former President Turtledove. That's if I'm not mistaken.

That's an rougher draft of this TL.

Subscribed

[DSS]

Originally Posted by Cathcon1

I may be mistaken, but I think I remember a TL titled "The Game" that diverged in 1968 with Teddy running after Bobby's death or something like that. In either a flashforward or a prologue it has some future election where President Rubio or Palin goes down to Julian Castro or something, Jimmy MacMillan is former New York State AG, and they refer to a former President Turtledove. That's if I'm not mistaken.

That was also mine.

[DSS]

Part #2: The Alternate Convention


Update Soundtrack





Taken from JPK: The Official Biography, Prof. Rush Limbaugh, 2008


… Joseph Kennedy's first trial in politics came at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in June 1932.

This trial came around the third ballot in which the delegates of the convention were attempting to nominate a presidential candidate. By the time of the third ballot, Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt of New York was struggling with the conservative Speaker of the House, John Nance Garner, and his predecessor in the governorship and the 1928 nominee, Al Smith.

It is little known that Kennedy endorsed in 1932 the same candidate he would later criticize: Governor Roosevelt. Earlier in the year, Kennedy had announced publicly that he would support Roosevelt for the nomination, and he openly campaigned for and donated to Roosevelt's presidential campaign. It is rumored by the former aides of Franklin Roosevelt that Kennedy endorsed the campaign in return for the chairmanship of the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Kennedy watched with anxiousness as the delegates and the candidates fought over the nomination. At the start of the convention, the conflict appeared to be between Roosevelt, a liberal New Dealer, and Garner, a Southern conservative Democrat, while Al Smith was played as minor candidate with a little chance at winning the nomination. Few seriously believed that Smith would win the nomination a second time. Garner stated shortly before the first ballot: “The same fellow who lost half the Solid South and his own home state four years ago can't win again.”

If this was what the Speaker truly believed, then he was certainly shocked when he first heard the results of the first ballot. Garner had placed third with only 90 delegates secure in his camp, with Smith leading Garner by 111 delegates for a total of 201. Smith was runner-up to Governor Roosevelt, who won a plurality – yet not a majority – of 666 delegates. Although Roosevelt held a clear advantage over Smith and Garner, his delegate count was too low to officially win the nomination. He was short 99 delegates.

Kennedy was overjoyed. Roosevelt almost had the nomination in the bag, he believed, and he would only have to wait one or two more ballots before the delegates come stampeding across the convention floor.

However, this was not to be. The second ballot proved that the Democrats still harbored some doubt over the Roosevelt campaign, as the Governor received only 677 delegates while the rest scattered between Smith, Garner, and other candidates such as Governor Albert Ritchie of Maryland, Governor George White of Ohio, and Senator James Reed. If this message of reluctance was not hit home on the second ballot, it was on the third, when Roosevelt won only five more delegates than before.

Kennedy was worried. Smith was holding down his support, and Roosevelt was barely gaining on every delegate count. Said Kennedy: “This reminds me of 1924, when it took 103 ballots to nominate a candidate. And in 1924, the Democrats lost in a landslide. I don't want 1932 to be 1924.”

And so, for the first time in his political career, Kennedy decided to intervene in politics on his own behalf. On the night of June 30, 1932, Roosevelt called the famed conservative journalist with the main source of public support for John Garner, William Randolph Hearst. What Kennedy told Hearst was the first example – and indeed, the first instance – of the famed political maneuvering and ruthlessness which the Kennedy family became so notable for. Kennedy attempted to convince Hearst that, if the convention continued its deadlock between Roosevelt and Garner, Smith would eventually win victory as a compromise candidate. The attempt at persuasion was ruthless because Kennedy did not personally believe “that Smith could possibly achieve victory … the idea is beyond me,” as Kennedy wrote in a journal. Indeed, the conversation was merely a false argument by Kennedy to convince Hearst that Garner could not win, and that it would be best for Hearst to convince Garner to endorse Roosevelt and negotiate for some political achievement outside the presidency, “such as the vice presidency.”

Kennedys seemingly never fail in politics, with the exception of a few members of the family, but in this event, the patriarch of the Kennedys did indeed fail. The conversation “backfired … we only argued politics after a few harsh words, and I think Hearst left the telephone more determined to win for Garner than before.” [1]

Despite its failure, Kennedy's first political action was a success. On the fourth ballot, Governor Roosevelt won a total of 688 delegates, while Smith gained 12 more than before. Garner's total declined. Now, with the fourth ballot concluded and still a long road ahead to the nomination, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, James Farley, realized that Roosevelt would indeed the nomination (as he had hoped, for Farley was a Roosevelt supporter). He also realized that, at the current speed, the Democrats would be balloting for at least thirty ballots before Roosevelt would officially clinch the nomination. Like Kennedy, Farley worried “that … the 1932 convention will follow the same path as the infamous 1924 convention.” With this new dawn of reality, Farley called up several key delegates to convince them to turn in favor of Roosevelt and nominate him “as quickly as possible.” The most notable delegate to switch allegiances through Farley's convincing was the chair of the California delegation, William Gibbs McAdoo, who was in support of Garner previously.

On the fifth ballot, Governor Roosevelt won the nomination by a slim margin of 17 delegates, with California voting for Roosevelt and other key delegations following suit. Roosevelt then broke with tradition to accept the Democratic presidential nomination on the spot, famously announcing “a new deal for the American people” and announcing that Senator Alben Barkley of Kentucky would be his running mate[2] …






[1] The POD!
[2] A very important aspect of the story.

[Errnge]

ever so subtle....

[historybuff]

What kind of guy was Reed?