"Solid South" with Obama as President

[allegro6]

What changes in History(after 1920) are necessary so that the South would still be a bulwark of the Democratic Party today, with Obama as President of the US as Democrat?

[Corbell Mark IV]

Keep the SOuth poor.

Analysis I read did a good job of showing the SOuth went Republican when it got richer. Tracking the voting of different social economic classes, there was no change in voting.

THe change was that the middle class and upper class grew dramatically.

So keep them poor.

[The Red]

Enough that would butterfly Obama being President, if existing at all.

[Mumby]

Really, you could say any African American as a Democratic President in this scenario. Not just Obama.

[d32123]

Any PoD before Obama's conception would butterfly away his existence.

[Killer300]

Originally Posted by d32123

Any PoD before Obama's conception would butterfly away his existence.

So if a marble dropped in another city that didn't in OTL seconds before Obama was born it would butterfly his birth?

Sorry, but I mean, butterflies are powerful, but not THAT powerful.

[Noravea]

Originally Posted by Killer300

So if a marble dropped in another city that didn't in OTL seconds before Obama was born it would butterfly his birth?

Sorry, but I mean, butterflies are powerful, but not THAT powerful.

Well, I once got beat up by a butterfly. They're quite dangerous, especially their ferocious wings.

[mowque]

Originally Posted by Killer300

So if a marble dropped in another city that didn't in OTL seconds before Obama was born it would butterfly his birth?.

I would say yes.

[Killer300]

Originally Posted by Noravea

Well, I once got beat up by a butterfly. They're quite dangerous, especially their ferocious wings.

Was it Mothera by any chance?

[d32123]

Originally Posted by Killer300

So if a marble dropped in another city that didn't in OTL seconds before Obama was born it would butterfly his birth?

Not before his birth, but before his conception, though I wouldn't doubt that a different Barack Obama would be born to the same parents in his place. Alternate Obama would have a slightly different genetic makeup and may or may not have the same OTL experiences and wind up as a politician.

[The Red]

Originally Posted by Killer300

So if a marble dropped in another city that didn't in OTL seconds before Obama was born it would butterfly his birth?

Sorry, but I mean, butterflies are powerful, but not THAT powerful.

He said conception not birth, as the odds of the same sperm reaching the egg are thousands if not millions to one, even a tiny change like that might have been enough to alter it.

[CaliBoy1990]

Originally Posted by Killer300

So if a marble dropped in another city that didn't in OTL seconds before Obama was born it would butterfly his birth?

Sorry, but I mean, butterflies are powerful, but not THAT powerful.

Yep, that IS true.

[Killer300]

Originally Posted by The Red

He said conception not birth, as the odds of the same sperm reaching the egg are thousands if not millions to one, even a tiny change like that might have been enough to alter it.

True. Okay, I see his point more now, although damn are butterflies terrifying things.

[CaliBoy1990]

Originally Posted by The Red

He said conception not birth, as the odds of the same sperm reaching the egg are thousands if not millions to one, even a tiny change like that might have been enough to alter it.

I think his point still stands, though.

A pen dropping in Moscow just before the conception of JFK, for example, wouldn't butterfly him at all, unless, perhaps, it fell from the top floor of an apartment building and killed the Tsar or some other important figure while they were in a parade or something.

[The Red]

Originally Posted by CaliBoy1990

I think his point still stands, though.

A pen dropping in Moscow just before the conception of JFK, for example, wouldn't butterfly him at all, unless, perhaps, it fell from the top floor of an apartment building and killed the Tsar or some other important figure while they were in a parade or something.

The Tsar being in Moscow and not Petrograd would imply some pretty big changes anyway.

[d32123]

Originally Posted by CaliBoy1990

I think his point still stands, though.

A pen dropping in Moscow just before the conception of JFK, for example, wouldn't butterfly him at all, unless, perhaps, it fell from the top floor of an apartment building and killed the Tsar or some other important figure while they were in a parade or something.

No, it will still change which sperm (if any) fertilize the egg.

[Corbell Mark IV]

Originally Posted by Corbell Mark IV

Keep the SOuth poor.

Analysis I read did a good job of showing the SOuth went Republican when it got richer. Tracking the voting of different social economic classes, there was no change in voting.

THe change was that the middle class and upper class grew dramatically.

So keep them poor.

Here's an article about that study I was talking about, which someone asked about.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/10/ma...ion2b.t-4.html

Everyone knows that race has long played a decisive role in Southern electoral politics. From the end of Reconstruction until the beginning of the civil rights era, the story goes, the national Democratic Party made room for segregationist members — and as a result dominated the South. But in the 50s and 60s, Democrats embraced the civil rights movement, costing them the white Southern vote. Meanwhile, the Republican Party successfully wooed disaffected white racists with a “Southern strategy” that championed “states’ rights.”
It’s an easy story to believe, but this year two political scientists called it into question. In their book “The End of Southern Exceptionalism,” Richard Johnston of the University of Pennsylvania and Byron Shafer of the University of Wisconsin argue that the shift in the South from Democratic to Republican was overwhelmingly a question not of race but of economic growth. In the postwar era, they note, the South transformed itself from a backward region to an engine of the national economy, giving rise to a sizable new wealthy suburban class. This class, not surprisingly, began to vote for the party that best represented its economic interests: the G.O.P. Working-class whites, however — and here’s the surprise — even those in areas with large black populations, stayed loyal to the Democrats. (This was true until the 90s, when the nation as a whole turned rightward in Congressional voting.)

So like I said, keep the South poor.

[Rich Rostrom]

Originally Posted by allegro6

What changes in History(after 1920) are necessary so that the South would still be a bulwark of the Democratic Party today, with Obama as President of the US as Democrat?

Hmm. A split in the Republican Party in the 1960s, with an ultra-conservative wing merging with the Dixiecrats? This would fail after a few years; that is, it would fail to control the South, and dwindle to a local crank force.

Meanwhile the remains of the GOP survive as a moderate, minority party elsewhere. Let's say that the Democrats become so notorious for corruption, they drive all the "reform" types to the Republicans.

But the Reform Republicans can never win, because they have no base in the South. All Southern states are solid Democrat, with black voters and white "organization" Democrats far outnumbering the white supremacist remnant. (And in fact the "organization" Democrats still tacitly enforce a lot of the old social rules, thus keeping most of the whites on the farm.)

[XNM]

As d said, this is bound to butterfly Obama away.

I think the only way for this to work, would be to make the Dems more conservative. Then you could perhaps have a situation in the Deep South that's akin to West Virginia, at least.

[Bob the Great]

Originally Posted by d32123

No, it will still change which sperm (if any) fertilize the egg.

How would it do that?

I can't see how the pen falling could affect the position of any matter so many miles away.