Alternate Electoral Maps II

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MoralisticCommunist

Banned
The Seventh Party System: Part XXXXV
Map of the United States
Part I - Metropotamia
Part II - Alta California
Part III - North Carolina
Part IV - New Jersey
Part V - Adams
Part VI - Alabama
Part VII - Rhode Island
Part VIII - Sequoyah
Part IX - Assenisipia
Part X - East Florida
Part XI - Tennessee
Part XII - Kansas
Part XIII - Dakota
Part XIV - Arizona
Part XV - Delaware
Part XVI - Oregon
Part XVII - Ozark
Part XVIII - New Hampshire
Part XIX - Western Connecticut
Part XX - New York
Part XXI - Santo Domingo
Part XXII - South Carolina
Part XXIII - Baja California
Part XXIV - Chersonesus
Part XXV - Canal Zone Territory
Part XXVI - West Florida
Part XXVII - Missouri
Part XXVIII - Colorado
Part XXIX - Trinidad and Tobago
Part XXX - Pennsylvania
Part XXXI - Wisconsin
Part XXXII - Lincoln
Part XXXIII - Deseret
Part XXXIV - Platte
Part XXXV - Kiribati
Part XXXVI - New Mexico
Part XXXVII - Maine
Part XXXVIII - Alaska
Part XXXIX - Hamilton
Part XXXX - Mississippi
Part XXXXI - North Virginia
Part XXXXII - Bioko
Part XXXXIII - Hawaii
Part XXXXIV - Louisiana

Seward is America's northern most territory, having been split off from the more populated south in order to ward off any socialist control of the Prudhoe Bay oil fields. However, even despite the territories distance from Anchorage socialism still holds a large amount of sway due to the radicalized Inuit constituency.

For decades the Inuit people of Seward had long been ignored and forgotten by the rest of America, who saw no qualms displacing them from their land in order to build new pipelines. This oppression created large scale resentment, leading to massive Inuit strike of 1973, which was not only in solidarity with the other general strikes that rocked the nation following the Conservative Revolution but also demanded government protections of native lands which were continuing to be ruined by oil companies. Stretched far too thinly by strikes rocking the nation Nixon decided against sending the army all the way up to Seward and instead offered the Inuit people a 5% cut out of all oil revenue generated from Seward. And the same time, however, to ensure that the Inuits could never halt oil production again Nixon also ordered all Inuit oil workers to be fired and replaced instead with workers from others states such as Alaska, which would be more likely to be loyal to the federal government.

The large number of out of state workers which began to spend most of their time in Seward lead to demands of representation in the Seward government. The workers also demanded an equal footing with the native Inuits and would not stand for simply being given a few representatives in the council. Thus, Seward territorial government took the unprecedented step of dissolving their own House, leaving only the Council as the sole legislative body in Alaska. As a compromise to the native residents of Seward the migrant workers were only given a representative for every 1000 workers while the people of Seward were given a representative for every 500 citizens.

While Seward's population is today more than 70% Native American the National Union remains the largest party by winning over those natives who still demand heavily on the oil industry for their jobs, performing various logistical and supportive tasks. The majority of natives, however, still vote with for their ethnic representatives, be they Inuit or Athabaskan. In this year's election with global oil prices on the downturn and more nonessential jobs being cut Inuit Ataqatigiit saw a sizable upsurge in their voteshare, knocking the NU down to 41 seats. But with the "Non-partisan" member of the council always voting in the interests of the National Union party their majority continued to rock solid, as it has been for the entire history of the territory.

Government:
National Union - The party of big government, big military, and American imperialism they have held control of Seward's legislature ever since the territory was granted autonomy in 1963. Viewing the Prudhoe Bay oil fields as an issue of national security they are extremely protective of the oil reserves and make sure that its production is always subsidized by as much federal money as possible. The majority of its voter base is also non-white, with natives, then whites, then asians making up the big three ethnic groups upon which it depends. And it also has a majority among the out of state workers, due to many of those positions being given to friends of the US military who are already naturally inclined to be favorable to the NU's policies.

Opposition:
Inuit Ataqatigiit - The Inuit party of Seward, they hold a democratic socialist position while also advocating for greater autonomy in the territory. In particular they want to make Seward a monolingual territory where all government documents would have to be made in Inuit. This move has still been heavy resisted by the National Union party which still favors Seward's bilingual status and does not want to get rid of English, despite the fact that a majority of the territory already speaks Inuit as their first language. Nevertheless, the party also benefits greater from the oil industry, with the 5% of oil revenue going towards fully funding the lifestyles of many natives, allowing them to live in comparable luxury and dedicate their time to creating artwork and writing books in the Inuit language.
Denaakke Ggenaa - With their party name literally translating into "Friends of the People with a Common Language", the party's main goal politically is to establish Athabascan as a third official language in the territory of Seward. Unfortunately, due the group's small population size their pleas are often ignored and even the Inuits remain hostile to the idea of adding another official language when they want to simply remove one. The party also holds deep social conservative values, reflective of the Athabascan's devotion to the Orthodox Church, and continue to campaign against the right of gays to get civil unions as well as the right of women to get an abortion.
United Left - America's catch all party for the far left, their voter base in the territory of Seward consists solely of migrant workers who hold socialist and communist viewpoints. With a majority of migrant workers being sourced from the closest state, Alaska, a large number of those Alaskan workers hold socialist values which remain dominant in that state. As such, they often side with the IA on most issues, except for the language issue wherein they often side with the DG in favor of expanding inclusivity, not restricting it.

seward_by_moralisticcommunist-dce0g6u.png
 

Pericles

Gave McCain all the states Obama won by 9% or less. This was, not the result I expected.
2008 US presidential election
genusmap.php

Barack Obama/Joe Biden-Democratic: 269 EVs 48.36%
John McCain/Sarah Palin-Republican: 269 EVs 50.10%​
 
Tex Arkana

Tex Arkana

Just a remake of an old map I made for Jimmy Carter landsliding Jerry Ford in 1976, except I tried to use Atlas colors rather than the Red-GOP, Blue-Dem scheme. It doesn't look as visually appealing as an actual Atlas map but since I'm terrible at using MS Paint it'll have to do.

UvCOhvC.png
 
Zachary VIII

Zachary VIII

Banned
Tex Arkana said:
Just a remake of an old map I made for Jimmy Carter landsliding Jerry Ford in 1976, except I tried to use Atlas colors rather than the Red-GOP, Blue-Dem scheme. It doesn't look as visually appealing as an actual Atlas map but since I'm terrible at using MS Paint it'll have to do.

UvCOhvC.png
Click to expand...
My guess for the State map.
ice_screenshot_20180610-161359.png
 
TimTurner

TimTurner

2013 election:
https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...ectoral-maps-ii.417468/page-261#post-17119431

2016 election:
https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...ectoral-maps-ii.417468/page-260#post-17094848

After the Unity-PD coalition was booted by voters in 2016, the damage done to the cohesion of the current party system was made clear. Both parties were mired in internal tensions, after Solidarity smoked them at the ballot box. Kasich hoped to remain as leader, but within weeks, he was thrown out by the caucus, who elected Bloomberg as interim leader in his stead. Acrimony between the two followed all the way till a leadership election one year later, which was the one thing both camps were in agreement on (they wanted to see which faction could outlast the other, hence they opted for a long campaigning period). Bloomberg defeated him by 11 points, and a dispirited and angry Kasich retired from politics. As an olive branch, Peters was kept as Deputy Leader. Bloomberg put his own stamp on the party almost immediately, going so far that he began alienating Kasich loyalists, like Elise Stefanik, MP for the Northcountry constituency in Upstate New York, and a rising star in the party. Bloomberg, ultimately, proved unable to unite a party that was split and divided over the legacy of its most recent Prime Minister.

In April 2019, he called a new leadership election, telling his opponents to "put up or shut up". He added that "it is impossible for us to present ourselves as an alternative government if we spend all our time fighting among ourselves". Stefanik decided to run, after conferring with fellow Kasich loyalists; she said the party needed a "good-faith discussion about the party's future". In a shocking result, Bloomberg fell to Stefanik, losing by 2 points at the party convention in May 3. As one delegate said, "Bloomberg as leader means the party is stuck in factional infighting. With Stefanik we can at least put the past behind us". Stefanik was just 34 years at the time, soon to be 35 (she had been first elected in 2010 at age 26 in a by-election triggered by the resignation of her father Ken Stefanik). It was assumed she would be a figurehead leader of sorts, and be consensus-oriented; and that this approach would allow Unity back into power. But events conspired against Unity, which, ironically given its name, had spent all of the time since the most recent election doing infighting.

The internal situation in the Progressive Democrats was even worse. After years as serving as leader of Progressive Democrats, Bernie Sanders retired as leader in October 2017. He said that "my heart is sick and sad of our record in the coalition government. We may have liberalized abortion laws and accomplished most of what we have wanted, at least for our folks on the Left factions, but austerity made that potentially not worth it all. Freedom is great, but I don't think austerity generally makes people more free - it's actually illiberal".

Sanders' decision widened an open wound in the PD party. The left factions were generally unhappy with the posture the party at large had taken in regards to forming a coalition with Unity should it ever play the role of kingmaker. Right factions, many of which were very friendly with Unity (especially the libertarian wing, headed by Deputy Leader Peter Thiel), opposed any wavering on this, while the Left factions wanted the party to toe an independent line, not wanting to usher in another austerity government. Sanders' decision to resign also created another thorny question - who gets to be leader? For the right, which tolerated Left faction leaders on grounds that it won the party votes, there was no one of the caliber and skills of Sanders (who was so popular and visible that he made it hard for any Left faction leader to reach such a standard), so the utility of a Left faction leader vanished overnight.

The libertarian wing, which was a majority of the Right faction, which in turn was a majority of the party at large, knew Thiel being leader would magnify their influence. Once Thiel being acting Leader, they acted in such a matter as to ensure that he would remain leader, at all costs. They provoked the Left into turning it into a factional battle - left vs right. Once the leadership election came around in May 2018, Thiel defeated the consensus Left candidate, Madison MP Russ Feingold, by 60%-40%. At the annual party convention in San Francisco, the party platform was also moved to reflect the Right's priorities - most insultingly, this included a scrapping of the party's longtime plank in favor of free college, which was dumped in favor of means-tested aid for low-income students. Also, the Deputy Leader was now Kathleen Rice MP, who served the Nassau South constituencies. She was another PD Right stalwart. The Left was now completely excluded.

The Left factions, angered by Thiel's decisions, began to see themselves as more and more divorced from the Right. Prime Minister Allison Lundergan Grimes, who was not blind to these developments, took advantage, and in July 2018, began pushing a free college bill with the support of some on the PD Left. The bill split the PD party down the middle, with most of the Right worried that it would cost too much money, some on the Right supporting it for pragmatic reasons, and the Left pretty much uniformly in favor. Grimes did not bother to whip Solidarity MPs to vote in favor of the bill at any point in the process, knowing there was a very large majority in her caucus for any bill she put forward, and that Unity and Center also had factions in favor of it. The final version of the bill received Royal Assent in October 15, 2018.

There was also news around the same time that the Right was planning secretly funded primary challenges to prominent Left MPs, in order to crush all opposition to Thiel being leader. Thiel at first claimed that Sanders was a "liar" for accusing him of involvement and called the Left faction politicians criticizing him "backstabbing scum". But he reversed course when documents and emails were uncovered proving them right, and insisted he had done the right thing all along - just that he felt the need to deny it in the cause of good. This news infuriated the Left, with lots of mistrust between the two camps.

Grimes' government did a lot that the left factions came to like, not just a free college bill, and her efforts to splinter the PD party finally succeeded in December 2018, when Thiel put a three-line whip on a resolution put forth by the Grimes government that said that "the austerity of the Kasich years hurt the poor and downtrodden and it is good news that the incumbent government is reversing that". Faced with a three-line-whip on a mere resolution with no lawmaking force, 20 MPs from the Left faction, sick of Thiel, defected to Solidarity, Bernie Sanders among them. Just like that, the Left faction of PD was amputated - one half being a small minority in Solidarity unable to move where the SJ party stood on social issues (though nonetheless being guaranteed renomination in their constituencies), the other half an irrelevant rump within the PD party. Recriminations were issued in mutual fashion. Sanders said that "Thiel ruined the Progressive Democratic party we know and love, giving us no chance but to go onto the lifeboats to flee a sinking ship". Thiel accused Sanders of "setting Columbia back to the Stone Age by acting as an useful idiot for misogynist women haters".

All this took place under the backdrop of a popular government that was riding off an economic recovery. Allison Lundergan Grimes had good fortune to be in the power during a good economy. Thanks to Kasich, she was also able to continue paying off the debt, maintain surpluses, and invest in left-wing priorities all at once. This made her look responsible in the eyes of suburbanites, egalitarian in the eyes of workers, and fair in the eyes of most voters. She even was able to dabble in some minor tax cuts for well-off people.

Taking the opposition by surprise, she called a general election on July 1, 2019, hoping to catch the opposition off-guard. She capitalized on the opposition's woes by painting Stefanik and her party as "not ready" (many commentators noted that Grimes was just 32 when she became Prime Minister herself, but then, she had a united party and Stefanik didn't). Grimes had one thing in mind in particular - knee-cap Stefanik's career by bringing about her defeat in her own constituency. Stefanik was one of Unity's best debaters in Commons, was telegenic, photogenic, and good with the media, and had proved herself to be a capable, competent minister in the Unity-PD coalition government. These were all dangerous traits for an opposition leader to have. If Stefanik won her seat again she could entrench herself as leader and help win Unity back the government - if she lost her seat (one she had won by 18 points in 2016), she would likely have to resign as leader, allowing for Bloomberg to return to the leadership. Grimes was of the view Bloomberg's unpopularity among rural voters would make it hard for him to become Prime Minister.

Grimes also knew that a heavy defeat for Unity would likely only worsen the party's woes. Unity was the opposition party that had the most potential for challenging Solidarity, with its base in the populated suburbs of the country. The Unity-PD coalition together had great potential to defeat Solidarity, and it was a combination that won 57% of Commons seats in 2013. She had a chance to make history and win a majority - if she took it. It was this desire that had guided her actions since she returned to power.

The opposition, in any case, had little chance at stopping her. The PD vote had shifted; a big chunk of the Left vote had migrated to Solidarity. Polling showed 73% of self-identifying PD voters liked Peter Thiel more than they liked Bernie Sanders, compared to just 41% in 2013. Unity, realizing its fate if it did not patch up its feuds, tried to present itself as an alternative to the "socialist, ideological government that is called the current Solidarity-led government", but this held little water among even its base vote, many of which was pleasantly surprised at the fact the Solidarity government had run three straight surpluses and cut the top rate of tax in its most recent budget.

Center pandered to rural voters as usual. They assumed they were going to return to government.

The election only had one debate. This debate was a disaster for the opposition. Stefanik was unable to beat back claims on part of Grimes that Unity was incapable of functional government. Memorably, Grimes suggested at one point that Unity change its name to "disunity". Grimes also won points against Thiel, saying that "you are so arrogant and power-hungry that one-fifth of your MPs left". Center Party leader Al Lawson never disagreed one bit with Grimes - knowing full well that she was almost a Center party PM in all but name.

In the end, after the short four-week-long campaign, the final electoral results were a catastrophe for the opposition. The PD vote plummeted in New England, and Bernie Sanders was re-elected as MP for Vermont. Solidarity won 14 of 21 seats in New England in all. In New York, Elise Stefanik went down in defeat, losing 40%-37% to Solidarity candidate Addie Jenne. But Kathleen Rice was defeated by Unity candidate Melissa Miller, who won on a split vote. Another lost opposition seat was the Trenton constituency, where Unity candidate, incumbent Unity MP Donna Simon, lost to Solidarity candidate Reed Gusciora. The Northeast voted for Solidarity by 39%-32% margin, with Unity becoming second. But this translated into a 49-25 seat advantage, because the opposition vote was split, and this cost Unity seats. PD Left voters swung to Solidarity; PD right voters stayed with the PD party, by and large; and Unity kept its base vote. This meant that the left was relatively united, while the right and center was split in two. This is what cost Stefanik and other Unity party figures their seats.

The South, being Grimes' home region, saw Center take some surprising losses, especially in open seats. A case in point was the Columbus and Albany seat, held by the retiring Sanford Bishop, which was lost to Solidarity candidate Sarah Carter, whose brother Jason was incumbent MP for the Augusta constituency. Solidarity made massive gains in Florida, on back of Grimes being seen as a reasonable socialist; Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, wildly popular among voters in her seat and an incumbent for 30 years, was the only one of Unity's Miami-Dade MPs to survive the Solidarity surge, and even then she won only by 15 votes, and was one of only 6 Unity MPs in all of Florida. Charlie Crist, MP for Saint Petersburg seat, survived on back of similar factors, and only prevailed by 1,256 votes. PD losses were even worse - it fell from 4 Florida MPs to only 1. There was no PD MPs whatsoever in Maryland, West Virginia, the entire Deep South, Tennessee, Arkansas, and Oklahoma. Solidarity won over 40% of the total Southern vote, and 109 seats in the region, picking off seats from all parties. No other competitor won even 24% of the vote, or even half as many seats.

The Midwest, core Solidarity heartland, turned even more red than usual. Solidarity won more votes than their closest opponent in every Midwestern state, and took 45% of the vote and 68% of the seats. Des Moines MP David Young lost to Solidarity candidate Preston Daniels, a former mayor of Des Moines. Only 3 Progressive Democratic MPs were returned to office in the region under a PD label; all the defectors were re-elected, including Russ Feingold. Candice Miller, MP for Macomb North and Huron, lost to Solidarity candidate Daniel Miller (no relation). Micheal Pence lost his Indiana constituency to Solidarity candidate Daniel "Big Dan" Manus. All in all, it was a very impressive performance.

The West, traditionally one of the weakest regions for Solidarity, swung dramatically in favor of the party, and the PDs did poorly. However, while they failed to break double digits in the Midwest and South, and got 15% in the NE, they still received 24% in the West. It was here that the libertarian right faction of PD was strongest. However, this meant that the PD vote held up the best there, resulting in an especially split opposition vote. This was seen in New Mexico; Solidarity took 86% of the seats (6/7) on only 41% of the vote. The holy grail, though, was in California, where "responsible socialism" won 27 of 56 seats in the Golden State. Scott Peters was among the big names who went down. Solidarity won the most votes and in some cases the most seats in almost every southern California county, on route to a landslide majority win. It was losses here which sent Unity into third place in seat count.

The results were the culmination of opposition divisions which were aggravated by Grimes' political maneuvering. By now, she had spent five and a half years as prime minister, and having pulled off something few of her political opponents (or, for that matter, the media) thought possible, she had undisputed control over her party, and over parliament. She became the First Solidarity leader to win a majority since Bob Casey in 1992, and won a majority larger than Kasich's Unity-PD coalition had done in 2013. Only God knew how long her one-party majority would last.

One side-effect of SJ's gains in the suburbs was that all opposition parties were reduced to double-digits in seat count, and Unity lost its status as Loyal Opposition to Center. On paper, Center was quite displeased with this; after all, they were going from government to opposition. But in practice, Center and Solidarity were quite close, Center was hardly an opposition at all, and Grimes had reversed a large amount of Kasich's austerity both because of Center's insistence and on her own initiative. Unity and the rump of PD was now to spend time in political wilderness.

Columbian general election 2019.PNG
 
Last edited:

MoralisticCommunist

Banned
ST15RM said:
@MoralisticCommunist how do you make these maps?? do you make the basemaps yourself or edit ones that already exist? How do you determine the number of reps per district? I have a lot of questions and I need answers.
Click to expand...

Well for some of the maps I use Chicxulub's county map of America as a basemap, as you can see credited in maps like my Louisiana one. However for maps such as Seward I use a variety of different base maps from Wikipedia, Google Maps, and other online sources, and then use the county or township populations to determine the number of representatives in each district. For instance, with this territory I decided to make some individual settlements their own districts, and so subtracted their populations from the boroughs they were in to get the population for the rural borough representatives.
 

Fed

So a little thing I've been working on, based on a TL I've been working on for a loong time but hadn't done anything about in a long time either.
jOk1031.png
 

Adam The Nerd

TimTurner said:
2013 election:
https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...ectoral-maps-ii.417468/page-261#post-17119431

2016 election:
https://www.alternatehistory.com/fo...ectoral-maps-ii.417468/page-260#post-17094848

After the Unity-PD coalition was booted by voters in 2016, the damage done to the cohesion of the current party system was made clear. Both parties were mired in internal tensions, after Solidarity smoked them at the ballot box. Kasich hoped to remain as leader, but within weeks, he was thrown out by the caucus, who elected Bloomberg as interim leader in his stead. Acrimony between the two followed all the way till a leadership election one year later, which was the one thing both camps were in agreement on (they wanted to see which faction could outlast the other, hence they opted for a long campaigning period). Bloomberg defeated him by 11 points, and a dispirited and angry Kasich retired from politics. As an olive branch, Peters was kept as Deputy Leader. Bloomberg put his own stamp on the party almost immediately, going so far that he began alienating Kasich loyalists, like Elise Stefanik, MP for the Northcountry constituency in Upstate New York, and a rising star in the party. Bloomberg, ultimately, proved unable to unite a party that was split and divided over the legacy of its most recent Prime Minister.

In April 2019, he called a new leadership election, telling his opponents to "put up or shut up". He added that "it is impossible for us to present ourselves as an alternative government if we spend all our time fighting among ourselves". Stefanik decided to run, after conferring with fellow Kasich loyalists; she said the party needed a "good-faith discussion about the party's future". In a shocking result, Bloomberg fell to Stefanik, losing by 2 points at the party convention in May 3. As one delegate said, "Bloomberg as leader means the party is stuck in factional infighting. With Stefanik we can at least put the past behind us". Stefanik was just 34 years at the time, soon to be 35 (she had been first elected in 2010 at age 26 in a by-election triggered by the resignation of her father Ken Stefanik). It was assumed she would be a figurehead leader of sorts, and be consensus-oriented; and that this approach would allow Unity back into power. But events conspired against Unity, which, ironically given its name, had spent all of the time since the most recent election doing infighting.

The internal situation in the Progressive Democrats was even worse. After years as serving as leader of Progressive Democrats, Bernie Sanders retired as leader in October 2017. He said that "my heart is sick and sad of our record in the coalition government. We may have liberalized abortion laws and accomplished most of what we have wanted, at least for our folks on the Left factions, but austerity made that potentially not worth it all. Freedom is great, but I don't think austerity generally makes people more free - it's actually illiberal".

Sanders' decision widened an open wound in the PD party. The left factions were generally unhappy with the posture the party at large had taken in regards to forming a coalition with Unity should it ever play the role of kingmaker. Right factions, many of which were very friendly with Unity (especially the libertarian wing, headed by Deputy Leader Peter Thiel), opposed any wavering on this, while the Left factions wanted the party to toe an independent line, not wanting to usher in another austerity government. Sanders' decision to resign also created another thorny question - who gets to be leader? For the right, which tolerated Left faction leaders on grounds that it won the party votes, there was no one of the caliber and skills of Sanders (who was so popular and visible that he made it hard for any Left faction leader to reach such a standard), so the utility of a Left faction leader vanished overnight.

The libertarian wing, which was a majority of the Right faction, which in turn was a majority of the party at large, knew Thiel being leader would magnify their influence. Once Thiel being acting Leader, they acted in such a matter as to ensure that he would remain leader, at all costs. They provoked the Left into turning it into a factional battle - left vs right. Once the leadership election came around in May 2018, Thiel defeated the consensus Left candidate, Madison MP Russ Feingold, by 60%-40%. At the annual party convention in San Francisco, the party platform was also moved to reflect the Right's priorities - most insultingly, this included a scrapping of the party's longtime plank in favor of free college, which was dumped in favor of means-tested aid for low-income students. Also, the Deputy Leader was now Kathleen Rice MP, who served the Nassau South constituencies. She was another PD Right stalwart. The Left was now completely excluded.

The Left factions, angered by Thiel's decisions, began to see themselves as more and more divorced from the Right. Prime Minister Allison Lundergan Grimes, who was not blind to these developments, took advantage, and in July 2018, began pushing a free college bill with the support of some on the PD Left. The bill split the PD party down the middle, with most of the Right worried that it would cost too much money, some on the Right supporting it for pragmatic reasons, and the Left pretty much uniformly in favor. Grimes did not bother to whip Solidarity MPs to vote in favor of the bill at any point in the process, knowing there was a very large majority in her caucus for any bill she put forward, and that Unity and Center also had factions in favor of it. The final version of the bill received Royal Assent in October 15, 2018.

There was also news around the same time that the Right was planning secretly funded primary challenges to prominent Left MPs, in order to crush all opposition to Thiel being leader. Thiel at first claimed that Sanders was a "liar" for accusing him of involvement and called the Left faction politicians criticizing him "backstabbing scum". But he reversed course when documents and emails were uncovered proving them right, and insisted he had done the right thing all along - just that he felt the need to deny it in the cause of good. This news infuriated the Left, with lots of mistrust between the two camps.

Grimes' government did a lot that the left factions came to like, not just a free college bill, and her efforts to splinter the PD party finally succeeded in December 2018, when Thiel put a three-line whip on a resolution put forth by the Grimes government that said that "the austerity of the Kasich years hurt the poor and downtrodden and it is good news that the incumbent government is reversing that". Faced with a three-line-whip on a mere resolution with no lawmaking force, 20 MPs from the Left faction, sick of Thiel, defected to Solidarity, Bernie Sanders among them. Just like that, the Left faction of PD was amputated - one half being a small minority in Solidarity unable to move where the SJ party stood on social issues (though nonetheless being guaranteed renomination in their constituencies), the other half an irrelevant rump within the PD party. Recriminations were issued in mutual fashion. Sanders said that "Thiel ruined the Progressive Democratic party we know and love, giving us no chance but to go onto the lifeboats to flee a sinking ship". Thiel accused Sanders of "setting Columbia back to the Stone Age by acting as an useful idiot for misogynist women haters".

All this took place under the backdrop of a popular government that was riding off an economic recovery. Allison Lundergan Grimes had good fortune to be in the power during a good economy. Thanks to Kasich, she was also able to continue paying off the debt, maintain surpluses, and invest in left-wing priorities all at once. This made her look responsible in the eyes of suburbanites, egalitarian in the eyes of workers, and fair in the eyes of most voters. She even was able to dabble in some minor tax cuts for well-off people.

Taking the opposition by surprise, she called a general election on July 1, 2019, hoping to catch the opposition off-guard. She capitalized on the opposition's woes by painting Stefanik and her party as "not ready" (many commentators noted that Grimes was just 32 when she became Prime Minister herself, but then, she had a united party and Stefanik didn't). Grimes had one thing in mind in particular - knee-cap Stefanik's career by bringing about her defeat in her own constituency. Stefanik was one of Unity's best debaters in Commons, was telegenic, photogenic, and good with the media, and had proved herself to be a capable, competent minister in the Unity-PD coalition government. These were all dangerous traits for an opposition leader to have. If Stefanik won her seat again she could entrench herself as leader and help win Unity back the government - if she lost her seat (one she had won by 18 points in 2016), she would likely have to resign as leader, allowing for Bloomberg to return to the leadership. Grimes was of the view Bloomberg's unpopularity among rural voters would make it hard for him to become Prime Minister.

Grimes also knew that a heavy defeat for Unity would likely only worsen the party's woes. Unity was the opposition party that had the most potential for challenging Solidarity, with its base in the populated suburbs of the country. The Unity-PD coalition together had great potential to defeat Solidarity, and it was a combination that won 57% of Commons seats in 2013. She had a chance to make history and win a majority - if she took it. It was this desire that had guided her actions since she returned to power.

The opposition, in any case, had little chance at stopping her. The PD vote had shifted; a big chunk of the Left vote had migrated to Solidarity. Polling showed 73% of self-identifying PD voters liked Peter Thiel more than they liked Bernie Sanders, compared to just 41% in 2013. Unity, realizing its fate if it did not patch up its feuds, tried to present itself as an alternative to the "socialist, ideological government that is called the current Solidarity-led government", but this held little water among even its base vote, many of which was pleasantly surprised at the fact the Solidarity government had run three straight surpluses and cut the top rate of tax in its most recent budget.

Center pandered to rural voters as usual. They assumed they were going to return to government.

The election only had one debate. This debate was a disaster for the opposition. Stefanik was unable to beat back claims on part of Grimes that Unity was incapable of functional government. Memorably, Grimes suggested at one point that Unity change its name to "disunity". Grimes also won points against Thiel, saying that "you are so arrogant and power-hungry that one-fifth of your MPs left". Center Party leader Al Lawson never disagreed one bit with Grimes - knowing full well that she was almost a Center party PM in all but name.

In the end, after the short four-week-long campaign, the final electoral results were a catastrophe for the opposition. The PD vote plummeted in New England, and Bernie Sanders was re-elected as MP for Vermont. Solidarity won 14 of 21 seats in New England in all. In New York, Elise Stefanik went down in defeat, losing 40%-37% to Solidarity candidate Addie Jenne. But Kathleen Rice was defeated by Unity candidate Melissa Miller, who won on a split vote. Another lost opposition seat was the Trenton constituency, where Unity candidate, incumbent Unity MP Donna Simon, lost to Solidarity candidate Reed Gusciora. The Northeast voted for Solidarity by 39%-32% margin, with Unity becoming second. But this translated into a 49-25 seat advantage, because the opposition vote was split, and this cost Unity seats. PD Left voters swung to Solidarity; PD right voters stayed with the PD party, by and large; and Unity kept its base vote. This meant that the left was relatively united, while the right and center was split in two. This is what cost Stefanik and other Unity party figures their seats.

The South, being Grimes' home region, saw Center take some surprising losses, especially in open seats. A case in point was the Columbus and Albany seat, held by the retiring Sanford Bishop, which was lost to Solidarity candidate Sarah Carter, whose brother Jason was incumbent MP for the Augusta constituency. Solidarity made massive gains in Florida, on back of Grimes being seen as a reasonable socialist; Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, wildly popular among voters in her seat and an incumbent for 30 years, was the only one of Unity's Miami-Dade MPs to survive the Solidarity surge, and even then she won only by 15 votes, and was one of only 6 Unity MPs in all of Florida. Charlie Crist, MP for Saint Petersburg seat, survived on back of similar factors, and only prevailed by 1,256 votes. PD losses were even worse - it fell from 4 Florida MPs to only 1. There was no PD MPs whatsoever in Maryland, West Virginia, the entire Deep South, Tennessee, Arkansas, and Oklahoma. Solidarity won over 40% of the total Southern vote, and 109 seats in the region, picking off seats from all parties. No other competitor won even 24% of the vote, or even half as many seats.

The Midwest, core Solidarity heartland, turned even more red than usual. Solidarity won more votes than their closest opponent in every Midwestern state, and took 45% of the vote and 68% of the seats. Des Moines MP David Young lost to Solidarity candidate Preston Daniels, a former mayor of Des Moines. Only 3 Progressive Democratic MPs were returned to office in the region under a PD label; all the defectors were re-elected, including Russ Feingold. Candice Miller, MP for Macomb North and Huron, lost to Solidarity candidate Daniel Miller (no relation). Micheal Pence lost his Indiana constituency to Solidarity candidate Daniel "Big Dan" Manus. All in all, it was a very impressive performance.

The West, traditionally one of the weakest regions for Solidarity, swung dramatically in favor of the party, and the PDs did poorly. However, while they failed to break double digits in the Midwest and South, and got 15% in the NE, they still received 24% in the West. It was here that the libertarian right faction of PD was strongest. However, this meant that the PD vote held up the best there, resulting in an especially split opposition vote. This was seen in New Mexico; Solidarity took 86% of the seats (6/7) on only 41% of the vote. The holy grail, though, was in California, where "responsible socialism" won 27 of 56 seats in the Golden State. Scott Peters was among the big names who went down. Solidarity won the most votes and in some cases the most seats in almost every southern California county, on route to a landslide majority win. It was losses here which sent Unity into third place in seat count.

The results were the culmination of opposition divisions which were aggravated by Grimes' political maneuvering. By now, she had spent five and a half years as prime minister, and having pulled off something few of her political opponents (or, for that matter, the media) thought possible, she had undisputed control over her party, and over parliament. She became the First Solidarity leader to win a majority since Bob Casey in 1992, and won a majority larger than Kasich's Unity-PD coalition had done in 2013. Only God knew how long her one-party majority would last.

One side-effect of SJ's gains in the suburbs was that all opposition parties were reduced to double-digits in seat count, and Unity lost its status as Loyal Opposition to Center. On paper, Center was quite displeased with this; after all, they were going from government to opposition. But in practice, Center and Solidarity were quite close, Center was hardly an opposition at all, and Grimes had reversed a large amount of Kasich's austerity both because of Center's insistence and on her own initiative. Unity and the rump of PD was now to spend time in political wilderness.

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How did you determine the number of constituencies for each state?

Also, that is impressive.
 
Tex Arkana

Tex Arkana

In 1960, John F. Kennedy faced an unexpected, and surprisingly strong, challenge from a formerly dead man... William Jennings Bryan decided to have his body frozen upon his death, and the technology became available in the late 1950's for him to be brought back to life. Bryan was initially a bit confused upon awaking from his once eternal slumber, but upon picking up a newspaper and reading about what he saw as a weak Democratic field, he decided to make a bold decision - he would run for the Presidency a fourth time. he announced his candidacy on November 3rd 1959 and soon became Senator John Fitzgerald Kennedy's main opponent for the nomination, forcing Texas Senator Lyndon B. Johnson and Minnesota Senator Hubert Humphrey to drop out early on in the primary season. eventually, after a bitterly close primary, Bryan managed to capture the Democratic nomination a fourth time, narrowly defeating JFK on the second ballot after neither candidate secured a majority of delegates. Bryan picked Hubert Humphrey to be his running mate, deciding to run on an unapologetically progressive yet very religious platform. on the GOP side, New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller narrowly defeated sitting Vice President Richard Nixon, and picked Texas Congressman George H.W Bush as his running mate in an effort to win back some of the South, despite polls widely predicting that Bryan would largely sweep the South. on election day Bryan scored a narrow victory over Rockefeller, winning 304 electoral votes to Rockefeller's 233 and winning the popular vote by a wider margin of 53-46 due to his strengths in rural areas.

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Adam The Nerd

Tex Arkana said:
In 1960, John F. Kennedy faced an unexpected, and surprisingly strong, challenge from a formerly dead man... William Jennings Bryan decided to have his body frozen upon his death, and the technology became available in the late 1950's for him to be brought back to life. Bryan was initially a bit confused upon awaking from his once eternal slumber, but upon picking up a newspaper and reading about what he saw as a weak Democratic field, he decided to make a bold decision - he would run for the Presidency a fourth time. he announced his candidacy on November 3rd 1959 and soon became Senator John Fitzgerald Kennedy's main opponent for the nomination, forcing Texas Senator Lyndon B. Johnson and Minnesota Senator Hubert Humphrey to drop out early on in the primary season. eventually, after a bitterly close primary, Bryan managed to capture the Democratic nomination a fourth time, narrowly defeating JFK on the second ballot after neither candidate secured a majority of delegates. Bryan picked Hubert Humphrey to be his running mate, deciding to run on an unapologetically progressive yet very religious platform. on the GOP side, New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller narrowly defeated sitting Vice President Richard Nixon, and picked Texas Congressman George H.W Bush as his running mate in an effort to win back some of the South, despite polls widely predicting that Bryan would largely sweep the South. on election day Bryan scored a narrow victory over Rockefeller, winning 304 electoral votes to Rockefeller's 233 and winning the popular vote by a wider margin of 53-46 due to his strengths in rural areas.

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Okay then
 

Fed

Nazi Space Spy said:
I really want to know more about this!
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Thanks! The PoD is back in the 1800s, so I haven't thought a lot about modern politics, but there's a few stuff I could link you to, or I could answer questions.

Charlie950 said:
I'm curious about a Sinn Fein contingency in Nova Scotia?
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The idea I had for Sinn Fein was Gaelic languages surviving much better in the Maritmes and Newfoundland, so that Cape Breton is more like Gwynedd and Canadian Scottish is still vibrant. An alternate Sinn Fein expands beyond Ireland and becomes a Celtic interests party (like the Irish Parliamentary Party) and becomes the foremost political movement in Cape Breton.
 
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