Interesting AH ideas that aren't commonly used
- Thread starter lerk
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- alternate history
So the US's obesity rate would be where the rest of the anglosphere is. Better than OTL.
Going by Butz's sense of humor, all you need is him being "witty" in an interview to get his job and thus angering Nixon enough to not do it.
Driftless
Donor
Old notions:
* Jennie Churchill returns to live in the US with her young son Winston.
* Erwin Rommel's family emigrates to the US in the 1890's
* Ernest Hemmingway remains in France and does not return to the US
* The Germans get cold feet in regard to Lenin crossing Germany in the sealed train and imprison him instead.
* Jennie Churchill returns to live in the US with her young son Winston.
* Erwin Rommel's family emigrates to the US in the 1890's
* Ernest Hemmingway remains in France and does not return to the US
* The Germans get cold feet in regard to Lenin crossing Germany in the sealed train and imprison him instead.
claybaskit
Gone Fishin'
President Johnson picks macathy in 64.,Humphrey runs in 68 as a anti war candidate.
While that certainly would be an interesting read, McCarthy wasn't seriously considered by LBJ for VP. Johnson entertained the idea mostly because he liked McCarthy at the time, but it was pretty clear that Humphrey would be the pick from start to finish. But assuming that McCarthy is picked for VP through some sort of especially ego-stroking display of public loyalty, he most definitely would've been a pro-war figure throughout the Johnson Administration. Another question is the fact that Humphrey was a good team player, and I don't know if he would be willing to run against Johnson in 1968.
Driftless
Donor
P.G. Wodehouse manages to avoid being co-opted by his Nazi captors in 1940-41.
A - He avoids being a persona non grata in his homeland
B - His writing takes a different twist after the war (any number of ways for this to play out)
A - He avoids being a persona non grata in his homeland
B - His writing takes a different twist after the war (any number of ways for this to play out)
- FDR doesn't run for a third term. Would Henry Wallace run?
I'm confused as to what you're trying to say. Are you talking about Butz charming Nixon or Butz angering Nixon?
- Dukakis wins in 1988
- Gore gets the Democratic nomination in 1988
- Dole gets the Republican nomination in 1988
- Dole wins in 1996
- Gore gets the Democratic nomination in 1988
- Dole gets the Republican nomination in 1988
- Dole wins in 1996
Something to do with the Middle East. In my opinion, the West has had far too much exposure in the alt-hist genre. I think it's time for the Middle East to get the spotlight. It would also be topical, given today's obsession with happenings in the Middle East.
Butz saying some joke, perhaps the OTL one that got him fired to Nixon and Nixon being like "Yeah, can't hire you even if it's hilarious".
One I like that is underdone (and I think never had a completed timeline) is LBJ becoming president and JFK being his Secretary of State or VP.
- William Beveridge gets the job he wanted during the Second World War - in charge of war manpower - and is not fobbed off with the offer of writing a report on social services. The Beveridge Report is never written, Labour win a much smaller majority in '45, and British social policy takes a different course (perhaps with not the same emphasis on universalism).
- An Irgun letter bomb is successful in killing Ernie Bevin in 1946, or the bomb in the Colonial Office in 1947 successfully detonates.
- The Labour government of 1945-51 succeeds in creating a salaried general practice directly employed by NHS health centres.
- Keith Joseph never makes his controversial 'balance of human stock' comments in October 1974 and is therefore the right-wing standard bearer in the leadership election against Ted Heath in 1975.
- The Labour Cabinet of 1976 splits over IMF cuts, leading to a run on sterling, an earlier minority Conservative government under Thatcher, Tory landslide and austerity in repeat of 1931, and even more brutal Labour infighting in Opposition than in OTL.
- Blair loses the vote on tuition fees (that he won by just 5 votes in OTL) in 2004 and resigns as IIRC he said he would privately, Gordon Brown becomes Prime Minister three years earlier.
On the one hand, even accounting for military interference, the pre-Taisho 20th century PMs all enjoyed the support of the House, they just were not de jure responsible to it. What turned Japan militarist was the crisis of the Great Depression, which compounded on an already shaky economy during the early Showa era.
Maybe if you butterfly away the Showa Financial Crisis, democracy (if a limited one) might survive?
Mars Direct - a practical far less costly manned mission to Mars 'not involving every pet project in NASA' AKA the Space Exploration Initiative is conducted in the late 90s - one of the Grand projects that occurred during the 'Peace Dividend' 1991-2024 where few major wars took place and resulted in a 6 year manned base on Mars and paved the way for 4 semi co-operative extended missions in the late naughties by NASA, ESA, CHINA and a Russo-Indian mission.
The later attempts to force the Dardanelles in WW1 are persisted with after Commodore Keyes manages to form a more disciplined mine sweeping force and Amphibian aircraft from HMS Ark Royal find more of the mines laid OTL and this coupled with teh defending batteries almost out of ammunition and suffering from very low morale, allows the force of mostly obsolete Battleships to force the straights - Greek Soldiers occupy the Western end before the Ottomans can send additional forces but do not occupy Istanbul which is abandoned by the Ottomans after the battle between HMS Queen Elizabeth and the Yavuz Sultan Selim formally the SMS Goeben during the battle of the Sea of Marmara which results in the destruction of the Battlecruiser. This effectively brings down the ottoman government and the successor government accepts terms and leaves the CP as well as opens the straights for business (90% of Russian imports and exports used the straights).
The UK and France ignore US demands as well as calling the USSRs bluff and persist with the occupation of the Suez canal...
The later attempts to force the Dardanelles in WW1 are persisted with after Commodore Keyes manages to form a more disciplined mine sweeping force and Amphibian aircraft from HMS Ark Royal find more of the mines laid OTL and this coupled with teh defending batteries almost out of ammunition and suffering from very low morale, allows the force of mostly obsolete Battleships to force the straights - Greek Soldiers occupy the Western end before the Ottomans can send additional forces but do not occupy Istanbul which is abandoned by the Ottomans after the battle between HMS Queen Elizabeth and the Yavuz Sultan Selim formally the SMS Goeben during the battle of the Sea of Marmara which results in the destruction of the Battlecruiser. This effectively brings down the ottoman government and the successor government accepts terms and leaves the CP as well as opens the straights for business (90% of Russian imports and exports used the straights).
The UK and France ignore US demands as well as calling the USSRs bluff and persist with the occupation of the Suez canal...
While I like the idea, Wodehouse is already in his mid-fifties by 1940 and is increasingly living abroad because he isn't that happy with the direction of post-war (WW1) Britain. Because Wodehouse went on writing prolifically right up to his death at the age of ninety in 1975 we forget that he was already in late middle age in 1940 with 35 years as a writer under his belt. I think you would have to settle for avoiding him becoming persona non grata. I can't see a major stylistic shift. He read widely and didn't ignore social realism but as he said "There are two ways of writing a novel. One is mine, to write a kind of musical comedy without music. The other is to go deeply into life without giving a damn"
Driftless
Donor
You are probably right, though a harsher imprisonment (from lack of cooperation) may have put a dent in Wodehouse's irrepressibility. I'm not seeing that he turns into a bitter cynic or anything like that; but I think the experience might have shown through in a Wodehouse way. A twist on wartime misadventure, in the vein of "The Swoop" perhaps?
Bertie Wooster crossed with a benign Harry Flashman-esque fall-assbackwards-into-good-luck? Though its very hard to imagine a benign Harry Flashman....
Sadly you might have a Richard Hull or Eric Frank Russell situation where he stopped writing because he could no longer summon sufficient enthusiasm.