2018 Presidential Election

BBC.CO.UK/Politics
Sunday June 23rd 2019

Lamont's "Peoples Rally" launches Labour Leadership campaign

Former Chancellor Daniel Lamont launched his second bid for the leadership of the Labour Party with a outside rally yesterday.

He said he "had to run to keep Labour Socialist" and "that the party should all apologise for what it did in Government between 1996 and 2004 and 2007 and 2011, because we didn't hit the fat cats enough" adding "I didn't do enough as Chancellor, I saw close up as Chancellor that the banking system is corrupt and holds so much power, a Labour party under my leadership will change that".

Lamont is pitching his vote at the younger voters and the Trade unions. the Lamont Campaign believe that we reach the required 39 nominations from MP's by the noon deadline tomorrow.
 
Former Chancellor and MP for Hackney South & Shoreditch, Daniel Lamont
ynrnxlczut6qq4yptqw0.jpg

(Photo by Michael French-Original thread casting)
 
Seems to be working for Boris Johnson.
I mean Boris was actively trying to disable his government

There is no record in this thread or its predecessor as far as I recall of Lamont arguing the government he was in didn't do enough

Or is his last campaign come to that
 
OOC: And part 3/3 of filling out the Cabinet positions.

Secretary of Commerce
1981-1987: Malcolm Balridge Jr. (Reagan)
1987-1990: Carl Fischer (Newman)
1990-1991: Norman Feinstein (Newman)
1991-1995: Russell Nash (Lassiter)
1995-1999: Mary Whitford (Lassiter)
1999-2007: Mitch Bryce (Bartlet)
2007-2010: Bill Dyson (Santos)
2010-2011: Leslie Cryer (Santos)
2011-2019: Andrew Jenkinson (Walken)
2019-0000: Shannon Frost (Seaborn)

Bryce and the final three Commerce Secretaries were established. The rest (after Balridge, who is OTL) are new.

Carl Fischer had been a major fundraiser for Democratic candidates for the past two decades by the time he was rewarded with a Cabinet post under D. Wire Newman. He would resign in early 1990 to become finance chair of Newman's unsuccessful 1990 re-election campaign.

Norman Feinstein was a successful stock broker who Newman tapped to replace Fischer in 1990. He's most notable for beginning NAFTA negotiations with Mexico and Canada.

Russell Nash oversaw the final negotations of NAFTA (the North American Free Trade Agreement), which resulted in President Lassiter signing the deal in 1993. After leaving the Cabinet in 1995, he would be elected as chair of the Republican National Convention in 1997. Sadly, three weeks into his tenure, he would mysteriously disappear without a trace. After several investigations, he was declared dead in absentia in 2012.

Mary Whitford was financier and CEO who became the first female Commerce Secretary during Owen Lassiter's second term.

Bill Dyson was a career corporate executive who President Santos selected to be Commerce Secretary after he expressed interest in streamlining the then-upcoming 2010 Census. Dyson would only oversee the run-up to the Census, however, as a series of seizures led to him resigning for health reasons.

Secretary of Education
1981-1984: Terrel Bell (Reagan)
1984-1987: Gil Pataki (Reagan)
1987-1991: Christina Staker (Newman)
1991-1995: Marshall Holleman (Lassiter)
1995-1999: Kate Dudar (Lassiter)
1999-2007: Jim Kane (Bartlet)
2007-2011: Lawrence Lessig (Santos)
2011-2019: Howard Niering (Walken)
2019-0000: Valeria Quintero (Seaborn)

Kane through Quintero are the only ones established, so there are four new additions here.

Gil Pataki was Reagan's third choice to replace Terrel Bell as Secretary of Education after his first (Mel Bradford) was disqualified for his pro-Confederacy views and his second (William Bennett) was founded have a severe gambling addiction during his FBI background check. Pataki was a prototypical Reagan Democrat, who switched his party registration soon after taking over as Education Secretary.

Christina Staker was an academic who had written several well-received articles on the importance of early childhood education. Her push to extend public schooling to include pre-kindergarten was poorly received by congressional Republicans and some within the Newman administration.

Marshall Holleman had served as superintendent of San Diego public schools before being chosen as Owen Lassiter's first Education secretary. He was mostly known for referring to the National Education Association (the largest teacher's union) as a "terrorist organization" and comments noting his dislike for Title IX (which forbid discrimination based on sex from any school or program that received federal financial assistance).

Kate Dudar was the head of the Domestic Policy Council during Lassiter's first term, who was promoted to Secretary of Education for Lassiter's second term.

Secretary of Veterans Affairs

1989-1991: Bill Natarus (Newman)
1991-1995: M. Graden Hill (Lassiter)
1995-1997: Lester McNoughton (Lassiter)
1997-1999: Frank Heaton (Lassiter)
1999-2007: Jason Weaver (Bartlet)
2007-2011: Adam Adamle (Santos)
2011-2019: Elaine Seymour (Walken)
2019-0000: Kate Harper (Seaborn)

Considering that there is no Department of Homeland Security, this is the only Cabinet agency in TWWverse that has been led only by non-OTL people. The first half are all new, while the last half are all people listed in the show (Weaver) or thread (Adamle, Seymour, Harper).

D. Wire Newman selected former congressman Bill Natarus to be the inaugural Secretary of Veterans Affairs. Natarus had served with distinction in Europe during World War II before embarking on his political career that had ended when he opted to retire in 1986.

M. Graden Hill was a retired Marine colonel advocate for his fellow Vietnam veterans when he was selected as Owen Lassiter's first Veterans Affairs secretary. Hill's tenure at the Veterans Affairs was controversial: he expanded services offered to female veterans, homeless veterans and those veterans who had been exposed to chemicals during Vietnam or the Persian Gulf, while at the same time, pushing through restrictions about the treatment of HIV/AIDS in VA facilities due to his labeling it as a "gay disease" and the military adopting a ban on openly gay service members.

Like Hill, Lester McNoughton was also a Vietnam veteran, but his service had resulted in his own disability, after losing his legs after stepping on a land mine in Bien Hoa. His tenure is most notable for reversing Hill's ban on treatment for HIV/AIDS contracted during a veteran's service. He resigned halfway through Lassiter's second term after being diagnosed with jaw cancer.

Frank Heaton was the long-time deputy VA secretary who was promoted by Lassiter during his lame-duck period. Like his two immediate predecessors, he is a veteran of the Vietnam War.
 
BBC.CO.UK/Politics
Monday June 24th 2019

Five candidates will contest Labour Leadership

All five of the declared contenders for the Labour leadership received the required number of thirty nine nominations by MP's to contest the election.

Jack Coll, Oliver Kendrick, Daniel Lamont, Ruth Butler and Rachel Lilburn all made it through to the campaign which starts officially this Wednesday.

Nominations Received
  1. Jack Coll 64
  2. Oliver Kendrick 56
  3. Ruth Butler 47
  4. Daniel Lamont 41
  5. Rachel Lilburn 40
Eleven MP's didn't declare for any candidate. Two are believed to be current Leader Andrea Benn and Deputy Leader Bryan Atkinson.

It was a surprise that Rachel Lilburn made it onto the ballot with a nomination to spare. Daniel Lamont also did worse than expected making it by just two nominations. Jack Coll did slightly worse than many expected and Oliver Kendrick slightly better.
 
Last edited:
OOC: And here are the resulting lists of Cabinet secretaries for each administration since Reagan (note: does not include Cabinet-level positions like Chief of Staff, etc.)

President Ronald Reagan
Vice President George Bush (acted as president, 1985-1987)

Secretary of State
Alexander Haig (1981-1982)
Lewis D. Eisenhower (1982-1987)​
Secretary of the Treasury Don Regan
Secretary of Defense Maximilian Perlman
Attorney General William French Smith (1981-1985)
Edwin Meese (1985-1986)
Oliver Q. Tully (1986-1987)​
Secretary of the Interior James Watt (1981-1983)
William P. Clark (1983-1985)
Calvin Gjerde (1985-1987)​
Secretary of Agriculture John R. Block (1981-1986)
Bernard L. Knowles (1986-1987)​
Secretary of Commerce Malcolm Balridge Jr.
Secretary of Labor Raymond J. Donovan (1981-1985)
Bill Brock (1985-1986)
John M. Scott (1986-1987)​
Secretary of Health and Human Services Richard Schweiker (1981-1983)
Orrin Kimball (1983-1987)​
Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Samuel Pierce
Secretary of Transportation Drew Lewis (1981-1983)
Liz Bodine (1983-1987)​
Secretary of Energy James Edwards (1981-1982)
Paul G. Berman (1982-1987)​
Secretary of Education Terrel Bell (1981-1984)
Gil Pataki (1984-1987)​
President D. Wire Newman
Vice President Roland Pierce

Secretary of State
Mike Schafford (1987-1990)
Sidney Gregg (1990-1991)​
Secretary of the Treasury Gunther T. Schultz (1987-1989)
Edward Frye (1989-1991)​
Secretary of Defense Walter Keegan
Attorney General Wilson T. Gage (1987-1989)
Calvin Harvey (1989-1991)​
Secretary of the Interior James Mejia
Secretary of Agriculture Reggie Thornton
Secretary of Commerce Carl Fischer (1987-1990)
Norman Feinstein (1990-1991)​
Secretary of Labor Coraline Harper (1987-1989)
Martin Dale (1989-1991)​
Secretary of Health and Human Services Madeleine Singer
Secretary of Housing and Urban Development David Eastman
Secretary of Transportation Denise Byers
Secretary of Energy Everett Peterson
Secretary of Education Christina Staker
Secretary of Veterans Affairs Bill Natarus (1989-1991)
President Owen Lassiter
Vice President Lewis D. Eisenhower

Secretary of State
Carl Renkowski (1991-1997)
Rita Frederickson (1997-1999)​
Secretary of the Treasury Terrance Lockyear (1991-1992)
G. Winfield Scott (1992-1997)
Dick Rumson (1997-1999)​
Secretary of Defense Bobby Bodine (1991-1994)
Robert Kilner (1994-1999)​
Attorney General Oliver Q. Tully (1991-1996)
Albert W. Reynolds (1996)
Enrique Ricardo (1996-1999)​
Secretary of the Interior Robert Riosello
Secretary of Agriculture Gail Conner (1991-1995)
Lenny Parker (1995-1999)​
Secretary of Commerce Russell Nash (1991-1995)
Mary Whitford (1995-1999)​
Secretary of Labor Leo McGarry (1991-1996)
Shirley Temple Black (1996-1999)​
Secretary of Health and Human Services David Konrad
Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Alan Broderick (1991-1995)
Preston Gonzalez (1995-1999)​
Secretary of Transportation Drew Benton (1991-1995)
Sally Levin (1995-1999)​
Secretary of Energy Kenneth Steinbach (1991-1995)
Shirley Nash (1995-1999)​
Secretary of Education Marshall Holleman (1991-1995)
Kate Dudar (1995-1999)​
Secretary of Veterans Affairs M. Graden Hill (1991-1995)
Lester McNoughton​
President Josiah Bartlet (Glen Allen Walken acted as president, 2003)
Vice President John Hoynes (1999-2003)
Bob Russell (2003-2007)​

Secretary of State
Lewis Berryhill
Secretary of the Treasury Ken Kato (1999-2003)
Karen Browning (2003-2007)​
Secretary of Defense Miles Hutchinson
Attorney General Dan Larson (1999-2003)
Alan Fisk (2003-2007)​
Secretary of the Interior Bill Horton
Secretary of Commerce Mitch Bryce
Secretary of Labor Carl Reid (1999-2002)
Jack Buckland (2002-2007)​
Secretary of Health and Human Services Marcus Heath
Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Deborah O'Leary (1999-2001)
Bill Fisher (2001-2007)​
Secretary of Transportation Jill Keaton
Secretary of Energy Ben Zaharian (1999-2000)
Bill Trotter (2000-2004)
Gerald Deloit (2004-2007)​
Secretary of Education Jim Kane
Secretary of Veterans Affairs Jason Weaver
President Matthew Santos
Vice President Eric Baker (2007-2009)
Wendell Tripplehorn (2009-2011)​

Secretary of State
Arnold Vinick
Secretary of the Treasury Christopher Parker
Secretary of Defense Mike Franco
Attorney General Oliver Babish (2007-2009)
E. Bradford Shelton (2009-2011)​
Secretary of the Interior Tracy Clendon
Secretary of Agriculture Jonathan Bartlet
Secretary of Commerce Bill Dyson (2007-2010)
Leslie Cryer (2010-2011)​
Secretary of Labor Mike Jackson
Secretary of Health and Human Services Kate Espenson
Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ross Kassenbach
Secretary of Transportation Jill Keaton
Secretary of Energy Felix North
Secretary of Education Lawrence Lessig
Secretary of Veterans Affairs Adam Adamle
President Glen Allen Walken
Vice President Elizabeth Clark

Secretary of State
Arnold Vinick (2011-2013)
Tom Case (2013-2015)
Bradley Gilmore (2015-2019)​
Secretary of the Treasury Stephen Kendrick (2011-2015)
Mark Holzien (2015-2019)​
Secretary of Defense Robert Kilner (2011-2013)
Brian Cambridge (2013-2017)
Amanda Kirkpatrick (2017-2019)​
Attorney General Ellen Luevano
Secretary of the Interior Chris Carrick
Secretary of Agriculture Larry Shanks (2011-2015)
Peggy Wade (2015-2019)​
Secretary of Commerce Andrew Jenkinson
Secretary of Labor George "Hawk" Fuller (2011-2013)
Henry Shallick (2013-2014)
Michael Swain (2015-2019)​
Secretary of Health and Human Services Sarah Newbury
Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Peggy Wade (2011-2015)
Samuel Ellis (2015-2019)​
Secretary of Transportation Lila Martinez (2011-2017)
Michael Jack (2017-2019)​
Secretary of Energy Xavier Bertrand (2011-2012)
Alexis Howard (2012-2019)​
Secretary of Education Howard Niering
Secretary of Veterans Affairs Elaine Seymour
President Sam Seaborn
Vice President Jack Hunter

Secretary of State
August Adair
Secretary of the Treasury Meredith Payne
Secretary of Defense Jack Shannon
Attorney General George Montgomery
Secretary of the Interior Sean Boone
Secretary of Agriculture Karen Kroft
Secretary of Commerce Shannon Frost
Secretary of Labor Gael Cordova
Secretary of Health and Human Services Stan Hale
Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Mark Richardson
Secretary of Transportation Matt Skinner
Secretary of Energy Joan Tanner
Secretary of Education Valeria Quintero
Secretary of Veterans Affairs Kate Harper
 
BBC.CO.UK/Politics
Tuesday June 25th 2019

Labour Leadership Polls
You Gov Poll, 3,000 Labour Party Members
  1. Jack Coll 37%
  2. Daniel Lamont 28%
  3. Oliver Kendrick 20%
  4. Ruth Butler 11%
  5. Rachel Lilburn 4%
Guardian Poll, 5,000 Potential Labour Voters
  1. Oliver Kendrick 49%
  2. Jack Coll 26%
  3. Ruth Butler 14%
  4. Daniel Lamont 7%
  5. Rachel Lilburn 4%
 
OOC: Some infoboxes of some important events of the Bartlet presidency:

eLWeljI.png

  • Didn't really have to add much for the Rosslyn box. The only addition are the names of the two gunmen, who were unnamed in the show (Leroy was the lookout who was caught later).

    Their names are references to American History X (Edward Norton plays the main character Derek Vinyard, Ethan Suplee plays another Neo-Nazi and Stacy Keach plays the main villain, Cameron Alexander).
  • The Shareef assassination would have had to be a military operation, since the SEALs were involved. The name is my own creation and a nod to Shareef's failed plot to blow up the Golden Gate Bridge; the Presidio is on one end of the bridge.

    Since Bermuda IOTL has only one airport that only has one runway, I had Shareef's assassination take place at a WWII-era former Royal Naval Air Station.

    The cover-up had Shareef's plane disappearing from radar 85 miles off the coast of Bermuda, and since it's likely that the US and UK couldn't have coerced every radar station in the area to go along with the story, I figured the CIA worked out a way to rip out the plane's transponder after Shareef was killed, attach it to a small plane (since Shareef's plane had bullet holes in it, it was destroyed) and then crash that plane in the ocean. Thus they would have fooled the Qumari investigators until the secret was revealed during the Zoey Bartlet kidnapping crisis a year later.
  • The 2006 DNC logo is my creation. Hopefully, I've captured the blandness of convention logos well enough. Gelsey was established in-thread as having been the convention keynote speaker, whose speech was little-noted because of the ongoing balloting.

    The vote totals, aside from Santos', are my own. For the non-Santos vote, Hoynes was last stated to have slipped to 102 delegates, so I figured those were dead-enders who wouldn't leave unless he threw in the towel. I gave Baker little more than a third of his stated totals from the last ballot (before revelations of his campaign's covering up of Mrs. Baker's struggles with mental illness) and then let Russell take the rest.
  • San Andreo is based on the San Onofre nuclear power plant, hence its location. It doesn't look like San Onofre from shots in the show, so I used a different nuclear plant for the image.

    The INES (International Nuclear Event Scale) goes from 1 (Anomaly) to 7 (Major Accident), so a 5 is bad. Three Mile Island was also a 5 on the scale, while Chernobyl (confirmed to have happened in the show) is was a 7 (it is also the only one ITTL since the other 7 on INES was Fukushima Daiichi, which did not happen here).

    As I mentioned in the article for San Andreo, it's pretty clear that the other mechanical engineer that was in the first team Bartlet sent in would eventually die of acute radiation sickness, so that's why two people are listed as deaths.
 
g990RZB.png


Thursday, June 27th 2019

Supreme Court rules against federal courts tackling partisan gerrymanders

The Supreme Court, in a 5-4 ruling today, said that federal courts do not have the power to hear challenges to partisan gerrymanders. In an opinion written by Associate Justice Christopher Mulready, the court's five conservative justices found that partisan gerrymandering is a "political question" beyond the reach of the federal judiciary. "Federal jurists have no license to allocate power between the major political parties, with no plausible grant of authority from the Constitution, and no legal standards to dictate or limit their action." Mulready wrote in his majority opinion. Chief Justice Evelyn Baker Lang wrote a scathing dissent joined by the court's liberals and moderates, saying that the court's failure to stop "a clear and anti-democratic process" like partisan gerrymandering "was misguided and imperils our system of government."

The ruling ended two separate lawsuits before the court, one where Democrats and progressives had argued that North Carolina's legislative maps were unconstitutional Republican gerrymanders, and another where Maryland Republicans argued that the Democrat-led Maryland Assembly violated the civil rights of Republicans in the state's sixth congressional district by moving the lines to make it more Democratic in a bid to defeat an incumbent Republican.

The court's ruling is, on the whole, seen as a victory for Republicans, who successfully retook many state legislatures in 2010 on Glen Allen Walken's coattails and thus were able to draw maps skewed towards their party during the subsequent redistricting process. While several of those maps have been either partially (several congressional and state legislative districts have been found to be unconstitutional racial gerrymanders and redrawn) or entirely (in the case of Pennsylvania) redrawn to be more "fair", for the most part, the maps have a definitive Republican tilt in many swing states, says Carla Figgs-Broward, professor of political science at Duke University. "On the federal level, the Republicans have not had enough success to translate to a victory on [the post-2010] maps, due to Democrats retaining popular incumbents in those seats" Figgs-Broward says, "But on the state level, they've been able to way outperform, in terms of seats, what they 'should' be able to win under completely neutral maps."

President Seaborn released a statement saying he was "disappointed" by the Court's decision and called on voters to "elect candidates who will pledge to end gerrymandering" in the 2019 off-year and 2020 midterm elections.
 
Do we have any idea yet of the ideologies and positions of the Labour candidates yet? Are some more Socialist like OTL's Jeremy Corbyn and some more Capitalist or "Blairite" or TTL's equivalent?
 
Do we have any idea yet of the ideologies and positions of the Labour candidates yet? Are some more Socialist like OTL's Jeremy Corbyn and some more Capitalist or "Blairite" or TTL's equivalent?
https://www.alternatehistory.com/forum/threads/2018-presidential-election.446643/page-110
The above is a link to a review I did after Andrea Benn resigned, although it doesn't include Rachel Lilburn.
Daniel Lamont, the former Chancellor under the last years two years of the Green Government (2009 to 2011) has moved more to the left since being in office. He is offering Socialism, and trying to win back voters from the "Socialist Alliance Party" (a United hard left Party which exists in this world). He is a "nicer" version Jeremy Corbyn basically but without the nasty bits.... (anti-NATO, anti-western, etc, etc).
Jack Coll is the candidate who is the "one last big heave" candidate, that when Richard Samuels leaves office (he has already made clear that he will not fight the next General Election which is due by September 2023) the Tories will move more to the right, and Labour will win basically by default.
Oliver Kendrick, is the upcoming star, wants the party to move on from both the Meyer and Green years he thinks that the party needs to be more modern, and cannot go backwards or just wait for the Tories to fall apart.
Rachel Lilburn is basically I was Foreign Secretary (2007-2009) I am experienced, vote for me.
 
Last edited:
acn_hbo_the_newsroom_logo.png


THIS WEEK'S TOP STORIES: Caxias wins second term in Brazilian election

Brasilia
President Francisco Fernandes Caxias won a term of his own on Friday, June 28th, defeating André Augusto Matarazzo of the environmentalist REDE in the second round of voting. Caxias, who will turn 78 this autumn, came out on top of the first round of voting held on June 7th with 33% compared to Matarazzo's 23% (Paulo de Abreu of the center/center-right PDSB won 21% and Fernando Gonçalves of the democratic socialist PT 18%) and led the outspoken and controversial Matarazzo in almost every poll held between the two rounds.

Caxias has had a troubled presidency to this point. After taking over when his illustrious predecessor, Marco da Luca, was killed in a helicopter accident in 2015, Caxias had trouble dealing with da Luca's PT cabinet members and supporters in the Federal Congress. His proposed cuts to public spending and push to overhaul the public pension system enraged the left and center-left and led to PT pledging to run a candidate against Caxias. His low-profile demeanor has not led to much personal popularity with the Brazilian people, although he ranks high on trustworthiness measures after sacking government employees implicated in fraud or corruption cases.

His re-election means that Brazil is likely to endure four more years of muddled, technocratic leadership, a sharp contrast from da Luca's twelve years in office when the Brazilian economy boomed and social welfare programs were created that drastically improved the lives of millions of Brazilians, especially those in extreme poverty. Markets seemed to approve, however, with Brazilian industries' stock rising two points after news of Caxias' reelection broke.

---------------------

OOC: Just realized that we missed the Brazilian election as it happened, so this is a quick recap

The infobox:
brazil19.png

Cast (previously established)
Carlos Vereza as Francisco Fernandes Caxias
Caco Ciocler as André Augusto Matarazzo

The state methodology is literally just which candidate (MDB or REDE) won more votes IOTL's 2018 first round
 
OOC: Another set of infoboxes, of people ranging from the director of the FBI to the man whose son is currently the most powerful person in the world

gjbvUB6.png

Cast (previously established)
John Amos as Percy Fitzwallace
Clint Eastwood as Steve Seaborn
George Coe as Howard Stackhouse
Chi McBride as Marcus Blakemore

  • Fitzwallace shares his birth place with Amos. His age is established in a roundabout way since he mentioned in one episode (in 2002) that he'd been a soldier for 38 years, meaning he joined the military as an officer in 1964, meaning he would have had to be born in late 1941/early 1942 to graduate college and get commissioned then.

    Fitz's previous commands were based off of those of David E. Jeremiah, who was the highest-ranking naval officer during the Clinton years. That means that Fitzwallace took part in the bombing of Libya in 1986 (which was established as taking place in the show). The Kundunese War is the name for the invasion of Equatorial Kundu during the Bartlet administration. Operation Righteous is my invented code name of the bombing and raids of Bahji camps in Qumar during the Zoey Bartlet kidnapping crisis.

    The list of his military decorations were painstakingly gathered from a screenshot of Fitzwallace in the show.
  • Steve Seaborn was established by the now-banned JoeMulk in the old thread and eventually cast as Clint Eastwood in the modern day. Parts of his biography (notably his birth date, place, Korean War service) is kept, but a lot of it (JoeMulk basically had younger Steve—played by Jon Hamm as Don Draper in Mad Men—do basically everything Sam Seaborn did in the Bartlet years during the Kennedy administration) I've retconned. Steve Seaborn I'm establishing as a lawyer and later corporate executive.

    He was established as having re-married (presumably the woman who he'd been having an affair with for decades by the time it's uncovered in the show). I've had him becoming a widower since Eastwood's first wife (who he divorced in the 1980s) died in 2018.
  • Stackhouse's biographical data is a mix of those of Coe (birthday, death date), Paul Wellstone (was a professor and activist before becoming a senator, plus Carleton College is where Wellstone taught) and Eugene McCarthy (born in a small town in Minnesota with a "Wa" name, got an advanced degree from the University of Minnesota). He was established as being born in 1923 from a line of dialogue in the show, and since that means he was 18 in 1941, I figured he would be a World War II veteran like most men his age.
  • Blakemore is, of course, the current FBI Director. His age, wife and previous political offices were previously established. He was established as being basically a career law enforcement/intelligence official with stints at the FBI, CIA and NSA.

    Wolke (his predecessor as governor) is a new establishment, but all of his other predecessors and successors were previously established. Observant readers will notice that his successor as Deputy NSA is Kate Harper's predecessor as Deputy NSA. Also that his middle name should be familiar to people who saw McBride in Waiting....
[/Notes]
 
Top