Recent content by Alonna

The invention of automatic mail sorting machines are what killed railway post offices. Once those entered into use, there was no longer any need to load the mail onto a train and have a USPS employee sort it by hand. It was cheaper and more efficient for the USPS to send all the mail to...

Prior to the 1960's, the USPS had contracts with the rail companies to transport mail on passenger trains. The contracts were sufficiently lucrative that the rail companies could operate passenger lines that otherwise would have been massive financial black holes. After the USPS decided to...

JFK picks George Smathers as his VP in 1960 who then becomes president after Kennedy is assassinated. Smathers, a segregationist, opposes the 1964 Civil Rights Act, but liberal Democrats and Republicans in Congress still take up the bill and invoke JFK's name to pass it with veto-proof...

One way to satisfy the Dixiecrats would be to put the hypothetical universal healthcare system under the control of the individual states, similar to what was done with the GI Bill. Local control was one of the concessions needed to get southern representatives and senators on board with the GI...

Widespread work-from-home probably wouldn't be possible in 2003. Internet service still wasn't ubiquitous at that point, and for those who had Internet, dial-up was often the only option. According to Pew Research, only 16% of Americans had access to high-speed internet in 2003 (Source). Lack of...

While Angus King may have been running against two people with the Republican and Democratic tags, for all intents and purposes, he was the real Democratic candidate, just without the letter D next to his name. He was endorsed by Democratic politicians as well as organizations that are usually...

The failure of the Southern Strategy to emerge is probably somewhat due to the fact that you've had GOP presidential candidates who weren't interested in exploiting racial tensions. George Romney was just as much a supporter of civil rights as Hubert Humphrey. It seems like, without the far...

I like the use of Bush's OTL phrase 'voodoo economics'. To this day, it's how I refer to the trickle-down theory. In regards to Manafort and Stone, hopefully someone will put a stop to their shenanigans before they have a chance to collude with the Russians and put Individual-1 in the White House.

This could easily lead to deadlocks where Senate seats simply sit empty because neither group can come up with a candidate acceptable to both sides. Frequent deadlocks were another reason why the 17th amendment was necessary. One of the worst instances was when a Delaware Senate seat was...

Having Senators appointed by the governor could have the unintended side effect of nationalizing gubernatorial races. Right now, governorships tend to be less partisan than other offices which is why we still see people like John Bel Edwards and Charlie Baker winning in states where their party...

One of the original reasons for the 17th amendment was as an anti-corruption measure due to issues with Senate seats being effectively bought and sold. If Senators remain appointed, you'd expect to see more scandals like Rod Blagojevich's attempt to sell Obama's Senate seat.

JFK wasn't in the Senate at the same time as Ted. Ted was his replacement in the Senate after the 1960 presidential election.

Under this hypothetical, this is what the presidential line of succession would have looked like: Speaker of the House: John McCormack President Pro Tempore: Carl Hayden Secretary of State: Deceased Secretary of the Treasury: Deceased Secretary of Defense: Robert McNamara Attorney General...

At the same time JFK was in Dallas, most of his Cabinet was on a plane flight to Tokyo. What if that plane had suffered a mechanical failure shortly after the assassination and crashed, killing everyone on board? This would have left the newly sworn in President Johnson without a Secretary of...

How would history and culture change if the circumstances surrounding the deaths of Lincoln and Kennedy were reversed? In this hypothetical timeline: 1. Lincoln is killed while riding in a parade by a lone nut with a rifle. The assassin is then murdered before he can be questioned by...