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CHAPTER ONE: ANOTHER BEGINNING’S END

“When I was a boy I was told that anybody could become President. I’m beginning to believe it.”

Clarence Darrow

"Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end.”

Seneca

From the inauguration of Michael S. Dukakis, as aired on January 20th, 1989:

CHIEF JUSTICE REHNQUIST: Raise your right hand and repeat after me. I, Michael Stanley Dukakis, do solemnly swear…

PRESIDENT-ELECT MICHAEL S. DUKAKIS: I, Michael Stanley Dukakis, do solemnly swear…

R: That I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States…

D: That I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States…

R: And will, to the best of my ability...

D: And will, to the best of my ability…

R: Preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.

D: Preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.

R: So help me God.

D: So help me God.

R: Congratulations, Mr. President!

(FANFARE, CHEERS)

From a 2013 NPR interview:

INTERVIEWER: What importance would you say that the tank picture had in winning Dukakis the 1988 election?

JACK WEEKS: Hell, I’d say it won him the election. We had so much trouble making Mike [Dukakis] look, you know, really qualified and competent as far as the military was concerned, and that picture made him look at least comfortable enough to be elected. I still can’t believe how close it was to ruining the campaign. God, that helmet.

I: Helmet?

JW: Yeah, there was this helmet that was part of the uniform that he was supposed to wear in the tank. One of the other advance guys for the event, Paul Holtzman, was modeling the uniform. He puts on the overalls, and I said “That’s fine, Paul.” And it was. It looked perfectly dignified. That’s what Dukakis wore in the final picture. And then he puts this damn helmet on. He goes and looks at himself in the mirror with the helmet on, and I told him, “You look like a goofy fuck. No helmet.”

I: So, you realized that the helmet would be detrimental?

JW: Exactly. Exactly. So, Dukakis is out doing the photo shoot, and he’s making passes with the tank, zooming by. Mike was always very safety conscious, you know, and I was hoping against hope that he wouldn’t wear the helmet, but I guess he saw reason in the end. He didn’t put it on.

I: And you believe that won him the election.

JW: God knows that it did! [2] Anyway, who’s to say that the world would’ve been worse off with a President Bush? We’ve had some good times, and some bad times. Is it fair to blame Mike for the Voyna, or for the situation in South Africa? No, it isn’t. That was just the world at work. Mike, god bless him, was part of that. He was our president. We’re all living in the Duke’s world.

I: That’s all the time we have. This is 89.9’s commemoration of the 20th anniversary of Michael Dukakis’ assassination.

A CHRONOLOGY OF THE CLOSING MONTHS OF THE 1988 CAMPAIGN

9/13: Dukakis takes his famous tank picture.

9/24-26: Large protests against the World Bank begin in West Berlin.

10/5: The first [3] vice presidential debate is held. Democrat Lloyd Bentsen of Texas dealt an incisive blow to Republican Dan Quayle of Indiana, with a particularly notable phrase said by Bentsen, in which, Quayle, after having compared himself to John F. Kennedy, was promptly shot down with “Senator, you’re not Jack Kennedy.” [4] The comment was subsequently replayed in Democratic advertisements, with an announcer intoning “Quayle: one heartbeat away."

10/13: Dukakis gives an admirable performance in the second presidential debates. [5] Presented below is an excerpt from the debates:

BERNARD SHAW (CNN): Governor [Dukakis], if Kitty Dukakis were raped and murdered, would you favor an irrevocable death penalty for the killer?

GOVERNOR MICHAEL DUKAKIS: Bernard, I do think that’s an unfair question. That kind of nightmare scenario would never happen. But, assuming it did, the death penalty wouldn’t end that kind of horrible, senseless violent crime. Put simply, the death penalty is not an effective deterrent for that. There are truly better ways to deal with violent crime. I’ve dealt with crime in my own state, on a huge scale, and you know what? Through not using the death penalty, we’ve seen the largest drop in crime in any industrial state, and we now have the lowest murder rate of any industrial state. Again: we don’t use the death penalty. I stand strong on that. I will stand strong on all my ideals, but I don’t know if I can say the same for Vice President Bush.

From Thomas Fleming, To Stand at Armageddon: A History of the 1988 Presidential Election (Barnyard, 2008)

...Dukakis was not a particularly agile debater. His reputation as a “Massachusetts liberal” often betrayed him. What the man lacked for in speaking was simply a charisma broader than a sort of machine competence and scientific description of his positive attributes vis a vis those of Bush…However, his performance in the second presidential debates was admirable, and more than a little atypical for Dukakis. He proved persuasive even in his own idiom; while he was no Bryan, nor was he Roosevelt, he was indeed able to describe his personal beliefs, why they were positive, and why Bush’s weren’t…For once, Dukakis’ technological persona gave way to human charisma. He won the debate handily

10/18: The second vice presidential debates are held. Bentsen further paints Quayle as an incompetent, inexperienced and oblivious. Notable moments include Senator Quayle’s forgetting the name of (soon-to-be killed) Mikhail Gorbachev, referring to him was “Vladimir Torpitov.” This was seen as utter proof of his incompetency. It was memorably parodied on Saturday Night Live in the “Quayle Administration” skit. Host Robin Williams played a “hysterically funny” Torpitov to Jeff Renaudo’s Quayle.

From Saturday Night Live (10/22/88)

JEFF RENAUDO (AS DAN QUAYLE): Hello, Mr. Premier Torpitov, sir. America is pleased to have you. Not in the sense you’re thinkin' of.

ROBIN WILLIAMS (AS “VLADIMIR TORPITOV”): Hello, Mr. Comrade President Quaalude. The USSR is pleased that we have someone as dull as you in office.

(SHRIEKS OF LAUGHTER)

DENNIS MILLER (AS AN AIDE): Uh, Mr. President…

JR (AS DQ): Don’t worry, Chuck. They got different customs in Russia.

Continued from To Stand at Armageddon:

The “Quayle Administration” skit was a crushing blow to the Bush campaign. The “Torpitov” blunder was bad enough, but to have it parodied utterly in front of millions of Americans; this was fatal. It would be seen as such in time, too. Quayle was mocked by millions of Americans, a punchline incarnate…The Indianan considered dropping out of the race, and it was only through careful persuasion he was kept on the ticket. The damage was still done, though…

On November 4th, the election was held. Dukakis won a sizable victory:



(D) Governor Michael S. Dukakis of Massachusetts/Senator Lloyd M. Bentsen of Texas (51.4%)

(R) Vice-President George H. W. Bush of Texas/Senator Dan Quayle of Indiana (48.6%)

[6]

From Vice President Bush’s November 7th concession speech:

BUSH: Thank you. Thank you. I have just called Governor Dukakis to congratulate him in his victory…After contentious recounts in New Mexico, Texas, and Illinois, we have finally determined that Governor Dukakis will be the next president…I wish all who voted for the Governor well. Thank you, Senator Quayle, for your contributions to the campaign. I hope that the Governor will steer the nation well, and God bless all of you. Thank all of you for voting, and following your hearts, and doing what was right, and being good Americans.

(APPLAUSE)

FOOTNOTES:

1. Thanks to SargentHawk for this title card!
2. This is a case of someone in an alternate history misdiagnosing what led them into uchronia. Truthfully, and to the observer of OTL, it was not this photo that won him the election.
3. IOTL, there was only one Vice-Presidential debate. ITTL, Quayle wanted to go back in for more, and lost even more brutally.
4. The butterflies have flapped their way into rewording Bentsen’s famed comment, and the anti-Quayle ads.
5. His better debating is because the sickness that afflicted him before the OTL debate is butterflied away. Thus, his argument against the death penalty is more forceful, more cogent, and more of a non-issue because of it.
6. So, what won Dukakis the election? Well, put simply, the campaign just went a bit better, what with more gaffes on the Bush side, less embarrassments for Dukakis, and just his appearing more competent. Was the tank the POD? No, it wasn’t. The better campaign was. We silly mortals are often inclined to attribute gradual change to the occurrence of a single event, and we can get that wrong.
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