AH Challange: "You sir, are like Jack Kennedy."

Penelope

Banned
Your challange, should you choose to accept it, is to come up with an brief timeline, showing how Dan Quayle can fufill his claim that he was like Jack Kennedy.

Rules
  1. Dan Quayle must be seen as a John F. Kennedy type figure.
  2. POD must be before 1988, but after 1974.
  3. Dan Quayle must be assassinated on an re-election campaign trip to a large city in a generally blue-state.
Aaaaaand... let the choas begin NOW! :D
 
Your challange, should you choose to accept it, is to come up with an brief timeline, showing how Dan Quayle can fufill his claim that he was like Jack Kennedy.


In all fairness to the former Vice President, he never claimed that he was like Jack Kennedy. He just responded to those questioning his level of experience by saying that he had as much experience as Kennedy did in 1960. Which is more or less true.
 

Penelope

Banned
In all fairness to the former Vice President, he never claimed that he was like Jack Kennedy. He just responded to those questioning his level of experience by saying that he had as much experience as Kennedy did in 1960. Which is more or less true.

Oh, for God's sake, I know. Just go along with it. :rolleyes::p
 
Oh, for God's sake, I know. Just go along with it. :rolleyes::p

Okay fine. POD in 1976. Reagan gets the nomination over Ford, but loses to Carter, since 76 was an overwhelmingly Democratic year, and no Republican could have won. In 1980, the unpopular Carter is defeated by George Bush and Bob Dole. In 1984, the economy is still in the toilet, so Bush loses to John Glenn. Glenn serves two terms (defeating Dole in 1988). In 1992, Glenn is extraordinarily popular, and Vice President Hart is expected to ride that popularity to victory. Enter Senator Quayle, who is just completing his second senate term. He has made a name for himself as a stauch anti-communist and for opposing Glenn's domestic policies. He wins the Republican nomination. The slightly older (and presumably wiser) Quayle uses his charisma and good-looks to defeat Hart in the debates, and goes on to eek out a victory in the general election. He goes on a tax-cutting spree and takes a tough stance against the Soviet Union. When the USSR dissolves in early 1995, many credit the young President with landing the final death blow that brought it down. Unfortunately, his success is short lived. In late 1995, with his popularity at an all-time high, he is gunned down in Boston Masssechusetts, the home-state of his Vice President Edward Brooke. Conspiracy theories abound over the circumstances surrounding his death. Most people remember Quayle fondly and wonder what might have been if he had lived and been re-elected. Is that good enough?
 
In all fairness to the former Vice President, he never claimed that he was like Jack Kennedy. He just responded to those questioning his level of experience by saying that he had as much experience as Kennedy did in 1960. Which is more or less true.
Quayle was trying to make a connection and comparison between himself and Jack Kennedy, framed in a talking point of experience. Otherwise, he wouldn't have brought him up.

***

You can give an eternity to attempt to make Quayle look like John Kennedy, and it would still be impossible. To do so would require competence, which Quayle lacked, elegance, which Quayle lacked, and sense, which Quayle also lacked. He was a Washington joke and deservedly so because the basis of the lack of serious thought concerning him came from his own incompetence.
 
When Quayle is conceived, a different sperm gets to be the lucky fellow. The resulting *Quayle is far smarter and more charismatic than the OTL version, and hence is compared very favorably to Jack Kennedy. Sorry I broke your POD time limit, though.
 
Simplest way to make Lloyd Bentsen say those words (yeah, yeah, I'm not 'doing' the OPer's challenge) is to have Bentsen in politics as a cranky 3rd party candidate who gets invited onto the stage to debate VP nominee Quayle.

"I earned every cent I have in my own business," he points at the conventional Republican senator accusingly, "You sir, are like John Kennedy."

Maybe Bentsen blames the Kennedys for losing the 1970 Texas senate primary in a TL where one or both of the brothers survives into that decade.

By 1988 or 1992 he is chosen to run on the ticket of a Perot-like figure.

He decides to vents his spleen against the electorally successful senator and those damned Kennedys...
 
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Um, can I have a POD of 1971 instead of 1974?

First, from the OTL obituary of Rep. Julia Carson: "An early marriage ended in divorce, and she raised two children as a single mother while working as a secretary with the United Auto Workers. She began her political career in the 1960s when then-Rep. Andrew Jacobs Jr. hired her to work in his office."

Next, from the OTL Wikipedia entry of Dan Quayle: "While serving in the Guard, he earned a Juris Doctor (J.D.) degree in 1974 at Indiana University School of Law - Indianapolis. At law school, he met his future wife, Marilyn, who was taking night classes at the time. Quayle became an investigator for the Consumer Protection Division of the Office of the Indiana Attorney General in July 1971. Later that year, he became an administrative assistant to Governor Edgar Whitcomb."

Anyone else see where I'm going with this? :cool:
 

Penelope

Banned
Quayle gets a brain transplant?

Quayle was trying to make a connection and comparison between himself and Jack Kennedy, framed in a talking point of experience. Otherwise, he wouldn't have brought him up.

***

You can give an eternity to attempt to make Quayle look like John Kennedy, and it would still be impossible. To do so would require competence, which Quayle lacked, elegance, which Quayle lacked, and sense, which Quayle also lacked. He was a Washington joke and deservedly so because the basis of the lack of serious thought concerning him came from his own incompetence.

When Quayle is conceived, a different sperm gets to be the lucky fellow. The resulting *Quayle is far smarter and more charismatic than the OTL version, and hence is compared very favorably to Jack Kennedy. Sorry I broke your POD time limit, though.

The point was to make him come to power and be assassinated, in a similar way that Kennedy did. Not to make him into Jack Kennedy. :rolleyes:
 
The point was to make him come to power and be assassinated, in a similar way that Kennedy did. Not to make him into Jack Kennedy. :rolleyes:
Quote:"Dan Quayle must be seen as a John F. Kennedy type figure."

Quayle can never be more than a joke. Perhaps he could have been President, but he'd have still been a joke.
 
Norton: We're talking AH here. Anything's possible with the right POD.

Perhaps Dan Qualye serves in Vietnam rather than gets a nice posting in the Guard somewhere and performs some act of heroism?

Just because he doesn't want to be there doesn't mean he can't go above and beyond the call of duty. IIRC Alvin York was a pacifist, but he was still one of the great heroes of WWI.

Wartime bravery would help with the Jack Kennedy comparison given Kennedy's own heroics. Perhaps the wartime experience tempers him a bit and he's a more effective person when he gets home?

(Thus eliminating the Quayle-isms.)
 

Penelope

Banned
Quote:"Dan Quayle must be seen as a John F. Kennedy type figure."

Quayle can never be more than a joke. Perhaps he could have been President, but he'd have still been a joke.

I was referring to the fact that John F. Kennedy is a reveered president. (Whereas in any other situation besides assassination, Dan Quayle would be seen as a joke-president. Possibly even IF he was assassinated.

(That's why this is an AH Challange. ;))
 
But to be revered in death requires quality in life, which Kennedy had and Quayle doesn't even have now.

You can have him be President, and you can have him get shot, but you can't have him in any way become some great American leader.
 
But to be revered in death requires quality in life, which Kennedy had and Quayle doesn't even have now.

You can have him be President, and you can have him get shot, but you can't have him in any way become some great American leader.

Why can't we have him become a great American leader?

During the Russian Civil War, one of the Reds' generals used to be a steel worker. Circumstances often forge people into more than people thought they could be.

Did you even read my earlier post about how Quayle might potentially GET "quality in life."
 
Incompetence is incompetence and there's no way around it. People can rise to great things. But they need something to mold with to start. Quayle doesn't have anything to mold from, nor at least anything that will happen with as close as he was to the top already. He was daft, a gaffe machine, and an embarrassment to Bush. He could perhaps achieve the Presidency because, well, voters are morons, but he wouldn't be some grand leader who can't spell potato and looks like a dullard every time he talks or attempts anything but manages a complex economic development program of prosperity and leads America into a new age.
 
The only way I can see this happening is that some influential historian (not that there are too many) popularizes the idea that Kennedy's presidency was a failure. Then, Quayle would certainly be seen as Kennedy-esque. ;)

Seriously, I'm not even going to try this one.
 
Incompetence is incompetence and there's no way around it. People can rise to great things. But they need something to mold with to start. Quayle doesn't have anything to mold from, nor at least anything that will happen with as close as he was to the top already. He was daft, a gaffe machine, and an embarrassment to Bush. He could perhaps achieve the Presidency because, well, voters are morons, but he wouldn't be some grand leader who can't spell potato and looks like a dullard every time he talks or attempts anything but manages a complex economic development program of prosperity and leads America into a new age.

What grounds to do you have to be so certain, both that incompetence cannot be made competent and Qualye does not have anytihng to mold from?
 

Penelope

Banned
But to be revered in death requires quality in life, which Kennedy had and Quayle doesn't even have now.

Quayle is regarded this way because of his Vice Presidency. And, I can certainly assure you that John F. Kennedy would definately not be seen in the same light as he is now, had he not died in Dallas.

(Please don't take that the wrong way.)

Also, MerryPrankster and TheSevenLeggedFallyDowner will get Planets/Moons named after them in CNG: Imperial Victory, since they were the only ones to be creative and particpate. :D

I like MerryPrankster's idea of Quayle serving in Vietnam, it could be a complete change of his World-View.
 
What grounds to do you have to be so certain, both that incompetence cannot be made competent and Qualye does not have anytihng to mold from?
The grounds that you can't teach an old dog new tricks. Quayle had a life time. He was given offices to prove himself in, which he did not, and given opportunities to shine, and he did not.

Quayle is regarded this way because of his Vice Presidency. And, I can certainly assure you that John F. Kennedy would definately not be seen in the same light as he is now, had he not died in Dallas.

(Please don't take that the wrong way.)
Kennedy had competence, poise, command and common sense, among other things Dan Quayle lacked and still lacks. Had he not been shot in Dallas, he would have retained that competence, poise, command and common sense and all those other things. The man had a 60+ percent approval rating and was liked by every American not a hardline Conservative or John Birch member, so there's not as much Rosy tinting history as you may think.
 
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