AH Challenge: Have Bush's popularity drop to current levels during his first term.

Just like my earlier challenge to make Bush into a popular President, this time the challenge is to have Bush have a massive drop in popularity during his first term, with a POD no earlier than the start of Bush's first term.
 
Just like my earlier challenge to make Bush into a popular President, this time the challenge is to have Bush have a massive drop in popularity during his first term, with a POD no earlier than the start of Bush's first term.

9-11 doesn't happen but the economy collapse even worse in 2002 and a massive quake rocks L.A. and a Category 5 hurricane strikes Miami.
 
George W. Bush is linked to Osama Bin Laden on 9-11. The Bin Laden Family's exodus from the United States is thwarted by vigiliant FAA officials, who learn that Bush had tried to get them out of the country.

The CIA then cracks that Saudi money financed 9-11, and therefore the money trail starts with Bandar "Bush" who is a longtime friend of George W.

George W. is then seen as either responsible for or at least entirely negligent of the consequences of his family ties to the Bin Ladens--and faces impeachment and removal for high treason against the United States.

That would be outlandish and require the CIA to be willing to dig hard, as well as some quick leads to massively undermine Bush immediately.
 

Anaxagoras

Banned
Easy- no 9/11. Between his inauguration and 9/11, Bush's popularity gradually declined (especially with his medieval restrictions on stem cell research) and people gradually came to see him for the bone-headed idiot that he is.

9/11 caused a rally-round-the-flag effect that Bush (or, more correctly, Karl Rove) used expertly to wine votes in 2002 and 2004. More to the point, they used the now-clear threat of terrorism to scare the American public into supporting Bush (i.e. Bush will protect you, but the Democrats won't). That's why we have such monumentally stupid things as the colored-coded terrorism threat alert system.
 
Without 9/11, Bush would almost certainly have been a one-term President. It takes something special to make him as unpopular as he now is, though:

A war is unlikely- unless he spectacularly mishandles the RC-135 incident, in which case there may not be many people left for him to be unpopular with!

An economic collapse would do it, I think. Perhaps combine with Rove dropping dead of a heart attack and/or a lot of Ashcroft's civil-liberties restrictions being enacted without the terrorist threat to justify them- perhaps with the excuse of cybercrime or something of that sort...
 
I dubt 9/11 did any direct difference. The left already hated him for stealing the election from Gore but the left alone isn't large enough to make Bush as disliked as he is. He must lose the fiscal conservatives and liberterian the way he did with the expanding goverment and Iraq war, not to speak of civil rights violations.

So how could Bush lose that element while not gaining the left. Maybe if he decides to build pyramids using slave labour with goverment waste.
 
Without 9/11, Bush would almost certainly have been a one-term President.

No 9/11 means no Iraq War. The WMD debacle and continuing casualties in Iraq were the biggest obstacles to Bush's re-election in 2004 (the economy was in decent shape). So without 9/11, it's likely Bush would still have won a second term, although his opponent would probably have been someone other than Kerry, most likely Edwards.
 
Approval_27267_image001.png


This graph might be helpful- it's Bush's approval ratings throughout bis presidency. Beware the arrows are a bit off- the "9/11" arrow is a bit too late for instance.

One thing to note is that each time Bush was elected, he had about the same approval rating. In term 2, it falls off steadily. In term 1, it jumps then falls rapidly, then jumps again.
 
WI we don't have 9/11, but have Bush still get his mania for invading Iraq and carrying it out, in spite of deep public opposition... if the occupation afterwards goes as poorly as it did in OTL, then that might be enough to drive Bush's ratings to the floor... he wouldn't even have the angst of 9/11 to justify his invasion...
 
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