John Fredrick Parker
Donor
With the latest possible PoD -- sometime in 2000 would be ideal -- prevent the emergence of the terms "red state" and "blue state".
Mid-2000: Gore picks anyone other than Joe Lieberman as his vice-presidential running mate and embraces (rather than rejects) President Clinton. Clinton then campaigns enthusiastically for Gore, who wins 325+ EV. Since the election isn't a nailbiter, Tim Russert isn't on at 2 am with his whiteboard talking about "blue states" and "red states."
Would McCain getting the GOP nomination also do the trick?
Yeah.I'm not trying to make a political argument here, just a strategic one. The reality is that in 2000, Clinton's approval ratings were in the low 60s and the economy was fundamentally sound.
Yeah.Had Gore ran as "Clinton's Third Term," he would have, IMO, won rather easily. For some reason -- perhaps he believed the stories being pushed by idiots like Peggy Noonan and Rush Limbaugh about 'Clinton fatigue?' -- Gore decided to run away from Bill Clinton and his 62% approval rating. He even picked the one Democrat to openly side with the Republicans over the Monica Lewinsky scandal, dipshit Joe Lieberman, and then forbade Clinton from campaigning for him.
Yeah.Replace Lieberman with any other hominid on earth, and run on Clinton's record, and Gore beats any Republican candidate you can throw out there in 2000,
Nah. It's still Candidate Goreincluding a time-travelling duo of Ronald Reagan and Dwight Eisenhower in their respective primes.
Nah. It's still Candidate Gore![]()
Easy PoD: They decide to use different colors besides red and blue for some reason during the 2000 election.
Maybe, for some reason, they decide to abandon American exceptionalism, and use red and blue as having the same political symbolism that they do elsewhere in the English-speaking world.
Not that the GOP really has to worry about being mistaken for left-wing as a result of misunderstood colour coding.
The thing is that the Democrats aren't a left-wing or labor party, which is why they have never used the color red.
The Liberals in Canada(who are to the left of the Dems, but not a labour or socialist party) use red as well(it also has some overlap with the modern Canadian flag, which the Liberals introduced.)
Interestingly the NDP in Canada, the official socialist party, has NEVER used red as far as I know. Maybe genuine leftists worry more about negative symbolism.
I'm not trying to make a political argument here, just a strategic one. The reality is that in 2000, Clinton's approval ratings were in the low 60s and the economy was fundamentally sound.
I'm not trying to make a political argument here, just a strategic one...
Easy PoD: They decide to use different colors besides red and blue for some reason during the 2000 election.
This is a pretty early PoD...
Even if Gore destroys Bush in '00, it only temporarily holds off the divided electoral college. We were bound to have a close, contested election after five consecutive blowouts. The second that happens, we're back to square one.