Miller
President Miller might have gone down as just another
Chester Arthur, one of those bland, one term presidents that happened to sit behind the oval office because the predecessor either got sick from hypothermia or happened to be murdered by an assassins' bullet. Indeed, anything anyone knew of him came from Democrat's taunt
"here's a riddle, it's a killer, who the hell is william miller?" In spite of conspiracy theories that it may have been under the direct orders of FBI director
Richard Nixon, no concise evidence has come forward to back up such a claim, which remains just a theory dismissed by more professional historians and investigative journalists. As the flag draped coffin that held the remains of
Barry Goldwater walked past Miller, the country wondered. It had been the second time in a decade that a president of the united states died. Many people weren't sure what to make of the supposed "man who drove LBJ nuts." However, he made the best attempt to live-up to the conservative leanings of his former running mate. The
New York representative soon, with his hand on the bible and meeting the glare of Chief-Justice
Earl Warren, spoke out the oath of office in a private, then public ceremony.
His administration saw the man hunt for Goldwater's killer come to a brutal end outside of a gas station, with the televised attempted arrest turned bloody shootout of
Arthur Bremer. Miller also controversially continued the
"proliferation and pacification campaign" as advocated by General
Curtis Le May. This policy completely shattered whatever goodwill there had been developing between the
South Vietnamese and the American forces stationed there, numbering at least a one hundred thousand by 1967. Miller resisted the more extremes calls for an atomic bombing of Vietnam, continuing the strategic bombing that was pursued by Goldwater. As the war dragged on however, Miller finally gave the consent for a
"small test to probe the Charlies." When
Hanoi was vaporized off the face of the earth In 1969, there was much alarm by the Soviets, and much of the world at such a move. No-one had been expecting to utilize nuclear weapons in a conventional war, but Miller reluctantly had followed through with Le May's demands. As the world held their breathe, there was no rush of soviet weaponry towards American cities, nor any of Uncle Sam's freedom deliveries coming in hot on Vladivostok or Sevastopol.
However, he was able to "Win" the Vietnamese War, so his presidency is given marks for that, even though many international human rights advocates argued for his imprisonment or worse for the act of vaporizing a city. In spite of his conservative opposition, the poll tax was officially abolished during his presidency via a constitutional amendment.
Wallace
One of the more progressive leaders within the deep south, George Wallace promised to "out-Lincoln Lincoln." In spite of the biting conservative rhetoric of his later senate career, culminating in his party switching in 1993, his time as a lawyer in
Alabama representing black clientele with the respect gave him his purpose in life, at least initially. The southerner would make good on his campaigns to assist the African American community. He, along with the help of northern majority leader
Eugene McCarthy, would embark on the "grand program for the negro." Opposed by southern segregationists, Wallace would force down several constitutional amendments, helping pass the
Civil Rights and
Equal Opportunity Amendments, sending them to the states to ratify, politically maneuvering lobbying efforts outside of the deep south, though continuously pushing for his home Alabama. His presidency is praised for his commitment to the efforts of civil rights, though some criticize his policies as being anti-white.
Ford
The eight years of Gerald Ford were an interesting time. Considered by some to be the highwater mark of conservatism, Ford was forced to deal with a hostile congress until his landslide re-election turned the house and gave way for conservative democrats to hobble back together the right-wing coalition that had enabled some sort of progress. Ford puffed out his chest at the Russian bear, confronting efforts such as in the
uprising of communist Quebec (at least what he was told by the Canadian Prime Minister, and who wouldn't pass up a good opportunity to bomb some reds?) However, his attempts early in 1982 at the continued privatization of President
Tugwell's crowning
Medicare met with such resistance from a now progressively democratic house that the government stopped functioning for a week. While ford blamed congress and congress blamed ford, the voters sided with congress, delivering a slightly expanded senate in favor of the opposition.
Dornan
Ford's compromise with the democratic house infuriated the staunchly conservative voters that had re-elected him in 1984, with controversial California governor Bob Dornan being the loudest critic from Sacramento. Dornan would beat back the other conservative democrat hailing from South Carolina running for president narrowly by a few thousand votes and the state of Illinois. Already known for a slew of controversial statements, his presidency would be marred by offhanded remarks and fiery speeches from the comfort of the oval office. "B-1 Bob", a nickname from his house days, would forcibly kick out the League of Nations in the
Woodrow Wilson Building Siege of 1989. Apart from starting another world war, he would propose a slew of constitutional amendments through proxy representatives and senators, ultimately culminating in the
Constitutional Convention of 1991.
Despite numerous disagreements devolving around partisan lines between
Republican and
Whig,
Federalist and
Democrat, a consensus was reached with the overturning of the
13th Amendment, in spite of the cries of former president George Wallace, who started a political resistance lobbying group known as Save13. Dornan's conservative fight was now with former president Wallace. By the
1992 election, Dornan's constitutional convention passed the new amendments that
overturned the 13th and 14th Amendments, seeing precedent with the 21st and 18th amendments. The Alabaman would challenge that the move was unconstitutional, a position rejected by the now conservative supreme court in
Wallace v. Peculiar Institutions ( 1993) The massive political changes led to numerous revolts against the president, with the civil rioters being quelled. As Dornan announced a run for an unconstitutional third term in 1996, he was wounded in an assassination attempt by one of the many people he pissed off during his administration. Dornan, taking the hint that people are pissed off at him, graciously backs out, endorses Perkins and retires to the conservative stronghold of California, being elected senator in 1998.
Perkins
The religious conservative faction soon eats the Republicans, resulting in a close election between an ardent left-leaning democratic candidate and former governor turned presidential candidate Tony Perkins. Controversially known for conflicts of interest in office, as he refused to resign from the
Family Research Council while serving as governor until an investigation began by the
FBI into white supremacy ties between the FRC. Cleared of any wrongdoing in the investigation, Perkins then runs and easily wins a third term as governor , distancing himself from the controversial Dornan administration and boosted by the spontaneous
implosion of Communist China in the
Asian Spring by the time of the presidential election. The Perkins Administration would actively support such nation building activities, though he would forge close ties with Iraq, even giving
Hussein the green light to invade Kuwait in 2001. In spite of the international outrage, not many nations were willing to do something about it after
"Miller Time."
In terms of domestic policy, Perkins refused to bail out the massive automotive industries in 2004, culminating with a combined
real-estate bubble popping and mass unemployment making Perkins suffer the lowest approval ratings to date. His religious answers indicating it was "divine intervention" to the massive 2004
Hurricane Caroline that struck Florida and Louisiana were televised bombshells that ruined any chance that the Republicans would carry on their six presidential term winning streak with a seventh and fourth republican president.
Silber
The first democratic president since Wallace, John Silber's presidency was marred by frequent interparty in-fighting between the staunchly conservative and liberal wings of the party, threatening to tear itself apart in time for a possible republican to make Silber the next Wallace one termer. Silber, for his part, did not make it any better by alienating the progressive wing and threatening to register as a republican. One of many reasons as to why the
governor of Massachusetts had won another term was that Perkins's running mate Jefferes ran for president himself. The Americans took one look at the lackluster policy and domestic affairs of the Silber administration and contrast it with the controversial an unpopular Perkins administration, to which Jefferes unwisely strategized to closely tie himself to as a symbol of loyalty to Perkins and to woo the evangelical base within the Republican Party. That's not to say there weren't policies in his first term, besides the construction of an i
nterstate highway system, pouring money into
a mass transit network and passing legislation that legalized
prostitution and
gay marriage were all seen as benefits and improvements compared to the Perkins administration.
