Bicentennial Man: Ford '76 and Beyond

[KingSweden24]

Looking Ahead​

It was a curious moment; for the first time since Eisenhower twenty years earlier, a term-limited incumbent was facing the transition lame duck period in preparation for his successor. Ford had watched the election returns from the White House and invited Carey for a visit the next morning; a week after the election, they toured the West Wing together and met for several hours in the Oval Office as Ford expounded on his thoughts on both domestic and foreign concerns. Carey came away impressed as always with Ford's knowledge of the issues in contrast to his image of a bumbling dunce in the media, while Ford once again appreciated Carey's blunt-talking style and careful politeness.

The inflation rate had already peaked in October at 14.7%, and the unemployment rate would peak in May of 1981 at 12.1% before its long, slow journey back down. [1] Ford's approval rating was commensurate with those types of numbers; having been the unexpected, unelected President and then scraping into a term of his own, he would finish a Presidency of six-and-a-half years, the President most associated with the 1970s in America even moreso than Nixon, and leave office as one of its most unpopular denizens, even if Americans liked him personally. But Ford was, in the final weeks of his Presidency, fairly chipper. He was eager to leave Washington and return to Michigan to start pondering the next chapter; Betty, for her part, was starting to consider doing philanthropic work around combatting alcoholism and drug abuse, an issue she herself had suffered from. His Cabinet was excited to look ahead, too; though few of them would serve in any official role again sans James Baker, there was a world of think tanks (including founding one, in George Bush's case), corporate boards and political organizations waiting for them to explore the next chapter, and with Ford's exit, and the Democrats subsequently repeating the Nixon-Ford era's 12 years in the White House, for a certain generation of Republican officialdom, it was their swan song, with a newer, younger crop of conservatives waiting in the wings for their opportunity when it arrived in 1993 with the inauguration of America's 41st President.

Ford journeyed to Las Vegas to speak with survivors and first responders after the devastating MGM Grand fire there in late November which took the lives of three hundred people and sparked a nationwide push for updated fire codes and building safety measures and also badly damaged Las Vegas' reputation for close to a decade; other than that, his last holidays in the White House were uneventful, spent with Betty and the kids for both Thanksgiving and Christmas. Before he knew it, the moving trucks were on Pennsylvania Avenue and he had most of his things back in Michigan well before January 20th. His last night in the Lincoln Bedroom, staring at the ceiling, he could think only one thing:

"Finally."

[1] Bear in mind - the early 1980s recession is ITTL more of a late 1970s phenomenon by being dramatically scooted forward by the Panama Shock and in some ways being milder without the 1979 oil crisis being quite as severe. It's still pretty bad, as the numbers suggest, but it also starts wrapping up a bit earlier, but the UE rate and CPI rate won't fall in tandem quite as fast.

 

[KingSweden24]

Gerald Rudolph Ford (July 14, 1913 - December 26, 2006) was an American politician who served as the 38th President of the United States from 1974 to 1981. He previously served as leader of the Republican Party in the House of Representatives, and was appointed the 40th Vice President of the United States in 1973. Following the resignation of President Richard Nixon following the Watergate scandal, he became President on August 9th, 1974, the first President to be inaugurated upon the resignation of his predecessor. Ford would be narrowly elected to a term in his own right in 1976, defeating Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter, but because he had become President less than halfway through Nixon's term, he was term-limited in 1980 and would be succeeded by Democrat Hugh Carey of New York.

Ford's record as President is mixed and has been the subject of great debate amongst historians. His most controversial choice as President came early, when he granted his predecessor Nixon a full and unconditional pardon. He faced a bitter primary campaign from his right from former California Governor Ronald Reagan in 1976 and his subsequent reelection over Carter was narrow as he became the first President since 1888 not to win the popular vote, damaging his reputation both with his party's base and the general electorate. During his Presidency, South Vietnam collapsed and the Vietnam War effectively ended, and Congress made moves to retake its influence in foreign policy and curb the power of the Presidency; nonetheless, he saw a continuation of detente with the Soviet Union and improving relations with China, and signed the Helsinki Accords. Early in his full term, the government of Omar Torrijos in Panama attacked the Panama Canal in an effort to push American forces out and surrender it to the Panamanian government, starting the Panama crisis; occurring at a period when the American economy was already in the midst of its greatest ebb in forty years, it badly exacerbated existing issues with unemployment and inflation as a severe supply crisis rippled through the global economy, and when Ford left office both inflation and unemployment were in the double digits. Ford presided over a general deregulation of transportation and logistics industries, however, and in response to the high cost of energy in the 1970s signed the Energy Policy Act of 1979 which poured billions of dollars into the completion of nuclear infrastructure, improving transmission lines, and enhancing domestic oil and gas production, a piece of legislation regarded as his greatest triumph in dramatically bringing down American energy costs over the next decade. Still, due to the domestic, foreign and political circumstances of his Presidency, Ford is ranked low amongst US presidents, generally in the lower quartile.

Following leaving the Presidency, Ford remained active in Republican politics and was a key leader of its moderate wing even as the party grew more conservative. He served as an elder statesman and was recruited as a backchannel for European diplomacy due to his good relations with many NATO leaders during the 1980s. Following the onset of a series of health problems, he died at his home in Michigan on December 26, 2006.

 

[Curtain Jerker]

Looking Ahead​

It was a curious moment; for the first time since Eisenhower twenty years earlier, a term-limited incumbent was facing the transition lame duck period in preparation for his successor. Ford had watched the election returns from the White House and invited Carey for a visit the next morning; a week after the election, they toured the West Wing together and met for several hours in the Oval Office as Ford expounded on his thoughts on both domestic and foreign concerns. Carey came away impressed as always with Ford's knowledge of the issues in contrast to his image of a bumbling dunce in the media, while Ford once again appreciated Carey's blunt-talking style and careful politeness.

The inflation rate had already peaked in October at 14.7%, and the unemployment rate would peak in May of 1981 at 12.1% before its long, slow journey back down. [1] Ford's approval rating was commensurate with those types of numbers; having been the unexpected, unelected President and then scraping into a term of his own, he would finish a Presidency of six-and-a-half years, the President most associated with the 1970s in America even moreso than Nixon, and leave office as one of its most unpopular denizens, even if Americans liked him personally. But Ford was, in the final weeks of his Presidency, fairly chipper. He was eager to leave Washington and return to Michigan to start pondering the next chapter; Betty, for her part, was starting to consider doing philanthropic work around combatting alcoholism and drug abuse, an issue she herself had suffered from. His Cabinet was excited to look ahead, too; though few of them would serve in any official role again sans James Baker, there was a world of think tanks (including founding one, in George Bush's case), corporate boards and political organizations waiting for them to explore the next chapter, and with Ford's exit, and the Democrats subsequently repeating the Nixon-Ford era's 12 years in the White House, for a certain generation of Republican officialdom, it was their swan song, with a newer, younger crop of conservatives waiting in the wings for their opportunity when it arrived in 1993 with the inauguration of America's 41st President.

Ford journeyed to Las Vegas to speak with survivors and first responders after the devastating MGM Grand fire there in late November which took the lives of three hundred people and sparked a nationwide push for updated fire codes and building safety measures and also badly damaged Las Vegas' reputation for close to a decade; other than that, his last holidays in the White House were uneventful, spent with Betty and the kids for both Thanksgiving and Christmas. Before he knew it, the moving trucks were on Pennsylvania Avenue and he had most of his things back in Michigan well before January 20th. His last night in the Lincoln Bedroom, staring at the ceiling, he could think only one thing:

"Finally."

[1] Bear in mind - the early 1980s recession is ITTL more of a late 1970s phenomenon by being dramatically scooted forward by the Panama Shock and in some ways being milder without the 1979 oil crisis being quite as severe. It's still pretty bad, as the numbers suggest, but it also starts wrapping up a bit earlier, but the UE rate and CPI rate won't fall in tandem quite as fast.

Great update. There's a reason Presidents (especially two termers) age in dog years - just look at the pictures of Dubya or Obama from their first year and see how much more haggard and older they look in their last years. The job is relentless.

Ford, while a bad (or at least mixed) President seems like a good man and I wish him and Betty nothing but happiness in their retirement.

 

[KingSweden24]

Great update. There's a reason Presidents (especially two termers) age in dog years - just look at the pictures of Dubya or Obama from their first year and see how much haggard and older they look in their last years. The job is unrelentless.

Ford, while a bad (or at least mixed) President seems like a good man and I wish him and Betty nothing but happiness in their retirement.

It doesn't help that those two looked a lot younger than they actually were upon entering office; while the same sort of applies to Reagan (he didn't look 70!) he was already so old that you didn't really notice the physical difference between 1981 and 1989.

But yes, this is farewell to Ford, as close to a main character as this TL has had. Good guy, very mediocre President

 

[BattlePig101]

It doesn't help that those two looked a lot younger than they actually were upon entering office; while the same sort of applies to Reagan (he didn't look 70!) he was already so old that you didn't really notice the physical difference between 1981 and 1989.

But yes, this is farewell to Ford, as close to a main character as this TL has had. Good guy, very mediocre President

Certainly an end to an era, hell, the timeline is named after him. Au revoir, Bicentennial Man! Let us journey into the beyond...

 

[KingSweden24]

Certainly an end to an era, hell, the timeline is named after him. Au revoir, Bicentennial Man! Let us journey into the beyond...

The first big pivot of the TL, absolutely.

 

[TGW]

I do love little hints to the future (Fascinating to learn that Bush is pretty much done with political matters, that's another big name swept off the board for future presidents) and Baker's role to come has left me very curious indeed.

Ford's departure leaves us with a foot dangling off the edge of certainty for the first time in the timeline. It absolutely makes sense that he'd be in the lower tier of Presidents, somehow I don't get the sense that people felt much confidence in him in the times of need and that has a big deal to do with it. I'd be curious to see if he got to see another moderate Republican rise to victory before his passing. Farewell Ford! Here comes Carey!

 

[Ambassador Huntsman]

Gerald Rudolph Ford (July 14, 1913 - December 26, 2006) was an American politician who served as the 38th President of the United States from 1974 to 1981. He previously served as leader of the Republican Party in the House of Representatives, and was appointed the 40th Vice President of the United States in 1973. Following the resignation of President Richard Nixon following the Watergate scandal, he became President on August 9th, 1974, the first President to be inaugurated upon the resignation of his predecessor. Ford would be narrowly elected to a term in his own right in 1976, defeating Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter, but because he had become President less than halfway through Nixon's term, he was term-limited in 1980 and would be succeeded by Democrat Hugh Carey of New York.

Ford's record as President is mixed and has been the subject of great debate amongst historians. His most controversial choice as President came early, when he granted his predecessor Nixon a full and unconditional pardon. He faced a bitter primary campaign from his right from former California Governor Ronald Reagan in 1976 and his subsequent reelection over Carter was narrow as he became the first President since 1888 not to win the popular vote, damaging his reputation both with his party's base and the general electorate. During his Presidency, South Vietnam collapsed and the Vietnam War effectively ended, and Congress made moves to retake its influence in foreign policy and curb the power of the Presidency; nonetheless, he saw a continuation of detente with the Soviet Union and improving relations with China, and signed the Helsinki Accords. Early in his full term, the government of Omar Torrijos in Panama attacked the Panama Canal in an effort to push American forces out and surrender it to the Panamanian government, starting the Panama crisis; occurring at a period when the American economy was already in the midst of its greatest ebb in forty years, it badly exacerbated existing issues with unemployment and inflation as a severe supply crisis rippled through the global economy, and when Ford left office both inflation and unemployment were in the double digits. Ford presided over a general deregulation of transportation and logistics industries, however, and in response to the high cost of energy in the 1970s signed the Energy Policy Act of 1979 which poured billions of dollars into the completion of nuclear infrastructure, improving transmission lines, and enhancing domestic oil and gas production, a piece of legislation regarded as his greatest triumph in dramatically bringing down American energy costs over the next decade. Still, due to the domestic, foreign and political circumstances of his Presidency, Ford is ranked low amongst US presidents, generally in the lower quartile.

Following leaving the Presidency, Ford remained active in Republican politics and was a key leader of its moderate wing even as the party grew more conservative. He served as an elder statesman and was recruited as a backchannel for European diplomacy due to his good relations with many NATO leaders during the 1980s. Following the onset of a series of health problems, he died at his home in Michigan on December 26, 2006.

View attachment 777714

It seems Reagan might have the last laugh if the party is gonna become even more conservative, is it like the Goldwater effect 2.0?

 

[peeter]

It seems Reagan might have the last laugh if the party is gonna become even more conservative, is it like the Goldwater effect 2.0?

I’d imagine it would be more of a McCain brand of conservativism

 

[John Fredrick Parker]

Regarding the mention of Ford’s cabinet looking forward to future careers - does this still include Dick Cheney?

 

[PresidentZinn]

Regarding the mention of Ford’s cabinet looking forward to future careers - does this still include Dick Cheney?

Did he not resign to run for the house?

 

[Sir William Jol]

Did he not resign to run for the house?

Why would he? IOTL the only reason he ran was because he was out of a job in 1977.

 

[EarthmanNoEarth]

Did he not resign to run for the house?

Latest mention I could find of him was Ford choosing not to fire him during the early primary season, not sure if I’m missing something more recent

 

[Kennedy Forever]

Looking Ahead​

It was a curious moment; for the first time since Eisenhower twenty years earlier, a term-limited incumbent was facing the transition lame duck period in preparation for his successor. Ford had watched the election returns from the White House and invited Carey for a visit the next morning; a week after the election, they toured the West Wing together and met for several hours in the Oval Office as Ford expounded on his thoughts on both domestic and foreign concerns. Carey came away impressed as always with Ford's knowledge of the issues in contrast to his image of a bumbling dunce in the media, while Ford once again appreciated Carey's blunt-talking style and careful politeness.

The inflation rate had already peaked in October at 14.7%, and the unemployment rate would peak in May of 1981 at 12.1% before its long, slow journey back down. [1] Ford's approval rating was commensurate with those types of numbers; having been the unexpected, unelected President and then scraping into a term of his own, he would finish a Presidency of six-and-a-half years, the President most associated with the 1970s in America even moreso than Nixon, and leave office as one of its most unpopular denizens, even if Americans liked him personally. But Ford was, in the final weeks of his Presidency, fairly chipper. He was eager to leave Washington and return to Michigan to start pondering the next chapter; Betty, for her part, was starting to consider doing philanthropic work around combatting alcoholism and drug abuse, an issue she herself had suffered from. His Cabinet was excited to look ahead, too; though few of them would serve in any official role again sans James Baker, there was a world of think tanks (including founding one, in George Bush's case), corporate boards and political organizations waiting for them to explore the next chapter, and with Ford's exit, and the Democrats subsequently repeating the Nixon-Ford era's 12 years in the White House, for a certain generation of Republican officialdom, it was their swan song, with a newer, younger crop of conservatives waiting in the wings for their opportunity when it arrived in 1993 with the inauguration of America's 41st President.

Ford journeyed to Las Vegas to speak with survivors and first responders after the devastating MGM Grand fire there in late November which took the lives of three hundred people and sparked a nationwide push for updated fire codes and building safety measures and also badly damaged Las Vegas' reputation for close to a decade; other than that, his last holidays in the White House were uneventful, spent with Betty and the kids for both Thanksgiving and Christmas. Before he knew it, the moving trucks were on Pennsylvania Avenue and he had most of his things back in Michigan well before January 20th. His last night in the Lincoln Bedroom, staring at the ceiling, he could think only one thing:

"Finally."

[1] Bear in mind - the early 1980s recession is ITTL more of a late 1970s phenomenon by being dramatically scooted forward by the Panama Shock and in some ways being milder without the 1979 oil crisis being quite as severe. It's still pretty bad, as the numbers suggest, but it also starts wrapping up a bit earlier, but the UE rate and CPI rate won't fall in tandem quite as fast.

The end of the Ford era. Nice summary of his feelings about leaving the White House

 

[Kennedy Forever]

Gerald Rudolph Ford (July 14, 1913 - December 26, 2006) was an American politician who served as the 38th President of the United States from 1974 to 1981. He previously served as leader of the Republican Party in the House of Representatives, and was appointed the 40th Vice President of the United States in 1973. Following the resignation of President Richard Nixon following the Watergate scandal, he became President on August 9th, 1974, the first President to be inaugurated upon the resignation of his predecessor. Ford would be narrowly elected to a term in his own right in 1976, defeating Georgia Governor Jimmy Carter, but because he had become President less than halfway through Nixon's term, he was term-limited in 1980 and would be succeeded by Democrat Hugh Carey of New York.

Ford's record as President is mixed and has been the subject of great debate amongst historians. His most controversial choice as President came early, when he granted his predecessor Nixon a full and unconditional pardon. He faced a bitter primary campaign from his right from former California Governor Ronald Reagan in 1976 and his subsequent reelection over Carter was narrow as he became the first President since 1888 not to win the popular vote, damaging his reputation both with his party's base and the general electorate. During his Presidency, South Vietnam collapsed and the Vietnam War effectively ended, and Congress made moves to retake its influence in foreign policy and curb the power of the Presidency; nonetheless, he saw a continuation of detente with the Soviet Union and improving relations with China, and signed the Helsinki Accords. Early in his full term, the government of Omar Torrijos in Panama attacked the Panama Canal in an effort to push American forces out and surrender it to the Panamanian government, starting the Panama crisis; occurring at a period when the American economy was already in the midst of its greatest ebb in forty years, it badly exacerbated existing issues with unemployment and inflation as a severe supply crisis rippled through the global economy, and when Ford left office both inflation and unemployment were in the double digits. Ford presided over a general deregulation of transportation and logistics industries, however, and in response to the high cost of energy in the 1970s signed the Energy Policy Act of 1979 which poured billions of dollars into the completion of nuclear infrastructure, improving transmission lines, and enhancing domestic oil and gas production, a piece of legislation regarded as his greatest triumph in dramatically bringing down American energy costs over the next decade. Still, due to the domestic, foreign and political circumstances of his Presidency, Ford is ranked low amongst US presidents, generally in the lower quartile.

Following leaving the Presidency, Ford remained active in Republican politics and was a key leader of its moderate wing even as the party grew more conservative. He served as an elder statesman and was recruited as a backchannel for European diplomacy due to his good relations with many NATO leaders during the 1980s. Following the onset of a series of health problems, he died at his home in Michigan on December 26, 2006.

View attachment 777714

Great wiki box. I kind of feel a bit sad for Ford with him being ranked in later years a low among Presidents.
Time to enter into the Carey years!

 

[KingSweden24]

I do love little hints to the future (Fascinating to learn that Bush is pretty much done with political matters, that's another big name swept off the board for future presidents) and Baker's role to come has left me very curious indeed.

Ford's departure leaves us with a foot dangling off the edge of certainty for the first time in the timeline. It absolutely makes sense that he'd be in the lower tier of Presidents, somehow I don't get the sense that people felt much confidence in him in the times of need and that has a big deal to do with it. I'd be curious to see if he got to see another moderate Republican rise to victory before his passing. Farewell Ford! Here comes Carey!

It took a lot of weirdness to get Bush to be VP, let alone President, IOTL to be honest (even though he was apparently on Ford's shortlist twice!) - ex-CIA directors don't usually run for higher office, after all. SOS is a job he was very well suited for, though, and almost certainly would have been slotted into in a Ford second term.

It seems Reagan might have the last laugh if the party is gonna become even more conservative, is it like the Goldwater effect 2.0?

I’d imagine it would be more of a McCain brand of conservativism

What I had in mind was more of the Nixon brand than Reaganism, tbh. There was of course a lot of overlap in the Venn diagram comparing the politics of Nixon, Ford and Reagan but each represented pretty different varieties of late century conservatism, and Nixon was the one who had a 49-state landslide behind him while Reagan (and Goldwater before)... didn't.

And the Fordites, all two dozen of them, are much more likely to accept Nixonism than Reaganism in the end, I'd think

Latest mention I could find of him was Ford choosing not to fire him during the early primary season, not sure if I’m missing something more recent

Correct. I don't think Cheney will make another appearance in the TL, at least I don't plan for him to.

The end of the Ford era. Nice summary of his feelings about leaving the White House

Thanks!

 

[KingSweden24]

1980 - Pop Culture Roundup

The moviegoing public was hugely excited in 1980 by the return of the Star Wars franchise with its second, much darker entry, The Empire Strikes Back, which would be the top grossing film of the year even if it failed to reach its predecessor's record-breaking highs. As far as more serious fare went, however, the year was defined by the pitched battle between two of the great 1970s auteurs directing two of their greatest works - Martin Scorcese's Raging Bull, and Michael Cimino's Heaven's Gate. The latter, while hailed by critics as a staggering, violent and brutal modern masterpiece of a revisionist Western [1] and netting Christopher Walken yet another Best Supporting Actor Oscar in partnership with Cimino, fell short to Scorcese's boxing autobiographical film which won four Oscars - Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor for Robert De Niro and Best Editing. The power of the two films overshadowed the star-making turn of a third legendary film of the year, American Gigolo, which helped establish its star Richard Gere in the same echelon as the era's acting titans Walken, De Niro and Al Pacino [2]. The output of 1980 promised cinephiles a remarkable young rising cohort of actors who promised to make the decade ahead one to remember.

The Philadelphia Flyers upset the New York Islanders in seven games to win the Stanley Cup, but the biggest sporting event of the year in Philly was the 1980 World Series, which saw the Philadelphia Phillies win their first-ever championship themselves (the Flyers at least were a power in the mid-70s, even with a lull due to the Habs dynasty). The NFL season of 1980-81 proved to be a bit of a bore - for the second straight year and third time in four seasons, the Super Bowl featured the top seeds of both conferences facing off as the defending champion San Diego Chargers faced off against the surprising Atlanta Falcons, who denied Philadelphia a crack at a third title in a calendar year by beating the Eagles at home by a field goal in the NFC Championship game. Super Bowl XV in New Orleans proved a bore, though - Dan Fouts had another outstanding game as his Chargers repeated their dominant run and boatraced the Falcons, 37-13. Repeat champions were the name of the game in basketball, too - the Seattle Supersonics won their third straight championship, vanquishing - you guessed it - the Philadelphia 76ers in seven games. To say the least, few cities have ever had a calendar year stretch as good as Philadelphia's Big Four teams did between spring of 1980 and the following year.

After college basketball presented a ho-hum win yet again by UCLA, another legendary longtime coach got a chance at redemption in one of the wildest bowl games in history. Presaging efforts to match up the "best" teams, No.1 Alabama and No.2 Florida State faced off in the 1981 Sugar Bowl after the 1980 NCAA football season, both undefeated, as fellow undefeated Georgia - the No.3 team - faced off against Notre Dame in the Cotton Bowl. In a year that featured a defensive end, Hugh Green, winning the Heisman for Pitt, it had a crazy ending as Alabama held on for a 1-point game thanks to a blocked field goal against the Seminoles to earn Bear Bryant his fifth and final national championship after he had come up just short in his previous two seasons. He would retire after the game and die less than a year later.

EDIT: Hamburg SV denies Nottingham Forest a second straight European Cup, a reversal of the OTL result in the final

[1] Heaven's Gate is actually... pretty damn good, considering its reputation, but having seen it twice I can also see why it was a commercial flop that killed New Hollywood for good
[2] Easy to forget today but between American Gigolo and Officer and a Gentleman there was a window in the early 1980s where Gere was, genuinely, considered to be in this tier of actors

 

[peeter]

What I had in mind was more of the Nixon brand than Reaganism, tbh. There was of course a lot of overlap in the Venn diagram comparing the politics of Nixon, Ford and Reagan but each represented pretty different varieties of late century conservatism, and Nixon was the one who had a 49-state landslide behind him while Reagan (and Goldwater before)... didn't

Mccain’s version of conservatism is pretty close to Nixon’s but just a bit more to the right. He was described as “conservative” but not “a conservative”. He believes in conservative principles in a superficial way but isn’t married to them at all and isn’t afraid of going against them if he feels it’s the right thing to do.

 

[Sir William Jol]

Correct. I don't think Cheney will make another appearance in the TL, at least I don't plan for him to.

I think you're unrerutilizing a major player in American politics in this time period. I would love to see Dick Cheney run for Congress in 1982 and maybe get a cabinet position in the next Republican administration, or even run for President at some point.

 

[Curtain Jerker]

Glad "Raging Bull" won Best Picture. I don't hate "Ordinary People" but "Bull" is a better movie.

"Heaven's Gate" is good but long and Cimino was apparently the prima donna of all prima donnas on set.