Can presidential assassination contain the US rightward swing ?

Hendryk

Banned
The OP is talking about the US, I'm talking about the US, and everyone else has been talking about the US.
I don't think it's true for the US either. RFK was assassinated in June 1968 and the Republicans won by a landslide in November.
 
I don't think it's true for the US either. RFK was assassinated in June 1968 and the Republicans won by a landslide in November.


Read one of Rogue Beaver's excellent US political time lines and learn what RFK's actual foreign and domestic policies would have been.

He wasn't some New Dealer or Great Society supporter and his views on Vietnam will shock you to the core. Just wait until you read about the wiretapping too...

Anyway, the assassinations that summer, coupled with the televised insanity of the Democratic convention in Chicago and the inner cities burning from coast to coast, did more than anything else to put the GOP in control of the White House, but not Congress.

There are landslides and then there are landslides.
 

Hendryk

Banned
Read one of Rogue Beaver's excellent US political time lines and learn what RFK's actual foreign and domestic policies would have been.

He wasn't some New Dealer or Great Society supporter and his views on Vietnam will shock you to the core.
I won't claim to be particularly well-informed on RFK, let alone what his policies would have been in a TL where he lived to win the Democratic nomination and then the presidential election. However he very much projected an image of liberalism in the American sense of the term, and less than six months after his death, Nixon, who campaigned on an overtly anti-liberal platform, was elected, and in the long term liberalism was marginalized as a political movement. It's saying something that Nixon of all people can now be referred to as a "centrist".
 
However he very much projected an image of liberalism in the American sense of the term...


He projected no such thing. The labels you and too many others believe describe him were attached to him after his death.

RFK was the US Attorney General who authorized more wiretaps than any other AG prior to the Patriot Act and he had no qualms admitting to that fact to the press.

... and less than six months after his death, Nixon, who campaigned on an overtly anti-liberal platform, was elected...
Nixon campaigned on a platform of law and order which, given the year the nation was experiencing in 1968, is entirely understandable.

It's saying something that Nixon of all people can now be referred to as a "centrist".
While correct, that observation has nothing to do with this thread. I will point out that Nixon attempted to pass a universal health care bill only to see Ted Kennedy kill it and was receptive to the idea of a negative income tax. There was far more to Nixon than the arch Cold Warrior/dirty trickster figure which now inhabits the public memory. Neither Nixon or RFK were who you think they are.

Getting back on topic and seeing you missed the fact we were talking about the US solely, let me repeat the next to last sentence in my post you've decided to comment on.

"Killing Reagan or Ford won't stop the nation's swing towards conservatism. Instead it might actually hasten that move."

Please note, not will, but might hasten.

Let me repeat my observation again. Killing Reagan or Ford will not discredit or deflect the nation's move towards conservatism as Eurofed suggested and it might actually hasten that move if the assassin(s) are linked in strongly enough the public's perception to liberalism or liberal causes.
 
Last edited:
I don't think it's true for the US either. RFK was assassinated in June 1968 and the Republicans won by a landslide in November.

Actually, Nixon only won by about 510,000 votes. And as was said earlier, the Democrats kept Congress. I don't think '68 was so much a rejection of liberalism as more of a desire for "law and order", especially in light of the turmoil of that year.
 

Hendryk

Banned
I don't think '68 was so much a rejection of liberalism as more of a desire for "law and order", especially in light of the turmoil of that year.
In 1968, "law and order" was largely shorthand for "put those lousy hippies and uppity niggers back in their place".
 
Let me repeat my observation again. Killing Reagan or Ford will not discredit or deflect the nation's move towards conservatism as Eurofed suggested and it might actually hasten that move if the assassin(s) are linked in strongly enough the public's perception to liberalism or liberal causes.
It won't discredit conservatism but if Reagan doesn't become president the shift is less likely to happen as dramatically. If he becomes president in '76 the right will be discredited by the "Jimmy Carter presidency". The assassins were insane, and the public believing it to be a liberal conspiracy is ASB.
 
Reagan's 1980 victory was not as overwhelming as all that. As I understand it the crazy guy who tried to murder Reagan had thought about killing Carter but thought the secret service were watching him.

Had Carter been murdered I think that the sympathy thing may have been worth the difference.

Further there was an economic improvement in 83, probably not linked to US policy. Mondale would have benefited.

Plus he would have gained because detante would seem to be the cause of the end of the Cold War
 
Who would the Democrats nominate in 1980 to beat Reagan? While Reagan might not have prevented the Shah's ouster he definitely would have evacuated the Embassy beforehand therefore no hostage crisis. The economy depends on whether in 1976 he follows a supply-side or monetarist economic policy. I say he wins narrowly in 1980: remember that even Carter was in a dead heat until late October even though by all accounts he should've been behind by double digits. Nonetheless I don't think conservatism would be discredited because of a potential Reagan defeat: it loses its greatest advocate.

As for Malcolm X, MLK and RFK: depends if you want me to elaborate.
 
The assassins were insane...

The OTL's successful assassins in the 60s were insane and the OTL's failed assassins of the 70s and 80s were insane, but that doesn't mean every potential assassin in an ATL is insane.

When you look at presidential assassins, either successful or failed, the majority were mentally unbalanced. There are significant exceptions to that however.

Booth's murder of Lincoln was a political act with defined goals and part of a larger conspiracy. A conspiracy of fools certainly, but not a conspiracy of the insane. When he murdered McKinley, Czolgosz saw himself as part of the worldwide anarchist movement. Like the other anarchists who had been knocking off presidents, monarchs, and other officials for decades, Czolgosz was making a political statement. After he took a few shots at FDR, Zangara made noises about killing all capitalists but it's generally believed he had been paid by criminal elements in Chicago to kill Mayor Cermak, something he managed to achieve while somehow also "missing" FDR. The attempt on Truman was carried out by Collazo and Torresola, both activists for Puerto Rican independence, and was framed by them through out their trials as a deliberate political act.

You can see that not every assassination or assassination attempt on a US president has been the work of madmen for reasons only the insane would understand. Occasionally, those acts have been for political purposes.

... and the public believing it to be a liberal conspiracy is ASB.
The public believing that 1970s OTL failed assassins Fromme or Moore were part of a liberal conspiracy is completely ASB.

Those women are not the only potential assassins in an ATL, however, and other those other assassins can very well have motives which don't arise from psychiatric issues.
 
Last edited:
Top