DBWI: Later Nixon and Ford and Earlier Kennedy Presidencies

In OTL, Vice President Richard Nixon was elected President and Michigan Representative Gerald Ford was elected Vice President of the United States in the United States Presidential Election of 1960, defeating Senate Majority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson and his running mate Minnesota Senator Hubert Humphrey. I can't remember why, but Nixon for some reason did not run for re-election in 1964, and instead groomed Vice President Ford to run instead. Ford and his running mate New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller defeated 1960 VP Nominee Hubert Humphrey and his running mate Connecticut Senator Thomas J. Dodd. In 1968, Ford was defeated for re-election by three-term United States Senator John F. Kennedy. Kennedy's younger brother Robert F. Kennedy was appointed to his Senate seat on January 3rd, 1969 to complete his term. Halfway through President Kennedy's term, he died of health problems coincidentally on January 20th, 1971. Kennedy's successor (I can't remember his name) won in 1972, defeating California Governor Ronald Reagan and his running mate Tennessee Senator Howard Baker.

What if Kennedy had won the Democratic nomination in 1960, instead of Johnson? Would he have defeated Nixon? If Nixon was defeated in 1960, would he try again in 1964 for a rematch? Would Kennedy have completed his term, having been younger and healthier? Maybe Robert F. Kennedy would be appointed to the United States Senate from Massachusetts eight years earlier in 1961.
 
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. . . What if Kennedy had won the Democratic nomination in 1960, instead of Johnson? . . .
Yes, I’ve seen this scenario and most of my fellow members will say, With a Democrat in the White House, no way does Vietnam drag on till 1967 before we get a halfway decent coalition government.

I guess I’m in a minority because with Kennedy’s “activism,” his tendency to above all do something, and also his penchant for showing off and trying to “excel” even when the circumstances do not lend themselves to such, I can see Vietnam dragging on till ‘71 or ‘72.
 
In OTL, Vice President Richard Nixon was elected President and Michigan Representative Gerald Ford was elected Vice President of the United States in the United States Presidential Election of 1960, defeating Senate Majority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson and his running mate Minnesota Senator Hubert Humphrey. I can't remember why, but Nixon for some reason did not run for re-election in 1964, and instead groomed Vice President Ford to run instead. Ford and his running mate New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller defeated 1964 VP Nominee Hubert Humphrey and his running mate Connecticut Senator Thomas J. Dodd. In 1968, Ford was defeated for re-election by three-term United States Senator John F. Kennedy. Kennedy's younger brother Robert F. Kennedy was appointed to his Senate seat on January 3rd, 1969 to complete his term. Halfway through President Kennedy's term, he died of health problems coincidentally on January 20th, 1971. Kennedy's successor (I can't remember his name) won in 1972, defeating California Governor Ronald Reagan and his running mate Tennessee Senator Howard Baker.

What if Kennedy had won the Democratic nomination in 1960, instead of Johnson? Would he have defeated Nixon? If Nixon was defeated in 1960, would he try again in 1964 for a rematch? Would Kennedy have completed his term, having been younger and healthier? Maybe Robert F. Kennedy would be appointed to the United States Senate from Massachusetts eight years earlier in 1961.

How could one forget the presidency of John Jay Hooker of Tennessee? I know Hooker wasn't the most memorable, he never got along with the Congressional leadership and because of that was more of a placeholder than anybody before or since, but come on. "Do you really want a Hooker for president?" is the best sign ever held up at a Republican rally.

Anyway, if John Kennedy had won the presidency the first time he ran for it, I think that his Coalition of Progress would have gotten big sooner, and maybe even burn itself out. People like President Allard Lowenstein never would have taken over the party, and that's huge. Lowenstein went from Secretary of Housing under Kennedy and Hooker to Governor of New York to the first two-term President since Eisenhower in 1988. Where would we be without his "Americans Work Hard" public project? My parents certainly wouldn't have become homeowners without the well paying AWH construction jobs Lowenstein created.
 
Not sure America was ready to accept a Catholic President in 1960. Nixon would have won by an even larger margin.

We might see a slower civil rights movement. Nixon was paranoid and highly sensitive to insults, and he took Wallace and Barnett's antics as personal affronts. So he went nuclear and invoked Section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment. Once the Dixiecrats were faced with the possibility of losing Congressional seats they changed their tune quickly. A consensus builder like JFK would have tried to reason with them (as he did when he helped pass the Civil Rights Act of 1966 and the Fair Housing Act of 1968).

The 1964 election was a Pyrrhic victory for whoever won, due to the social unrest, rise in crime, bad 1968 economy, and concerns over the counterculture. With a worse Vietnam, Wallace might have beaten Kennedy for the nomination. Scary thought.

On the plus side, we get to the moon in 1969 instead of 1979. That was uniquely JFK's vision.
 
In addition, President Kennedy appointed George Shultz and Bob Finch to the Atomic Energy Commission, and as new members on a 5-member commission, that effected a sea change.

It changed it from a pro forma agency which dragged out the regulatory process but almost always said yes, to an agency which sometimes said yes and sometimes said no. George in particular was just very matter-of-fact, no, we’re not going to site plants in geologically-active areas of California.

And Bob Finch got the ball rolling on seed money for high-efficiency transmission lines.

And not just because he died in office, but because he deservedly got credit, the 1972 John F. Kennedy Energy Independence and Fair Trade Act, is almost always called the Kennedy Energy Act, even by academic publications.

No, not enough to fully prevent the 1975 energy crisis but enough to soften the blow and that made a difference.
 
Without Nixon in the White House, the french coup d'etat of 1962 would have probably failed,meaning that the war in Algeria wouldn' t have been dragged until 1973.
Seriously Nixon and Ford are controversial figures only in America. Most of the inhabitants of the European Commonwealth simply hate them.
 
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