Ok, I might have read too far into it, but I think that's the point, but what always comes to mind when I'm trying to explain No Southern Strategy is a line from the beginning of Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman where he talks about everybody having to be photogenic to make it and a Gore Vidal quote where he says the Reagans of the world will be the rule, not the exception, with being successful in politics: which I interpreted as being reliant on aids for policymaking, being generally charismatic, and appealing as a sanitized, corporate-ish public persona rather than simply a politician. There is also an interview with Vidal where he talks about having sit next to Reagan at a dinner and to him the man came across as shallow and having never had an original thought. IMO, this is what happened to us that did not happen in No Southern Strategy. Politics remained as messy as it was in the '70s and politicians never transformed into friendly-faced, flat public personalities. It feels like more of a natural outgrowth of the '60s and '70s than the '80s and beyond did as far as politics goes, which makes is what makes it crazy to OTL.