Hard Election Challenge: Republican Sweep in 1964

With a POD no earlier than JFK's assassination in Dallas, TX, have the Republican Party sweep the 1964 elections: the Republican candidate for president must win in the Electoral College (gain 270 electoral votes), and the Republicans must make strong gains in the House and Senate.
 
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Oh come on...four posts on the 1984 WI that has been done multiple times in the last month, and none on this? Surely someone has an idea.
 
Well, you can start by having Johnson refer to MLK as a N****r at some sort of function in which he didn't think the mike was on.
 
Oh come on...four posts on the 1984 WI that has been done multiple times in the last month, and none on this? Surely someone has an idea.

That's 'cause, with your POD, it's frickin' hard. But, ok.


JFK survives his gunshot wounds (I'm weaselling on your wording about than POD—you said "no earlier than", but you didn't specify "and kill JFK"), but they complicate his existing medical problems which begin to leak out to the media. Greater investigation into JFK reveals his sexual escapades and in early January 1964 JFK steps down from the Presidency, citing his health.

Hubert Humphrey (or some other liberal) promptly throws his name into the ring and he and LBJ go at it, with LBJ suddenly facing his nightmare scenario: 1960 all over again, where he couldn't get any non-Southern delegate support.

Meanwhile Goldwater declines to be drafted on the Republican side, leaving Rockefeller coasting to victory. (Ideally some Southern Democrat could be flipped into being his VP).

After a bitter primary fight LBJ is defeated, and the electorate is given a choice between a liberal Democrat and a moderate Republican…*and George Wallace, mounting an early bid for the Presidency.

Wallace gets a bunch of Southern states which makes the electoral math impossible for the Democrats and President Rockefeller comes into office with a large new class of conservative Republican Congressmen & Senators (basically the '66 election early).
 
Another option...

JFK is shot and wounded by Lee Harvey Oswald on 22 November.

Oswald lives, and in the course of the investigation, his roots within the hard left (including his time in Russia and attempt to live in Cuba) are revealed.

With JFK wounded, and the assassination clearly being aimed at JFK from the left, things start to get a bit interesting for liberals.

The Republican National Committe's chairman manages to get Rockefeller and Goldwater to agree to support Michigan governor George Romney, a pro civil-rights Republican but one who is seen as more conservative, as a compromise candidate.

Romney's Vice Presidential nominee is William A. Miller. At this point, the Democrats have a problem. JFK's wounds preclude him from running for re-electon. The Democrats then face a rough fight between Wallace, Johnson, and Humphrey. Johnson wins, but is so battered, and now knows that whoever he picks as VP will alienate part of his coalition.

When the votes are tallied, the Republicans have picked up 14 seats in the House, and three in the Senate. Among the winners of Senate seats are George Bush in Texas, Paul Laxalt in Nevada, Howard Baker and Dan Kuykendall in Tennessee, and Edwin Mechan in New Mexico.

The final tallies give the Republicans the White House, 190 seats in the House, and 37 seats in the Senate. Not quite a sweep, but it does set things up.

In Romney's first term, the Vietnam War starts to heat up, but when Romney tells the generals to "win this thing fast - failure and stalemate are not options," the Air Force launches Operation Rolling Thunder on 14 April, 1965 [in essence the OTL version of Linebackers I and II combined with the Cambodian bombings]. The Tet Offensive of 1966 is launched, but ends up as a military victory for the United States, at which point, the North Vietnamese government asks for a cease-fire. President Romney states the terms: The DMZ becomes the international boundary, and all NVA forces must leave Cambodia and Laos. In return, America would draw down military forces in Vietnam. It is presented as a take-it-or-leave-it offer, with the alternative being a resumption of Rolling Thunder.

On 29 April, 1966, the Paris Treaty is signed. The United States ultimately drew down until all that was left in Vietnam were advisors, the 9th Infantry Division, and a fighter wing of the United States Air Force (pretty much, another Korea situation).

Rationale
For the GOP to win in 1964, two things are crucial: JFK must live, but be unable to run in 1964, and the GOP needs to nominate ABGR - anyone but Goldwater or Rockefeller.

For the GOP, the natural candidate is George C. Romney. As a businessman, he would reassure conservatives, yet he was also pro-civil rights. As a Mormon, he would also benefit from not having any skeletons in his closet. Furthermore, Romney could turn any attacks on his religion against the Democrats.
 
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What about coupling Kennedy's incapacitation as a result of the assassination attempt and the Democratic split that occurs afterwards with Henry Cabot Lodge Jnr. winning the GOP nomination? Afterall he won the NH and NJ primaries as a write in. Maybe in TTL he resigns as ambassador to S. Vietnam and heads stateside to pursue the nomination eventually emerging as a compromise candidate between Rockefeller and Goldwater. He then goes on to win the election against a deeply divided Democratic party.

A Lodge presidency would certainly alter the Vietnam War as he proposed that S. Vietnam relinquish it's independence and become a US Protectorate!
 
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