"If nominated...." - President Cheney...then what?

Hey all

Does anyone have any thoughts about what would have happened in terms of the middle east and the financial crisis if Cheney would have become president following his term as vice president?

Obviously he was massively unpopular, probably more so than Bush himself, but if he hadn't had the heart problems and decided to seek nomination and won the election (bear with me here) would anyone like to speculate on how things would have been done?

Basically the only way I see it happening is the following:

1) GOP primaries -

Cheney is already unpopular, but respected, which puts him in a good position to be aggressive in the debates. He also goes into it with the advantage of experience that only McCain can rival, but McCain is too soft spoken and Cheney old enough to call him out on things without looking disrespectful. The end result is that you have a miserable primary resulting in low approval ratings for all involved and Cheney basically wins by default. The GOP goes into the presidential debates fearing the worst.....however....

2) Dem primary

John Edwards :)

3) Presidential debates

Edwards, nervous due to the memory of his weak performance in 2004 against Cheney fluffs the debates badly, but is still considered the most likely to win the election.

4) Scandal

The scandals involving Edwards break early. Poll ratings now show Edwards down with the lowest approvals in history for both candidates. Perhaps there is open rebellion saying the ticket should be changed at the 11th hour (whether this is possible or not doesn't matter, it just makes things worse). Election goes ahead pending possible criminal investigation.

5) Election

Lowest percent voter turnout ever. Cheney narrowly wins (say with Romney as his running mate).

So..... what next? The financial crisis has just hit, how does he respond. What happens in the middle east? How does he deal with the Arab spring?

Anyone any thoughts?
 
He probably does a bailout just Bush and Obama have done towards corporate banks, it may even be larger than the ones in reality. He keeps troops in Iraq and Afghanistan longer and continues to raise the deficit "to finish the job." He might get Osama Bin Laden because that was a CIA achievement. As the Arab Spring continues to spread greater US intervention in Syria and Libya takes place. There may very well be a NATO no-fly zone in Syria as well as well as significant support from the CIA. I see a one-term presidency.
 
Hey

Yea it's 2008. The way he was elected isn't important (I thought I'd just throw the only way I could think of together). As to the question of where Hillary and Obama are - Hillary was beaten, as she was in our time line, Obama is almost certainly the guy on the bottom of the ticket. Also, is a GOP win so unlikely if the Dems go into the election with a man on top of the ticket who is going to begin his first term by possibly going to jail? Especially if there's open calls by various Dems to stick someone else on the top of the ticket days before the election. Feasibility aside, it's not going to look good. Or was Bush so unpopular that literally anyone could have been the Dem nominee that year and still pulled it off?

As to beating McCain, is it really all that unbelievable? Might be difficult, but McCain hardly ran a stellar campaign at any point in the election cycle. If McCain is attacked directly by someone senior enough, with sufficient experience and weight for it to not make it look like a youngster being mean to an old man (which is exactly what you would have got if Huckabee or whoever started being aggressive etc.) then he's going to look weak. Even if his answers are good, he's a softly spoken old fella and it won't look like he's up to the fight if you can get someone like Cheney to growl and snarl some insults about liberal voting records or whathaveyou as long as people are left with the image of McCain as someone who can't debate particularly well.

Also, I'm not suggesting that he'd ride in on a wave of enthusiasm. The general feeling in the GOP would probably be that he used seniority and abrasiveness to make the other candidates look bad, that he was a terrible candidate for the presidency and this was going to be an election that would embarrass them for a generation.

Anyway, as I said, that's not the point. It's unlikely, and come 2010 you're almost certainly going to see Dem landslides all over the country, but I'm wondering if anyone has read anything or heard any interviews that might give them an idea about how he'd have dealt with things.

Thanks for the replies so far!

(also, extra points if anyone can get him elected in a more plausible way than I suggested).
 
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Cheney will become a new Buchanan or Nixon - history will revile his memory. I'm not saying that as a liberal or anything; I'm a moderate -- but at this point, the fact of the matter is that liberal economic policies got us out of this recession, really, and Cheney would not handle it right. Add that in with Iraq, Afghanistan... 2010 will be an absolute blowout for the Democrats and the 2012 election will be at least like 2008 IOTL electorally; probably more of a 1988 election honestly.
 
The only way Cheney becomes President is if Bush dies. And there's a seriously good chance he faces a primary challenge. Either way, he's never actually elected to the presidency.
 
Hey

Yea it's 2008. The way he was elected isn't important (I thought I'd just throw the only way I could think of together). As to the question of where Hillary and Obama are - Hillary was beaten, as she was in our time line, Obama is almost certainly the guy on the bottom of the ticket. Also, is a GOP win so unlikely if the Dems go into the election with a man on top of the ticket who is going to begin his first term by possibly going to jail? Especially if there's open calls by various Dems to stick someone else on the top of the ticket days before the election. Feasibility aside, it's not going to look good. Or was Bush so unpopular that literally anyone could have been the Dem nominee that year and still pulled it off?

As to beating McCain, is it really all that unbelievable? Might be difficult, but McCain hardly ran a stellar campaign at any point in the election cycle. If McCain is attacked directly by someone senior enough, with sufficient experience and weight for it to not make it look like a youngster being mean to an old man (which is exactly what you would have got if Huckabee or whoever started being aggressive etc.) then he's going to look weak. Even if his answers are good, he's a softly spoken old fella and it won't look like he's up to the fight if you can get someone like Cheney to growl and snarl some insults about liberal voting records or whathaveyou as long as people are left with the image of McCain as someone who can't debate particularly well.

Also, I'm not suggesting that he'd ride in on a wave of enthusiasm. The general feeling in the GOP would probably be that he used seniority and abrasiveness to make the other candidates look bad, that he was a terrible candidate for the presidency and this was going to be an election that would embarrass them for a generation.

Anyway, as I said, that's not the point. It's unlikely, and come 2010 you're almost certainly going to see Dem landslides all over the country, but I'm wondering if anyone has read anything or heard any interviews that might give them an idea about how he'd have dealt with things.

Thanks for the replies so far!

(also, extra points if anyone can get him elected in a more plausible way than I suggested).

If you have a situation where the Obama/Hillary contest goes worst case scenario, where HIllary wins, but it is perceived by the African-Americans and liberals that the nomination was STOLEN from him, you could tear apart the Democratic Party.

Not an actual split, but an election where many stay home, some actual vote GOP or Green as a protest and even OTL Cheney could win.


And before anyone suggests it, no Obama won't run as a Third Party candidate and split the vote.
 
2008 was a year for the Dems. There were just too, too many things running against the GOP that year that were anchors around their necks. Even with McCain seen as Bush's relative "enemy", he was still a Republican. The Great Recession, six years of the party of "fiscal responsibility" spending like drunken sailors in the GOP-controlled Congress, W's hyper-deregulation of the investment banks, Sarah Palin being one 71 year old's heartbeat from the Oval Office (1), and the voter's backlash (both in 2006 and 2008) against the cowboy-style Neo-Conservative foreign policy of W that both Cheney and McCain championed.:mad: (2)

1) Whatever may have been heard in terms of the cheers of the party faithful at CPAC to Sarah jokes, short of the deepest of the Republican Base, in an ATL where McCain had won (and been re-elected) the country as a whole would have had to live with the specter of a manifestly unfit President Palin until January 2017!

2) A Cheney campaign would just be doubling down on a McCain Campaign. Nominating a less popular Hillary or a damaged Edwards isn't going to reverse these historic factors.

Yes, yes, yes, it was a bad year for Republicans. Many of your concerns are valid, especially the spending of the GOP controlled congress, that was very disappointing.

But beyond that the recession, the bank problems, hell, the wars, were all more bi-partisan than people like to admit.



You have Hillary "steal" the nomination from Obama, late in the primaries, and it could happen.
 
Even a scandal-ridden John Edwards would defeat Cheney in 2008. Both Clinton and Obama would get well over 400 electoral votes.
 
Even a scandal-ridden John Edwards would defeat Cheney in 2008. Both Clinton and Obama would get well over 400 electoral votes.

Didn't it look like he might go to jail for a while though? Surely that's got to count for something? Yea, no doubt that Clinton and Obama would win massively. The point is though for Edwards to get in the way of what should be inevitable so that we get a president Cheney :)
 
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POD: After John Tower's nomination for Sec. of Defense goes down in flames, 41 picks Rumsfeld as his Sec. of Defense as a safe and reliable choice.

1994: By this point the Republicans want to take back the House badly. Under the direction of House Minority Leader Dick Cheney, they reclaim the House and Cheney becomes Speaker. However allegations of DUI's in Dubya's past make him appear as a hypocrite after attacking Ann Richards for having a drinking problem. The whole thing blows up in his face and he loses.

2000: With a weak Republican field, Republicans recruit the popular Speaker Cheney to run for President (unlike Gingrich, he doesn't pursue impeachment of Bill Clinton, government shutdown, etc). Against his personal wishes, he jumps into the race and wins.
 
DAMN GOOD! Now THAT'S a TL I could believe in. Especially with "Slick Willie" dodging all those scandalettes and Cheney "rising above the fray" by refusing to let himself be dragged into the Clinton Wars.:) Cheney will have real problems surviving the GOP nomination process, though. A Rocky Mountain state politician brings no real numbers of primary delegates for the nomination (or EC votes to the table for the general election either).:( He'll face issues regarding his health, but McCain is no one to challenge him on such a matter. Is there a prospective 2000 Democratic challenger you think might be weaker than Gore?:confused:

IDK, after Clinton I basically see Gore getting the nomination. Although, Kerry seriously considered running, maybe he makes a bid and wins running as a more liberal candidate and Cheney swift boats him four years earlier?

As for Cheney's quest for the nomination: you got Elizabeth Dole as his main competitor right up until Iowa, and then you have McCain. Maybe Fred Thompson enters? I just don't see him challenging Cheney.

I gotta admit that all I did was take an idea from here one step further. :p
 
POD: After John Tower's nomination for Sec. of Defense goes down in flames, 41 picks Rumsfeld as his Sec. of Defense as a safe and reliable choice.

1994: By this point the Republicans want to take back the House badly. Under the direction of House Minority Leader Dick Cheney, they reclaim the House and Cheney becomes Speaker. However allegations of DUI's in Dubya's past make him appear as a hypocrite after attacking Ann Richards for having a drinking problem. The whole thing blows up in his face and he loses.

2000: With a weak Republican field, Republicans recruit the popular Speaker Cheney to run for President (unlike Gingrich, he doesn't pursue impeachment of Bill Clinton, government shutdown, etc). Against his personal wishes, he jumps into the race and wins.

Yea, that's better than my way of getting him president... I'd like to say that I didn't think Edwards would have ever got the nomination, just that if he did he'd be by far the easiest to sink. Was simply a way of getting a "Prez Chez" so I could get opinions on what he'd do.

To be honest though, it's probably been more interesting seeing the discussion on a campaign he'd have run and how unlikely it would be for him to win.
 
"How does the War Hero McCain lose the Republican Nomination Fight to such a supreme chickenhawk as Cheney?"

He lost to Bush in 2000. Bush (Texas Air National Guard) won against Kerry (Three times decorated Vietnam war hero) in 2004. A military record won't stop him looking old and tired if he's caught off guard by an aggressive, disrespectful Cheney.

I'd still bet on McCain though, but it wouldn't be impossible to discredit him with the right angle of attack.
 
The only way Cheney becomes President is if Bush dies. And there's a seriously good chance he faces a primary challenge. Either way, he's never actually elected to the presidency.

Would he even try to run? Cheney's always struck me as more of a behind-the-scenes sort of guy. Likes to pull the strings and what not. I can't be the only person to have that impression.
 
Would he even try to run? Cheney's always struck me as more of a behind-the-scenes sort of guy. Likes to pull the strings and what not. I can't be the only person to have that impression.

He was quite clear that he didn't want to, hence the name of the thread (the "Sherman pledge" he made). Although this is often said in modesty, I'm guessing he really meant it.
 
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