Lloyd Bentsen as the Democratic Nominee of 1988

What inspired me to create this thread is the faithless elector from Virginia casting a vote for Lloyd Bentsen. In OTL, Bentsen did not seek the nomination at all during the primaries or the convention in 1988. Perhaps the POD could be some dire circumstance happening to Michael Dukakis, forcing him to concede the nomination? Would the nomination go to Jesse Jackson or Bentsen (that's where I am unsure)? I've always been interested in seeing an election where the Democratic and Republican nominees are from the same home states. I think the best Vice Presidential candidate Bentsen could select is Senator John Glenn of Ohio. Any ideas? Thoughts?
 
In OTL, Lloyd Bentsen did not seek the nomination at all during the primaries or the convention in 1988. Perhaps the POD could be some dire circumstance happening to Michael Dukakis, forcing him to concede the nomination? Would the nomination go to Jesse Jackson or Bentsen (that's where I am unsure). I've always been interested in seeing an election where the Democratic and Republican nominees are from the same home states. I think the best Vice Presidential candidate Bentsen could select is Senator John Glenn of Ohio. Any ideas? Thoughts?

The nomination would go to Bentsen. There's no way in hell the Democrats were going to nominate Jackson, especially four years after Mondale's loss in 84 and with the memory of George McGovern still fresh. As for who wins, Bentsen at the top of the ticket could mean the Democrats narrowly carry Texas and possibly win the general election. OTOH, the economy was still good and while Reagan's job approvals were still north of 50%, so Bush would still be a force to be reckoned with.
 
I don't see any realistic way for Bentsen to win the Democratic nomination in 1988; he's essentially a worse version of Al Gore (who, at the time, was carving out a niche for himself as a conservative southern DLCer), who got destroyed everywhere except the South.

IOTL, Bentsen looked good to the general electorate as a VP candidate because he was the exact opposite of Dan Quayle; Quayle was perceived as a youthful, illiterate buffoon, and Bentsen was the wise old statesman with the gravitas and experience to be a plausible President. Also, at a time when George W. Bush was painting Dukakis as an unelectable liberal, Bentsen remained a centrist. As Dukakis' campaign imploded in the fall of '88, many general-election voters (and conservative Democrats) began to see Bentsen as a better choice than the top of the ticket itself, such as the faithless elector you reference.

But that's the general election; in the primary -- and in the absence of Dan Quayle -- Bentsen's qualities, along with his centrism, are going to be much more of a liability than an asset. I just don't see how he can win the nomination even with a truckload of PODs.
 
This is one of those PODs that are technically possible but unlikely.

For various reasons, having to do with his age, already having a strong position in DC, and positioning within the party, Bentsen is unlikely to run for the nomination himself.

You get VP candidates that could plausibly have made a run for the nomination last year, if they didn't actually do it, like Kefauver, Johnson, Mondale, Bush, Kemp, Edwards, and maybe Biden. And they you have VP candidates who would have been unlikely presidential candidates for one reason or the other, which is more the norm. Kemp in the other thread you could actually see running himself.

That leaves Dukakis getting into a bad accident in the tank.

Though possible, one interesting thing about all the presidential elections the US has had that the country gotten close to a major party candidate dying during the campaign twice. Once was Teddy Roosevelt in 1912, and you can argue he wasn't a major party candidate, and once was Greeley in 1872. This is not counting something happening during the nomination contest. But thinking it over, its possible. Its hard to imagine how the public would react.

So yeah, if the POD is that Dukakis' tank crashes, Bentsen benefits from a sympathy vote, plus the fact that he is not Dukakis. And he has beaten GHW Bush in an election before. So he would probably win the election.
 
Firstly, to nominate Jackson would have been political suicide, and the Democratic leadership would have known that.

Of the others, I'm not entirely sure Bentsen would take it. I agree with previous posters. The only way Lloyd Bentsen is the nominee is if something happens to make Dukakis unable to run post-nomination, and thus Bentsen is bumped to the head of the ticket.

If something knocks out Dukakis before the nomination, then Bentsen has to deal with Al Gore, Dick Gephardt, Richard Stallings, Gary Hart, and others.

I don't see him coming out as the last man standing in such a contest.
 
Top