Having just completed the book Nixonland by Rick Perlstein, I have a few questions.
1 - Pat Brown won the 1966 Democratic Gubernatorial nomination contest with Sam Yorty. Brown won 52% of the vote, Yorty won 38%.
1a - My Question is how could Sam Yorty have beaten Gov. Brown to be the Democratic nominee, and could Yorty have beaten Ronald Reagan to become California Governor?
2 - President Nixon only received token challenges to his re-nomination from people like John Ashbrook and Pete McCloskey.
2a - My question(s) is/are how would Nixon perform against Ronald Reagan if he challenged the President for the GOP nomination? Was a Reagan primary challenge ever plausible or likely?
3 - Nixon sabotaged his Democratic Presidential opponents so as to face the weakest nominee.
3a - My question is how would the Democratic nomination process have panned out had Nixon not interfered?
3b - My assumption is that only Edmund Muskie, Scoop Jackson, Hubert Humphrey or George Wallace were plausible nominees that could win the nomination and the general election. George Wallace winning the nomination involves either avoiding the assassination attempt, or having Wallace get shot somewhere besides the spine (arm, leg...).
What do other people think?