That Wacky Redhead

[Daibhid C]

A very interesting update, even for someone like me who always gets confused with American politics. The Republicans' backfiring Kirk comparison reminded me of the 2010 UK General Election, where Labour had a poster showing Cameron as Gene Hunt from Life on Mars/Ashes to Ashes and the caption "Don't let him take Britain back to the 80s". The popularity of DI Hunt meant that not only did the poster not have the desired message, the Tories adopted an altered version themselves!

 

[e of pi]

Interesting update. I like the nods to the 'unimpeachable rules of presidential politics' (which of course are completely arbitrary, as XKCD pointed out) being different in TTL.

While I know a winner-only map can give a false impression if a lot of the wins are close (e.g. 1980 in OTL) I'm surprised the Republicans didn't win any state (aside from New Hampshire) east of the Mississippi. Indiana in particular has tended to be a particularly consistent win for them throughout the last century in all but the direst circumstances.

A landslide can have surprising results--it turns out that there's bastions and then there's bastions, and the minor differences can have odd consequences. To create these maps, in general, the approach was comparing 1980, 1984, and 1988 IOTL and then accounting for the swing relative to those popular vote margins. It's not a perfect method, but it's good enough for an election like this that's (1) not the main topic and (2) pretty much a Glenn win no matter what. As it happens, Indiana happened to flip "naturally," but there were a few states where we put a bit of a finger on the scale--Texas, Bush's home state, was less safe than we thought, but we figured he'd run a hard campaign to avoid losing it, and Florida was right on the knife-edge. In the end, with Glenn's association with the state, we gave it to him.

If we're casting votes for the totally-not-cannon-expanded-'verse: Buzz Aldrin/George Takei '88.

Well, Buzz Aldrin's not in politics, and even to the extent he is, my understanding is he's a Republican--making a ticket with Takei unlikely in the extreme. Jack Schmitt (Apollo 17 LMP IOTL, Apollo 18 LMP ITTL, Senator from New Mexico thanks to surviving his 1982 re-election ITTL) might be a better choice as "Apollo astronaut most likely to be President," but that's a pretty marginal difference--and he's still a Republican.

 

[Ogrebear]

With world temperatures a few notches lower than in OTL I guess we won't see a series of nuclear war themed shows in the early 80's like Threads, Day After etc...?

 

[Roger Redux]

Well, Buzz Aldrin's not in politics, and even to the extent he is, my understanding is he's a Republican--making a ticket with Takei unlikely in the extreme. Jack Schmitt (Apollo 17 LMP IOTL, Apollo 18 LMP ITTL, Senator from New Mexico thanks to surviving his 1982 re-election ITTL) might be a better choice as "Apollo astronaut most likely to be President," but that's a pretty marginal difference--and he's still a Republican.

"I vas making a leetle jyoke."

 

[Brainbin]

So many wonderful responses to my latest update! Thank you all very much, this one was definitely a labour of love. And now for my replies to your responses...

Well, at least Glenn wins reelection. That's good. His administration turned out well.

I'm not sure I'd say that - after all, the universe is going to end midway through his second term, and who wants that as part of their legacy?

Just asking, but after Cosmos, what's Carl Sagan up to now?

That is proprietary information that will be revealed later on

My mother would have been fond of this ticket (especially with their focus on alternative energy). IMO, Carter could have won a second term IOTL, but the winds of the late 1970s were against him...

The conventional wisdom on this forum is that whosoever won in 1976 was doomed to lose in 1980 (excluding Ford, of course, since he couldn't run again), and I followed that paradigm in my own TL.

While your timeline is about the changes in pop culture I love your political updates. They ring true to the storyline and are well written. One question - why didn't you have Nixon try for the nomination?

Thank you, jwgview, and welcome aboard! To answer your question, Nixon is a two-time loser (1960 and 1968), and the only Presidential candidate to have been nominated three times as a challenger by the same party was William Jennings Bryan, who lost all three times (Henry Clay was nominated as a challenger three times, but for three different parties). Nixon is also 71 years old in 1984 - no major-party Presidential nominee has ever been that old ITTL. (President Reagan was 69 while running for re-election in 1980.) The three front-runners ITTL are all considerably younger while still being old enough to have extensive political experience: Bob Dole is 61, George Bush is 60, and Howard Baker is 59. (Amusingly, all are younger than President Glenn, running for re-election at age 63.)

Sometimes things are just so well-written, I can't stay away.

I was hoping you'd notice this post, Andrew, but I'm humbled and flattered to have lured you away from your Very Important Legal Career to post!

By using a 1982 song in a 1984 campaign commercial, Glenn and Carter truly have co-opted their inner Reagan. The Gipper was, of course, famous for his efforts to capitalize on current pop culture throughout his Presidency. Despite having a considerable edge in popularity among younger voters, the Democrats have never really followed suit IOTL.

Here's one way to look at it: IOTL, the closest Democratic analogue to "Brand New Day" is almost certainly the 1992 Clinton/Gore campaign's use of Fleetwood Mac's "Don't Stop," a upbeat rock song that emphasized the candidates' youthful energy. Of course, "Don't Stop" had been a huge hit for Fleetwood Mac... in 1977, so the "youthful" Democrats were actually reaching fairly deep into the nostalgia bag.

An excellent point to make, although I suspect that your specific example might have more to do with how baby boomer culture - and then nostalgia (since both Clinton and Gore were the first baby boomers to run for and win the White House, after all) - has utterly defined the latter half of the 20th century. It's the same reason all the Christmas music we hear every year all originates from the 1950s and 1960s. It's what Boomers listened to as kids, and they're still around to listen to them even today. I can provide a (non-Obama) counter-example to the one you provided in the ill-fated John Edwards campaign using "This is Our Country" as its campaign theme in 2008. Yes, the song is by John Cougar Mellencamp, a Boomer icon - but it had still only been released the previous year.

Put another way: Imagine, if you will, Hillary Clinton using Pharrell Williams' "Happy" or DJ Snake & Lil Jon's "Turn Down For What" as her campaign theme next year.

That would never happen - neither of those songs is performed by a woman!

(That aside, I could maybe see her using a recent retro throwback hit song like "Uptown Funk". Don't believe me? Just watch!)

You will not be surprised that I love this reimagining of Don Henley's career in a world in which the go-go '80s are marked by a resurgence of old-school liberalism instead of the sharp drift rightward we experienced IOTL. IOTL, Henley came out of the gate as a solo artist in 1982 with deeply bitter political songs like "Johnny Can't Read," "Them and Us," and a certain notable song protesting the state of the media that shall go nameless. In fact, many of the songs in his '80s repertoire ranges from the wistful (songs such as "A Month of Sundays," which lamented the death of the small American farm) to the overtly political, such as "The End of the Innocence," a full-blown critique of the Reagan '80s. Even his non-political songs trended towards the sardonic, such as "All She Wants To Do Is Dance."

Of course, Don Henley could do upbeat just fine, and I won't argue with you if you tell me that "Boys of Summer" is your favorite Henley song. But it's certainly the case that his entire career would have taken a very different arc here in TWR.

Obviously I made Henley the song's writer-performer as a direct nod to your excellent timeline, Dirty Laundry. In fact, I was originally going to have "Brand New Day" be a Springsteen song, to make the parallel to "Born in the USA" more obvious (after all, harder for him to write that song when the war he's talking about ended years earlier). The problem with Springsteen - and Henley, and lots of other artists of their ilk - is, as you mention, most of them aren't exactly known for their "happy" songs, which is part of their whole ethos. As far as I'm concerned, "Brand New Day" is still something of an odd duck on Henley's otherwise more cynical and polemic debut album. Of course, it's the one that becomes the Top 10 single, because that's what so often happens. I can see Henley being happy to hand it over to the Glenn campaign, because at least that can give his song a constructive purpose - it's not just fluff anymore, it's actually doing some good in the world.

Unless things get much darker in the next two years, you're looking at a race to see who can carry on the "Glenn Legacy." As with Reagan IOTL, there will be calls by Democrats in Glenn's second term to repeal the 22nd Amendment. Even assuming that Glenn avoids OTL's Reagan scandals, those are not likely to go very far. Glenn himself will be 67 in 1988 and will almost certainly look a decade older than that.

Good point about the Presidency aging its occupants - maybe that'll help me get away with using his 1990s Senate portrait for his second Presidential portrait in 1985!

Anyway: congratulations on a fabulous update that marries the political and the pop-cultural in the best possible way.

Thank you very much!

Interesting update. I like the nods to the 'unimpeachable rules of presidential politics' (which of course are completely arbitrary, as XKCD pointed out) being different in TTL.

Arbitrary trivia like that is something which I find incredibly fascinating, so it was a lot of fun for me to write about!

While I know a winner-only map can give a false impression if a lot of the wins are close (e.g. 1980 in OTL) I'm surprised the Republicans didn't win any state (aside from New Hampshire) east of the Mississippi. Indiana in particular has tended to be a particularly consistent win for them throughout the last century in all but the direst circumstances.

To add to e of pi's points, I should also point out that Ohio, Glenn's home state, is right next door to Indiana, and indeed Glenn does exceptionally well throughout the Midwest. (Note that one of the two times the GOP lost Indiana since WWII IOTL - in 2008 - they also lost it to a Midwesterner from a neighbouring state.)

Sweet update as always BB! Although being so close to the end is bittersweet; especially since your cutoff is right before the PoD for so many pop-culture TLs

Thank you, Roger Redux, and I must say, it's quite fortuitous that so many TLs have decided to pick up where I plan on leaving off; whether by design or by coincidence is something I've yet to determined. I have often toyed with writing an entirely different pop culture TL with a POD at about the same time TWR is set to end, but so many other personages from other eras beckon. Arthur Tudor, Joseph Chamberlain... not to mention Harry Potter, that one is technically ongoing, if on extended hiatus.

I think Nintendo might be TTL's Game Freak, while Sega (with Shigeru Miyamoto's talent, something I actually really liked) is a mixture of Nintendo and Sony (the latter because I think Sony owns Sega now)

Sony does not own SEGA. I would never!

Still, this is an amazing story! Love the details!

Thanks, Orville

A very interesting update, even for someone like me who always gets confused with American politics.

Thank you, Daibhid! I admit to preferring Westminster systems as well, but I wonder if that's just because I live under one.

The Republicans' backfiring Kirk comparison reminded me of the 2010 UK General Election, where Labour had a poster showing Cameron as Gene Hunt from Life on Mars/Ashes to Ashes and the caption "Don't let him take Britain back to the 80s". The popularity of DI Hunt meant that not only did the poster not have the desired message, the Tories adopted an altered version themselves!

An excellent observation, because yes, that's exactly where I got the idea! Well, that along with the frequent media comparisons of then-newly-elected President Obama to Mr. Spock in the wake of the first reboot film's release. It got me to thinking: if he's supposed to be Spock, then who would make a good Kirk? Everything fell into place nicely when I decided upon John Glenn for President.

With world temperatures a few notches lower than in OTL I guess we won't see a series of nuclear war themed shows in the early 80's like Threads, Day After etc...?

No, alas, this timeline will not be graced with the incomparable acting career of Anne Sellors. (But in all seriousness, no, the wave of nuclear holocaust miniseries isn't happening ITTL.)

 

[DakotaTimeTraveler]

Yikes...the GOP is pretty much a joke and a non-entity in US politics in this TL. They've had frequent landslide defeats in elections and Reagan is this TL's equivalent of Jimmy Carter.

So will the GOP go extinct by the 1990s?

 

[Miss Teri]

Sony does not own SEGA. I would never!

Oh. Sorry. I just took this line:

SEGA itself was divested by what remained of Gulf+Western after the Trial of the Century gutted the organization (and an ill-timed fatal heart-attack left it rudderless), sold to another conglomerate, this one based out of Japan, in 1984. This conglomerate almost immediately moved to release a new console (successive generations of the SG-1000 proving increasingly inferior to the VCS II), [/FONT][/COLOR]and one which would be marketed in the rest of the world…

And assumed that the congolomerate was Sony.

 

[Nivek]

Oh. Sorry. I just took this line:

And assumed that the congolomerate was Sony.

that conglomerated this OTL CSK Holding, a network and communication company in japan, owned by sega historical owner, Isao Okawa, thus i think braibin falled to recall the name and keep it generic.

 

[Gordian]

that conglomerated this OTL CSK Holding, a network and communication company in japan, owned by sega historical owner, Isao Okawa, thus i think braibin falled to recall the name and keep it generic.

Matsushita/Panasonic might work, considering they bought MCA/Universal around the same time period.

 

[Miss Teri]

that conglomerated this OTL CSK Holding, a network and communication company in japan, owned by sega historical owner, Isao Okawa, thus i think braibin falled to recall the name and keep it generic.

I see what you mean. The fact he never says the name of the conglomerate was another reason I thought it was Sony.

 

[The Professor]

No further comments, just a mention I'm still following

 

[Electric Monk]

I do believe this is my favourite timeline.

I just wanted to say the following: this is amazing, glad I could help out way back when, and I'm super-happy I managed to be back for the end (and then sad, because it be ending, alas).

Sony does not own SEGA. I would never!

Don't worry, I would totally do something like that.

 

[Brainbin]

Yikes...the GOP is pretty much a joke and a non-entity in US politics in this TL. They've had frequent landslide defeats in elections and Reagan is this TL's equivalent of Jimmy Carter.

So will the GOP go extinct by the 1990s?

Welcome aboard, DakotaTimeTraveler! I'm not sure how you could call a party which held both Houses of Congress from 1975 to 1981, and then again from 1983 to 1985, and which has held the Senate continuously since 1975, a "non-entity". Not to mention that yes, they have won the Presidency only once since 1956, but 1960, 1968, 1972, and arguably even 1980 were all nail-biters which could have gone either way (as 1968 did IOTL). Only 1964 and 1984 were landslide defeats for the GOP, and only 1964 could be cited as a deliberate rejection of the GOP platform (as opposed to 1984, which was more a continued endorsement of the incumbent administration - unlike OTL 1984, which was a combination of the two). Your question reminds me a great deal of the widespread speculation in popular culture during the late-1980s and early-1990s that the Democratic Party were no longer capable of winning the Presidency (after only three consecutive defeats) - an episode of The Golden Girls made a joke about this, as did a scene in one of the Naked Gun movies. And yet in the very next election along comes Bill Clinton to totally upend the political paradigm, and the GOP hasn't gotten more than 51% of the vote in any election since. My point is, you should never assume that one of the parties in the two-party US political system is moribund - both of them have shown a remarkable resiliency...

They've spent, with the exception of Reagan, 24 years in opposition since 1961.

1933-1945 Franklin D. Roosevelt (Democratic)
1945-1953 Harry S. Truman (Democratic)
1953-1961 Dwight Eisenhower (Republican)
1961-1963 John F. Kennedy (Democratic)
1963-1969 Lyndon B. Johnson (Democratic)
1969-1977 Hubert Humphrey (Democratic)
1977-1981 Ronald Reagan (Republican)
1981-1989 John Glenn (Democratic)

First of all, the colours to represent each party are incorrect - I use the traditional Leipscheme (blue for Republicans, red for Democrats). But that's a minor point. Here's my major point:

1861-1865 Abraham Lincoln (Republican/National Union)
1865-1869 Andrew Johnson (National Union) [1]
1869-1877 Ulysses S. Grant (Republican)
1877-1881 Rutherford B. Hayes (Republican) [2]
1881 James A. Garfield (Republican)
1881-1885 Chester A. Arthur (Republican)
1885-1889 Grover Cleveland (Democratic)
1889-1893 Benjamin Harrison (Republican)
1893-1897 Grover Cleveland (Democratic)
1897-1901 William McKinley (Republican)
1901-1909 Theodore Roosevelt (Republican)
1909-1913 William Howard Taft (Republican)
1913-1921 Woodrow Wilson (Democratic)
1921-1923 Warren Harding (Republican)
1923-1929 Calvin Coolidge (Republican)
1929-1933 Herbert Hoover (Republican)

[1] Though Johnson was personally a member of the Democratic Party, he sought election for Vice-President on the "National Union" ticket as running-mate to Republican Abraham Lincoln.
[2] Though to be fair, Democrat Samuel J. Tilden won the majority of the popular vote in this election - the only time during this entire span that any Democratic candidate did.

In a 72-year span, the Republicans won fourteen of eighteen elections (7/9, or 77.78% - only slightly worse than the eleven of fourteen, or 78.57%, won by the Democrats from 1932 to 1984 ITTL), including a record six consecutive wins from 1860 to 1880, and four from 1896 to 1908. None of the four Democratic victories during that span can be called decisive - 1884 was decided by about 1,000 votes in just one state (New York), and 1912 was the textbook definition of vote-splitting. (Tellingly, the Democrats received a majority of the popular vote only once in any election between 1852 and 1932 - whereas all three Republican victories from 1932 on ITTL did clear that threshold). In short, don't write off the GOP just yet. They'll be back, just as the Democrats came back IOTL.

Oh. Sorry. I just took this line:

And assumed that the congolomerate was Sony.

that conglomerated this OTL CSK Holding, a network and communication company in japan, owned by sega historical owner, Isao Okawa, thus i think braibin falled to recall the name and keep it generic.

Matsushita/Panasonic might work, considering they bought MCA/Universal around the same time period.

I see what you mean. The fact he never says the name of the conglomerate was another reason I thought it was Sony.

Nivek has it - I wanted to avoid saying it was CSK Holdings specifically (butterflies are free to fly, after all), and indeed, perhaps some other Japanese conglomerate might have taken an interest.

But not Sony

No further comments, just a mention I'm still following

Thank you, Professor! Glad you're still reading

I do believe this is my favourite timeline.

Well, Electric Monk, you certainly know how to come back with a bang! Thank you so much for the superlative compliment

I just wanted to say the following: this is amazing, glad I could help out way back when, and I'm super-happy I managed to be back for the end (and then sad, because it be ending, alas).

Thanks for being there to help out! Hard to believe that was almost four years ago now - it's entirely because of you that this timeline even has a list of updates (and a Wiki page at all, in fact). Everyone who's used that list to catch up on this TL in lieu of poring through 222 pages of thread is in your debt. And don't worry, at this rate, I'll keep updating (erratically) for months to come.

Don't worry, I would totally do something like that.

And then you go and spoil all the good feelings by saying something like this

---

In other news, 3D renderer extraordinaire, author of the recently resumed alternate space program TL Kolyma's Shadow, and good friend to this thread nixonshead has been toiling away for the last week on some new artwork for this thread! He's just putting the finishing touches on his latest creation and I expect you'll all be seeing it in the very near future, so stay tuned for that! In the meantime, please feel free to take a look at the other marvellous works he's made for this TL over on (what is effectively) his page on the Alternate History Wiki.

 

[nixonshead]

In other news, 3D renderer extraordinaire, author of the recently resumed alternate space program TL Kolyma's Shadow, and good friend to this thread nixonshead has been toiling away for the last week on some new artwork for this thread! He's just putting the finishing touches on his latest creation and I expect you'll all be seeing it in the very near future, so stay tuned for that! In the meantime, please feel free to take a look at the other marvellous works he's made for this TL over on (what is effectively) his page on the Alternate History Wiki.

Not to keep you hanging around, here's a look at one of the high speed trains that the Glenn Administration has been proudly opening all over the country. Named Paxrail, it's a great train... a fast train... some may even call it... a supertrain!

 

[Gordian]

First of all, the colours to represent each party are incorrect - I use the traditional Leipscheme (blue for Republicans, red for Democrats). But that's a minor point. Here's my major point:

In a 72-year span, the Republicans won fourteen of eighteen elections (7/9, or 77.78% - only slightly worse than the eleven of fourteen, or 78.57%, won by the Democrats from 1932 to 1984 ITTL), including a record six consecutive wins from 1860 to 1880, and four from 1896 to 1908. None of the four Democratic victories during that span can be called decisive - 1884 was decided by about 1,000 votes in just one state (New York), and 1912 was the textbook definition of vote-splitting. (Tellingly, the Democrats received a majority of the popular vote only once in any election between 1852 and 1932 - whereas all three Republican victories from 1932 on ITTL did clear that threshold). In short, don't write off the GOP just yet. They'll be back, just as the Democrats came back IOTL.

I apologize, I didn't think of it that way.

I'm still hoping for Carter/Takei '88.

 

[Roger Redux]

Not to keep you hanging around, here's a look at one of the high speed trains that the Glenn Administration has been proudly opening all over the country. Named Paxrail, it's a great train... a fast train... some may even call it... a supertrain!

So you're saying Paxrail is powered by a Commodore PET?
Cool picture as always Nixonshead!

 

[Ogrebear]

I wonder if in this timeline's 2015 someone is sat reading about the Legacy of Star Trek's multiple series, and how a new show will new show will be Online for the 50th Anniversary?

 

[THE OBSERVER]

Not to keep you hanging around, here's a look at one of the high speed trains that the Glenn Administration has been proudly opening all over the country. Named Paxrail, it's a great train... a fast train... some may even call it... a supertrain!

What exactly are these trainsets modeled on ITTL? Are there any OTL equivalents?

 

[Barbarossa Rotbart]

What exactly are these trainsets modeled on ITTL? Are there any OTL equivalents?

I may be wrong but it seems that the picture is based on the German ICE (InterCity Express).

 

[e of pi]

What exactly are these trainsets modeled on ITTL? Are there any OTL equivalents?

I may be wrong but it seems that the picture is based on the German ICE (InterCity Express).

The rough shape was taken from the OTL Acela, which was also built by Bombardier (who collaborate with EMD for the Glennrail units). Nixonshead elaborated on that shape with some details from the ICE v3. Since both of those designs from OTL post-date when Glennrail is being built, it's best to say that they're essentially unrelated to any OTL technology, and details would be a matter of speculation.