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Carl Albert/Vacant (Democratic) February 22, 1974-October 7, 1974
Carl Albert/
Thomas Moorer (Democratic/Nonpartisan) October 7, 1974-September 5, 1975

Def. Never Officially Elected
Former Positions: Speaker of the House [1971-1974] (along with other high-ranking positions within the Democratic house caucus), Representative from Oklahoma's 3rd District [1947-1974]


Despite his short term and general lack of major legislation passed, Carl Albert's presidency is seen as one of the most defining during the 1970s, and for good reason. In Feburary of 1974, the Watergate Scandal, which was expected to take down president Nixon was in full swing, and it was beginning to create a cynical view of government that would last for long after. However, Nixon was not taken down by Watergate like many expected, instead, a political radical named Samuel Byck would do that. In the morning of February 22, 1974, Byck hijacked a plane in Maryland and crashed it into the White House, killing himself, President Nixon, Vice-President Ford, and hundreds of other cabinet members, tourists, and aides. Byck's audio tapes that he recorded have become a morbid part of American history, as they detailed how Byck planned such an operation and how he did so expecting to be seen as a hero, who was protecting America's poor from Richard Nixon, who he felt was attacking the poor. President Albert's lasting achievement was creating the "Baker Commission", lead by Tennessee Senator Howard Baker, which was quite similar to the Warren Commission, albeit with even more focus on a potential conspiracy, as few believed such a horrendous act could've been committed by one man. The Commission did not find evidence of a conspiracy, but they found several "intriguing" things about Byck's past. The most famous of these was the fact that Byck had attempted to join the Black Panther Party, which would later be used to crackdown on radical groups like the BPP during the "Pink Scare" of the 1980s.

Albert's calls for unity following the assassination of Nixon have become repeated by many politicians attempting to call for bipartisanship. His "National Unity" address delivered on March 4, 1974 is often called one of the greatest speeches in American history, simply for its attempts to "rally around the flag", particularly when Albert said "We as a nation must unify in this time of need, if we collapse, if we spend this time attacking each other over petty reasons and for political gain, our nation could fall into chaos, and if our nation falls into chaos, the people who want to see our nation fall- people like Nixon's assassin- will get their wish." Albert himself never wanted to be a controversial president, and reached far across the isle, even so much as appointing conservative Republicans Paul Laxalt and Jack Kemp to cabinet positions, along with keeping several surviving Nixon appointees. He also chose Thomas Moorer, the former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, to become Vice-President. Moorer was respected by both Republicans and Democrats, and since Albert wanted to avoid a long and decisive confirmation process, Moorer seemed perfect for the position. He was approved by congress almost unanimously, with only Senator Mike Gravel voting against his nomination. Gravel would later say that while he respected Moorer, he voted against him due to his coldness towards Israel[1] (that would later become much more controversial in the following years) and to uphold a "democratic prescient" of "letting no man be appointed unopposed". Despite Gravel's opposition, Moorer was popular enough that his appointment was supported by people from Jesse Helms to Ron Dellums, which certainly helped him as a vice-president.

However, while Carl Albert was famously much more of a unifying figure than his predecessor Richard Nixon, the two men had similar presidencies. Both Albert and Nixon had scandals before their presidency- for Nixon it was his controversial use of funds given to him by political backers that lead to the famous "Checkers Speech" and for Albert it was his famous drunk driving scandal that would be described as a "moral failing" by some conservative Republicans in early 1975. Both had scandals that affected them in death- for Nixon it was the obvious Watergate Scandal, while Albert had "Koreagate" where it turned out that several Democratic politicians had taken bribes from South Korean political figures. This was only found out about month before Albert's death, and the general reaction from the populace was a massive growth in cynicism. However, Albert, like Nixon before him, was killed before he could face a full reaction to his scandal. On September 4, 1975, Albert was shot and killed by Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, who was a member of the radical Manson family. The deaths of two presidents in the midst of scandal lead to a uprising of political anger, exhaustion, conspiracy theories, and previously mentioned cynicism. Of course these conspiracy theories could've been a lot more credible if Charlie Manson didn't proudly celebrate Albert's assassination and Byck hadn't already tried to kill Nixon and send tapes to people such as Abraham Ribcoff and Jack Anderson. As for Moorer, his presidency would be a lot more controversial than his appointment to the position of Vice-President, particularly when it came to foreign policy...

[1] Yes, Mike Gravel is enough of a crazy person that he could've voted against Moorer because he was afraid of a military coup or some dumb bullshit like that. However, Moorer was very anti-Israel, even saying "[Did] our government put Israel's interests ahead of our own? If so, Why? Does our government continue to subordinate American interests to Israeli interests?" about the attack on the USS Liberty and even more controversially "I've never seen a President . . . stand up to them [Zionists]. If the American people understood what a grip those people have got on our government, they would rise up in arms.” (in 1983, before his ITTL appointment), which would definitely ignite controversy if people weren't screening him as liberally as McGovern screened Eagleton due to the President dying in a terrorist attack. I would've had John Rarick vote against him instead of Gravel due to general lunacy, but he lost re-election in 1974 so we don't get that experience. Also please don't take this footnote as showing any of my opinions on Israel, I'm much too dumb to deal with an issue as complicated as that and would rather not deal with it here. As usual, if anything I put here is an issue with anyone, I will gladly remove it.
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