Harold Stassen
(Republican - Minnesota)
(1977-1985)
After Stassen's resignation from the UN, he was popular with Republicans during the Mansfield Administration, and gave advice. In 1972, his name was thrown around as a possible candidate, with more seriousness than it had many times before. he lost out to John A. Volpe, who was more centrist. In 1976, Stassen easily won his party's nomination, even getting support from the Progressive Party, which ran Dennis Frederickson. Come election day, Stassen swept the United States, winning in a landslide over Mills and Frederickson.
Stassen was inaugurated in 1977 as the oldest President, ascending to the office at age 69. His first three years were considered some of the best in history. America was booming, its economy great. With support from all three parties, Stassen created the guiding economic principle for the US until the present; Stassenist Social Democracy. Though his civil rights bills were opposed by some of the far-right Democrats, almost every member of the Senate voted for the expansions to Social Security, and, in 1979, the creation of the National Health Agency. Having secured peace at home, Stassen's approval ratings were in the 70s in May 1980. But over the course of two days, the world was changed forever. On Wednesday, April 16, Soviet and Chinese forces skirmished on the Manchurian border. Both sides quickly escalated, bringing in more troops. Sometime in the afternoon, the Soviets began flying planes, and both sides began bombing each other's infrastructure near the border, a situation that continued overnight. The next day, it appeared, if anything, both sides were gearing up for a full-scale war. Around noon, a Soviet missile commander informed Moscow he had seen a missile launched. Moscow authorized the firing of a few missiles in retaliation, but, since the Chinese had not fired one, they took it as an attack, leading to the Chinese firing all their missiles, followed by the Soviets responded. The Indians were hit by Chinese missiles, so they retaliated, glassing over much of China. On the 17th, Americans woke up, realizing a nuclear war had been fought in Eurasia. A week went by in which the population was too stunned to do anything.
Meanwhile, President Stassen was working on a solution. He quickly mobilized much of the army, sending it to protect Korea and American allies against possible attacks, and to clean up radiation. In Europe, he partnered with the Pan-European Federation, moving into Eastern Europe, where the states were unharmed, but frightened. The dictators there were propped up for convenience.
After forging alliances with what was left of the Soviet and Indian leadership, the slow process of rebuilding began. Most of the devastated regions of Eurasia saw people resettled into the areas not hit in the war. Still, this was not a peaceful process. Nationalists in parts of these nations rose up, and were fought by the forces of the destroyed powers.
In 1980, Stassen was jointly nominated by the Republicans and Progressives, and won in a landslide. His second term focused on the rebuilding of Eurasia, but, it also saw economic depression at home, and the return of the factory jobs that had slowly been trickling out.
Leaving office in 1985, Stassen was liked by all members of society, and was considered a hero abroad. His successor, though well intentioned, had many crises to deal with upon his inauguration.
By Drdpw (Own work) [CC BY-SA 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons