What would life be like if 9/11 never happened?

I think that are world would be a bit more tolerant of muslims that much is clear. Also there wouldn't be a war. How do you think the world would be differen't?
 

Tovarich

Banned
I think that are world would be a bit more tolerant of muslims that much is clear.
I dunno, I rather feel the people who started loud muslim-bashing after 9/11 were the same people who were that way inclined anyway, they just felt more comfortable saying so afterwards.

King of Hell said:
Also there wouldn't be a war.
Which war?
Iraq never had anything to do with Al Quaeda, so that war may well have found another excuse invented for it.
 
Bush definitely does not win a second term. The Democratic nominee is probably either Hillary or Al Gore, as I could either or both running without the war. If the field stays the same than Edwards probably wins. Remember that Kerry's appeal was largely that he was considered electable due to his views on the war.
 
We'd have a different mindset: Air ports wouldn't make believe putting a hand up my butt could fight Terrorism, you wouldn't have had that period where we freaked out and everyone who disagreed even slightly with the way things were handled were Communists and everything was smothered in Patriotism and American flags (so no Freedom Fries).

Basically, we wouldn't have become paranoid and everything that came from that paranoia would not have arisen. Airport security would remain looser, paranoia wouldn't come about, criticism of the administration wouldn't be painted as radicalism and support for terrorism, and censorship would remain looser (the FCC weirdly used 9/11 as an excuse to peel back what was permitted on TV).
 
Why is Bush "definitely" denied a second term? Postwar only three presidents lost reelection: Ford, Carter and Bush Sr. The economy will have undergone a largely jobless recovery by 2004. There is no pressing reason to dump Bush. Remember that in 2004 IOTL a few thousand votes in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and New Hampshire would have given Bush a 321-217 EC margin.

Gore probably won't run in 2004, and Democrats have never nominated a previously failed candidate since the war. As for Hillary: you can take out all the scathing articles written about her predecessor (just switch the names and dates), and she declined to run for those reasons: ruthless opportunism, the dynasty trying to get back in after a single term's interval, etc.
 
We're talking about viable candidates who aren't running against the first presidential God (and de facto indie) since FDR, or possibly Abe.
 

Tovarich

Banned
As for Hillary: you can take out all the scathing articles written about her predecessor (just switch the names and dates), and she declined to run for those reasons: ruthless opportunism, the dynasty trying to get back in after a single term's interval, etc.

Not much of a dynasty really, is it; one bloke and someone who only has the same name by marriage.
If Chelsea Clinton becomes President at some time, then you have the start of a dynasty.

Though there is no more/less chance of that happening than if *whatshisname's kids become President.


*(I know I should remember the bloke's name, he is current POTUS after all, but I just can't for some reason, and can't be arsed to google)
 

Anaxagoras

Banned
Without the expansion of government due to post 9/11 security concerns, and the cost of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, it is likely that the federal budget situation would be much more stable than it is IOTL, although the Bush tax cuts had already blown the surplus by the time 9/11 happened.

The United States would be more respected and admired around the world than it is IOTL, as the foreign policy of the Bush administration in the wake of 9/11 was essentially a giant middle finger held up to the world.
 

Tovarich

Banned
*(I know I should remember the bloke's name, he is current POTUS after all, but I just can't for some reason, and can't be arsed to google)

Barrack Obama, that's it, I remember now!

I knew it'd come to me, if I stopped trying to think of it:)
 
I think we'd see the growth of third parties (not necessarily winning more then they do, but growing and nicking away at the Dem/GOP base), and more general apathy for the American political system and life. Things would also be a lot less polarized. I do wonder how pop culture would have turned out, especially without the paranoid period of the early to mid 00s. Environmental stuff might have picked up more, and been less polarized in how it was handled.

I'm not really sure how Bush would have lost, but I remember back then, I was in high school, and he was an utter joke. Gore wasn't much better, but I remember before 9/11 Bush was generally portrayed as a two-bit moron. He probably would have done more of his "compassionate conservatism", and maybe lost some of the base to a still right wing Reform or the Constitution Party; thus causing another really close election in 2004 that might land a Democrat in the office. Though if the 2008 meltdown occurs on a similar schedule, you'll probably see a Republican back in for this cycle, a party shuffle would define the 00s.

This of course all assumes that butterflies let Katrina occur in 2005, the great recession occurs in 9/08, and a 9/11 type event does not blow something else up and cause a war.

I also remember some nonsense about a "new cold war" with China. Though this just wreaks of pre-9/11 hawkish desperation, in hindsight.
 
The Republicans might have lost their majority in 2002.

Howard Dean ran as an antiwar candidate; with no Iraq War what would he run against? Same goes for Kerry, except that he ran as a candidate with military experience. So we might have had President Joe Lieberman instead, maybe with Hillary as Veep.

The Republican Party would be driven by social issues even more than in OTL and it might have resulted in a libertarian reaction in the form of a third party candidate like Ron Paul in 2008.

As for Bush, he would probably try to stay more in the middle as President if his party lost in 2002, there would probably be a bigger push for immigration and social security reform on his part. Much of the rest of his domestic agenda would probably remain the same. His tax cuts might have expired after he left office and he'd be remembered as a one-term wonder like his father.

My guess is that the Taliban could be overthrown with help from the CIA a la Afghanistan in the 1980s but Karzai probably wouldn't be in charge. Maybe Saddam gets assasinated? Our relations with China wold probably be worse than they are now.

Pop culture would probably be pretty much the same; we'd be even more obsessed with reality TV and celebrity scandal than we are now. "24" might not have lasted as long as it did OTL. "Law and Order" was planning a crossover event involving a terrorist attack on New York City that was called off after 9-11; it might have been aired instead.

If Al Qaeda is still a threat you would probably still see the Bali, Madrid, and London Underground bombings and the airliner plot might have been carried out (on a smaller scale perhaps). But these would be seen as overseas events and terrorism would be seen as containable, there would be no "War on Terror". Al Qaeda might be a bigger threat to the governments of Pakistan, Yemen, and other countries.
 
At least for music, there was a brief trend for more politicized hip hop, as a reaction to the early bling/club phase. I think the "do not question anything about America, or your a terrorist loving traitor!" helped nip it in the butt. I still don't think it would have killed the wankster/club rap that dominates now, but we might have seen a mainstream split in the music, instead of more lyrical based Hip Hop being driven underground. Hell Immortal Technique was going to be signed by Sony, just some guy there wanted him to change his lyrics and be more "poppy"; without the "question America and die" vibe going around, he might be face on MTV. Aside from political, Atmosphere was getting more mainstream play, they might have also latched onto this mainstream split.

As for rock, I think nu-metal's hey day was still going reach its end sometime in the early 00s. I know some fans who felt they couldn't relate to the subject matter of "suburban loser" any longer, with all what was going on-whether they wanted to join the army or fight the man, it was a similar vibe (this kind of including myself, but I was always more of a Punk and Harcore fan when it came to rock, so I felt most Nu-Metal was crap to begin with, but I digress). Still, given Emo was even more self-obsessed kind of downer crap, shows it was more then this that killed Nu Metal. Personally I believe it had more to do with the often Rock-Hip Hop mix suffering a backlash as Hip Hop dumbed down and became the music of choice, for those who beat the crap out of the alternative rocker kids; so it would have died anyway sometime in the 00s.

No 9/11 might have also kept the Hipster scene from possibly formering, or at least in its current form. Since 9/11 shrank the pool of bohem-criticize America kids, they might not have grouped together so many hippies, indie rockers, geek-chic, punks, etc to birth the hipster. These groups probably would have stayed separate, evolving in a less "join together or die" manner, with a more diverse political opinion amongst themselves. Apathy would have kept them seeing involvement in either left or right on the mainstream political spectrum as a waste of time and effort.

Just some food for thought.

I do wonder how country would have developed, or synth, techno, and such. Anyone have any ideas?
 
I dunno, I rather feel the people who started loud muslim-bashing after 9/11 were the same people who were that way inclined anyway, they just felt more comfortable saying so afterwards.


Which war?
Iraq never had anything to do with Al Quaeda, so that war may well have found another excuse invented for it.

A way would have been found to get the US into war with them.
 
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