Who would be the worst PLAUSIBLE President?

I don't think Goldwater would have been that bad. I mean, most of his economic policies were not much worse than Reagan’s and at least he wasn't a fan of the Religious Right (who I think are perhaps the greatest threat to American security at this moment in time)

Maybe in an alternate 2008, some twit like Alan Keyes may have been nominated as the answer to Obama? Now that would be horrific, the worst of all possible Neo-Cons!

:eek:

Alternatively, with rather more plausibility, how about someone like John Thune? Young (ish), rather charismatic and totally, insanely religious! The worst thing is that he has still got another twenty years or so left to run
 
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I don´t see Wallace being an acceptable running mate to Kennedy, particularly because he challenged the President in the primaries as he did OTL. Which reminds me I was thinking about Strom Thurmond but ÇI don´t see him plausibly getting elected.
 

JohnJacques

Banned
Dude, WJB would be President before Evolution became an issue at large in any scenario that he becomes President. It took years for evolution to be taught everywhere (not till the 60s, IIRC) Please note that Scopes lost his trial. Putting a fundamentalist in around the turn of the century won't really affect that trend.

Delaying evolutionary theory in that era is, at best, small potatoes. Bryan wouldn't pursue it as President any more than the Presidents who IOTL ignored it.

As to all colleges not being private, thats correct. But none are federal. Certain states banned evolutionary teaching in any state school IOTL. Bryan would have no means to ban evolution in state schools or private schools, because federal intrusion into education didn't come about until much later.
 
It already happened. He won the 2008 election IOTL.

Sure. Bush 2.0 would have been the best choice, but a FDR 2.0, that was the horrible decision.

I don't think Goldwater would have been that bad. I mean, most of his economic policies were not much worse than Reagan’s and at least he wasn't a fan of the Religious Right (who I think are perhaps the greatest threat to American security at this moment in time)

The problem being that you can only possibly argue Reagan's economics as an answer to a down turning economy, and even with that there is a massive deficit after a 5 year or so period (and, I may be in a minority to say this but I don't care, Paul Volcker was the one that created the economic recovery of the 1980's whereas Reagan burned up that success with his economic policies and contributed more to the deficit than the boom). Goldwater ran in an era of relative economic success. He also could have turned Hanoi into an irradiated crater.
 
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I wouldn't call him FDR 2.0

Probably closer to LBJ 2.0, which, while I'm fine with, may not be what others want......

I'm not speaking so much of what he will do for sure, but rather his ideology and at least what he will try to do. LBJ was too conservative for me to consider Obama in line with him. Obama will likely be bipartisan, but not conservative or centrist.
 

JohnJacques

Banned
LBJ wasn't conservative, unless you count non-Civil Rights social issues, and then he was a product of his time. He was the last of the New Deal Democrats, and he did a sight more good for the country than Kennedy did, who was seen as the "shining star" of liberalism.

Johnson had balls and was a power-player, he had a vision for the country that was a step beyond even FDR's New Deal or JFK's New Frontier..... but he had a foreign mess to step into.

That pretty much describes Obama. Except Obama has the image of JFK as well.
 
I'm not speaking so much of what he will do for sure, but rather his ideology and at least what he will try to do. LBJ was too conservative for me to consider Obama in line with him. Obama will likely be bipartisan, but not conservative or centrist.

yes LBJ conservative....... so whats Liberal? :confused:
 
LBJ wasn't conservative, unless you count non-Civil Rights social issues, and then he was a product of his time. He was the last of the New Deal Democrats, and he did a sight more good for the country than Kennedy did, who was seen as the "shining star" of liberalism.

Johnson had balls and was a power-player, he had a vision for the country that was a step beyond even FDR's New Deal or JFK's New Frontier..... but he had a foreign mess to step into.

That pretty much describes Obama. Except Obama has the image of JFK as well.

yes LBJ conservative....... so whats Liberal? :confused:

I'm not saying Johnson was a Conservative, but was a more conservative person on the left side of the spectrum even for the era, and did things that may be considered outright conservative where it applied to foreign policy and his feelings on the youth of the time and their movements.
 
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JohnJacques

Banned
Grant Park youth killed Liberalism. And thats also where it was reborn.

I doubt Obama holds substantially different views on the hippies.

Johnson was not a conservative.
 
George McGovern isn't plausible.

I would have to disagree with you on that. Of course McGovern was an absolute disaster in the 1972 election, however I think anyone who gets the nomination of either the Democrats or Republicans should be considered a plausible president. You don't get chosen to one of two people competing for the highest office in the USA without having at least a signifcant level of broad community support.

Whilst I don't know that much about the electoral college system (I'm Australian and there's nothing even remotedly similar here to compare it to), I do know that it does dramatically over-exaggerate McGovern's loss, due to him having large minorities of support in almost all states. On the other hand this would mean that it would only take him to garner a few more percentage points of support (ie have him moderate some of his stances) for a lot of states to be won by him.
 
The Electoral College is very simple. Each state gets electoral votes equal to its two senators and the number of members of the House of Representatives. The District of Columbia (Washington DC) gets three votes despite having no Senators. This formula does often exagerate a winners margin of victory. In 1972, Richard Nixon won 61% of the popular vote but got somewhere around 97 % of the electoral votes.
 
I would have to disagree with you on that. Of course McGovern was an absolute disaster in the 1972 election, however I think anyone who gets the nomination of either the Democrats or Republicans should be considered a plausible president. You don't get chosen to one of two people competing for the highest office in the USA without having at least a signifcant level of broad community support.

Whilst I don't know that much about the electoral college system (I'm Australian and there's nothing even remotedly similar here to compare it to), I do know that it does dramatically over-exaggerate McGovern's loss, due to him having large minorities of support in almost all states. On the other hand this would mean that it would only take him to garner a few more percentage points of support (ie have him moderate some of his stances) for a lot of states to be won by him.
i would agree with that after 72 because before that it was pretty much the convention bosses who decided the candidates.
 
More of a little game then a challenge. Tell me who you think would be the worst plausible President (i.e. no President Charles Manson or anything). By that, I mean it has to be someone that was actually reasonably close at one point to becoming President. So, was Vice President, almost became Vice President, got the party's nomination, was about to get the party, almost got his party's nomination, etc.

I would say that everything is plausible. There is a POD or a series of POD's to make everything happen.
If you get a really liberal president in the 60's. followed by the widespread legalization of homosexuality and drugs as an order from that president.
as well have a greater focus on rehabilitation instead of punishment in the legal system...
as well as setting a precident of immoral presidents
you could be saying hello to President O.J. Simpson
as well as
 
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