WI George W Bush wins seat in Congress in 1978

In 1978, Bush ran for the House of Representatives from Texas's 19th congressional district. His opponent, Kent Hance, portrayed him as out of touch with rural Texans. Bush lost the election by 6,000 votes (6 percent) of the 103,000 votes cast.[55]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_W._Bush#Early_career.2C_1978.E2.80.9395

In 1978 George W Bush ran for a seat in Congress but lost. What if he'd won? How would Bush's career be altered by him going into Congress? How would this alter American politics? What would be the effects? What if?
 
This is a pretty interesting POD.

One thing not commonly realized is that being defeated in an election at the AAA level seems to help politicians, provided they can draw on the resources to try again and bounce back. Bill Clinton and Barack Obama also lost races for the House of Representatives. That seems to be something its better to lose an election for than win if you are really ambitious. Lyndon Johnson and George HW Bush ran for the Senate and lost. Carter ran for some lesser office and lost. Nixon had to wait until he lost a general election for President, and LBJ, Reagan, and GHW Bush lost in the presidential primaries. You really need to get a defeat in somewhere to be viable for the presidency.

George W Bush probably would have stayed in the House of Representatives until 1988, when he would have run against Lloyd Bentsen and lost, just like his father. I don't seem him running in the Republican primary against Gramm in 1984 or winning if he did. He then would have worked in his father's administration and then everything goes like IOTL. One possible difference is that his problems with the bottle would have been butterflied either worse or better, its hard to tell with these things.
 
Maybe Bush runs for Texas Governor in 1990 and beats Ann Richards then. Then he runs for President in 1996. Or he could stay in Congress and be an important fiugure there in the 1990s. Or likely just some nobody. Whatever happens it has a big impact.
 
George W Bush probably would have stayed in the House of Representatives until 1988, when he would have run against Lloyd Bentsen and lost, just like his father.

I disagree that GW Bush would have given up what by then would be a safe congressional seat--TX-19 was a conservative Democratic district in non-presidential elections in the late 1970's but by the late 1980's was Republican on all levels--for what was universally recognized at the time as an uphill battle against Bentsen. 1970 was different, because first of all, GHW Bush hoped to run against Ralph Yarborough, not Bentsen; and second, even Bentsen was far more vulnerable in 1970 than he would be in 1988. (In 1970 it was still possible to hope that liberals would desert him as they did William Blakely in 1961 and Waggoner Carr in 1966; in 1988, it was clear that pretty much the entire Texas Democratic party was united behind Bentsen.)
 
He'd hold on to his house seat until the '90s, 93 or 94 if Clinton Still wins the Presidency in 92. It would be '93 if Bentsen still resigns from the Senate to be Treasury Secretary and Bush wants to run in the Special Election to fill the vacancy, or he would as in OTL run for Governor in 1994.
 
Top