WI: No Obama in 2004

Has this been done? (I don't frequent this particular forum very often.)

Peter Fitzgerald (http://bioguide.congress.gov/scripts/biodisplay.pl?index=F000442) was Illinois' junior senator beginning in 1998. A centrist Republican, he had a reputation as a principled legislator and was popular enough back home. He cited family concerns when he declined to run in 2004, and since he was involved in no scandals or controversies, it seems to be the rare case where this was his real reason for stepping down.

Had Fitzgerald run again, he probably could have won fairly easily, whether or not state legislator Barack Obama had challenged him. Has anyone followed this line of thought? Would it lead to anything more interesting than "President Hillary Clinton"?
 
We really need to stop mucking around with political what-ifs from so close to the present (or at least find some new ones...)

I think that the circumstances surrounding the 2008 election are still more or less the same, and somebody still challenges Clinton. Maybe edwards, but I don't think that he was really a viable candidate for 2008. Who takes Obama's place, then, and are they saavy enough to dominate the primaries as he did? I'm thinking that Bill Richardson plays a similar role to Obama, but doesn't do quite as well, and winds up VP on Hillary's ticket (he was a close supporter originally...), but that is an instinctive reaction. Butterflies may kill mcCain's comeback, in which case my guess would be... hmmm. Giuliani may now take the moderate wing, but this causes a reaction towards Huckabee... In the end, IMO Giuliani is just too much of a stretch to get the nomination, but Huckabee is a bit of a long shot, so maybe Romney to bridge the gap?
 
Like I said, I rarely look at this forum. So are there a lot of 2004 election what-ifs floating around? If so, accept my apologies.
 
Like I said, I rarely look at this forum. So are there a lot of 2004 election what-ifs floating around? If so, accept my apologies.

Actually, I don't recall a whole lot of 2004 election what if?'s recently. Their is a new timeline about Hillary Clinton running for President in 2004 though....

Anyway, to answear your question, I'm not sure President Clinton is an atomatic outcome for this situation. I personally think she might have been to polarizing to win the election, which could mean we might have President Mccain instead. Or Edwards,Romney or Richardson.
 
Like I said, I rarely look at this forum. So are there a lot of 2004 election what-ifs floating around? If so, accept my apologies.

not nearly as many as teh 2000 what ifs. but I'm a bit hesitant to deal in these PODs, and a lot of "Obama never elected" ideas get bounced around from time to time...
 
OK, then. Let's look at the immediate results. Obama (assuming he runs, which I think he would) would get a lot of people excited in certain parts of Illinois; he'd have that big sign over the expressway that would make visitors from Wisconsin and Indiana say to each other, "Does that say Osama"? (I was in Minnesota for this election and missed the deadline to file absentee, so this was what I thought when I visited home that autumn.) But in the end, Obama would likely lose to the popular incumbent and go back to Hyde Park, maybe to run for the state legislature again in 2006. But essentially, he's out of the picture, having lost both times he ran for the US Congress.

Meanwhile in Washington, there is one more Republican in the Senate for 2004-2010. He's a genuine moderate who violates the party line on occasion.

That's a start, at least.
 
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