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Editor says, what if Nixon's dirty tricks had been exposed a decade earlier? Part 2. Please note that the opinions expressed in this post do not necessarily reflect the views of the author(s).
This story was published in the November 2011 edition of Changing the Times Magazine.
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In 1968, on this day the 33rd Governor of California Ronald Wilson Reagan announced his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination. continues from Part 1
A Thousand Days, Part 2The reaction of his opponent, Vice President Hubert Humphrey was to issue an apocalyptic warning that "the very future of liberalism in America is in question!". But in reality Reagan had only emerged as the anti-liberal candidate after his predecessors (Barry Goldwater and Richard Nixon) had both decided against a second run for the White House.
Instead, he choose George Romney as his running mate and between them they would easily win by a landslide, receiving 347 votes in the electoral college (including five states that third party candidate George Wallace was hoping to win).
The Democrat Party Convention would be torn apart by division between patriots and anti-war protestors. This conflict in the party might have been resolved days before the election if full details of the "secret plan" to end the war in Vietnam had been fully disclosed. Because Lyndon Johnson called a halt to the bombing of North Vietnam, hoping to swing the anti-war vote behind Humphrey, and also impose a de facto decision upon his presidential decision. But it was Reagan's intention to resume the bombing of North Vietnam, and hand the military full control of the management of the conflict. He was absolutely convinced that the war in Vietnam could still be won.
Entry posted by Todayinah Editor
© Alternate Historian, 2004-.Story Tags
Permalinks: Post, Day. Browse Thread: Politicians Source: Enter Stage Right Labels: Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, 1968, California, Presidency.
~ Reagan would've been all over the Vietnam War, too (if he could have gotten elected with anti-war sentiment as it was). Could've gone so forwardly that instead of Nixon's opening of China in OTL, we'd have gone to war with 'em.
~ Comment from Alan Abrahomovich: It seems we're not up to alternate Nixons dirty tricks. I cant see Reagan wiining hands down over Humphrey. In our universe Humphrey almost caught Nixon to make it close after being behind after Chicago. Reagan was considered too right wing for the USA then.
~ Where's Nixon's discrediting? See the link to Part 1. Lies about Pat Brown, truth about John F Kennedy, both of which he used in smear campaigns in 60 and 62, hence his absence from the 68 race Humhrey=-Reagan-about 50-50 if Wallace pulled out. Interesting the source article makes a different calculation
~ I'm not sure if Reagan had the chops yet for a run for POTUS, although Governor of California's not a bad preparation.
~ Reagan actually did run in '68, you know. He got nowhere. Even Republicans had a hard time taking him seriously as a presidential candidate at that time. It was only later, after he'd had two full terms as governor of Caalifornia and hadn't sunk the state--and after Republicans began really seething with bitterness over Nixon's downfall--that RR came to be seen as a credible candidate. Then, of course, in 1980, he was able to exploit anger at Jimmy Carter and Iran.
© Today in Alternate History, 2013-. All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
