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Chains of Consequences: the Perils of Choosing a Veep

Small typo in the caption for John Tyler where he is described as "the first ice president". Unless we're giving each President and Vice President Pokemon style types in which case please tell me more.
Him being cryogenically frozen feels like it fits with the 'surviving grandchildren' thing at least...
 
Him being cryogenically frozen feels like it fits with the 'surviving grandchildren' thing at least...

"We've discovered a steampunk cryogenic lab with former Presidents frozen, we can thaw them out safely!"

"Excellent! This will help bring the country together, which Presidents?"

"John Tyler, Millard Fillmore, Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan."

"Let's leave them there."
 
Hey, I'm actually early in reading and commenting on one of these articles.

Evan Bayh (a younger Indiana Senator who ultimately chose to retire from politics unexpectedly in 2010)

God, imagine a world where Bayh was VP for 8 years and a plausible candidate for President in 2016, instead of ignobly running away from certain loss in 2010, and then ignobly stealing the nominating in 2016 because he thought he could win while still fucking losing.

Oh yeah, and Biden would have been President Pro Tempore of the Senate for two years instead of Leahy. And maybe even still in the Senate (2014 would probably be a wash, but who knows if he would have left in 2020 the same way he came in 1972, being beaten by a younger, more liberal candidate).

I own a compilation of Peanutss trips from the 1990s (but published in the 2000s) with an introduction explaining that younger readers might find some references dated, such as a mention of Joe Biden. How history can change!

Odd type and formatting on Peanuts there.

I think after his failed Senate race, and his multiple failed Presidential races, Jerry Brown was seen much the same way. I doubt anyone immediately after 1992 would have thought he'd make a political comeback as mayor of Oakland, then state Attorney General, and finally as the longest serving Governor in California history.

The first two presidents to die in office were both elected from the Whig Party, who opposed the Democrats in the 1830s-50s period. William Henry Harrison and Zachary Taylor, both war-hero generals, died early in their first term and left the presidency to vice-presidents who were regarded as inadequate.

Given how the Whig party in particular was cursed, I imagine Winfield Scott would have found a way to fall off his horse or something had he won in 1852, and left(...who was his VP pick again? *googles*) William Alexander Graham, a...future Confederate States Senator, to fuck things up like Tyler and Fillmore...(wow, this joke worked even better than when I started writing it).

Once in office, Johnson’s lack of ideological commonality with the Republicans in Congress and indifference or hostility to the freed slaves in the South led to his attempted impeachment.

It was hostility. Andrew Johnson was a mean, drunken, near-illiterate little cuss that had no place for blacks in his white populist America.

Richard Nixon (eventually) resigned after Watergate in 1974, but his VP Spiro Agnew had already resigned for another scandal, so the presidency went to newly-appointed VP and former House Speaker Gerald Ford.

Funny enough, Ford was never Speaker of the House. He was the Republican House Minority Leader when he was appointed (by the Democratic Congress) to be Vice-President (being deemed as sufficiently trustworthy by them, and not a Nixon hack).

I say funny enough as, when I was a kid, I made this mistake too, mixing up fact 1 (the Speaker is second in line for POTUS), with fact 2 (Nixon's Vice President, Angew, resigned), fact 3 (Ford was a member of the House), and fact 3 (Ford became President). Somehow I forgot or didn't register the fact he became Vice-President.

Note that the current year also ends in a 0, if anyone had any more reason to put weight on Joe Biden’s choice of vice-president...

I'm pretty certain Reagan defeated the curse, and Bush doubled up on it. Although both did have health scares, so we'll see what puts Biden out of commission for a time.
 
I'm pretty certain Reagan defeated the curse, and Bush doubled up on it. Although both did have health scares, so we'll see what puts Biden out of commission for a time.
Reagan and Bush both had assassination attempts, they just weren't successful (and the one on Bush, in Georgia-the-country-not-the-state, didn't get anywhere near as close).
 
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Odd type and formatting on Peanuts there.

When you copy and paste an italics word into wix, it doesn't recognise the spaces on either side.

So if someone writes 'compilation of Peanuts strips' and then I copy and paste that into the draft it comes out as 'compilation ofPeanutsstrips' and then I have to add the spaces manually, hence it being in the wrong place.

Will fix as soon as Wix comes back from maintenance and allows me too
 
Despite his age, there was some speculation Biden might run in 2016, which would make him a number of incumbent vice-presidents to try to make the leap to the presidency

This should presumably be 'one of a number'.
 
When you copy and paste an italics word into wix, it doesn't recognise the spaces on either side.

So if someone writes 'compilation of Peanuts strips' and then I copy and paste that into the draft it comes out as 'compilation ofPeanutsstrips' and then I have to add the spaces manually, hence it being in the wrong place.

Will fix as soon as Wix comes back from maintenance and allows me too
Didn't realise that - is there a way I can format it to make it easier for you?
 
You're an amazing bunch of proof readers, I must say. That's four mistakes I didn't catch while reading over it.

All fixed now and thank you for all doing my job for me, much appreciated.

I demand we all get writing credits, or I'll start a union and sue. (Unions can sue, write right?)
 
You're an amazing bunch of proof readers, I must say. That's four mistakes I didn't catch while reading over it.

All fixed now and thank you for all doing my job for me, much appreciated.
I guess the solution to get more feedback is more articles about US politics. Which is convenient, as I can do another one next time (this one was meant to be it, but I ended up having to lay too much background and changed it into a more general topic).
 
One thing left out is that while the Vice-Presidency was the aforementioned 'bucket of piss', up until fairly recently, that has not been true in the past three decades: starting with Al Gore, but continued with both Cheney and Biden, the Vice-Presidents have had enormous influence and an important role to play in the administration. Pence might be seen as a reversal to the norm but it's more likely than not that this is just Trump being very irregular by the standards set by the recent presidents and unable to trust anyone not him or his family. This is reflected in Vice-Presidents running more and more for the Presidency after having spent two terms operating under another, with only Cheney not doing so because he knew he was so massively unpopular.

So choosing a Vice-President is indeed important even if they never get called upon to succeed to the Presidency or decide a tie vote in the Senate and it will be especially so because Biden knows what the job entails.
 
One thing left out is that while the Vice-Presidency was the aforementioned 'bucket of piss', up until fairly recently, that has not been true in the past three decades: starting with Al Gore, but continued with both Cheney and Biden, the Vice-Presidents have had enormous influence and an important role to play in the administration. Pence might be seen as a reversal to the norm but it's more likely than not that this is just Trump being very irregular by the standards set by the recent presidents and unable to trust anyone not him or his family. This is reflected in Vice-Presidents running more and more for the Presidency after having spent two terms operating under another, with only Cheney not doing so because he knew he was so massively unpopular.

So choosing a Vice-President is indeed important even if they never get called upon to succeed to the Presidency or decide a tie vote in the Senate and it will be especially so because Biden knows what the job entails.
I did allude to that in the article, but the point is that this is an informal and administration-specific model rather than something which has a constitutional existence. So in that regard it's more of a British approach to an office's role.
 
One thing that I find interesting is that I've yet to see much commentary on regional geographic balance this year, but a hell of a lot on the need for Biden to nominate a woman, and now specifically a black woman to the ticket.

Specific swing states yes, but nothing like some of the old historic commentary (e.g northern Democrats paired with southern Democrats, New England Republicans with Mid-westerners/Californians).

Kind of makes sense now that electoral coalitions are now so much more demographic than geographic; and while the whole 2004 Blue State/Red State map feels very dated, anything approaching a 50-state landslide is unthinkable. Hence parties can think of locking down Virginia/Minnesota/suburban women, but not so much attempt a whole nation appeal.
 
One thing that I find interesting is that I've yet to see much commentary on regional geographic balance this year, but a hell of a lot on the need for Biden to nominate a woman, and now specifically a black woman to the ticket.

Specific swing states yes, but nothing like some of the old historic commentary (e.g northern Democrats paired with southern Democrats, New England Republicans with Mid-westerners/Californians).

Kind of makes sense now that electoral coalitions are now so much more demographic than geographic; and while the whole 2004 Blue State/Red State map feels very dated, anything approaching a 50-state landslide is unthinkable. Hence parties can think of locking down Virginia/Minnesota/suburban women, but not so much attempt a whole nation appeal.

Geography, sometimes called 'diversity' at the time, used to be a significant factor in both presidential politics and supreme court appointments, but it hasn't been a big factor in selection for a long time now. Probably the last presidential nominee who made geography a big factor was Dukakis with Bentsen, and that didn't translate in any relevant way. Kerry as well perhaps, and the same applies.

In step with the development of the role in recent decades there's been a significant growth in 'what a nominee can bring in government' as a factor in selection rather than bald electoral considerations, which was a big factor in the selection of Gore, Cheney and Biden.
 
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