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Biaggi’s Other Opium Den

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Ted Kennedy, David Dinkins, and the 1968 Election That Paved the Way For American Socialism:

Presidents of the United States:
1969-1977: Ted Kennedy (Democratic)
1968 def. (with Dan K. Moore) Richard Nixon (Republican), George Wallace (American Independent)
1972 def. (with Dan K. Moore) Robert Taft Jr. (Republican), James Gavin (Non-Partisan)
1977-1985: Norbert Tiemann (Republican)
1976 def. (with Lamar Alexander) Dan K. Moore (Democratic)
1980 def. (with Lamar Alexander) George McGovern (Democratic), Meldrim Thompson (National Conservative)
1985-1989: Donald Fraser (Democratic)
1984 def. (with Michael Kendall) Lamar Alexander (Republican), John K. Singlaub (National Conservative)
1989-1993: Lawrence Hogan (Republican)
1988 def. (with Wheelock Whitney) Donald Fraser (Democratic), Larry McDonald (National Conservative), Walt Brown (Independent Democratic)
1993-2001: David Dinkins (Democratic)
1992 def. (with Chet Edwards) Lawrence Hogan (Republican), Pat Robertson (National Conservative)
1996 def. (with Larry Sabato) Chet Edwards (Republican), Pat Robertson (National Conservative)

Leaders of the Soviet Union:
1964-1969: Leonid Brezhnev[1] / Alexi Kosgyn / Nikolai Podgorny (CPSU Troika)
1969-1974: Alexi Kosgyn / Nikolai Podgorny / Mikhail Suslov (CPSU Troika)
1974-1980: Alexi Kosgyn (CPSU)
1980-1984: Yuri Andropov (CPSU)
1984-2001: Vitaly Fedorchuk (CPSU)




[1] Assassinated
 
Blackentheborg said:
I'm always surprised nobody uses Morton Downey Jr. more often. He's like Trump and Jerry Springer met in a blender.
Click to expand...

To be fair, his longest-lasting legacy is having a Koopaling from Mario named after him (and real talk, since they're all ostensibly named and patterned after performers, why was Morton, the one who resembles a Kiss bandmate, named after a talk show host?)
 
Heading into the 1976 election, the suicide of Richard Nixon loomed heavy over the population of the United States. Incumbent president Nelson Rockefeller led a country filled with a looming disgust at the government after years of scandal, war, and death, and he privately blamed himself for Nixon's suicide, as after he replaced Spiro Agnew as Vice President he refused to commit himself to a full pardon of Nixon. Despite this, the country trudged along. Nelson Rockefeller decided to run with an interesting strategy, hoping to unite Democrats and Republicans of all stripes in a "National Union" coalition, appointing Hubert Humphrey as Vice President in replacement of himself, and appointing a largely non-partisan grouping of political figures to his cabinet. Not only that, but after Rockefeller defeated Ronald Reagan and (tacitly White House-aligned) John Conlan in the Republican primary, he held a National Union Party convention in lieu of the Republican one, a movement that angered the conservative wing of the Republican party so much, they walked into the carcass of the American Party and nominated Ronald Reagan for president, despite some of Reagan's earlier reservations, and paired him with southern conservative William Westmoreland.

Meanwhile, in the Democratic Party, the formation of the National Union Party decimated any hold the conservative and moderate wings of the Democratic Party could once claim. Democrats, increasingly led by the left wing, played for a repeat of the 1972 campaign, and nominated a man many considered to be a left wing radical, Fred Harris, who campaigned around the nation in a Volkswagon and called for "economic democracy". His selection of Jerry Brown for the position of vice president did little to dispel any notion that the ticket was "eccentric" to say the least. Labor and business leaders from the Democratic Party filtered out as Harris and his supporters called for a Second Bill of Rights, and helped form the backbone of the National Union Party.

The general election was originally considered uninteresting. Americans were too beaten down to back the more radical Harris or Reagan, and despite some economic stagnation, many agreed that he had been a solid and formidable leader in the wake of Richard Nixon's suicide. That was, of course, until the assassination of Ronald Reagan. While Reagan was campaigning in his home state of California, he was shot and killed by Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme, a member of the Manson family. The assassination was not only a blow to the conservative movement in general, as Reagan was their most charismatic and popular leader, but a blow to their 1976 campaign. Reagan's replacement with the cold, calculating general Westmoreland hurt the conservative movement, as did the entrance of Democratic primary candidate Ellen McCormack as an independent, who cut into their northern conservative vote with her near single-issue "pro-life" campaign.

In the end, all the shouting didn't seem to matter, as Rockefeller brushed aside his divided and radical opposition, and won himself a second term in office in the shadow of one of the most watershed moments in American history.
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However, despite the major National Union victory in the 1976 election, the newly-formed party would suffer early in Rockefeller's term. Hubert Humphrey, long known as an icon of liberal politics, who turned into an establishment figure towards the end of his life, would lose his final battle to cancer, which he had largely kept quiet from the rest of the country during the 1976 campaign. Humphrey would die in May 1977, forcing Rockefeller to select a second vice president in three years. Rockefeller would replace Humphrey with his Secretary of State, the more conservative Robert Ellsworth, in the hopes of placating conservative critics of his administration. However, Rockefeller would himself succumb to the final battle, as he passed away due to a heart attack in early 1978, and Ellsworth would find himself in an increasingly unstable office.

While Americans found themselves in an increasingly unstable situation in the national executive branch, state governments found themselves with increasing power and confusion. The creation of the National Union Party had created divided Democratic and Republican parties across the nation, many of which collapsed and were replaced with newer parties that represented new factions and beliefs in the United States.

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In Wisconsin Lee Dreyfus, the chancellor of the University of Wisconsin defeated a split left wing on his newly-created "Sovereignty" Party. While many described the campaign's victory as a "fluke", Dreyfus's strong support for a less powerful federal government and increasing power for the states became an increasingly popular rallying cry across the United States, beginning a so-called "regionalist" movement of the 1980s and 1990s, which sought to diverge the United States from its ideological battles, and instead lead a fight to shrink the federal government. Dreyfus would become the blueprint for the movement, although ironically he would do so outside of Wisconsin, as the state rejected him in 1982, and he brought his regionalist politic west of the Mississippi River, which would grow the movement even further.
 
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