If 9/11 hadn't happened?

[Col. Roosevelt]

How do you think politics, pop culture, and the Presidency of George W. Bush would've proceeded if 9/11 had either been stopped or somehow avoided? Would the 'feel good' laid back, "America is unstoppable" peaceful mindset which colored the 1990s and up to 2001 have continued?

[Thunderbird is the word]

I think that the 2000s would have resembled the 1920s, you'd have the housing bubble as per OTL only during peacetime. Bush would have been ousted in 2004 due to corruption. You'd hear a lot more about domestic issues and the left in the US would be focused more on some continuation the anti-globalization movement and anti-WTO protests. Culturally I don't think it would be all that different actually minus some of the iconography.

[Sumner 1868]

One very key affect would, as mentioned, be that the anti-globalization movement doesn't basically throw in the towel, and mass demonstrations, starting with Seattle and peaking at the 2000 IMF conference, would continue.

But the more obvious affect would be the Patriot Act, Homeland Security and PRISM do not exist, nor is torture a US policy. And with no fear of the world, if Bush tries to invade Iraq then the antiwar movement will likely be even bigger than OTL.

[The Arizonan]

Everyone would have realized that George W. Bush was a piece of s*** and he wouldn't have gotten reelected in 2004.