If you went into a coma for 6 months, and woke up to O'Malley vs. Gilmore...

[IceSpear]

a) Construct a scenario for how this would occur
b) What would be your reaction?

[Bojack Horseman]

A terrorist attack at two debate venues wipes out all the other candidates except O'Malley and Gilmore, both of whom were disqualified from the debates. I'd probably think the morphine hadn't worn off yet.

[Virginiá]

A prehistoric virus that is fatal only to presidential candidates with modest-to-high poll numbers is released from thawing permafrost and a combination of pro-life extremists and a gang of weaponized hipsters take out the rest of the candidates (except for O'Malley and Gilmore)

My reaction would be that, if O'Malley wins, things could actually be looking up for America, provided he gives most of his speeches shirtless.

[Figueira]

(a) There's suddenly a major scandal about a week from now that destroys Hillary Clinton's chances. She quickly drops out. It's a hotly contested battle between Sanders and O'Malley. The establishment gets behind O'Malley and he manages to barely eke out a victory.

Meanwhile, Trump destroys everyone in Iowa and New Hampshire while Gilmore does better than expected, causing everyone except Trump and Gilmore to drop out due to embarrassment. The media finally starts paying attention to Gilmore, and Gilmore manages to get all the anti-Trump vote behind him. It's another hotly contested battle, but Gilmore narrowly defeats Trump.

(b) IceSpear predicted this!

[°Leprechaun]

easy: both conventions are brokered convention (not a likely scenario, but neither is O'Malley v Gilmore)
If the brokered conventions picked them, obviously also not a likely scenario, but when life gives you lemons made lemonaid, and when life gives you lemonaid make lemons.

True, none of this is likely, but who would have predicted that Sanders would be doing so well or that Trump and Cruz would be leading the pack a year ago?

[°Leprechaun]

(a) There's suddenly a major scandal about a week from now that destroys Hillary Clinton's chances. She quickly drops out. It's a hotly contested battle between Sanders and O'Malley. The establishment gets behind O'Malley and he manages to barely eke out a victory.

Meanwhile, Trump destroys everyone in Iowa and New Hampshire while Gilmore does better than expected, causing everyone except Trump and Gilmore to drop out due to embarrassment. The media finally starts paying attention to Gilmore, and Gilmore manages to get all the anti-Trump vote behind him. It's another hotly contested battle, but Gilmore narrowly defeats Trump.

(b) IceSpear predicted this!

Not a bad scenario, come to think of it.

[Former Senator Haslam2020]

O'Malley somehow gets a surprise victory in Iowa, he gets a good showing in New Hampshire, second and wins South Carolina, loses Nevada but becomes the moderate choice against Sanders. It goes to a brokered convention, resulting in an O'Malley/Clinton ticket, Gilmore does good in a undercard debate, uses it to get 2% in Iowa. He then somehow wins New Hampshire and becomes the hawk-moderate choice. He picks Graham as VP, just for the hell of it.

Gilmore loses 360-178.

[Mr. Reactionary]

After months of being bullied by Trump in the debates, Jeb! Bush loses it, brings an AR-15, and kills all of the candidates and himself. Meanwhile Hillary gets indicted and Bernie Sanders is a Socialist.

[Absentee Voting Ghost of Ruin]

a) Construct a scenario for how this would occur

Clinton dropped out after being indicted, O'Malley got a surge of endorsements from Clinton backers, and Bernie had a major health scare. On the Republican side, Cruz, enraged at having had the nomination "stolen", detonates a bomb vest (disguised as body armor) while on stage with all the other possible candidates. Gilmore wasn't invited, and thus survives.

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My reaction: it's a pity we didn't get Sanders, but trading Trump for Gilmore may be more of a gain than losing Sanders for O'Malley was. It's going to be a dull primary season.

[SillyAmerican]

a) In a freak of nature, every other candidate somehow died along the way.
b) I'd hit myself on the head, in the hopes of putting myself under for another 6 months, thus avoiding the craziness that is the 2016 election cycle.

[Broken System]

The O'Malley story:

Clinton gets indicted and O'Malley is the only hope to stop Sanders. A majority of Clinton supporters switch to him. He wins the nomination.

The Gilmore story:

On January 28th, 2016, Gilmore has arguably the best debate ever by any politician, all in the undercard debate. He breaks 10% in the Iowa results and the strong 3rd/4th place finish propels him to victory in New Hampshire, finally uniting the establishment voters behind one candidate that they are comfortable standing behind. This victory was partially helped by an endorsement by Mitt Romney. Gilmore, having taken back most of the defected ex-establishment voters from Trump, leaves Trump weak and clinging onto conservative voters across the country. Cruz and Trump split the conservative vote and Gilmore comes out on top.

[EliteLX]

After months of being bullied by Trump in the debates, Jeb! Bush loses it, brings an AR-15, and kills all of the candidates and himself. Meanwhile Hillary gets indicted and Bernie Sanders is a Socialist.

Alright I laughed, lol.

Seems legit.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

1st reaction: WTF?
2nd reaction: I guess it's not that bad.

[Gustaf]

The O'Malley part is kind of fine, because all it takes is really Clinton disappearing from the race somehow for it to not be totally unreasonable.

Gilmore is another story...

[Lief 🗽]

I would ask to be placed back into the coma.

[Mike Thick]

A. Hillary dies, and O'Malley gets establishment support. I suppose that if Gilmore does something incredible that attracts a crapton of attention at the kiddie table debate and surges, it's almost possible.
B. No matter how bad it is, it could have been Trump.

[Fuzzy Bear]

I'd think that Barbara Eden really was a Genie, and one of these guys found her bottle on the beach.

[LLR]

a) Hillary crashes after suddenly becoming pro-life and anti-gun control, O'Malley gains her voters and establishment support.

Gilmore wins the replacement to the Iowa Caucuses, the National Rapid-fire Corn-eating Race and then wins NH too.

b) Rejoice

[Jyrki]

a)
Gilmore
After the next Iowan kiddie debate (he's in! For real!), Gilmore stays in the backstages during the main debate. A terrorist attack happens then and Gilmore saves the day.
Cruz throws a baby at a jihadist to protect himself, Rubio pisses his pants (he drank too much water...), Trump begs for life on his knees, Jeb tries to hide behind a little girl, Christie flees but stumbles and gets shot in the ass, Carson watches everything happen while doing nothing at all, Paul tries to argue about freedom with a djihadist and gets killed doing so, Kasich does nothing special or interesting. Gilmore (who served in the U.S. Army as a counterintelligence agent) then comes on the stage and knocks all out all the terrorists one by one on national television!
Hailed as a hero, he wins Iowa ahead of Huckabee and Santorum who split the religious vote. Kasich wins New Hampshire but Gilmore is a close second. The military in South Carolina helps Gilmore win there. Kasich says something extremely disparaging about conservatives and most of them unite behind Gilmore reluctantly. The southern states on Super Tuesday give him more momentum and he takes the nomination against an opposition bitterly divided between Kasich and Huckabee.
O'Malley
Hillary gets recorded on a smartphone saying "If they send me another check, I'll change my position on that." She gives 94693736 different explanations in the following weeks. Sanders wins Iowa easily with O'Malley finishing second. Then, in a JFK-style conspiracy, Sanders gets shot and killed! The Bernie voters unite behind O'Malley to defeat Hillary in a long fight.

b)
I would first be quite depressed but I would rejoice a little when O'Malley wins the presidency after a lackluster campaign from a very unconvincing Gilmore.

[Lexii, harbinger of chaos and sexual anarchy]

it could've turned out a lot worse

[Leinad]

"DOCTOR!!! What the [fuddruckers] is this madness?!?!?" asked a bewildered Leinad, still at the hospital.

"Hey, Leinad, you're out of your coma!" replied Dr. Icanothinkov-Names (he's half-Russian--that's totally a legitimate Russian name!) as he entered the room. "And...on the...internet. How did you get that laptop?"

"Never mind. I'm looking at political news, and...O'Malley vs. Gilmore?!?"

"Oh that. Yeah..."

Just then, Dr. Icanothinkov-Names was interrupted by a slew of friends, family, and assorted loved ones. "Yay, you're alive!" "Thank God!" "Congrats on not dying!"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm alive, whatever. O'Malley vs. Gilmore...WHAT IS GOING ON?!?"

"Well," replied the good doctor, "that's a long story. And it goes like--"

"No, don't break into song. Please, just, no."

Slightly dejected, Dr. Icanothinkov-Names put his banjo down, and continued. "I'll go Gilmore first. It all started in the kiddy table debate."

"The one before Iowa?"

"That's the one. Gilmore replied to every question with an Earth, Wind, and Fire song. Therefore, he was the talk of the media for the next week. The polling boost from his name being mentioned was enough to put him to 15% in most polls."

"But 15% doesn't win the nomination. How did he do that?"

"Strategy. One by one elimination, starting with the establishment. First, he took out Jeb!."

"How?"

"Paid an operative to shoot rubber-bands at him in the debate. Trump made fun of him for it, and everyone laughed at poor Jeb!, who then dropped out. Next, he bribed Christie with a copy of Bridge Simulator 06"--I don't know, that's probably a real computer game (I could've gone with a fat joke, but that would've been too easy)--"but before Christie's public endorsement, used his campaign to attack Rubio as a 'Tea Party extremist'--thus forcing Rubio to alienate everyone in desperate defense of himself. And most of that establishment vote went to Gilmore--"

"Wait, what about Kasich?"

"He literally bored a New Hampshire voter to death, and was arrested for manslaughter charges. Anyway, Gilmore narrowly beat Trump in New Hampshire, which caused the Donald to have a nervous breakdown and think he was running in the Democratic Party. In the pre-South Carolina debate he advocated for 'marriage equality,' 'reproductive freedom,' 'free college,' and 'finally, finally, a path to citizenship for undocumented Americans!' He is promptly booed for nearly 10 minutes, and his poll numbers took a nose-dive--WHOOSH." The doctor makes a hand motion suggesting something diving off something.

"What happened in Iowa?"

"Cruz won, Trump a close second, Gilmore third."

Leinad paused, followed by a sigh. "Tell it to me straight, Doc...what happened to Rand?"

"Who?"

"Damn, that was worse than I thought it would be..."

"Gilmore easily won South Carolina, and at that point his national polls were well over 60%, Carson was in a distant second. Gilmore dominated Super Tuesday, and never looked back."

"Wait, what happened to Cruz?"

"Oh, he spontaneously belted out the Canadian National Anthem as his closing statement in the South Carolina debate."

"Hmmm...now, how did O'Malley win?"

"Well, Hillary got indicted, a--"

"No! That's too easy!"

"But it happened."

"Damn. That's just...a lack of creativity." Leinad sighed again. "Okay, you can keep going."

"Bernie's campaign accidently sent out Larry David to do a debate. It was hilarious, but viewed as a bad move. O'Malley was the front-runner from there on--he coasted to victory."

"Any interesting third-party candidates?"

"Jon Huntsman!"

"Really?"

"Ha, no way. That's silly."

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

Hillary gets indicted with multiple felonies for mishandling classified information and pay to play involving the Clinton Foundation. She drops out of the race. The establishment realizes it's too late to get someone else to run, and quickly backs O'Malley. In a 2 person race, O'Malley is able to win over just enough Bernie supporters to narrowly win the nomination. As for the Republican side, there is a terrorist attack that manages to kill every Republican at an event, except for Gilmore who wasn't there.