Barack Obama (D) vs. George Allen (R) in 2012 in a Gore-wins-in-2000-scenario
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  Barack Obama (D) vs. George Allen (R) in 2012 in a Gore-wins-in-2000-scenario
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Author Topic: Barack Obama (D) vs. George Allen (R) in 2012 in a Gore-wins-in-2000-scenario  (Read 664 times)
Californiadreaming
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« on: August 01, 2016, 06:12:16 PM »

Here is the scenario:

Starting from September 2000, Al Gore begins spends a bit more time in Florida in comparison to real life. He also begins talking about the good economy in 2000 and about his role in helping to create this prosperity as the incumbent Vice President. As a result of this additional campaigning and better message, Al Gore performs slightly better in Florida on Election Night and ends up with a lead of several hundred votes after an automatic machine recount is conducted. After additional manual recounts (which include the overvotes) are conducted, Gore's lead in Florida increases, with Gore being certified as the winner of Florida by 1,248 votes. After launching some lawsuits challenging Al Gore's victory, George W. Bush realizes that his fight for Florida is hopeless and thus concedes the U.S. Presidency to Al Gore in mid-December 2000.

During his Presidency, Al Gore successfully implements some version of his Social Security "lock-box" proposal. In addition to this, after 9/11 occurs, President Gore invades Afghanistan, overthrows the Taliban, kills Osama Bin Laden, and installs a democratic Northern Alliance-led government in Afghanistan. Meanwhile, President Gore establishes closer ties with Iran (due to Iran's and the U.S.'s mutual hostility towards both the Taliban and Saddam Hussein) and uses the post-9/11 international goodwill towards the U.S. to revive and strengthen the sanctions regime against Iraq. In this scenario, North Korea is kept in check, Libya eventually (say, in the mid-2000s) agrees to give up both its WMDs and its nuclear weapons program, and U.S.-Israel relations significantly deteriorate during the Second Intifada in this scenario (but eventually begin improving after the end of this Intifada in 2005). Also, President Gore uses his post-9/11 popularity boost in the U.S. to successfully push through both some middle class tax cuts and some additional environmental regulations and protections through the Republican-controlled U.S. Congress. (For the record, due to 9/11, the Democrats win back control of the U.S. Congress in 2002 in this scenario.)

As a result of the job creation starting from 2003, President Gore narrowly defeats John McCain in 2004 and thus narrowly gets re-elected. As a result of President Gore's prudent fiscal management, the U.S. government continues to have surpluses all of the way up to 2008, when the 2008 recession and financial crisis causes the U.S. government to have its first deficit since the 1990s. In the 2008 Democratic primaries, incumbent VP Joe Lieberman is defeated by Hillary Clinton, who in turn proceeds to lose the general election to Republican Senator George Allen (the winner of the 2008 Republican primaries). By the end of President Gore's second term in January 2009, the U.S. has mostly withdrawn from Afghanistan but had to keep some of its troops behind in order to protect Afghanistan against a resurgent Taliban. Also, by this time, the international sanctions regime on Iraq once again begins collapsing.

When U.S. President George Allen takes office, the U.S. unemployment rate is 7.6% and rapidly increasing. Initially, President Allen implements a policy of austerity (as well as a policy of tax cuts for everyone, including the wealthy) and thus causes the Republicans to suffer an extremely massive and humiliating defeat and to lose both houses of the U.S. Congress in 2010. Afterwards, President Allen adopts Bill Clinton's post-1994 policy of triangulation, but in reverse, To elaborate on this, President Allen cooperates with the Democratic Congressional leadership to pass an extremely massive stimulus package and comprehensive immigration reform (which includes amnesty and an eventual path to citizenship for most illegal immigrants in the U.S.). In addition to this, President Allen also expands on President Gore's previous legacy of environmental protection. Normally, this might result in a serious GOP primary challenge to President Allen in 2012, but the outbreak of the Arab Spring in 2011 along with the improving U.S. economy (unemployment peaked at 11.1% in early 2011 and then declined to 9.3% by November 2012) caused Republicans to rally behind their Commander-in-Chief. In regards to the Arab Spring, President Allen largely sat on the sidelines. He allowed Muammar Gaddafi to crush the Libyan rebels and to massacre them in Benghazi while initially giving Bashar al-Assad a free hand to crush the Syrian rebels. Meanwhile, Saddam Hussein survived the initial shock of the Arab Spring in 2011 since Iraqi Shiite memories of Saddam Hussein's previous brutality towards them caused Iraqi Shiites to avoid launching another large-scale rebellion against Saddam Hussein (indeed, think of Algeria during the Arab Spring in real life). In turn, this emboldened Saddam Hussein to actively and openly fund the Sunni Syrian rebels in the hopes that they will topple Assad and thus eliminate the Iranian "encirclement" of Iraq. Indeed, Saddam Hussein even went as far as to send Iraqi troops (officially as "volunteers") to help the Sunni Syrian rebels. Once Iran found out about these Iraqi moves in mid-2012, Iran launched some limited border excursions into Iraq and warned that a new Iran-Iraq War might soon occur if Saddam Hussein refused to stop helping the (Sunni) Syrian rebels. However, Saddam Hussein thought that Iran was bluffing due to his belief that the Iranian regime wouldn't dare send many of its young people to fight his army just a couple of years after many of these young people protested against President Ahmadinejad's controversial re-election (in 2009). Anyway, the situation significantly escalates by November 2012 but doesn't descend into all-out war between Iran and Iraq yet. However, this situation is sufficiently troubling for U.S. President George Allen to place U.S. troops in the Persian Gulf and in the Mediterranean on high alert.

Meanwhile, U.S. Senator Barack Obama wins the 2012 Democratic nomination in this scenario and runs as a New Deal-style Democrat against President Allen. To elaborate on this, Senator Obama criticizes the New Democratic approach of Presidents Clinton and Gore (which ultimately resulted in the 2008 recession and financial crisis) as well as the austerity policies of President Allen during his first two years in office. Senator Obama also argues that he can make the U.S. economy recover faster due to the fact that he is more supportive of things such as large-scale government spending than President Allen is (in spite of the fact that President Allen previously signed a large-scale stimulus package, et cetera). Meanwhile, President Allen acknowledges that he has made mistakes during his first two years in office but argues that he has already learned from these mistakes, that the U.S. economy is gradually moving in the right track (with unemployment being 7.6% in January 2009, 11.1% in early 2011, and 9.3% in November 2012), and the U.S. Presidency certainly isn't a place for on-the-job training--especially considering the current extremely high and rapidly escalating tensions between Saddam Hussein's Iraq and Iran.

Anyway, what exactly would the outcome of the 2012 U.S. Presidential election be in this scenario? Smiley
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Californiadreaming
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« Reply #1 on: August 01, 2016, 06:13:09 PM »

Also, I'm sorry for the extremely long amounts of text that you will have to read here! Sad
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Californiadreaming
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« Reply #2 on: August 01, 2016, 06:28:12 PM »

Also, here are my own thoughts on this:

George Allen/Mitt Romney (R): 52.08% PV; 326 EVs
Barack Obama/Evan Bayh (D): 46.11% PV; 212 EVs



Basically, the recovering economy in 2011-2012 (in spite of President Allen's previous misguided austerity policies in 2009-2010) along with the rapidly escalating and extremely high tensions between Saddam Hussein's Iraq and Iran cause most Americans to agree with President Allen's argument that the U.S. Presidency isn't a place for-on-the job training--especially given the current situation in the Middle East.
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anthonyjg
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« Reply #3 on: August 01, 2016, 06:59:54 PM »


In your scenario it sounds like Allen's biggest argument is that he is ready to be president but I don't think Allen could say that he made mistakes in his first term and then argue that Obama doesn't have enough experience to be ready on day one. Additionally, the current situation and Obama's more liberal policies would still allow for a 2008 hope and change like campaign which would be a huge advantage over someone as boring as Allen.
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Kingpoleon
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« Reply #4 on: August 01, 2016, 08:00:55 PM »


338: President George Allen/Vice President Norm Coleman - 51.8%
200: Governor Barack Obama/Senator Russell Feingold - 44.4%
Others - 2.8%
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Californiadreaming
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« Reply #5 on: August 01, 2016, 09:18:32 PM »


In your scenario it sounds like Allen's biggest argument is that he is ready to be president but I don't think Allen could say that he made mistakes in his first term and then argue that Obama doesn't have enough experience to be ready on day one. Additionally, the current situation and Obama's more liberal policies would still allow for a 2008 hope and change like campaign which would be a huge advantage over someone as boring as Allen.
Frankly, my argument here is this:

1. The U.S. economy has already began recovering.
2. Allen's newfound centrism helps him with moderate voters.
3. The current Iran-Iraq crisis helps Allen because he has more foreign policy experience than President Obama.
4. By adopting some of the Democrats' agenda, Allen weakens Obama's claim that electing Democrats is necessary in order to adopt and implement liberal economic policies.
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MATTROSE94
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« Reply #6 on: August 01, 2016, 09:30:51 PM »

Also, here are my own thoughts on this:

George Allen/Mitt Romney (R): 52.08% PV; 326 EVs
Barack Obama/Evan Bayh (D): 46.11% PV; 212 EVs



Basically, the recovering economy in 2011-2012 (in spite of President Allen's previous misguided austerity policies in 2009-2010) along with the rapidly escalating and extremely high tensions between Saddam Hussein's Iraq and Iran cause most Americans to agree with President Allen's argument that the U.S. Presidency isn't a place for-on-the job training--especially given the current situation in the Middle East.
Seems about right. With regards to the rising tensions in the Middle East in this scenario, would you feel that President Allen would be more likely to support either Iraq, Iran, or neither. Personally, I feel that President Allen may decide to support Iraq if Saddam Hussien promises to allow the US to install Reza Pahlavi (the Shah of Iran's son) into power if the Iraqi army is able to successfully remove the Iranian government from power.
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Kingpoleon
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« Reply #7 on: August 01, 2016, 09:52:40 PM »

If New Mexico votes R, does that mean that Hispanic voters only narrowly vote D and Democrats do slightly better with whites?
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anthonyjg
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« Reply #8 on: August 01, 2016, 11:17:03 PM »


In your scenario it sounds like Allen's biggest argument is that he is ready to be president but I don't think Allen could say that he made mistakes in his first term and then argue that Obama doesn't have enough experience to be ready on day one. Additionally, the current situation and Obama's more liberal policies would still allow for a 2008 hope and change like campaign which would be a huge advantage over someone as boring as Allen.
Frankly, my argument here is this:

1. The U.S. economy has already began recovering.
2. Allen's newfound centrism helps him with moderate voters.
3. The current Iran-Iraq crisis helps Allen because he has more foreign policy experience than President Obama.
4. By adopting some of the Democrats' agenda, Allen weakens Obama's claim that electing Democrats is necessary in order to adopt and implement liberal economic policies.
Ok, you make a good argument. After reading your reply and rereading your original post I will concede that the election would be much closer than I originally had it (probably flip VA, NC, FL, and IN), but I still think that Obama would win. Foreign policy would help Allen. The economy is recovering so it wouldn't hurt Allen, but it isn't growing at a rate that would really help him either. However, I think President Allen would still have a couple of big problems in his reelection campaign.
1. Allen's centrism could end up hurting him in the same way Romney was hurt by being painted as a flip-flopper for his pivot towards the center.
2. Allen's tax cuts on the rich appears to be very unpopular, as shown by the midterm results, and would be harmful to his reelection chances especially in a country still reacting to the height of Occupy Wall Street.
3. Allen is very socially conservative and his stances could hurt him among young, independent, and non-religious voters.
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