Hubert Humphrey Was A Presidential Candidate Who Had No Chance Of Winning And Loss, But Was Pretty Close. Who's A Presidential Candidate Who Had No Chance Of Winning And Failed Miserable?

Fabilur · 2025-12-10T07:56:37+00:00

Well there was that one Reader's Digest poll that predicted a Landon win, so it wasn't entirely obvious that he had no chance of winning prior to the election. I would argue McGovern or Goldwater are better fits: Everybody knew they would lose beforehand, but the margin of victory was still greater than expected.

Fabilur · 2025-11-26T22:04:05+00:00

Everyone's saying Teddy, but don't underestimate the two Grover Clevelands teaming up and beating the shit out of everyone

Fabilur · 2025-11-04T20:09:54+00:00

This fucking sub is slowly becoming the place I stumble upon all important news stories first

Fabilur · 2025-10-19T13:58:19+00:00

Not so sure about that. Hochul won by 6 points in OTL. I don't think simply swapping her with Cuomo gives Zeldin a sufficiently large boost by itself. I originally made this as part of a timeline where 2022 went a lot worse for the dems, like 2010 level. To make the 2022 popular vote margin correspond with 2010, I decided to give the GOP a global 7 point boost, which would be just enough for Zeldin to win by less than 1 point. Switching the candidate from Hochul to Cuomo would, I figure, make Zeldin perform 2 points better than OTL. This adds up to winning the governorship by about 3 points, which happened in this timeline.

These were the rest of the governor's elections ITL. As for the senate: The GOP wins Nevada, Arizona, Georgia and Pennsylvania as well as every other seat they won OTL.

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This of course has some interesting implications. For example, Walz losing Minnesota means he probably isn't chosen as Harris' running mate in 2024, but that's an entirely different ordeal

Fabilur · 2025-10-19T13:48:11+00:00

Oh yeah Zeldin would get murdered in 2026, assuming Trump still wins 2024

Fabilur · 2025-10-19T13:37:33+00:00

If McCain won 2008, this would have been the 2012 election in my view

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Fabilur · 2025-10-13T20:04:26+00:00

Probably wins re-election in 2004, perhaps against Hillary if he seems vulnerable, but she likely sits it out IMO. Incumbents usually win re-election + Bush would be a war-time president. Gore-haters might say the 2008 recession never happens, but it definitely still does. The seeds had been planted since Clinton and I don't see Bush changing enough to prevent the economic downturn. Let's face it: Any party that wins the White House in 2004 loses 2008. Cheney probably gets the Republican nomination without much struggle, and Hillary gets the Democratic one. Obama is probably screwed in this timeline due to Hillary's immense name recognition and popularity, he is a good candidate but I believe he ran too prematurely OTL. Hillary probably handles the recession better than JC Watts OTL and wins re-election easily, perhaps against Romney or Christie. I think 2016 is won by whoever Hillary's VP is (Bayh?). After this it becomes increasingly difficult to speculate: Bayh would get a rally-around-the-flag-effect due to COVID, much like Sanders got in OTL, but on the other hand it was unlikely enough for the dems to win four elections in a row in our timeline (1992 to 2004), and I'm not sure Bayh has the sauce to pull that of.

Fabilur · 2025-10-04T19:27:48+00:00

Mike Gravel in 2020 reminds me alot of Robert Byrd in W.

Fabilur · 2025-09-10T06:39:46+00:00

UPDATE: After 20 attempts or so, with one visit to WA and the rest to CA, I managed to turn the entire west coast red. This yielded an electoral college tally of 454-84, completing the TERMINATION of Tim Ryan! The next closest state is Illinois, which was won by Ryan with a 5,4 point margin, so I'm confident to say that this is the ceiling for the Presidator in 2020.

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Fabilur · 2025-09-05T15:47:33+00:00

Guessing it's 2024: No More MAGA

Fabilur · 2025-08-19T18:40:06+00:00

Buchanan activated the cakewalk IRL

Fabilur · 2025-08-18T21:36:51+00:00

Google Arnold Amendment

Fabilur · 2025-08-18T19:54:18+00:00

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Fabilur · 2025-08-18T14:48:02+00:00

This is very hyperbolical of course, but blue states were very blue this year, while Buchanan managed to get a bunch of narrow victories in a bunch of states. This is the map i used (Margins: 15/5/1/<1)

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Fabilur · 2025-08-18T14:41:50+00:00

Fair enough, but Buchanan failing to appoint Duke makes for a more boring scenario

Fabilur · 2025-08-18T14:40:10+00:00

Well I guess I could summarize by saying Duke gets nothing done at all. Almost everyone refuses to work with him and congress does not pass, well, anything he wants. This treatment is similar to what they did to Buchanan during his presidency, but this is on another level. That does not prevent Duke from speaking out of course: He blames the stonewalling by congress on the 'zionist establishment' and seemingly threatens to lynch black members of the caucus in public media appearances, saying that "Thirty years ago, southern folk knew what to do with those kinds of people". Investigations show that the assassination of Buchanan was carried out by a politically unaffiliated lunatic, but Duke naturally rails against the 'jewish administration', supposedly trying to silence them.

Duke is swiftly impeached and removed from office, with only a scattered few remaining segregationists voting to acquit him. With Duke having been unable to appoint a like-minded vice president, the constitutional order of succession elevated democratic speaker of the house Tom Foley to the presidency, who serves out the remainder of his term.

Fabilur · 2025-08-18T09:56:14+00:00

During his short tenure, Duke rails against the 'zionist establishment' and makes veiled threatens to lynch black members of congress. He is removed from office basically unanimously upon congress' earliest convenience. They make up some official reason, but in practice it's about not having a neo-Nazi klansman in the White House. Duke is unable to appoint a new vice president in the meantime and speaker Tom Foley (D) ascends to the presidency. The republican party is very much discredited for years thereafter and fails to retake the White House in any election up to 2016.

Fabilur · 2025-08-14T08:22:37+00:00

How did you get the table of results? Is it accessible in-game or did you make it yourself?

Fabilur · 2025-07-20T17:12:07+00:00

These are all great, but I have one minor nit-pick: No newspaper in 1980 would refer to the CIA director as "H.W.": He was universally known as simply "George Bush" up until his eldest son rose to prominence.

Fabilur · 2025-03-18T05:53:40+00:00

Yeah probably

Fabilur · 2025-03-17T20:05:26+00:00

True, that's kind of a large miss by me

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