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Lincoln serving a full eight years before handing it off to Grant and living long enough to provide private advice is probably right up there on my list of things that results in the “Golden Timeline”.
I'll decide what is worth it to me, I am from the EU this channel is not really a big loss on me personally, but I am saving my rant for the best time to release it.
I mean go for it? But we can talk about those presidents on any other subreddit. It’s nice that we have a respite here to discuss the presidency without immediately devolving into modern day politics and hyperbole.
Because we’ve all experienced it. It’s top of mind going into November.
Plus, who truly knows what today would be like if Dewey beat Truman? Or Adams had beat Jefferson?
That’s plenty of time to have unforeseen consequences.
No matter who anyone says this can be a bit of a monkey paw question, because it's not clear if it means prevent from winning in the general or prevent from even being nominated. For example based on the pic above are we preventing Buchanan though a Fremont or Fillmore victory; or some other Democrat winning in 1856? If the latter who; could be another doughface like Cass.
Buchanan or no Buchanan, once a chain of events that began with the Missouri Compromise, through the Mexican-American war and Bleeding Kansas that finally culminated in John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry, the Civil War was inevitable.
Buchanan’s biggest crime was not acting to gut the Confederacy in its infancy by properly reinforcing Federal positions in the South.
I am going to begin by talking about Buchanan; who’s in the cover picture. Although his presidency was bad, I believe it was absolutely necessary that a do-nothing democrat be elected in 1856 to delay the civil war until 1861 (it was inevitable). I however, do not believe Andy Johnson’s presidency was necessary and would choose him instead. If I could only choose presidents who were elected I would choose Franklin Pierce
In fairness to Buchanan too, his do-nothing attitude is exactly what allowed the South to start the war as the aggressor and gave the Union the moral high ground to retaliate
Exactly, any delay to the Civil War only allowed the North to Industrialize more and therefore gain a larger advantage. The 1850s were a crucial time for Northern Industrialization as well as additional Manpower arriving throughout the decade in droves from places like Germany and Ireland.
I visited the Hoover Presidential Library and that was really my first contact with Hoover and his life. That guy was great at everything except being president. It’s really amazing lol
Outside of breaking rule 3, I’d try to keep Reagan out of office. His economic policies are basically the entire reason why the Millennials broke the trend of each generation doing better (economically) than the generation preceding it. At the rate we’re going, I wouldn’t be surprised if Gen Z and the Alpha generation continue to do worse than their predecessors.
Same here for the same reasons + the cataclysmic effects of the War On Drugs, the mixing of conservatism and religion, and his intervention in the Soviet-Afghan War. I really hate to contribute to a hate-circlejerk, but as a Gen Zer, it puts me in incredible pain thinking about how much better off my generation and modern-day America would be if he were never elected. We could've had it all :(
Actually [pushes glasses up on nose] Gen X is the first generation to not do better than their parents, but I concur, it is thanks to Reagan’s economic policies.
> He set the trend that the current GOP operates on
Bush winning in 1980 ends the right wing insurgency that hijacked the GOP and set it on its current course. A two-term Bush presidency in the 80s would've been the best possible outcome for the long term health of our political discourse.
Bush 43.
Neocon project Iraq, corporate welfare, Chimerica, trillions spent on the War on Terror, NSA surveillance, open endorsement of torture, "you are with us or you are against us", "report suspicious activity", all these are devastatingly responsible for the systemic crisis that followed.
His eight years in office were an unmitigated disaster, a calamity whose consequences will reverberate for the rest of this century.
Yeah I hear people say every four years “this is the most important election of our lifetime.”
And I strongly disagree. The most important election of my lifetime already happened in 2000, and we got it wrong. (Or you could say Florida/SCOTUS got it wrong, but whatever)
I like to think on everything that would have changed if a very popular Colin Powell had decided to run for the Republicans against Bill Clinton in 1996. Throw in our first black President coming a decade early and from the right…. and possibly a President Powell on 9/11 instead of Bush….
Fun scenario for a What-If. I’m not sure Clinton was beatable in 1996. He was running on peace and prosperity, a truly formidable combination for an incumbent. (Actually, I think he’s the last incumbent to truly have both on his side in large measures)
Powell in 2000, though. I think he could’ve had a good shot.
I agree that W was a mistake. My only problem is that Gore lost Tennessee. His home state would have solved the elector college without Florida being involved.
If Gore had won New Hampshire, a state that has voted blue in every election since, he would've won the election without Florida. Bush only won New Hampshire by about 7,000 votes.
Tennessee was never going blue, no matter who the Dem nominee was. It hadn't since Clinton and it hasn't since. What happened with Florida was a SCOTUS-authorized theft we're still feeling the effects of.
I think Tennessee was unwinnable for any Dem in 2000, but regardless of why Gore lost, my point is that this was the most important election of our lives (if you’re at least 25), and we got it wrong.
If we think about where the country is at today, the Bush vs Gore result could have put us on a much different path if it went the other way -- in terms of wars, surveillance and green energy. Not sure whether we get Obama as president in 2008 with Gore, but maybe Obama comes along later?
Also, if there's no Obama starting in 2008, maybe this thread in 2024 isn't complaining about rule 3 so much.
This is my vote. Don’t forget that 2001-2008 was also a crucial time for climate change. If we’d had a Dem president we might have been able to forge a Paris Agreement may years earlier. At this point it really seems like too little too late.
great points, avoiding the Iraq War would be worth it alone, but the bloviating know nothing did more damage to the USA itself methinks, and it he had lost, he would be irrelevant right now. W did more damage to the USA as a global citizen.
I’d swing the 2000 election. I think Gore would have been great for the country and done some really good things. And W, and Cheney, did damage that very much lives today. I think for right now, that’s the turning point we could use a second chance at.
To be fair to Buchanan, as he’s in the picture, the civil war was going to happen regardless of who was president and regardless of what they did to avoid it. The south was too afraid of loosing its slaves and Lincoln’s name simply being on the ballot was enough to begin the first round of secessions. That being said, he still managed to make the worst of a bad situation, not to mention almost sleepwalking into open war with the British empire over a minor and unimportant island between the US and Canada.
To answer the question however, it’s got to be Wilson. If by sheer coincidence, he hadn’t happened to be president during WW1 and hadn’t overseen the reconstruction of Europe, he would rightly be reviled today as one of the most backward and appalling presidents ever. He single handedly ensured the progressive era would be for whites only, intentionally scaled back the admittedly minimal civil rights progress that had already been made, was openly racist and screened a movie at the White House portraying the original KKK as knights of the republic and national hero’s (they weren’t, they were domestic terrorists and traitors) and then hid a debilitating stroke from the public and basically let his wife run the country for a while.
Thinking logically, Franklin Pierce. Looking at his opponents, we had Winfield Scott and John P. Hale, two strong candidates but I’d like to focus on Hale. Hale was anti slavery and would’ve appealed the compromise of 1850 as well as taking a strong stand against the south, which may stop or at least prevent the civil war
Ya know, that’s a great answer to this. I don’t think the Civil War stops, mind, but if Scott especially gets in I think we’d still be able to handle things decently well. Pierce also causes Bleeding Kansas (talk about giving us a next episode preview for the Civil War) and vigorously enforces the Fugitive Slave Act.
Most of the elimination of mental health institutions occurred in the 70s before he took office. It was also broadly supported, because said institutions were inhumane and cruel. The policy failure to replace them with a better alternative dates to Ford and can be attributed to every administration since.
Nixon.
So much can be traced back to origins in the Nixon presidency. Either things that he did directly or reactions to his presidency.
The flip of the Republican party to a "states rights" party seems to have started with his 'new federalism'. The Watergate scandal undermined confidence in the government and the office of the president. Allowing Reagan to campaign on restoring dignity to the office. I seriously do not think Reagan would have had such an easy time if Nixon hadn't shat the bed.
Just want to say a little bit more than some others have shared about why Andrew Johnson would be one to keep out of office. If the assassination attempt killed Johnson in addition to Lincoln, we could have a president Schuyler Colfax, who was the House Speaker at the time and most likely would've taken a harder stance during reconstruction.
This is before the 25th amendment though, and who knows how things could've ended up.
The speed with which Johnson ensured Confederate states could rejoin the United States produced long-lasting ramifications we still see today that might have been different if those states and their leaders saw harsher punishment. To truly set the US on a different course, the country would've needed to do something similar to denazification in Germany.
GW took us to war in Iraq under completely false pre tenses just to avenge what was perceived as his father’s weakness for not “finishing the job” in the first gulf war. In doing this, he eliminated the only staunchly secular Islamic country that served as a giant counter weight to the Islamist government in Iran next door. Once Saddam was gone, Iran was free to take over the oil market, pursue actual WMD’s and fund terrorism world wide that is causing havoc all over the world to this day. So yeah GW.
Unreal how cavalier they were about Lincoln’s security. One guy was sent to protect him at Fords and he was a well known drunk and all around bad at this job 🤦🏻♂️
George W. Bush and in part, of course, because of not heeding explicit warnings about 9/11 and essentially lying to get us into Iraq, but also because we had the budget balanced, and he exploded it with his IMO unnecessary tax cuts. I feel he has set a lot bad precedents that have followed us down to our current day and time.
I have serious doubts that any president would have prevented 9/11. In fairness to Bush, there are tons of threats to the US every day. However, with Gore, there would be no Cheney, and the response to 9/11 would have us in a radically different world today and I think it would be undoubtedly better.
This is one of the few times I’ve seen his tax cuts mentioned by anyone other than myself - that was arguably one of his worst and most destructive decisions, especially since he didn’t reverse it after putting us into two wars.
Obvious only if you ignore the guy whose refusal to manage reconstruction produced a century of Jim Crow, lynchings, and general misery amongst African Americans (in addition to general economic mismanagement) among many options.
I would have Lincoln make Hamlin or Sumner his VP because Johnston changed the course of history. The radical republicans would have convinced Lincoln (to an extent) and we might have seen a better, more educated, more diverse America.
Andrew Jackson, I despise populism and the USA would have been much better off if the Bank of the United States had continued. I think this would have avoided a lot of the boom/bust 19th and early 20th centuries
I have to agree with the Franklin Pierce vote, mostly because I'm not sure any of the immediately better sounding options are actually better.
If Fremont beats Buchanan, sure we miss out on the disaster that is the Buchanan Presidency, but the South almost certainly seceded four years earlier, and I'm not sure Fremont is who we want handling the Civil War.
If not Johnson, I think it depends on who would actually replace him. I think Lincoln not dying would be the best case scenario, but Lincoln's Reconstruction policy would have been very similar, and I'm not as optimistic as others it would've changed. The bright side is that Lincoln was less racist and would've supported the 14th and 15th Amendments contrary to Johnson, but I don't think Reconstruction would've changed radically, and I think that's what people want. Same with if Lincoln chose a different VP: Johnson was the choice as a Southern Dem who supported Lincoln and the Union. Lincoln likely would've chosen at least a Dem regardless, and either the Northern Dems tended to be less radical on Reconstruction. I think the problem with choosing Johnson is that almost nothing realistically changes.
If not Hoover, it would've still been a Republican overseeing the crash, and probably someone much more conservative and willing to do a lot less. If anything, the Depression looks *worse* going into 1932. I love Al Smith, but there's realistically no chance he wins and the only way to stop a Hoover Presidency is by choosing a different Republican.
Wilson would be my choice as my least favorite President, but I think the problem is how we respond to WWI with anyone else, and I'm almost certain it would've been worse, which kinda pushes back against the fact that I hate basically everything else about him. Plus, like Hoover, I think it becomes a different Dem who wins rather than him, so people probably shouldn't get their hopes up for Roosevelt or Taft.
Ironically, if you stopped Buchanan from being elected President in 1856, and instead Fremont won, the Civil War probably would've started four years early.
Sometimes when I'm feeling very petty I could easily say Grover Cleveland (either the 1st or 2nd time) just because he threw off forever the count of how many presidents we have had. (I steadfastness believe we should could them by unique individual).
But as I said, that is due to very petty reasons. If I were to think more seriously, I'd probably say Reagan (due to being able to clearly tell present day impact), or William Henry Harrison, since his death lead to John Tyler in office and I'd be curious to see where we'd be if he hadn't fought so hard to annex Texas. (Plus he was for the confederacy later, so we can ditch him)
If I could really muck about with time I would have Andrew Jackson in the White House in the four years before secession. As a raging psychotic he had very strong feelings about secessionists, none of them good. I'd have stopped Richard Nixon from attaining the White House. He established the current Republican paradigm of all government is evil, minorities are coddled and there are only two camps of people in the USA - people who unquestioningly support the Republican party in the person of the President and everyone else and these two sides are eternally and irreparably divided and simply can not coexist. He also led a very determined and focused assault on the rule of law and the Constitutional guarantees meant to protect us from sick and petty little tyrants like himself.
I would have liked to have seen Philip Sheridan as VP. His attitude and actions against the marauding death squads overrunning the South were pretty unambiguous.
If I had to pick I would say Carter. Ford being elected during that time might have been what the country needed. The gas crisis wouldn’t have either not been as bad or handled and never happened. Also he might have even put us back on the Gold and Silver standard. The hostages in Iran might not have ever happened. Possible the country is even better off today because of it.
FDR, in the hope that someone else could have possibly prevented the most destructive war humanity has ever experienced. Maybe he could have come up with an equitable plan with the Japanese to split up their Pacific colonies and spheres of influence. Even if that hypothetical replacement couldn't have prevented the war from starting, maybe he would have helped keep casualties lower (by not getting the US involved in Europe, and letting the Germans and the Soviets tire each other out). Maybe this hypothetical president would not have given up half of Europe to the Soviets, thereby indirectly preventing the Korean War, the Vietnam War, Kim Jong Un's ballistic missiles, and so on.
Andrew Johnson. Imagine what America could be like if he didn't sabotage Reconstruction. No Jim Crow, no segregation, maybe we could have had a black president a hundred years before Obama.
And in a world where slaves weren't just immediately replaced with sharecroppers under the same terrible people, maybe the South would have been more flexible, diversifying its agricultural yield so it wouldn't have been economically devastated the way it was when cotton prices crashed in the 1950s.
I’m sorry, but that simply is not true. LBJ was far more pro-civil rights than JFK who, while he absolutely was paying lip service to it, was not willing to play hardball or expend political capital the way LBJ was to get this bill passed.
Woodrow Wilson. Never get involved in WW1. France England & Germany end in a draw. Hitler never takes over Germany. We tipped the scales in WW1. Germany doesn’t suffer from hyper inflation.
George W Bush. The worst modern presidency by any measure. Imagine a world where we didn't invade Iraq or Afghanistan. Where the financial crisis of 2008 was handled by... anyone else. Where stem cell research wasn't stunted for nearly a decade. Where we didn't burn off the entire budget surplus (that wasn't actually a surplus) by writing every American a check for a couple hundred dollars
William Jefferson Clinton, he spawned the same political figures that we are stuck with today. After bill it was George then 8 years of Obama the most unqualified president as payback for Dems having to take Bush's shit. If there were no bill. There'd be no Hilary nuff said. Bill is a great guy. Fit the build, but he was able to ride the financial coat tails of what was in the works in the financial and tech fields before he got elected.
John Tyler. In the 1840s there was real momentum for more economic and political centralisation. But Tyler turned out to be a rogue president after WHH’s death and he reversed all the progressive policies of the platform he was elected VP on.
I don’t think changing other presidents would have changed that much in a positive way. In the 1850s the situation had deteriorated so much that a civil war would be inevitable, no matter the president. In the 1980s neoliberalism was so *en vogue* that even without Reagan decentralisation would have happened.
The only other president who really went against the spirit of the times (in a negative way) like Tyler did was Andrew Johnson. He would be my second pick.
I wonder what happens if you put Buchanan in 1852 instead of Pierce. Still a doughface but is he as bad as he was in his original term? Plus Pierce doesn’t win and his son doesn’t get destroyed by a train so maybe we don’t have four years of a depressed alcoholic president
I would replace one of the presidents that encouraged the deportation and massacre of Native Americans with one that is more benevolent. One that would for example choose to respect an "Indian State" around the Great Lakes (Michigan Territory or Northwest of Ohio), as well as a large native Arkansas. These large northern and southern territories would become the economically viable homelands for the largest Native American groups.
Andrew Jackson loses to John Quincy Adam, the Indian Removal Act doesn't happen. Political debates on native land rights take a different direction. The "Five Civilized Tribes" win their right to a state in the north, while Oklahoma is created as a "homeland" in the south, but no forced exile and relocation happen.
I think given positive trajectory of the last 248 that you couldn't reasonably stop any of the presidents from being president. In modernity though, I would think stopping 45 and substituting in Bernie would yield the greatest results for the future of the American dream. I liked Bernie. Hillary was a corporatist. Socialism and social programs are really the only way to at least temporarily keep the American dream alive.
W., Andrew Johnson, JFK. As for JFK, I would not want him as President in 1960, but 1968. He would rocked the hell out of the late 60's and early 70's. With JFK not being President in 1960, RFK would not have been killed (maybe) and he could have been President after his brother. Pipe dream, I know.
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I’d give a lot to convince Lincoln to make Hamlin his veep for his second term
Depending on the parameters of the exercise, we could also use our magic wand to prevent Johnson's presidency by stopping the assassination altogether
That's what I did, I have RFK not getting killed.
Sorry to break it to you, but I think you saved the wrong RFK
Lincoln serving a full eight years before handing it off to Grant and living long enough to provide private advice is probably right up there on my list of things that results in the “Golden Timeline”.
What I dropped in to say.
The only problem is that Booth conspirators were also out to get Johnson. Who knows where a VP Hamlin might have been that fateful night.
Or find a way for Grant/Seward to be both General/Secretary of State and Vice President…
Or barring that really working with Benjamin Butler to accept the VP spot
>barring that really working with Benjamin Butler to accept the VP spot Hope not
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Wait do people out here actually believe a rule 3 is worthy of this wish than ALL OTHER PAST presidents ?
As I said, this is bait. Don’t bite, it ain’t worth it.
After scrolling the ammount of similar comments I'm actually starting to appreciate rule 3
It’s the best rule, seriously. Damn near every post would be devolving into partisan mudslinging if it wasn’t for it.
I agree. This is one of the more civilized subs I follow.
I'll decide what is worth it to me, I am from the EU this channel is not really a big loss on me personally, but I am saving my rant for the best time to release it.
I mean go for it? But we can talk about those presidents on any other subreddit. It’s nice that we have a respite here to discuss the presidency without immediately devolving into modern day politics and hyperbole.
Because we’ve all experienced it. It’s top of mind going into November. Plus, who truly knows what today would be like if Dewey beat Truman? Or Adams had beat Jefferson? That’s plenty of time to have unforeseen consequences.
Recency Bias
True, rule 3 is just the final form of a LONG game….
What did they say?
It was the mad Max fury road "that's bait" gif
Yes, of course Reagan and his trickle down bullshit is right up there
My first thought as well!
No matter how much people hate rule 3 presidents, it has to be Andrew Johnson. This would have been a better world without him.
Absolutely!
My mind immediately went to Jackson.
I’d swap Buchanan with Jackson, so Andrew can march down to South Carolina and hang the confederacy before it starts
No matter who anyone says this can be a bit of a monkey paw question, because it's not clear if it means prevent from winning in the general or prevent from even being nominated. For example based on the pic above are we preventing Buchanan though a Fremont or Fillmore victory; or some other Democrat winning in 1856? If the latter who; could be another doughface like Cass.
Buchanan or no Buchanan, once a chain of events that began with the Missouri Compromise, through the Mexican-American war and Bleeding Kansas that finally culminated in John Brown’s raid on Harper’s Ferry, the Civil War was inevitable. Buchanan’s biggest crime was not acting to gut the Confederacy in its infancy by properly reinforcing Federal positions in the South.
“You never know what worse luck your bad luck has saved you from.”
Cass atleast would’ve not let the confederacy secede. He left buchanan’s administration at the very end because Buchanan did nothing
Third option, they win the election but trip and die before inauguration day
I am going to begin by talking about Buchanan; who’s in the cover picture. Although his presidency was bad, I believe it was absolutely necessary that a do-nothing democrat be elected in 1856 to delay the civil war until 1861 (it was inevitable). I however, do not believe Andy Johnson’s presidency was necessary and would choose him instead. If I could only choose presidents who were elected I would choose Franklin Pierce
In fairness to Buchanan too, his do-nothing attitude is exactly what allowed the South to start the war as the aggressor and gave the Union the moral high ground to retaliate
Exactly, any delay to the Civil War only allowed the North to Industrialize more and therefore gain a larger advantage. The 1850s were a crucial time for Northern Industrialization as well as additional Manpower arriving throughout the decade in droves from places like Germany and Ireland.
Oh come on.
Herbert Hoover, dude ruined his reputation by being a president during Great Depression. Till that moment, everyone loved him.
I visited the Hoover Presidential Library and that was really my first contact with Hoover and his life. That guy was great at everything except being president. It’s really amazing lol
Outside of breaking rule 3, I’d try to keep Reagan out of office. His economic policies are basically the entire reason why the Millennials broke the trend of each generation doing better (economically) than the generation preceding it. At the rate we’re going, I wouldn’t be surprised if Gen Z and the Alpha generation continue to do worse than their predecessors.
Same here for the same reasons + the cataclysmic effects of the War On Drugs, the mixing of conservatism and religion, and his intervention in the Soviet-Afghan War. I really hate to contribute to a hate-circlejerk, but as a Gen Zer, it puts me in incredible pain thinking about how much better off my generation and modern-day America would be if he were never elected. We could've had it all :(
Actually [pushes glasses up on nose] Gen X is the first generation to not do better than their parents, but I concur, it is thanks to Reagan’s economic policies.
Not their fault at all right??
Touche. He set the trend that the current GOP operates on
> He set the trend that the current GOP operates on Bush winning in 1980 ends the right wing insurgency that hijacked the GOP and set it on its current course. A two-term Bush presidency in the 80s would've been the best possible outcome for the long term health of our political discourse.
Andrew Johnson, without him the re-construction wouldn’t have been completely botched.
Bush 43. Neocon project Iraq, corporate welfare, Chimerica, trillions spent on the War on Terror, NSA surveillance, open endorsement of torture, "you are with us or you are against us", "report suspicious activity", all these are devastatingly responsible for the systemic crisis that followed. His eight years in office were an unmitigated disaster, a calamity whose consequences will reverberate for the rest of this century.
Yeah I hear people say every four years “this is the most important election of our lifetime.” And I strongly disagree. The most important election of my lifetime already happened in 2000, and we got it wrong. (Or you could say Florida/SCOTUS got it wrong, but whatever)
I like to think on everything that would have changed if a very popular Colin Powell had decided to run for the Republicans against Bill Clinton in 1996. Throw in our first black President coming a decade early and from the right…. and possibly a President Powell on 9/11 instead of Bush….
Fun scenario for a What-If. I’m not sure Clinton was beatable in 1996. He was running on peace and prosperity, a truly formidable combination for an incumbent. (Actually, I think he’s the last incumbent to truly have both on his side in large measures) Powell in 2000, though. I think he could’ve had a good shot.
I agree that W was a mistake. My only problem is that Gore lost Tennessee. His home state would have solved the elector college without Florida being involved.
If Gore had won New Hampshire, a state that has voted blue in every election since, he would've won the election without Florida. Bush only won New Hampshire by about 7,000 votes.
Tennessee was never going blue, no matter who the Dem nominee was. It hadn't since Clinton and it hasn't since. What happened with Florida was a SCOTUS-authorized theft we're still feeling the effects of.
“It hadn’t since Clinton” is a wild statement, given that Clinton won it in the election directly preceding 2000.
I think Tennessee was unwinnable for any Dem in 2000, but regardless of why Gore lost, my point is that this was the most important election of our lives (if you’re at least 25), and we got it wrong.
If we think about where the country is at today, the Bush vs Gore result could have put us on a much different path if it went the other way -- in terms of wars, surveillance and green energy. Not sure whether we get Obama as president in 2008 with Gore, but maybe Obama comes along later? Also, if there's no Obama starting in 2008, maybe this thread in 2024 isn't complaining about rule 3 so much.
This is my vote. Don’t forget that 2001-2008 was also a crucial time for climate change. If we’d had a Dem president we might have been able to forge a Paris Agreement may years earlier. At this point it really seems like too little too late.
great points, avoiding the Iraq War would be worth it alone, but the bloviating know nothing did more damage to the USA itself methinks, and it he had lost, he would be irrelevant right now. W did more damage to the USA as a global citizen.
Not to mention the massive expansion of executive power.
I get a violent facial tic every time I remember "if you see something, say something."
Reagan.. I know he was super popular. But his policies were garbage and had very long-lasting consequences.
I’d swing the 2000 election. I think Gore would have been great for the country and done some really good things. And W, and Cheney, did damage that very much lives today. I think for right now, that’s the turning point we could use a second chance at.
Yup W wothout a doubt.
I'd probably rather see a world in which RFK survived.and became president instead of Nixon.
No Nixon, no Reagan - no Giant Debt ❤️🇺🇸
To be fair to Buchanan, as he’s in the picture, the civil war was going to happen regardless of who was president and regardless of what they did to avoid it. The south was too afraid of loosing its slaves and Lincoln’s name simply being on the ballot was enough to begin the first round of secessions. That being said, he still managed to make the worst of a bad situation, not to mention almost sleepwalking into open war with the British empire over a minor and unimportant island between the US and Canada. To answer the question however, it’s got to be Wilson. If by sheer coincidence, he hadn’t happened to be president during WW1 and hadn’t overseen the reconstruction of Europe, he would rightly be reviled today as one of the most backward and appalling presidents ever. He single handedly ensured the progressive era would be for whites only, intentionally scaled back the admittedly minimal civil rights progress that had already been made, was openly racist and screened a movie at the White House portraying the original KKK as knights of the republic and national hero’s (they weren’t, they were domestic terrorists and traitors) and then hid a debilitating stroke from the public and basically let his wife run the country for a while.
Wilson really wasn't that bad of a President, Top 20 even. Andrew Johnson on the other hand..
Yeah sure, if you weren’t black he was great.
How many presidents between Grant and Truman did a lot for civil rights?
Thinking logically, Franklin Pierce. Looking at his opponents, we had Winfield Scott and John P. Hale, two strong candidates but I’d like to focus on Hale. Hale was anti slavery and would’ve appealed the compromise of 1850 as well as taking a strong stand against the south, which may stop or at least prevent the civil war
Ya know, that’s a great answer to this. I don’t think the Civil War stops, mind, but if Scott especially gets in I think we’d still be able to handle things decently well. Pierce also causes Bleeding Kansas (talk about giving us a next episode preview for the Civil War) and vigorously enforces the Fugitive Slave Act.
It’d also be for his sake too (unless his presidency gets prevented either by him getting TB instead of King or him dying on the train)
Reagan. I actually think about this whenever I see a mentally ill person living on the street.
Most of the elimination of mental health institutions occurred in the 70s before he took office. It was also broadly supported, because said institutions were inhumane and cruel. The policy failure to replace them with a better alternative dates to Ford and can be attributed to every administration since.
Wilson
Dam right get Teddy a 3rd term
Or hell, even a second for Taft! He was a good president!
A big president with even bigger accomplishments
Andrew Johnson
John adams, I don't hate him I just prefer Jefferson
In my lifetime and avoiding any rule breaking - GWB Otherwise, I’m on the anti-Johnson train all day.
Nixon. So much can be traced back to origins in the Nixon presidency. Either things that he did directly or reactions to his presidency. The flip of the Republican party to a "states rights" party seems to have started with his 'new federalism'. The Watergate scandal undermined confidence in the government and the office of the president. Allowing Reagan to campaign on restoring dignity to the office. I seriously do not think Reagan would have had such an easy time if Nixon hadn't shat the bed.
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Rule 3 broken
Who is this guy?
Andrew Johnson. Fuck him
Woodrow Wilson! Horrible president, horrible human being!
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Did you read the rules??????
William Henry Harrison. He just wasted time and was sick too much
Andrew Jackson. The Trail of Tears For example.
Just want to say a little bit more than some others have shared about why Andrew Johnson would be one to keep out of office. If the assassination attempt killed Johnson in addition to Lincoln, we could have a president Schuyler Colfax, who was the House Speaker at the time and most likely would've taken a harder stance during reconstruction. This is before the 25th amendment though, and who knows how things could've ended up. The speed with which Johnson ensured Confederate states could rejoin the United States produced long-lasting ramifications we still see today that might have been different if those states and their leaders saw harsher punishment. To truly set the US on a different course, the country would've needed to do something similar to denazification in Germany.
GW took us to war in Iraq under completely false pre tenses just to avenge what was perceived as his father’s weakness for not “finishing the job” in the first gulf war. In doing this, he eliminated the only staunchly secular Islamic country that served as a giant counter weight to the Islamist government in Iran next door. Once Saddam was gone, Iran was free to take over the oil market, pursue actual WMD’s and fund terrorism world wide that is causing havoc all over the world to this day. So yeah GW.
Richard Nixon. He single-handedly destroyed the national perception of the presidency forever.
In recent times definitely Bush Jr. Historically Andrew Johnson
George W. Bush. He squandered a $5 trillion surplus, doubled the national debt and started the Iraq War. Truly a disastrous presidency.
Andrew Johnson. Either from sending Lincoln to a different play or a different VP
Unreal how cavalier they were about Lincoln’s security. One guy was sent to protect him at Fords and he was a well known drunk and all around bad at this job 🤦🏻♂️
George W. Bush and in part, of course, because of not heeding explicit warnings about 9/11 and essentially lying to get us into Iraq, but also because we had the budget balanced, and he exploded it with his IMO unnecessary tax cuts. I feel he has set a lot bad precedents that have followed us down to our current day and time.
I have serious doubts that any president would have prevented 9/11. In fairness to Bush, there are tons of threats to the US every day. However, with Gore, there would be no Cheney, and the response to 9/11 would have us in a radically different world today and I think it would be undoubtedly better.
This is one of the few times I’ve seen his tax cuts mentioned by anyone other than myself - that was arguably one of his worst and most destructive decisions, especially since he didn’t reverse it after putting us into two wars.
Didn't clinton miss out on taking out bin laden when he had the chance? Not bush's fault on 9/11.
Andrew Johnson.
Andrew Johnson
Reagan seems to be the obvious choice
Obvious only if you ignore the guy whose refusal to manage reconstruction produced a century of Jim Crow, lynchings, and general misery amongst African Americans (in addition to general economic mismanagement) among many options.
That bitch ass Andrew Johnson
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I would have Lincoln make Hamlin or Sumner his VP because Johnston changed the course of history. The radical republicans would have convinced Lincoln (to an extent) and we might have seen a better, more educated, more diverse America.
Andrew Jackson, I despise populism and the USA would have been much better off if the Bank of the United States had continued. I think this would have avoided a lot of the boom/bust 19th and early 20th centuries
I have to agree with the Franklin Pierce vote, mostly because I'm not sure any of the immediately better sounding options are actually better. If Fremont beats Buchanan, sure we miss out on the disaster that is the Buchanan Presidency, but the South almost certainly seceded four years earlier, and I'm not sure Fremont is who we want handling the Civil War. If not Johnson, I think it depends on who would actually replace him. I think Lincoln not dying would be the best case scenario, but Lincoln's Reconstruction policy would have been very similar, and I'm not as optimistic as others it would've changed. The bright side is that Lincoln was less racist and would've supported the 14th and 15th Amendments contrary to Johnson, but I don't think Reconstruction would've changed radically, and I think that's what people want. Same with if Lincoln chose a different VP: Johnson was the choice as a Southern Dem who supported Lincoln and the Union. Lincoln likely would've chosen at least a Dem regardless, and either the Northern Dems tended to be less radical on Reconstruction. I think the problem with choosing Johnson is that almost nothing realistically changes. If not Hoover, it would've still been a Republican overseeing the crash, and probably someone much more conservative and willing to do a lot less. If anything, the Depression looks *worse* going into 1932. I love Al Smith, but there's realistically no chance he wins and the only way to stop a Hoover Presidency is by choosing a different Republican. Wilson would be my choice as my least favorite President, but I think the problem is how we respond to WWI with anyone else, and I'm almost certain it would've been worse, which kinda pushes back against the fact that I hate basically everything else about him. Plus, like Hoover, I think it becomes a different Dem who wins rather than him, so people probably shouldn't get their hopes up for Roosevelt or Taft.
Ironically, if you stopped Buchanan from being elected President in 1856, and instead Fremont won, the Civil War probably would've started four years early.
Sometimes when I'm feeling very petty I could easily say Grover Cleveland (either the 1st or 2nd time) just because he threw off forever the count of how many presidents we have had. (I steadfastness believe we should could them by unique individual). But as I said, that is due to very petty reasons. If I were to think more seriously, I'd probably say Reagan (due to being able to clearly tell present day impact), or William Henry Harrison, since his death lead to John Tyler in office and I'd be curious to see where we'd be if he hadn't fought so hard to annex Texas. (Plus he was for the confederacy later, so we can ditch him)
Andrew Johnson. Because of the….implication.
Andrew Jackson. Evil incarnate.
If I could really muck about with time I would have Andrew Jackson in the White House in the four years before secession. As a raging psychotic he had very strong feelings about secessionists, none of them good. I'd have stopped Richard Nixon from attaining the White House. He established the current Republican paradigm of all government is evil, minorities are coddled and there are only two camps of people in the USA - people who unquestioningly support the Republican party in the person of the President and everyone else and these two sides are eternally and irreparably divided and simply can not coexist. He also led a very determined and focused assault on the rule of law and the Constitutional guarantees meant to protect us from sick and petty little tyrants like himself.
I would have liked to have seen Philip Sheridan as VP. His attitude and actions against the marauding death squads overrunning the South were pretty unambiguous.
If I had to pick I would say Carter. Ford being elected during that time might have been what the country needed. The gas crisis wouldn’t have either not been as bad or handled and never happened. Also he might have even put us back on the Gold and Silver standard. The hostages in Iran might not have ever happened. Possible the country is even better off today because of it.
FDR, in the hope that someone else could have possibly prevented the most destructive war humanity has ever experienced. Maybe he could have come up with an equitable plan with the Japanese to split up their Pacific colonies and spheres of influence. Even if that hypothetical replacement couldn't have prevented the war from starting, maybe he would have helped keep casualties lower (by not getting the US involved in Europe, and letting the Germans and the Soviets tire each other out). Maybe this hypothetical president would not have given up half of Europe to the Soviets, thereby indirectly preventing the Korean War, the Vietnam War, Kim Jong Un's ballistic missiles, and so on.
Obastard
🍿🍿🍿🍿🍿 POPCORN, GET YOUR POPCORN! ONLY 1 UPVOTE!
The rules of this subreddit prevent me from properly answering this question.
Andrew Johnson. Imagine what America could be like if he didn't sabotage Reconstruction. No Jim Crow, no segregation, maybe we could have had a black president a hundred years before Obama. And in a world where slaves weren't just immediately replaced with sharecroppers under the same terrible people, maybe the South would have been more flexible, diversifying its agricultural yield so it wouldn't have been economically devastated the way it was when cotton prices crashed in the 1950s.
I’d pull a mind trick on the GOP to let TR have a third term under the Republican Party
Ronald Reagan
Woodrow Wilson
Reagan
Ronald Reagan, without a doubt!
Reagan.
Reagan
Woodrow Wilson- a racist who should never have involved America in WWI
I agree with the choice except that we should have intervened earlier rather than not at all.
Flair checks out. We could have saved lives by helping end it sooner, and by a stretch, maybe prevented Stalinism.
Its a toss up between hoover, nixon, and regan really
It’s kind of nuts how no one is saying Hoover. Probably the most popular derided President for a whole generation of Americans.
Lyndon Johnson. Kennedy would probably pick a different running mate or something in this timeline.
Losing LBJ means losing the Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act, and the Fair Housing Act. Nah man, we **need** that.
LBJ just finished the work that JFK was doing with the Civil Rights Act
I’m sorry, but that simply is not true. LBJ was far more pro-civil rights than JFK who, while he absolutely was paying lip service to it, was not willing to play hardball or expend political capital the way LBJ was to get this bill passed.
Carter was a weak and ineffective President.
Without modern ones I’d do Carter. Nice guy but terrible president. Caused massive inflation and American jobs and almost created a second depression
Obama.
Wilson.
Woodrow Wilson. Never get involved in WW1. France England & Germany end in a draw. Hitler never takes over Germany. We tipped the scales in WW1. Germany doesn’t suffer from hyper inflation.
George w bush because he shouldn’t have been in there anyway. King of voter fraud. Never forget
George W Bush. The worst modern presidency by any measure. Imagine a world where we didn't invade Iraq or Afghanistan. Where the financial crisis of 2008 was handled by... anyone else. Where stem cell research wasn't stunted for nearly a decade. Where we didn't burn off the entire budget surplus (that wasn't actually a surplus) by writing every American a check for a couple hundred dollars
Jackson.
Reagan. It's always Reagan for me.
William Jefferson Clinton, he spawned the same political figures that we are stuck with today. After bill it was George then 8 years of Obama the most unqualified president as payback for Dems having to take Bush's shit. If there were no bill. There'd be no Hilary nuff said. Bill is a great guy. Fit the build, but he was able to ride the financial coat tails of what was in the works in the financial and tech fields before he got elected.
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Who’s the one in this post pic?
Buchanan
I would prevent Wilson and give Taft a second term
John Tyler. In the 1840s there was real momentum for more economic and political centralisation. But Tyler turned out to be a rogue president after WHH’s death and he reversed all the progressive policies of the platform he was elected VP on. I don’t think changing other presidents would have changed that much in a positive way. In the 1850s the situation had deteriorated so much that a civil war would be inevitable, no matter the president. In the 1980s neoliberalism was so *en vogue* that even without Reagan decentralisation would have happened. The only other president who really went against the spirit of the times (in a negative way) like Tyler did was Andrew Johnson. He would be my second pick.
I wonder what happens if you put Buchanan in 1852 instead of Pierce. Still a doughface but is he as bad as he was in his original term? Plus Pierce doesn’t win and his son doesn’t get destroyed by a train so maybe we don’t have four years of a depressed alcoholic president
Wilson or Johnson
Rule 3
I would replace one of the presidents that encouraged the deportation and massacre of Native Americans with one that is more benevolent. One that would for example choose to respect an "Indian State" around the Great Lakes (Michigan Territory or Northwest of Ohio), as well as a large native Arkansas. These large northern and southern territories would become the economically viable homelands for the largest Native American groups. Andrew Jackson loses to John Quincy Adam, the Indian Removal Act doesn't happen. Political debates on native land rights take a different direction. The "Five Civilized Tribes" win their right to a state in the north, while Oklahoma is created as a "homeland" in the south, but no forced exile and relocation happen.
I think given positive trajectory of the last 248 that you couldn't reasonably stop any of the presidents from being president. In modernity though, I would think stopping 45 and substituting in Bernie would yield the greatest results for the future of the American dream. I liked Bernie. Hillary was a corporatist. Socialism and social programs are really the only way to at least temporarily keep the American dream alive.
Woodrow Wilson
Ray gun
Rule 3 Wilson Andrew Johnson (we jumping Booth) Buchanan
Woodrow Wilson
W., Andrew Johnson, JFK. As for JFK, I would not want him as President in 1960, but 1968. He would rocked the hell out of the late 60's and early 70's. With JFK not being President in 1960, RFK would not have been killed (maybe) and he could have been President after his brother. Pipe dream, I know.
Johnson, easy.
Andrew Johnson fucked everything up after Lincoln was assassinated.
who was the guy who freed the sl-nvm
woodrow wilson
Woodrow Wilson