Paul V McNutt
Banned
I enjoyed the book as I have enjoyed Greenfiled's other alternative histories.
I thought we could discuss it and offer our own theories about a surviving John Kennedy.
He starts with an interesting POD. It rains in Dallas on November 22, 1963, so the bubble top is put on the top of the limo. I always assumed that the bubble top was bullet proof ,but according to Greenfield, it just slows the bullet and Kennedy is only wounded. A wounded President is still a national trauma. He does kill someone on that day. He has Oswald, when the police approach him, successfully grab his pistol and die in a shot out. I think that is insulting to the Dallas Police officers who arrested Oswald. They of course knew to stop a suspect when he is reaching for his pistol.
Unlike that detail about Oswald, I agree with Greenfield that ITTL there is no 1964 Civil Rights Act. Kennedy did not have Johnson's skill in dealing with Congress. There was also no honoring the memory of the martyred President. The next year, after Selma, he introduces a voting rights bill. Greenfield leaves us the dark on whether or not the Voting Rights Bill Passes. I think the public reaction to Selma would have allowed Kennedy to pass an omnibus civil rights bill that combined the features of the OTL 64 and 65 acts.
Like the civil rights acts, 1964 election is different. With LBJ not being president, there is a more intensive investigation of the Bobby Baker scandal and Johnson resigns as Vice President. He is replaced on the ticket with Stuart Symington. Greenfield has Kennedy beating Goldwater with 54 percent of the vote. I think that is low. It would not have been the OTL 61 %. The vast majority of the landslide was anti Goldwater. So I think Kennedy would have done better than 54 %.
I had a bigger disagreement on Vietnam,the big if Kennedy lives question. He has Kennedy withdrawing, claiming that the South Vietnamese were doing well enough that US help was not necessary. In what I see as ASB, he has South Vietnam fall after the Tet offensive of 1966. I think if things were going bad for South Vietnam, Kennedy would have been obligated to send troops to help.
ITTL the Vietnam war is over and does not effect the 1968 election. As I mentioned I disagree. I think there would have been a Vietnam war. Sometime 1964-1967 the South Vietnamese would have needed help.I agree with Greenfield that Humphrey would have won the 1968 Democratic nomination. I find his depiction of the Republican nomination annoying. OTL Reagan announced his candidacy at the Republican convention, after Nixon secured most of the Southern delegates. ITTL Reagan runs earlier and wins the Southern delegates and the nomination. I think Greenfield,who champions plausibility, is guilty of what I call fictionalism. That is when an alternative history writer inserts an interesting plot twist without explaining how it happened. He does not tell us how the living President Kennedy gave Reagan more motivation. Greenfield leaves in the dark on who wins. I give it to Humphrey who wins over moderates who OTL voted for Nixon.
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I thought we could discuss it and offer our own theories about a surviving John Kennedy.
He starts with an interesting POD. It rains in Dallas on November 22, 1963, so the bubble top is put on the top of the limo. I always assumed that the bubble top was bullet proof ,but according to Greenfield, it just slows the bullet and Kennedy is only wounded. A wounded President is still a national trauma. He does kill someone on that day. He has Oswald, when the police approach him, successfully grab his pistol and die in a shot out. I think that is insulting to the Dallas Police officers who arrested Oswald. They of course knew to stop a suspect when he is reaching for his pistol.
Unlike that detail about Oswald, I agree with Greenfield that ITTL there is no 1964 Civil Rights Act. Kennedy did not have Johnson's skill in dealing with Congress. There was also no honoring the memory of the martyred President. The next year, after Selma, he introduces a voting rights bill. Greenfield leaves us the dark on whether or not the Voting Rights Bill Passes. I think the public reaction to Selma would have allowed Kennedy to pass an omnibus civil rights bill that combined the features of the OTL 64 and 65 acts.
Like the civil rights acts, 1964 election is different. With LBJ not being president, there is a more intensive investigation of the Bobby Baker scandal and Johnson resigns as Vice President. He is replaced on the ticket with Stuart Symington. Greenfield has Kennedy beating Goldwater with 54 percent of the vote. I think that is low. It would not have been the OTL 61 %. The vast majority of the landslide was anti Goldwater. So I think Kennedy would have done better than 54 %.
I had a bigger disagreement on Vietnam,the big if Kennedy lives question. He has Kennedy withdrawing, claiming that the South Vietnamese were doing well enough that US help was not necessary. In what I see as ASB, he has South Vietnam fall after the Tet offensive of 1966. I think if things were going bad for South Vietnam, Kennedy would have been obligated to send troops to help.
ITTL the Vietnam war is over and does not effect the 1968 election. As I mentioned I disagree. I think there would have been a Vietnam war. Sometime 1964-1967 the South Vietnamese would have needed help.I agree with Greenfield that Humphrey would have won the 1968 Democratic nomination. I find his depiction of the Republican nomination annoying. OTL Reagan announced his candidacy at the Republican convention, after Nixon secured most of the Southern delegates. ITTL Reagan runs earlier and wins the Southern delegates and the nomination. I think Greenfield,who champions plausibility, is guilty of what I call fictionalism. That is when an alternative history writer inserts an interesting plot twist without explaining how it happened. He does not tell us how the living President Kennedy gave Reagan more motivation. Greenfield leaves in the dark on who wins. I give it to Humphrey who wins over moderates who OTL voted for Nixon.
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