StarSettler
Banned
Title. Obama obviously was elected in 2008.
But could we have had one earlier? And if so who?
Or what kind of president?
But could we have had one earlier? And if so who?
Or what kind of president?
When is the Earliest a possible time we could have a Black President?
- Thread starter StarSettler
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Edward Brooke wins the Republican Primaries in 1976 after Ford declines to run, draws some liberal votes away from Carter and wins the debates - just enough to get a narrow upset victory. The South would be obviously enraged by this, but by 1976 they had turned their backs on segregation and were in the "New South" phase, even then they were too poor to do anything. The Civil Rights Movement was mostly over by 1976 so I don't think Brooke (being a Republican) would or could make any groundbreaking new changes.
Obama is likely as early as you could get.
Only way I see it happening before is if there is a black speaker of the house or cabinet member and there is a mass die off of the people in front of them in the line of succession
Only way I see it happening before is if there is a black speaker of the house or cabinet member and there is a mass die off of the people in front of them in the line of succession
President Frederick Douglass, after the Red Death sweeps the world (an airborne virus that gives a mild fever to Africans and African-Americans, and a hemorrhagic cytokine storm to everyone else)
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- Nixon in 1972 figures out Spiro Agnew is a piece of shit and drops him from the ticket for the 1972 election.
- Nixon, who is paranoid (has been since losing to Kennedy in 1960) decides to try to win the African American vote by nominating African American US Senator Edward Brooke of Massachusetts.
- Nixon resigns because of Watergate and Edward Brooke becomes our first African American president.
- Nixon, who is paranoid (has been since losing to Kennedy in 1960) decides to try to win the African American vote by nominating African American US Senator Edward Brooke of Massachusetts.
- Nixon resigns because of Watergate and Edward Brooke becomes our first African American president.
I honestly think it was just a backlash against a Democratic Presidency. Use of any racially derogatory themes was just handy material to use against someone who was a target for partisan sore-loser reasons, not the prime motivator. Any white dude or dudette President would have gotten the same animus, just a modification of particular name-calling. And probably less committed turn-out, in the bargain. Saying the prime motivator of crap Obama got was race and not partisanship is just his own partisans virtue-signalling over the opposition, and that form of moral preening of being better than thou white people just is rmore utterly predictable fuel for what partisans on the other side think of what white liberals - we hate them, and we'll get them back, because they disrespect us.
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I think Collin Powell was the best shot. Maybe Edward Brooke if he gets lucky. Jesse Jackson was never going to get it sadly.
Colin Powell was almost certainly viable, probably a few years before Obama (I can't quite remember when his political star peaked).
Jesse Jackson ran in '84 and '88 and did pretty well, especially in the latter election. Overall, I kinda doubt he'd get to 51% of the national electorate, even if he had won the Democratic nomination, but he was at least a serious contender.
Given the right individual (a better version of Virginia's Doug Wilder, say), I think 1992 and 1996 are plausible. Arguably, the right black candidate has better odds within the Republican party, as a sort of Nixon goes to China thing. i.e. If the candidate has conservative bonafides and can win the Republican nomination, in the general that candidate can pull most conservative/Republican voters, plus some independents who want to prove, to themselves at least, that they can support this idea (as, I think, was a helpful trend for Obama in '08), and of course, a much higher % of the black vote than a typical Republican candidate would get in the 1990s.
Jesse Jackson ran in '84 and '88 and did pretty well, especially in the latter election. Overall, I kinda doubt he'd get to 51% of the national electorate, even if he had won the Democratic nomination, but he was at least a serious contender.
Given the right individual (a better version of Virginia's Doug Wilder, say), I think 1992 and 1996 are plausible. Arguably, the right black candidate has better odds within the Republican party, as a sort of Nixon goes to China thing. i.e. If the candidate has conservative bonafides and can win the Republican nomination, in the general that candidate can pull most conservative/Republican voters, plus some independents who want to prove, to themselves at least, that they can support this idea (as, I think, was a helpful trend for Obama in '08), and of course, a much higher % of the black vote than a typical Republican candidate would get in the 1990s.
Honestly, I think Douglas Wilder '92 could almost work if he had a better national profile. Maybe '88 if the same?
Jesse Jackson '88 or '92 could also work if he didn't make his NYC gaffe.. though might still be too left wing.
Colin Powell '96 or '00 has a VERY good shot imo but his liberalism might be a problem. That said, I could see him winning '04 if Gore won in '00. Just needs to have a Conservative running mate. Powell/Pataki in '04 maybe? Powell/Jeb! in '00 could also work.
That said, I do think depending on how things go and people are positioned, you could get a Black President as early as even 1976 or 1980. In class right now so can't go too deep into it, but while it's.. remote, I do think its possible - Just be aware they may come into the office due to line of succession, etc.
Jesse Jackson '88 or '92 could also work if he didn't make his NYC gaffe.. though might still be too left wing.
Colin Powell '96 or '00 has a VERY good shot imo but his liberalism might be a problem. That said, I could see him winning '04 if Gore won in '00. Just needs to have a Conservative running mate. Powell/Pataki in '04 maybe? Powell/Jeb! in '00 could also work.
That said, I do think depending on how things go and people are positioned, you could get a Black President as early as even 1976 or 1980. In class right now so can't go too deep into it, but while it's.. remote, I do think its possible - Just be aware they may come into the office due to line of succession, etc.
Riain
Banned
How about the white man barrier being broken not by a black man but by a woman? If Geraldine Ferraro became VP in 1984, at the time Jesse Jackson was also hunting for the Presidency in a serious fashion the idea of having non white man VP candidates would be normalised from then on and in the intervening 38 years who knows who could have become a black VP. Once you get black VPs the next step is black Presidents. A problem is a lack of Presidential election cycles before Obama for this to become normalised, I don't know if 6 elections is enough to generate a pattern.
You can get REALLY wild, in a VERY low probability scenario. Lincoln, in an effort to show that the black man will not be forgotten and neglected, appoints one to the cabinet.
The south, absolutely outraged, manages to off not just Lincoln, but the VP, and a lot of Congress. (Perhaps a very large KABOOM under the house chambers...)
Senor survivor happens to be black.
Or one scenario I saw somewhere: South succeedes. A generation or two later, the USA elects a black president to say "F*** You" to the south.
The south, absolutely outraged, manages to off not just Lincoln, but the VP, and a lot of Congress. (Perhaps a very large KABOOM under the house chambers...)
Senor survivor happens to be black.
Or one scenario I saw somewhere: South succeedes. A generation or two later, the USA elects a black president to say "F*** You" to the south.
A Reagan-Brooke ticket in 1968 (leaving Brooke one helicopter crash or assassination away from the presidency, if the ticket won) is not totaly implausible:
"[*National Review* publisher William] Rusher and his...comrade Clif White aimed to secure the presidency for Reagan at the GOP convention by forging a tacit alliance with Rockefeller's supporters to stop Nixon on the first and second ballots. 'At the third ballot,' according to the notes of one Ripon member at the meeting with Rusher, 'Rockefeller and Nixon forces part company. Reagan, with Clif White as broker, 'aims at Reagan-Percy ticket with Nixon as Secretary of State and Rockefeller (with a sneer from Rusher) as 'the man who put it all together.' If Percy wouldn't take the vice-presidency, they would look for another moderate. *'If I could be convinced that Ed Brooke could deliver a portion of the Negro vote, we would take him.'* [my emphasis--DT] Rusher felt that the California governor would have no chance if he were perceived as the 1968 version of Goldwater, so at Miami he would 'do everything possible to appear moderate, humane, and compassionate...He must start appearing progressive, responsible, and ecumenical in a hurry.'" Geoffrey Kabaservice, *Rule and Ruin: The Downfall of Moderation and the Destruction of the Republican Party, From Eisenhower to the Tea Party,* p. 241
https://books.google.com/books?id=GJ9baqZLVIYC&pg=PT272
"[*National Review* publisher William] Rusher and his...comrade Clif White aimed to secure the presidency for Reagan at the GOP convention by forging a tacit alliance with Rockefeller's supporters to stop Nixon on the first and second ballots. 'At the third ballot,' according to the notes of one Ripon member at the meeting with Rusher, 'Rockefeller and Nixon forces part company. Reagan, with Clif White as broker, 'aims at Reagan-Percy ticket with Nixon as Secretary of State and Rockefeller (with a sneer from Rusher) as 'the man who put it all together.' If Percy wouldn't take the vice-presidency, they would look for another moderate. *'If I could be convinced that Ed Brooke could deliver a portion of the Negro vote, we would take him.'* [my emphasis--DT] Rusher felt that the California governor would have no chance if he were perceived as the 1968 version of Goldwater, so at Miami he would 'do everything possible to appear moderate, humane, and compassionate...He must start appearing progressive, responsible, and ecumenical in a hurry.'" Geoffrey Kabaservice, *Rule and Ruin: The Downfall of Moderation and the Destruction of the Republican Party, From Eisenhower to the Tea Party,* p. 241
https://books.google.com/books?id=GJ9baqZLVIYC&pg=PT272
Wilder could in '92, if Perot can take more votes from Bush in this time line then from the democrats, And if Wilder has a better national profile earlier. I don't know if it can work if hes just the last man standing in a understanding in a difficult 1992 primary season, if he starts to build his profile in 91 and gets lucky he could. Democrats thought 1992 was an unwinnable year right after the Gulf war, but if they think they can win more white guys might join the race and thus deny Wilder the chance.
So, if he enters the race at just the right time and Clinton winds up having having his skeletons exposed early, southerners might flock to him because Wilder does have some conservative tendencies. He can talk about being hard on crime and and then push for more help for victims and things like that to appeal to the Democrats.
If he says just the right things, like at the Rodney king verdict - maybe just saying everyone is at fault and then instead of berating police officers he says that the problem is that "these officers may have had post traumatic stress disorder! It's a war in the inner cities, just like our soldiers who so bravely fight on the battlefield only to come home and come home and still be fighting the war every day of their lives" - which is possible - He could get credit for trying to solve the problem and understanding nuances of situations.
1992 has become the era of the sound bite. Part of it also is that the media needs to desire to play the right sound bites. He was genuinely popular though I think.
While part of me thinks the national profile part means that he has to enter years earlier - let's say that in 1982 the candidate endorsed by Byrd doesn't drop out, Wilder runs as a 3rd party candidate, and he gets enough votes the democrats decide to boost him boost him for Congress or the senate - Part of me also thinks that, as governor for only 2 years, that might make him seem like more of a political outsider than someone like Bush. Which will help to draw some people who ordinarily would have voted for Perot.
A good, strong vice presidential running mate would be a requirement but Someone like Gephardt or Glenn could really boost him in the Midwest.
It would be closer than in our time line but I think he could do it.
So, if he enters the race at just the right time and Clinton winds up having having his skeletons exposed early, southerners might flock to him because Wilder does have some conservative tendencies. He can talk about being hard on crime and and then push for more help for victims and things like that to appeal to the Democrats.
If he says just the right things, like at the Rodney king verdict - maybe just saying everyone is at fault and then instead of berating police officers he says that the problem is that "these officers may have had post traumatic stress disorder! It's a war in the inner cities, just like our soldiers who so bravely fight on the battlefield only to come home and come home and still be fighting the war every day of their lives" - which is possible - He could get credit for trying to solve the problem and understanding nuances of situations.
1992 has become the era of the sound bite. Part of it also is that the media needs to desire to play the right sound bites. He was genuinely popular though I think.
While part of me thinks the national profile part means that he has to enter years earlier - let's say that in 1982 the candidate endorsed by Byrd doesn't drop out, Wilder runs as a 3rd party candidate, and he gets enough votes the democrats decide to boost him boost him for Congress or the senate - Part of me also thinks that, as governor for only 2 years, that might make him seem like more of a political outsider than someone like Bush. Which will help to draw some people who ordinarily would have voted for Perot.
A good, strong vice presidential running mate would be a requirement but Someone like Gephardt or Glenn could really boost him in the Midwest.
It would be closer than in our time line but I think he could do it.
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