Circle of Willis
Well-known member
'WI: Rick Santorum (the historical runner-up in the 2012 GOP primaries) overcomes first Romney, then Obama that year'
Alternate History Ideas and Discussion
- Thread starter AndrewJTalon
- Start date
Zyobot
Just a time-traveling robot stranded on Earth.
Circle of Willis
Well-known member
I threw this map together in 270towin in the last two minutes:Hmm.
I wonder how the Election Night map would look?
Very simply, I flipped the three closest states won by Obama in RL 2012 (FL, OH, VA) and also gave Santorum his home state of Pennsylvania to get him over the top.
As far as running-mates-turned-VPs go, I imagine Santorum's best bet is to go for one of the alternatives Romney ultimately chose Paul Ryan over historically: either Senator Marco Rubio of Florida (to decisively lock the Sunshine State down) or Senator Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire (for ideological balance - Ayotte was a moderate as New England Republicans often are, but not as much as say, Susan Collins, and more palatable to conservatives). Both are freshmen Senators, having been elected as part of the 2010 red wave.
Would agree that their not incompatible but I don't think that alters the argument that migrants from S Asia would find the region unwelcoming for political, racial and religious reasons. Also poor people would need money to move that far which would be another issue.
Doomsought
Well-known member
Here's a wild one: What if Nixon had a warrant? Not only that, but caught the Democrats red handed in something very spicy.
Skallagrim
Well-known member
It would probably be pretty disastrous for the conservative movement. Santorum supported all sorts of fairly left-wing stuff like government-mandated minimum wage hikes, new social welfare programmes, more foreign aid... and the left would happily make sure that all got a majority -- while still demonising him all the way. And Santorum didn't much care about the actual economic issues that Republican voters care about, like American job security. He voted globalist all the way, and his "partial privatisation plan" for social security reads like a "worst of two worlds" kind of nightmare.
That kind of approach always goes terribly for Republicans. You lose your own base by doing stuff they don't want, you don't do stuff they do want, you're senselessly helping the left, and for your trouble, the left still paints you as Satan incarnate.
And make no mistake about that, they'd be just as fanatical as they were about Trump, just in a different way. Because the fact is, Santorum is so socially conservative that even many Republicans think he's going too far (at least on some issues). Some of Santorum's proposed policies would run into all sorts of trouble, not least because he planned to do this federally, rather than have the states do it, which is the tradition GOP position here. He also has a history of expressing himself in poor ways, which just means the left scores easily, painting him as a madman. The stupid meme that all Republicans are illiterate retards who think the Earth is only 5000 years old ultimately died out a bit in OTL... but a Santorum Presidency would instead see it super-charged. He'd give the progressives their biggest, easiest propaganda victory ever. They'd be shrieking that the USA is turning into something out of The Handmaid's Tale 24/7... and here's the problem: most moderates would agree.
Even some Republicans would agree, because even if they do agree with Santorum that abortion is murder and pornography is debased filth... many Republicans still don't want the Federal government to "solve" this. They want the government to roll back all that (Demorat-instigated) centralisation, and give a lot of decision-making power on these issues back to the states.
This hints at another major issue with Santorum: he was vocally anti-libertarian, and eerily pro-paternalism. And that turns off not just the hard-core libertarians, but the entire (large!) segment of the GOP that prefers the government out of one's private life. To many Republicans, Santorum is just another propagandist of the busy-body nanny state, simply yelling about it from the right instead of from the left.
To summarise: Santorum would alienate a large segment of the GOP base, promote policies that would make the GOP an easy target for mockery and which he'd never be able to pass, drive all moderates away, wouldn't even keep the blue collar anti-globalist voters on board, and would in practice only get stuff passed that Democrats typically want passed.
And for his trouble, he'd get booted out after four years, and leave a hopelessly divided Republican Party behind.
Zyobot
Just a time-traveling robot stranded on Earth.
OTL Democrats: “Trump’s the worst president we’ve ever had!”
Rick Santorum: “Hold my American flag and six-shooter.”
Skallagrim
Well-known member
Naturally, in this climate of partisan politics, every Republican is "Literally Hitler!!!1!" to the Democrats. Bush was Hitler, McCain was Hitler, Romney was Hitler, Trump was Hitler...
The main outcome here is how it affects the Republicans. Trump, for all his flaws and foibles, demonstrated a strategy that can win, plotting out a viable path forward for the GOP as the populist/anti-globalist faction. Santorum would be just as hated, but his plans don't come together into a winning formula. So you catch all the same flak, but you don't ever hit your target.
Zyobot
Just a time-traveling robot stranded on Earth.
I'm guessing Democrats have 2016 in the bag, then?
If so, I'd assume HRC is the favorite, though part of me wonders if a certain celebrity businessman might upset the applecart, but on the other side of the fence this time...
Skallagrim
Well-known member
Trump screwing over Hillary's ambitions by co-opting the Democratic Party is, of course, a hilarious notion. And it's also funny to consider that various persons who hate him in OTL would be his staunchest allies. (And some of his OTL defenders would instead be detractors.)
Zyobot
Just a time-traveling robot stranded on Earth.
Quite.
It's not perfectly in line with @Circle of Willis's original scenario, but there's this one article from a ways back about "Blue Trump" winning in 2016. Naturally, Hillary would still be pretty sore about losing the nomination, though I imagine she (and her fans) would at least have to pretend to support him here, in the spirit of party unity and such.
Doomsought
Well-known member
Watching a video on one of the many failed NAZI wonder projects gave me an idea: What if after the invasion of Poland, NAZI Germany halted its expansion to focus on infrastructure projects and building up a stockpile of super-weapons for several years before taking on France?
Skallagrim
Well-known member
I love that article so much. The quintessential accuracy of it is, to equal degrees, wonderful and depressing.
Some things obviously don't fit in the scenario, and I actually think that Trump running as a Democrat right after Obama is highly implausible. (Because Trump planned a run for over two decades, and always ensured he was a member of the opposition party -- to optimise his chances of winning after the incumbent left officer after eight years. Those are the best races for a dark horse, when everybody's tired of the establishment.) The idea of Trump being a Democratic "response" to President Santorum would work perfectly.
As I've mentioned from time to time, in OTL, I expect that the future is "populism versus establishment". Trump has turned the Republicans into the proto-Populares. And I believe that various groups which are now still with the Democrats will eventually join the populist movement. This includes, for instance, the actually blue collar subset of Sanders voters. And the black and latino working class.
In this ATL, it would be the other way around. Trump would turn the Democrats into the proto-Populares. I don't think Hillary would be quite as chummy, and that she'd actually be the ATL "Romney" to Democratic Trump (i.e. the pissed-off establishment stooge who does everything to stab him in the back). Meanwhile, Trump would be popular with the exact groups I just mentioned above. Sanders would be his ally. (And are you ready to imagine the notion of AOC as a Trump fangirl?) It would be the "Buchanan Republicans" that would eventually have to be won over to complete the broad populist movement. And this would take time.
But it would happen. Just as the aforementioned groups will not stay with the Democrats forever in OTL. The future is a struggle between the masses and the elite, and it doesn't matter which party ends up representing which group. The labels are irrelevant to the content.
Skallagrim
Well-known member
Zyobot
Just a time-traveling robot stranded on Earth.
You mean OTL?
Funny, but I meant having Romney be a member of Team Blue from the beginning.
(Granted, it's theoretically possible he could defect to the Democrats in the future, though that's not quite what I'm aiming for here.)
Last edited:
Skallagrim
Well-known member
Romney had been enormously irritated by his father's loss for the Presidential nomination to Nixon. He was an independent until '93, and voted in the Democratic primaries in '92 (for Tsongas). It's credible that he might seek to enter politics on the Democratic side, rather than joining the GOP.
Not impossible if he strongly downplays his religious right credentials and instead runs a pseduo-populist working class campaign in 2012 similar to what Donald Trump did in 2016. But it would be harder to pull off against an incumbent US President.
A lot of South Asians could save up enough money before moving. Do you think that the Latin Americans who moved to the US had a lot of money? In a lot of cases, I would presume that they didn't, especially if they moved to the US illegally.
And would Central Asian Muslims really be that hostile to South Asian Muslims?
Steve, when do you think is the earliest time in the past that you could have realistically been magically transported to while still being able to make a successful living for yourself? 2000? Earlier than that? I mean your current self.