How would history have treated the same events if the “other guy” had won the election?

My Liberal friends are forever telling me that the mainstream press is completely unbiased when it comes to reporting the news.  Moreover, analysts and historians who view these same events years later are simply putting the facts together, not manipulating the evidence to fit their own political agendas.  They claim that if a Democrat/Liberal did the same exact thing for which a Republican/Conservative was condemned, an identical story would be written about “their guy.”

This is an interesting assertion.  However, since we can never prove or disprove their thesis, there’s no way to come to any real conclusion about this issue.  That is, unless we do something like Einstein suggested when discussing his Theory of Relativity.  When the object in question, by its very nature, is incapable of direct study, we can still employ another useful device — the thought experiment.

So, sit back and look at the last fifty years of American politics; only this time, let’s pretend that the guy who lost the election actually won.  What follows is a brief synopsis of each of their administrations as it would have been seen through the eyes of an “unbiased” national press, and their fellow travelers in the academic world. 

Same events, same outcomes . . . just a different man in the Oval Office.

1960:  Nixon Defeats Kennedy

Arriving in Washington under the pall of a disputed election, where Republicans were accused of stealing the Illinois vote to defeat John F. Kennedy, the administration of Richard M. Nixon got off to a rocky start.  Humiliated in his first face-to-face meeting with Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, Nixon tried to redeem his failing presidency with an ill-conceived attack on Castro’s Cuba.

Suffering defeat at the hands of a third-world army which easily repelled the U.S.-backed invasion, Nixon later brought the world to the brink of nuclear war through an illegal naval blockade of that island.  Were it not for the restraint of the communist leadership in Moscow and Havana, a hundred million lives could have been lost in a world-wide nuclear conflagration.

Embarking on another ill-conceived military adventure, Nixon later sent U.S. troops to South Vietnam in a foolhardy attempt to influence the outcome of a civil war that would eventually claim over 50,000 American lives.  Had it not been for his assassination in November 1963, which some historians have traced to use of organized crime figures in the pursuit of U.S. foreign policy, it is likely that the administration of Richard Milhous Nixon would have engendered no public sympathy at all. 

1964: Goldwater Defeats Johnson

The administration of Barry Goldwater represents another unmitigated disaster in American politics.  His pursuit of the failed Nixon Administration Vietnam policy is rivaled only by a disjointed and ruinous domestic political agenda. 

Guilt-ridden over the racist past of his political party, Goldwater rammed a “Great Society” program through Congress over the objection of fiscal Southern conservatives.  This program nearly bankrupted the U.S. economy and eventually sent inflation to historically high levels.  It usurped the Constitution by further blurring the divide between state and federal rights in the area of elections and judicial matters.  It, along with the Vietnam war, was responsible for the tremendous social upheaval of the 1960s, which produced massive, nation-wide protests and rioting in the streets from Watts to Washington DC.

1968 and 1972:  Humphrey Elected President

It eventually fell upon the shoulders of Hubert H. Humphrey to clean up the mess of the two previous administrations.

The primary focus of the 37th President of the United States was to end the U.S. war in Southeast Asia “with honor.”  This was a difficult task, because throughout his term President Humphrey met with continued resistance from the military industrial complex, which sought to continue the war to boost their own power and corporate profits.  They succeeded in delaying a U.S. exit from Vietnam until the mid-1970s.  However, never wavering in his commitment to bring peace and justice to that embattled part of the world, President Humphrey was finally able to persevere mid-way through his second term and bring the troops home with honor.  And for this, the American people will always hold him in their debt.

Although ending the Republican-initiated Vietnam war was President Humphrey’s main focus, his Administration was not without other significant foreign and domestic achievements.  Internationally, he ended the isolation of mainland China by establishing diplomatic relations with the legitimate government of over one-quarter of the world’s population.  In the process, Taiwan was relegated to second-tier status, as befitted its true nature. 

Domestically, President Humphrey introduced workplace safety (OSHA) and wage and price controls into the American economy.  These, as well as other salutary public policies, changed the way workers and employers have interacted since that day, and helped make consumers’ lives better than they were before.  Not since the New Deal has the American public benefited from such a wise and compassionate leader.

All this, however, did not come without a personal price.  Unable to be defeated at the polls (his 1972 victory was a modern-day landslide), President Humphrey’s critics eventually succeeded in driving him from power before the end of his term.  The rogue actions of a small group of misfits and petty thieves gave his opponents the opening they needed to bring down his presidency.

Never charged with actually committing a crime, President Humphrey was the victim of a White House recording system installed by Richard Nixon during his term of office.  The faulty technology resulted in several gaps in these recordings — one for 18-and-a-half minutes — which the President’s critics used to manufacture public outrage against him.  Rather than tarnish the office he loved, President Humphrey did the only noble thing in his power.  He resigned from office under his own volition to bring an end to this phony controversy, and in so doing deny his critics the opportunity to further harm the country.

1976: Ford Defeats Carter

Still reeling from the so-called national scandal that drove President Humphrey from office, a former football player and member of Congress was elected president in 1976.  Gerald Ford was sworn into office and began almost immediately, both through his incompetence and inaction, to systematically undermine U.S. prestige abroad while at the same time wrecking the American economy.

Domestically, Ford presided over a hitherto unknown phenomenon: stagflation.  His malaise-driven economic policies were so inept that for the first time in U.S. history America suffered an economic downturn and increasing inflation at the same time.  It was the worst economy the U.S. had seen in the last 50 years — that is, since the time of the great depression.  (Note: this same phrase, ironically, would be used as a politically-motivated charge against the Dukakis Administration when it sought re-election in 1992.  Nothing done from 1988-1992 rivaled the double digit unemployment and inflation of the 1976-1980 Ford Administration.)

Internationally, Ford not only “lost” Afghanistan to the Soviets (his only response was to boycott the Moscow Olympics), he allowed U.S. government officials to be taken captive by a third-rate Middle Eastern country.  These hostages remained there for 444 days.  A botched U.S. military rescue attempt left 9 U.S. soldiers dead and a billion dollars worth of equipment destroyed.  Only when Jimmy Carter succeeded in defeating a former movie actor in the 1980 presidential election were the hostages finally freed, and some semblance of U.S. integrity restored in the world.

Upon leaving office Ford attempted to restore his image by participating in a series of highly publicized philanthropic efforts in which other people actually did all the work. In an ironic twist that has made him the laughingstock of the world, Ford received a Nobel Peace Prize for his effort to keep Korea free of nuclear weapons.  The prize was awarded shortly before Korea exploded an atomic bomb, which it had been building all along despite Ford’s self-serving, publicity-driven assurances to the contrary.

1980:  Carter defeats Reagan

It is no coincidence that on the very day that Naval Academy graduate and nuclear engineer Jimmy Carter was sworn into office, Iran freed all of the U.S. hostages it had seized under the Ford Administration.

Jimmy Carter will be best remembered, however, not simply for this act; or for defying an assassin’s bullets early in his administration.  President Carter, and later his successor President Walter Mondale, together embarked on a decade-long effort to rebuild the U.S. military which had suffered great declines in the 1970s.  This foresight in protecting our national security through a strong, vigorous military would pay great dividends in the future.

Domestically, President Carter began to meticulously rebuild an economy that was ruined by his predecessor.  Inflation declined, economic activity spurred, and by the mid-1980s it was “Morning in America” again.  The 1980s economy presided over by President Carter has been responsible for the longest sustained economic expansion in U.S. history.

President Jimmy Carter, the former nuclear engineer and peanut farmer/man of the people, will always be remembered as a visionary leader who made all our lives better, both economically and by protecting us from foreign enemies.

1984: Mondale Defeats Reagan

The second time was not a charm for former B-movie actor and Bedtime for Bonzo star Ronald Reagan.  Soundly defeated by the Mondale Landslide of 1984, Reagan returned to the obscurity of private life.  He eventually succumbed to the ravages of Alzheimer’s disease, which — along with the plight of Charlton Heston — has proved to be fodder for a never-ending stream of jokes from George Clooney and other Democrat and Liberal humanitarians.   

President Mondale completed the work begun by President Carter on the domestic and international fronts.  Under the leadership of the Mondale Administration, the stock market soared to new heights.  Since a growing number of small investors now owned stocks and mutual funds, experts unanimously agree that a rise in the stock market suggests a similar rise in the average standard of living.  Once again, through Democrat Party leadership, the “little person” has been given new opportunities to share in the American dream.

In foreign affairs, President Mondale inaugurated a space-based missile defense system that helped bring down the Soviet Union and its Eastern block allies, who could not match American technology and defense spending.  Critics of the president have tried to insinuate that the last Soviet leader, an obscure historical figure with an unfortunate birthmark on his forehead, was equally responsible for this outcome. 

One can only wonder at the desperate motives of President Mondale’s critics who seek to deny this great man his place in history by suggesting that the Soviet Union somehow “defeated itself” without any appreciable outside influence.

1988:  Dukakis Defeats Bush

Ushering in the “Age of the Technocrat,” Massachusetts governor Michael Dukakis defeated George Herbert Walker Bush, an obscure Texas politician who was the butt of many Washington insider jokes.  Seemingly unable to hold a job, GHWB was bounced from office to office and position to position until finally failing spectacularly by overreaching for the office of the Presidency in 1988.  History would play a joke on us all, however, with the 1992 presidential election.  In a truly despicable move, GHWB played the class-envy card ("the worst economy in 50 years") to defeat the re-election bid of President Dukakis.

As president, Michael Dukakis oversaw a grand restructuring of North American commerce through the negotiation of the NAFTA accord.  In international affairs, he proposed a visionary “new world order” to accompany the “peace dividend” that resulted from the collapse of Russian communism, brought about by the policies of President Mondale.  Facing the challenge of Iraqi aggression in 1991, President Dukakis crafted an international coalition to drive Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait and protect western oil reserves from Middle East thugs.

Though defeated by a duplicitous Republican disinformation campaign that cost him the 1992 election, President Dukakis will be remembered as the first great president of the 21st century; a man clearly ahead of his time.

1992:  Bush Defeats Clinton

Using lies and distortions to characterize a mild two-month recession at the end of 1992 as the “worst economy in 50 years,” George Herbert Walker Bush finally assumed the presidency in January 1993. 

Almost immediately Bush set out to protect companies like Enron and Halliburton that would play significant roles in the collapse of the U.S. economy at the end of that decade.  Equally significant, he ignored repeated warnings that Middle Eastern terrorism was a growing threat against U.S. interests domestically and abroad.  When the World Trade Center was bombed in 1993, Bush treated it like a “criminal matter” instead of retaliating militarily.  This only emboldened U.S. enemies who saw America as a paper tiger.  From Somalia, to the attack on the USS Cole, to the bombing of U.S. embassies in Africa, the root of America’s present day problems can be traced to the inattention of the two Republican administrations of the 1990s: Bush and Dole.

1996:  Dole Defeats Clinton

Octogenarian Robert Dole inherited a vibrant economy that started back in the 1980s under the Carter and Dukakis Administrations, and was fed by the blind-eye given to the Enron fraud and the dot-com bubbles of the 1990s. 

So concerned with his popularity and place in history that he didn’t want to “rock the boat,” upon assuming office Dole not only refused to curb the corporate excesses that began — and prospered — during the 1990s, he actually encouraged them.  Selling overnight visits in the Lincoln bedroom to the highest bidder, and using his Commerce Secretary Ron Brown to extort money from U.S. corporations so they could open up new markets in China by selling them classified missile technology, Dole was the “Warren G. Harding” of his times.  His ruinous oversight of the economy that “cooked the books” to mask its weaknesses almost plunged the country into another recession.  It was only through the shrewd business acumen of Albert Gore, elected president in 2000, that fiscal disaster was avoided.

The Dole years are also marked by two additional scandals.  In a misguided effort to produce a “legacy” for his failed presidency, Dole attempted to strong arm Israel — America’s staunchest Middle East ally — into surrendering almost all of its occupied land without any tangible assurances for its security.   Fortunately, cooler heads prevailed and this bogus solution was rejected by Palestinian statesman, the late-Yassir Arafat.

On the domestic front, Dole perjured himself under oath, and was only the second U.S. president to be impeached by Congress.  Maintaining the laughable defense that he was only “lying about sex,” Dole was reminded that “rape is sex,” as is groping women against their will and subjecting them to other such indignities.  Unfortunately, the country had no stomach for turning a president out of office while their retirement portfolios were still rising, so the efforts of the Democrat-led Congress to preserve the nation’s dignity failed. 

Dole preoccupies himself during his retirement years by making millions of dollars in speakers fees which capitalize on his White House contacts, as well as criticizing United States policy during his overseas travels; an unprecedented breach of presidential ethics never before encountered in the 200+ years of the nation’s history.

2000:  Gore Defeats Bush

Fighting off a last minute attempt to steal the Florida 2000 vote, Albert Gore defeated former-drunk and military deserter George W. Bush, the son of the failed president George Herbert Walker Bush.

Gore set about his first few months in office trying to repair the damage to the U.S. economy and our national psyche brought about by the Bush-Dole excesses of the 1990s.  In this he has more than succeeded.  Economically, the nation has surpassed even the go-go 80’s and 90s in terms of employment and every other economic indicator; a feat made even more remarkable by the attack on America by Middle East terrorists on September 11, 2001. 

Resisting calls to turn the matter over to the United Nations, Gore retaliated first against Afghanistan, where a new government was installed to replace the terrorists' allies. Vowing never to allow another attack on U.S. soil by any hostile power, President Gore identified an “axis of evil” that bankrolled and supported international terrorism.  Since all nations universally believed that Iraq possessed Weapons of Mass Destruction,  President Gore set about building an international “coalition of the willing” to remove Saddam Hussein from power.   With over 60 countries supporting U.S. actions, America went to war against Iraq in 2003.

Despite efforts to tarnish the Gore Administration’s military success by pointing to a lack of WMD found in Iraq, the President has steadfastly maintained that his policy is the correct one.  Not only has a cruel, Middle East tyrant been removed from power and his country given the opportunity to pursue a path to democracy, the “Gore Doctrine” has resulted in Libya voluntarily surrendering its nuclear technology.  The protests of Russia, Germany, and France seem particularly hollow in light of the oil for food scandal, where it was clearly evident that their opposition to military force was not due to any principles, but was an effort to hide their misdeeds and protect their own self-interests.

* * *

Now, imagine if you would this interpretation of American history setting the stage for the public debate from 2003-present over a continued U.S. commitment to Iraq.

Every policy I wrote about above actually occurred during the time frame indicated.  The only difference is that I attached a different president’s name to it.  Would the press, and historians, have been equally kind to a Republican president who lied under oath, or presided over the late-1970s economy?  Would they have said that character doesn’t matter if Clinton was a war hero, and Dole a philanderer? 

To this point, will Obama be subject to the same “lacking gravitas” charges in 2008 as George W. Bush was in 2000?   And will Hillary’s health care fiasco of the early 90s be treated the same as any “failed” Republican policy, or will it simply be forgotten or excused?

The only way to separate truth from fiction as history is viewed is to think for ourselves, instead of taking our cues from the national press — or your favorite political science professor.