"Then Everything Changed:" Alternate History (JFK, RFK, Reagan...) What if you could change history?

[anneboleyn]

Then Everything Changed: Stunning Alternate Histories of American Politics: JFK, RFK, Carter, Ford, Reagan
by Jeff Greenfield

What would America look like if Bobby Kennedy had gone on to win the nomination? What would the democratic party look like if he had been an accomplished two-term president (Vietnam legacy, social programs for the poor, etc.)? There are so many compelling possibilities. I'd love to read your ideas.

In Jeff Greenfield's new book, he imagines what would have happened if certain key historical events had turned out differently than what we know to be the case. I posted the reviews from Booklist and Publishers Weekly below. The book has its strong points and some weak points (apparently he goes into too much detail about minutiae that isn't so interesting) but it inspired me to post a question here. Imagine an alternate history, and then how would history have changed as a result. I know the history buffs love to discuss alternate histories of WWII and famous battles, so I thought we could give this a turn ourselves.

http://www.amazon.com/Then-Everything-Changed-Alternate-Histories/dp/0399157069/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1303165095&sr=8-1

From Booklist

"Greenfield, chief political correspondent for CBS News, is also a successful novelist. Here, he tries something different: alternate history, delivering takes on three different moments in the not-so-distant American past. Not many people remember that in December 1960, President-elect Kennedy was almost assassinated. What if Richard Pavlick had gotten to Kennedy three years before Lee Harvey Oswald? Conversely, what if Robert Kennedy had not gone through the kitchen of a Los Angeles hotel where Sirhan Sirhan lay in wait? And, in 1976, had Gerald Ford not made a mistake in his debate with Jimmy Carter, that election might have gone a different way. Inevitably, speculation plays a role in Greenfield�s accounts, but he bolsters possible scenarios with ancedotes, quotes, and oral histories, all of which are sourced at the end of the book. This reliance on sources is why Greenfield prefers that his work be called nonfiction, though some may disagree. Perhaps readers who remember the actual events and casts of players will be the book�s best audience, but any history buff will appreciate these fascinating reinterpertations." --Ilene Cooper

From Publishers Weekly
"Speculation isn't history, but it's catnip to pundits and journalists like veteran CBS News reporter and commentator Greenfield (The Real Campaign), who can be excused for this romp into what ifs. He rightly says that alternative history's foundation is plausibility. And since he's read widely in the sources, his excursions into possible histories are decently anchored to the ground. In the first narrative, an actual failed attempt to assassinate JFK before his inauguration instead succeeds. LBJ takes his place, Guantánamo is wiped out by a rogue Soviet missile, and war with the U.S.S.R. is only narrowly averted. In the second narrative, Robert Kennedy isn't assassinated, beats Nixon in 1968, winds down the Vietnam War, and with no Watergate scandal, the cultural changes of the 1970s are averted. The third account has Ford winning re-election, but in 1980 it's Hart vs. Reagan, and Hart wins. Of course, there are other possible scenarios, which Greenfield doesn't discuss. And in these novelistic narratives, readers drown in excess, irrelevant detail (dinner menus, precise times of meetings, exact conversations)—all wonkish pundit stuff, and none essential to Greenfield's purpose. In the end, fun but insubstantial." (Mar.)