Turn the clock back to the thirties and many parts of the world needed serious rule or change. The Great Depression was setting in and in 1932, Roosevelt was warned not to run for president unless he was ready to assume a role of dictator. After all, look at Russia, Italy and Germany. FDR...
By 1939, didn't Germany already have its war machine? If Hitler passes away in 1936, after the Olympics, would there be less preparation for war? Hopefully, the antisemitism would decline rather than accelerate.
Prices for fuel and real estate accelerated inflation before 1981. When the prices stopped rising (or fell) in 1983-84, the incumbent president (or his party) was guaranteed another term.
The second decade of the 20th century offers many PODs for history. A shorter WWI, no Bolshevik revolution, no collapse of the German economy in 1923 or no Hitler. Even if the Titanic did not sink, survivors of a luxury liner would have influence. A different WWI rewrites history.
Counter-culture had many dimensions, namely music, art, dress, and anti-war sentiment. As I remember it, war protests were the most vocal. When people demonstrated on campuses, they were against the Vietnam war. The fifties saw an "incomplete" teaching of Nuremberg and ex post facto that...
I never said Nuremberg was not justified. I say the fact that American history classes did not say why it was not ex post facto was actually a problem that led to the counterculture.
The number of people who used LSD was small and the media over-emphasized it. In fact, only 4% of the young...
Civil rights and counterculture are two different subjects. I see civil rights as a direct response to television programming. TV brought to homes daily display of the newest homes, furnishings and vehicles in advertisements, programs and game shows. They did it at the time postwar prosperity...
The causes were rather simple. It was the way history was taught. Children were taught in the fifties how ex post facto laws were one of the greatest violations of human rights. As the history books moved a few chapters forward, the Nuremberg Trials were justified. Wait a minute, were these...
Recording technology was still limited in the forties. The consumer market still used 78-rpm records with incomplete fidelity. Until the war looked favorable for the Allies after D-Day, entertainment would have still been secondary.
Bush once used the term "voodoo economics" for Reagan's proposals, so many elements of Reaganomics will not be implemented. Supply and demand will cause prices for fuel and real estate to level (or fall) in 1983, assuring a second term for Bush in 1984. If the unearned income tax rate still...
The details that would be relevant might be no Bush tax cuts, no Iraq war, different economic reaction in 2008 and if Gore gets a second term, different supreme court justices. At some point the scenario would cross the line into current politics. The election of 2000, though is a good...
In the late fifties, WW2 veterans were pleasantly surprised as jet planes took off and television flooded homes. They had memories of the Depression, wartime rationing and waiting lists for cars, housing and appliances. Then, by the late fifties, supply caught up with demand. Television...
D&D worked because it was confined to a middle-aged setting and used magic from children's stories. Dune and other sci-fi settings wouldn't have the same potential for rules and would be less likely to succeed.
Stop or delay television and newsrells/shorts expand. TV was already delayed. The Depression slowed it down and the few stations there were in 1940 were forced down for the World War. When TV came back after the war, expansion was delayed from 1950 to 1953 to allocate channels. The challenge...