Constitutional Crisis

The state of TIAH

March 22nd, 2007

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Alternate Historian's Note: I promised you a collection, and we are working on it – but real life is getting in the way. Fortunately, the worst part of the real-life problems we were having has been resolved. I have found new employment (yay!). We're going to aim for an April release for the collection, and will make more announcements about it as we draw closer to actually making that a reality. And, speaking of April, our Guest Historian, Stephen Payne, suggested that it was time for a contest, so we're going to have an April Fool's Day Contest! Email us up to 3 entries for an alternate April 1st and we will post the best 10, with your own credit and link to your website (if you have one). My lovely Co-Historian says that if we can get 30 entrants, we can offer an ultimate winner a complimentary TIAH mug, but we only have 3 entrants so far! Get researching those alternate histories now, folks! The deadline is March 29th.

in 1956, television writer and archivist Peggy Dale Taylor is born in Bryan, Texas. In addition to her freelance work on several television series, she is best-known for her complete histories of Starsky & Hutch, T.J. Hooker and Star Trek. She is a fixture at many fan conventions around the southwest and is often used as a fan liaison by the television networks.

in 1972, after the overwhelming passage of the Equal Rights Amendment by the US Congress, feminists across the country gear up for the state-by-state ratification process. Their years of preparation for this process pay off as 37 states immediately place the amendment on their legislative dockets. In 1973, after much spirited debate, Tennessee becomes the 38th state to take up the ERA, and ratification by the state places protection for both genders into the constitution.

in 2007, President George Bush instructs his staff to disregard the subpoenas to appear before Congress to explain their actions in a growing number of scandals. Even his fellow Republicans are upset with him over this, but they don't see how far he is willing to go. When Attorney General Alberto Gonzales essentially refuses to enforce a subpoena on himself, Congress turns to their Sergeant-at-Arms. Former Secret Service agent Bill Livingood makes contact with his old colleagues before heading over to the White House, and is told that the SS men around the Bush administration will probably not let him take anyone into custody. He attempts to execute the subpoenas anyway, and is thrown out of the White House and roughed up. This insult outrages the vast majority of Congressmen, and the House takes up impeachment proceedings against Gonzales. With virtually no friends on either side of the aisle, Gonzales is impeached and ordered removed from office within the week. However, President Bush refuses to acknowledge the Congress' power to impeach his attorney general. “We're at war, and I'm the commander-in-chief,” he says to a group of reporters coming to see Gonzales' expected exit. “In order to preserve our national security, I need the best team possible around me, and Attorney General Gonzales is part of that team. He's not goin' anywhere.” When Vice President Cheney attends his usual meeting with Republicans in the Senate the next day, he is given an earful by Senators who are unhappy with being ignored. Several of them are also somewhat fearful of their election chances – their party's standing at a 21% approval rate, and Bush himself is down to 12%. Rather unhelpfully, he tells them to “Grow a pair,” and storms off. House Speaker Pelosi calls for articles of impeachment against the Vice President and President, which Bush goes on national television to denounce. A firestorm of protest swirls around the capitol, the majority of which is very pro-impeachment. The House passes the articles, and the Senate trial is merely a matter of formality – the vote against Cheney is 90-9, and the vote to remove Bush is 71-28, with Senator Tim Johnson of South Dakota unable to attend the vote. Speaker Pelosi takes the presidential oath of office and heads a large delegation of Congressmen and protesters to the White House. The Pentagon, contacted by Bush, refuses to send soldiers to his aid, and most of the Secret Service goes over to Pelosi when she enters the White House. Cheney flees the country, flying in his personal jet to the new Halliburton headquarters in Dubai. A significant minority of the population continues to support Bush, and he escapes Washington to their warm embrace in the western US. For years afterward, the Bushistas, as they become known, agitate for separation from the larger country around them. When the former president dies in 2014, their numbers fade to nothing and one of the nation's darkest chapters is brought to a close.

Memorial	In 1621 with the pilots suffering from the melancholy of exclusion emanating from First Nation group consciousness, the Mayflower and Speedwell ..
.. run aground as the Pilgrims fail to establish Plymouth Colony. A peace treaty is signed with Massasoit of the Wampanoags. In return for repairs to the Mayflower and Speedwell, the survivors agree to peacefully return to Southampton, where a memorial was built to their failed mission.
~ entry by Steve Payne from counter history in context - you're the judge!

In 1979 Margaret Thatcher put down an Early Day Motion censuring the British government, which led to the defeat of the Labour administration of James Callaghan. Now she could implement the program of change the establishment had planned since the mid-1960s. It would not after all be necessary to install a military government ..	Louis Mountbatt..
.. headed by an Interim Prime Minister such as Lord Louis Mountbatten. A shopkeeper's daughter, she told Mountbatten, what mattered was the business of the shop, not the dressing in the window.
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

Comet Hale-Bopp	In 1997 the comet Hale-Bopp had its closest approach to earth and was notable for inciting a degree of panic about comets not seen for decades. In November 1996, amateur astronomer Chuck Shramek of Houston, Texas took a CCD image of the comet, which showed a fuzzy, slightly elongated object nearby. When his computer sky-viewing ..
.. program did not identify the star, Shramek called the Art Bell radio program to announce that he had discovered a 'Saturn-like object' following Hale-Bopp. UFO enthusiasts, such as remote viewing proponent Courtney Brown, soon concluded that there was an alien spacecraft following the comet. Rumours that the comet was being followed by an alien spacecraft gained remarkable currency, and inspired a mass suicide among followers of the Heaven's Gate cult. They were right to worry.
~ entry by Steve Payne from counter history in context - you're the judge!

In 1965 Bob Dylan 'goes electric,' releasing his first album featuring electric instruments, Bringing It All Back Home. He was electrocuted before the recording was completed.	Bob Dylan
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

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Hallowe'en

Haloween	In 1976, the police siren reached its apex and stopped, the child screaming as Jeremy Thorn raised the stiletto high above him. "Stop!" shouted a voice from the street and two policemen emerged from the rain, one drawing a resolver as they ran from their car. Thorn glanced up at them, then down at the child, and with a sudden cry of rage plunged the knife downward, the child's scream coming simultaneously with the sound of a gunshot. For a moment, everything was frozen. Then the church doors swung open and a priest stared out at the scene: a tableau behind the veil of down-pouring rain.
Hallowe'een Story

By using just one of the seven knives of Meggido, Thorn had only succeeded in extinguishing physical life from the saviour, Estelle Gerard. "This makes things really difficult" said Father Brennan, stepping forward to face the policemen.

.

Alexander Litvinenko

In 2006, former KGB spy and Kremlin critic Alexander Litvinenko suddenly fell ill and was hospitalised. He died three weeks later, becoming the first known victim of lethal polonium-210-induced acute radiation syndrome. Litvinenko's allegations about the misdeeds of the KGB and his public accusations that the Soviet government was behind his unusual malady resulted in worldwide media coverage.

The unsolved death brought a new low to Anglo-Soviet relations. "The police investigation will proceed, and I think people should know that there is no diplomatic barrier to that investigation," Mr. Blair told reporters during a trip to Copenhagen, Denmark. The use of polonium-210 is an alarmingly new escalation in the biological phase of the Cold War going back almost thirty years. In 1978, while walking across Waterloo Bridge in London, Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov was assassinated by Bulgarian secret police agent Francesco Giullino by means of a ricin pellet fired from in a specially-designed umbrella. Security around government facilities has been doubled and the British Security Forces are on their highest alert since the first Gulf War ending in exchanges of bio-weapons with Iraq in 1991.

Abraham Lincoln	"A house divided against itself cannot stand. (Mark 3:25) I believe this government cannot endure permanently half slave and half free. I do not expect the Union to be dissolved..It will become all one thing, or all the other." ~ Abraham Lincoln (16 June 1858) Before the War of Southron Independence forced a decision - “the other”. A synopsis of Lincoln's pre-election statements are detailed at Wikipedia
US President

Kinky Friedman	In 2008, on the eve of Election Day, Texan singer/songwriter and Independent US Presidential Candidate Richard S. “Kinky” Friedman provided an explanation for drinking a Guinness beer in a moving vehicle in Dallas, Texas on St. Patrick's day - I admit to drinking it, but I did not swallow.

In 1952, Operation Ivy was conducted on Elugelab Island in the Enewetak atoll of the Marshall Islands. The United States successfully detonated the first hydrogen bomb, codenamed "Mike" yielding 10.4 megatons of explosive power, over 450 times the power of the bomb that fell on Nagasaki. Military planners were once again trapped inside the logic of the nuclear option. Applying Bernard Montgomery's second law they had demonstrated unwillingness to “take their land army to Asia” and accept American casualties in the hundreds of thousands. Therefore with Communist forces threatening to overrun Korea, China and Vietnam US President Thomas Dewey had two choices. Either to withdraw from Asia or to use the hydrogen bomb. He chose the latter, it was a no brainer really.	Hydrogen Bomb

Margaret Thatcher

In 1990, on this day the Conservative Government of Great Britain was dealt a fatal blow by the resignation of a senior cabinet minister. Margaret Thatcher, one of Sir Geoffrey Howe's oldest and staunchest supporters, resigned from her position as Deputy Prime Minister in protest at Howe's European policy. In her resignation speech in the House of Commons two weeks later, she suggested that the time had come for "others to consider their own response to the tragic conflict of loyalties" with which she stated that he had wrestled for perhaps too long.

In 1973, on this day Leon Jaworski was appointed as the new Watergate Special shortly after the Saturday Night Massacre which led to the dismissal of prosecutor Archibald Cox. During his tenure as Special Prosecutor, Jaworski was perhaps most famous for his protracted constitutional battle with the White House concerning his attempts to secure evidence for the trial of former senior administration officials on charges relating to the Watergate cover-up. The Special Prosecutor knew that President Robert F Kennedy had discussed the Watergate cover-up with the accused on numerous occasions and that these conversations had been recorded by the White House taping system. Jaworksi requested tapes of sixty-four Presidential conversations as evidence for the upcoming trial. The President refused to hand them over, citing executive privilege.	Richard Nixon
The Watergate scandal refers to a 1972 break-in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters at the Watergate Hotel in Washington, D.C. by members of the Kennedy administration. The White House “plumbers” were attempting to stage manage a burglary by the Republican nominee Richard Nixon, the second time the Kennedys had cheated Honest Dick out of the White House. The resulting cover-up led to the resignation of the President.

US Invades Canada

July 12th, 2007

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The Announcement

After Monica put the pie down, she went off to hang out with some of her cousins, and Andrea wandered over to the soft drinks. The reporter caught up with her and offered her one. “Thanks,” she said. “I hope this assignment hasn't been too boring for you.”
“Let's just say I'm glad you haven't thrown any punches at me,” he said, smiling a perfect smile with perfect teeth. The slight afternoon breeze didn't so much as stir one hair on the helmet of his coiffure. “I've been through a lot worse assignments. Very few people I've covered have invited me to a 4th of July cookout.”
“Well, we're neighborly folks.” She sipped at her soda and looked him over. In spite of how much attention he obviously paid to his looks, he wasn't supernaturally handsome, but he was OK. She thought he might be more attractive if he didn't use so much hairspray; of course, the hair might be a wig. She caught herself staring a little too hard at it and said, “You know, I'm really not going to do anything very newsworthy until the actual committee meeting on Monday. If you want to go tell your bosses that, you might be able to get somebody a little more worth your time.”
“I think you're very much worth my time,” the reporter said, flashing that smile again. Boy, is he full of himself, she thought, mentally rolling her eyes. “You're working on something that's the most historic event in human history. Historians are going to want to know what you were doing every minute before the probe was brought in. And right now, you're my exclusive.”
She shrugged. “OK. Just remember that I told you you could get a better assignment.” She turned to look at her Aunt Hettie, who walked over and smiled at the two of them.
“Is this your new young man, Andi?” Aunt Hettie extended a hand out to the reporter. “Hettie Lowery. I'm Andi's aunt, on her mother's side.”
The reporter shook her hand and introduced himself. “Gary Lance. Pleased to meet you, Ms. Lowery, but I'm actually covering Doctor Ross for the news.”
“Oh, really?” Aunt Hettie adjusted her hair and hat to make herself more presentable. “Is there a camera around?”
“I believe my cameraman is over there with the food right now,” Lance said, pointing at the table with the largest crowd of people. “But, we'll probably need some shots of Doctor Ross's family later on.” He leaned over and whispered, “We'll let you know.”
“You do that,” she said, smiling broadly and waving her hand at him. She kissed Andrea on the cheek and whispered in her ear, “He's all right, for a white boy. Better-looking than Monica's father.”
“Aunt Hettie,” Andrea said reproachfully, even though she had to agree. Vince had been possessed of a lot of good qualities, but dashing good looks weren't among them. Not that the reporter was Brad Pitt, but...
“Well, I'm going off to see Millie and them,” Aunt Hettie said. “Pleased to meet you, Gary.” She extended her hand again, and Lance shook it gently.
As Aunt Hettie walked off, Lance asked, “So, do you have a 'new young man', as she said?” His smile turned a little smirky. “I hate to be all gossipy, but I'm sure the historians will want to know.”
Andrea looked ruefully after her aunt. “Hettie is the kind of relative who's always trying to matchmake. But, no, I don't have a 'young man' at the moment. My daughter's father and I divorced about three years ago, and I don't really have the time to date much.” She thought she detected a little glimmer of something in his eye when she said that, but didn't think about it too much.
“That's too bad. You're an attractive woman; obviously highly intelligent; not to mention very polite. You're a real catch.” He grinned at her over his soda. “And that's not even adding in the whole discovering-alien-probe thing.”
“I didn't discover it,” she said, almost automatically. She'd been saying that quite a few times the last few weeks. “I just led the team that confirmed it.”
“Modest, too.”
“I don't like to take credit that rightfully belongs to others. There's plenty to go around here.”

In 2009, TV networks ran episode three of So What If?. The Russian sailor's mutiny at Kronstadt spreads like wildfire to the German, British and French bases at Heligoland Bight, Scapa Flow and Mers El-Kebir. Years later, Trotsky confesses that Socialism in One Country would never have succeeded. Bolshevik High Command was committed to World Communism, and as Karl Marx had foreseen, Capitalism would destroy itself from within.

~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

"It is only a beginning, always. The young must know it; the old must know it. It must always sustain us,...
Nixon	".. because the greatness comes not when things go always good for you, but the greatness comes and you are really tested, when you take some knocks, some disappointments, when sadness comes, because only if you have been in the deepest valley can you ever know how magnificent it is to be on the highest mountain. " ~ Final televised Address to the Nation from the Oval Office on January 17, 1977.
President

Rationalising his narrow escape from censure over the Watergate Scandal during the critical period July – November 1973. On July 13, 1973, Donald Sanders, the Assistant Minority Counsel, asked Alexander Butterfield (Deputy Assistant to the President) if there were any type of recording systems in the White House. Butterfield answered falsely that there was no system in the White House that automatically recorded everything in the Oval Office. The shocking revelation that there was such as system emerged during the Carter Presidency and radically transformed the historical view of the crisis – but by then, it was too late with the tapes long since removed from the White House. Public reaction was still hostile with protestors standing along the sidewalks outside the White House holding signs saying "HONK TO IMPEACH," and hundreds of cars driving by honking their horns. Allegations of wrongdoing prompted Nixon famously to state "I am not a crook" in front of 400 startled Associated Press managing editors at Walt Disney World in Florida on November 17, 1973. Much like the famous Chequers Speech of twenty years before, Nixon succeeded in cauterising the wound with a direct appeal based upon his personal integrity. Ultimately, the American public's respect for the Presidency was again exploited by Trick Dicky to pull off yet another incredible escape. A transcript of Nixon's speech is described at the History Place

~ quotation by Co-Historian Steve Payne from Counter-history – You're the Judge!

In 2010, the Skip Zone dissipates around the HARC II site in Alaska's White Mountains. Operatives have already terminated the powerful beam of high-frequency electro-magnetic energy entering the ionosphere and the episode is over. From the highest peak in North America, the “high ones” of Mount Denali reflect on their most necessary of interventions. The Anglos had caused trouble before, unquestionably, and naming the Mountain after McKinley being particularly disrespectful. But threatening to destroy the Turtle Island was a new escalation. Incredibly, General Ben Crewe was being congratulated for the counter-intuitive achievement of personal sacrifice in order to save lives. Perhaps this event was, finally, the episode that required direct intervention by the “high ones”.

~ variant from Steve Payne: extensive use of original content has been made to celebrate the author's genius.

"Max" Aitken	In 1942, the catastrophic State Visit to the Irish Isles ended to the great relief of Taoiseach Éamon de Valera and many others. As he boarded a plane back to the United States, the 32nd American President Winston S. Churchill managed to fit one further gaffe in. Questioned about his personal commitment to the statement “Something ..
.. has to be done”, reporter William Maxwell "Max" Aitken noted Churchill's' response “The Americans will always do the right thing...after they've exhausted all the alternatives.”.
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

In 1973, a fire destroyed the entire 6th floor of the National Personnel Records Center of the United States. The arsonists were E. Howard Hunt, John Paisley inter alia members of the White House Special Investigations Unit known simply as the Plumbers. Of course not all the records were destroyed, the Plumbers made ..	National Archiv..
.. off with a number of sensitive documents which were successfully used by Richard M Nixon to blackmail the establishment and forestall moves to impeach him. Most powerful of all, an inventory report from Japanese General Otozoo Yamada's Bacteriological weapons research in Unit 731 of experimental substances handed to General Douglas MacArthur in 1945. On page three was listed the young Chinese known simply as X, a carrier of the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome.
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

Jewish Ghetto i..	In 2006, Haganah initiates Operation True Promise. Katyusha rockets and mortars were fired at Palestinian military positions and border villages, diverting attention from another Haganah unit that crossed the border, kidnapping two Palestinian soldiers and killing ..
.. three others. President Abbas was forced to send the Palestinian Defense Force in Southern Lebanon, to eliminate the Jewish terrorists and the Christian militias who were their accomplices. As Jewish Ghettos were destroyed in Beirut, Zionist opinion starts to turn against Haganah and the leadership of brothers Benjamin and Yonatan Netanyahu.
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

In 1812, the United States invaded Canada at Windsor, Ontario in collusion with Napoleonic forces which struck simultaneously from New France. The expulsion of Great Britain from North America was, it seemed, at hand. Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington was of a different mind. The field marshal was headed towards the ..	Arthur Wellesle..
.. Americas to set the clock back to 1776 and he meant business. Today, south of the Potomac River lies the capital of the North American Union. That most English of Cities, Wellington was built from the ruins of Washington DC after August 24, 1814 when British forces burned the capital. That tragedy occurred during the most notable raid of the War of 1812 in retaliation for the sacking and burning of York (modern-day Toronto). You can't make an omelette without breaking some eggs, was the orthodox wisdom for this act of wanton violence by Wellesley which still besmirched his name in some sections of American society.
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

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Impeachment

The state of TIAH

February 5th, 2007

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Alternate Historian's Note: We are working on a new project – a collection in book format of several timelines with more-or-less complete stories inside them – The Fall, the Tolman timeline, the Mormon War, the Lascaux Cave story, and more – that will have our NaNoWriMo novel, After, included with it. Once they're edited together, we'll put the lot up for sale on Lulu. If you would be interested in this, or would like to suggest something for inclusion in the collection, please email me and let me know. And, speaking of side projects, Guest Historian Stephen Payne has one, Crimson Kiss, available for free on Lulu. Check it out and put up a review!

in 1937, newly-reelected President Franklin Roosevelt begins his push to expand the Supreme Court to 15 members in order to create a liberal majority on the High Court. In spite of spirited Republican opposition, Roosevelt's immense popularity carries the day, and 6 new Justices are sworn in the following spring. With their help, the New Deal takes its place as entrenched law in short order. Unfortunately for the liberal movement, conservatives take over the court in the 1950's and 60's, and America's support structure is dismantled in the 1980's. The importance of this structure is made clear to the nation when the stock market crashes in 1987 and savings & loans across the country collapse due to corruption brought about by deregulation. The crisis ushers in a new liberal era with the election of President Jesse Jackson in 1988, who turns America around with a radical restructuring of the nation's resources. Although the wealthy wail about having to return to tax rates mirroring those of the 1950's, the country as a whole is strengthened by his policies and supports him for his landslide reelection in 1992.

in 1988, a federal court in Florida hands down a pair of indictments for Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega on drug trafficking charges. After Noriega makes a call to Langley, Virginia, the indictments are quietly squashed. President Reagan, who had been considering sending troops down to Panama to capture the dictator, is warned off of the action by Vice-President Bush, a former CIA director.

in 2007, after President Bush killed almost a dozen members of the White House Press Corps and 2 Secret Service agents while joyriding a tractor, impeachment papers were drawn up in the House, with reluctant bipartisan support. The White House immediately denounced the effort, saying that the charge of manslaughter did not rise to “High Crimes and Misdemeanors” as required by the Constitution. Representatives argued back that the charge had been reduced to manslaughter only because of White House pressure on the local District Attorney – video of the event clearly showed the president laughing maniacally as he ran down the reporters.

Tybee Bomb	In 1958 the Tybee Hydrogen Bomb is lost by the US Air Force off the coast of Savannah, Georgia. By a perverse twist of fate, it would detonate at the height of the Cuban Missiles Crisis, spooking the trigger-happy Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Curtis 'Bombs Away' LeMay into believing ..
.. that America was under attack. The cool head of President Joseph P Kennedy was required to question why Georgia should be the chosen target for a Cuban nuclear launch. A serial womaniser and prohibition profiteer, Joe was an old hand at self-preservation by avoiding unnecessary fights.
~ entry by Steve Payne from counter history in context - you're the judge!

In 1924 the Royal Greenwich Observatory briefly began broadcasting the hourly time signals known as the Greenwich Time Signal or the 'BBC pips'. The short-fused inhabitants of the Red Planet known as Mars found the pips irritating to say the least, and transmitted back a high pitched shriek ..	Royal Observato..
.. that deafened mankind. You just need a firm hand when dealing with noisy neighbours.
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

Charles de Gaul..	In 1962 French President Charles De Gaulle calls for allowing Algeria to be an independent nation. In so doing he fulfilled a promise made during his leadership of the La Grande Armée Afrique. Later that year De Gaulle was assassinated by the settler Organisation armée secrète terrorist ..
.. group who then made a Unilateral Declaration of Independence (UDI).
~ entry by Steve Payne from counter history in context - you're the judge!

In 1971 crew members of the Apollo 14 Mission Alan Shepard and Edgar Mitchell aboard LM, Antares land on the Moon at Fra Mauro formation. By the end of the year both would be held at the Atlanta Plague Center, suspected carriers of a virulent space bug.	Apollo 14
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

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Days Of Grace

July 6th, 2007

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The Announcement

A note from the AH: Since my contribution is now whatever I am currently writing, today my contribution is just a little intro to Steve's work – ah, the luxury of having a Co-Historian! Here are Steve's “bobby dazzlers”, as he calls them...

Kerry Edwards	In 2004, Democrat Presidential nominee John Edwards suffered from pangs of doubt following a meeting in North Carolina with Vice Presidential hopeful John Kerry. Edwards' plan was to secure the national security vote with a balanced ticket combining his strong anti-war stance with a former Vietnam Veteran.
Of course, if Edwards had allowed his political advisor Bob Scrum to push him into supporting the war, the positions would have likely been reversed. Or Howard Dean would have been meeting with Kerry, who could say?. Iraq was the big flip-flop of this political generation. ~ Steve Payne: use of this news item was selected to debate Iraq War not to comment on the Iraq War.

In 1777, the people of the Long House completed a week of celebration for the first anniversary of the birth of their nation. In reference to the expulsion of Europeans from the Turtle Island, Leaders of the Iroquis Federation quoted from the Aztec, Montezuma who famously said "The price of freedom is eternal vigilance".

~ variant by Steve Payne: respect is due to Jerry Oltion's classic Red Alert, potraying the Cuban Missile Crisis, recast in the 1800s as the Iroquois Federation inter-tribal air force vs. Manhattan.

Prince Harry	In 2008, at RAF Northolt the Royal Family welcomed the return of Prince Henry Charles Albert David following his release by hostage takers in Iraq. Third in the line of succession to the thrones of the United Kingdom, "Harry" had been seized on patrol and held for 115 days before his release.
An unusually emotionally scene reminded many of a somewhat similiar scenario from 1982. Former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's son Mark had returned from Sahara desert where he had been presumed lost while taking part in an international motor race. Quoting the scriptures, the Queen said "Welcome Home Our Beloved Son...We Are Well Pleased." Three months later, in an unconnected move, British troop withdrawals were announced. Everyone's son was coming home it seemed, and in a sense, Harry's service had achieved the great leveller that national pride had demanded. ~ Steve Payne: use of this news item was selected to debate Iraq War not to comment on Prince's personal safety.

In 1999, the networks ran instalment eight of TSEotTC in two parts. A terrible car crash in Paris, the British nation in tears. The Prince of Hearts, dying in the arms of his lover Camilla Parker-Bowles. And beyond the high drama, the conspiracy..

~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

In 1969, Director of the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation John Edgar Hoover issued executive instructions effectively banning a musical festival planned in New York State for the weekend of August 15th.	Hoover
400,000 people from all over America were expected to descend on a 600-acre dairy farm of Max Yasgur, in Bethel, New York, for a three-day concert, the Woodstock Music and Art Fair. Planned performances were expected from, among others, the Who, Santana, Janis Joplin, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Joe Cocker, Sly and the Family Stone, Jimi Hendrix and, in only their second live show together, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young. Within Government circles it had been feared that like the million-man March on Washingston six years before, hippies would become self aware that far from being scattered individuals, they actually were much bigger in number than they thought. Since the return of the Republicans to the White House, the Nixon Administration had pursued a conservative agenda. The "showbiz" attitude of the Kennedys combined with anti-war protest threatened to implode American society unless firm action was taken at the beginning of the Presidency. American youth needed "what my father would call a visit to the wood shed" said Nixon, taking a very hardline on the counter-culture that had emerged since he left the White House with Eisenhower in 1961. Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix and Jim Morrisson would all die mysterious deaths before the '72 election. In a concilitatory measure, Nixon invited the Beach Boys to the White House, an all-American success story for the music industry.
~ entry by Co-Historian Steve Payne

Jethro Tull	In 1969, the Gnomes of Basle faced an unprecedent challenge to their uninterrupted world rule following the release of progressive rock band Jethro Tull's concept album Stand Up. Ironically, David Palmer, Glenn Cornick, Clive Bunker, Martin Lancelot Barre and Ian Anderson would not have looked out of place at the mastermind's underground HQ below the Bank for International Settlements building in Switzerland.
Quite simply, Ian Anderson flute playing was sublime. Stand Up represented an unexplored dimension of pure mellowness that could prove fatal to the despondency the Gnomes' required to sustain their world-grip. Laboratory tests at Basle had proven that human listeners achieved a degree of freedom that could if unchecked force them to reconsider feelings of disempowerment. Sound government required the Gnomes to accelerate the introduction of formulaic music, stick Ian Anderson on an obscure Scottish Island and flood the coming generations with mindless pulp noises.
~ entry from Steve Payne: tribute to Ian Anderson - you rule, sir!.

In 2010, in Alaska's White Mountains swift and effective counter-measures are taken at the High-frequency Auroral Research Center (HARC II). The world's most powerful beam of high-frequency electro-magnetic energy enters the ionosphere and destroys the small pox virus weapons. The rogue North Korean leadership who launched the weapons were already dead in Pyongyang, destroyed by a British Trident.

~ variant from Steve Payne: extensive use of original content has been made to celebrate the author's genius.

Freddie Mercury	Machines...It's a machines world, . Don't tell me I ain't got no soul When the machines take over, It ain't no place for rock and roll They tell me I don't care, But deep inside I'm just a man.. We have no disease no trouble of mind No thank you or please no regard for the time We never cry we never retreat We have no conception of love or defeat ~ Lyrics to Back to Humans
Rock Cyborg

Cyborg technology rescued Rock mega-star Freddie Mercury real name Farrokh Bulsara from a certain death at the hands of the AIDS pandemic. In “Back to Humans”, Mercury speaks of the duality of his release and imprisonment through this techno escape route. A synopsis of the life of Freddie Mercury can be viewed at Wikipedia

~ quotation by Co-Historian Steve Payne from Counter-history – You're the Judge!

Churchill	In 1942, it was agreed by Taoiseach Éamon de Valera that 32nd American Winston Churchill would after all visit London Town as part of his State Visit to the Irish Isles. It is further agreed he would support the Dublin Government by denouncing the protestant terrorists behind “the Troubles” in Southern England.
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

In 1942, following the funeral of Ian Fleming, the fifteen other members of the assassin squad were executed on this day in Dublin. The subversive English underground newspaper reported the executions as follows. ”No nobler blood than theirs has fallen on Irish earth in the long struggle for freedom. The military failure ..	Ian Fleming
.. of the assassination proved to be no less significant than the effects of its impact upon the nation's mind. It was the expression in action of an idea essentially spiritual, the translation of an old and vital aspiration into living history. In this State Visit the historic English nation was reborn. For men who shared in that shining deed Fleming, in one of his last messages, asked the remembrance of England present and to come. He did not ask in vain. 'They shall be remembered for ever'"
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

John Edwards	In 2004, John Kerry named John Edwards as his Vice Presidential running mate on the Democratic Party ticket. Just about the only thing that John Edwards agreed with his boss on is that America can "do better". Edward's interpretation is somewhat different from Kerry's, the North Carolina Senator meant “do better” than ..
.. having his boss assume the Presidency. Regrettably that meant Edwards had to seek common cause with these unlikely allies, the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. The following year Edwards beat Harry Truman's record ascendancy to the Presidency after only 82 days, when Kerry was forced to resign over inconsistencies in his Vietnam War Record.
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

In 1975, on this day Arthur Ashe celebrated the achievement of becoming the first African American man to win the Wimbledon singles title. At 1 John 5:19 it is written that the whole world lies in that wicked one, and Satan did not want to play ball. The story of Ashe's life turned from success to tragedy in 1988, however, ..	Arthur Ashe
.. when he discovered he had contracted HIV during the blood transfusions received during one of his two heart surgeries. He spent much of the last years of his life writing his memoir Days of Grace, finishing the manuscript less than a week before his death of complications from AIDS on February 6, 1993.
~ entry by Steve Payne from Counter History in Context - You're the Judge!

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The Bull Moose Turned Loose

The state of TIAH

August 7th, 2006

Alternate Historian's Note: light post today. The plague has returned to haunt the Academy this weekend.

in 1912, former President Theodore Roosevelt is nominated for the presidency by the Bull Moose (Progressive) Party. “This bull moose shall roar his way back into the White House,” he said in his acceptance speech. The Progressives campaigned vigorously for him, but he seemed to be a long shot until October 12th. An insane gentleman by the name of William Shrenk attempted to assassinate him, declaring that “Any man looking for a third term ought to be shot.” Schrenk missed Roosevelt, but the attempt transformed the former president into something akin to a martyr for the progressive cause. People flocked to his speeches in the fall, and in November, he narrowly edged out the Democrat, Woodrow Wilson, to win what was actually only his second full term in the White House. Perhaps Roosevelt's greatest legacy was the rise of the Progressive Party and the diminishment of the Republicans. Although old money himself, Roosevelt's Progressives supported the rights of unions, as well as several reigns on big businesses and trusts during his time in the White House. In 1916, although the Progressives wished to nominate him again, he declined and supported instead his Vice-President, Hiram Johnson, who barely won the office after a campaign blitz from the old Bull Moose lifted his fortunes.

in 2017, although they are eager to tour the earth, the Amandarans on board the Pokor are limited to a few hours off-ship at a time, due to earth's greater heat and gravity than any of their moons. Still, the Quarai in particular are in high spirits, even though they are forced to wear space suits to keep visiting the earth. “This is amazing,” Captain Mawrao told Commander Patterson. “It is wonderful, after all the dead worlds we have seen together, to see this one filled with life. It make us very happy.” The P'tar ambassador who had accompanied them was spending a lot of time at the UN; her world was heavier and hotter than Amandara 14, and she was able to withstand longer periods on the planet without ill effects. The Amandaran Union was prepared to offer the earth a lot of advanced technology in exchange for constant access to the Jump device, and she was making this case to them very convincingly. “Our scientists do not yet understand the device, but it is only a matter of time before they do. Our 4 races could unite as one, and reach out to the stars together, a true union of planets.” Although her words are moving, many delegates consider the Jump device as their only advantage over the Amandarans, and want to keep it away from them. Spirited debate follows her offer.

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Q's Opens; Norma Jean's Skirt

September 15th, 2005

in 1847, Mlosh businesswoman Q’Moltriya opens her first boutique in Paris selling pastries adapted from traditional Mlosh recipes. While French gastronomes are daunted at first, Q’s becomes one of the city’s most popular patisseries within a few years, with adventurous gourmets making pilgrimages to the City of Lights specifically to eat there.

in 1883, the People’s College of Austin, a liberal arts school founded by Marxist-Thoreauvians from New Hampshire, began receiving state funding and renamed itself The University of Texas. It grew over the next century to become the largest public college in the Soviet States.

in 1915, the Boston Pilgrims beat the Jefferson City Nickels by the incredibly lopsided score of 20-1. Town Ball has seen few such blowouts since then, and the Nickels have never been beaten as badly.

in 1919, after corresponding with a young Vietnamese man named Ho Chi Minh, President Woodrow Wilson attempt to negotiate French Indochina’s independence from France. Although he was unsuccessful, Ho Chi Minh never forgot that the United States had attempted to intervene on his people’s behalf, and when Indochina won its independence after World War II, he became a staunch ally of the Americans.

in 1944, composer and band leader Glenn Miller disappeared over the English Channel. He had been appointed a Captain in the Army Specialist Corps whose job was keeping the troops’ morale high, and was embarking on a tour of Europe. 20 years later, Miller and his plane reappeared on the French coast, not having aged a day. Neither Miller nor his crewmates could remember what had happened to them, in spite of many inducements to do so. The reappearance of the jazz legend brought his music back into style, and jazz experienced a renaissance.

in 1945, The German Reich forbids all non-Aryans from holding citizenship. More laws follow that strip those who marry non-Aryans of their citizenship, that forbid citizens to trade with non-Aryans, although the government still allows itself that privilege, and that declare non-Aryans enemies of the state.

in 1954, Norma Jean Mortensen’s most iconic pose is shot while filming The Seven Year Itch. She stands over a subway vent while her skirt is blown up, laughing and trying to push it down. Her husband, comic playwright Arthur Miller, is reported to have kept pictures of the most risqué poses on his desk in their home.

in 1970, Murray Gell-Mann, a physicist working in the field of subatomic particles, vanishes. Gell-Mann had belonged to Richard Tolman’s parallel universe cult since his childhood, and had been working on a special project for them at the time of his disappearance.

in 1983, on the 20th anniversary of the bomb blast in which she was the sole survivor, Cynthia Wesley announced her candidacy for the governor’s seat in Alabama. Ms. Wesley had been a great rallying point for the civil rights movement since her childhood was ripped from her by an explosion in her church in Birmingham; she won office with a slim majority of the vote, becoming Alabama’s first black female governor.

in 1990, a young girl disappears in Kingston, Massachusetts, and the FBI came in to investigate. On a hunch, the lead FBI agent asks permission from Washington to get the neighbors to take polygraphs. The request is turned down, since polygraphs are inadmissible in court, and the hunt goes on for months before a neighbor of the girl is caught abducting another child from the street, and practically beaten to death by an angry mob of local parents.

in 2002, two very hairy men approach the front gate at the White House and talk with the guard there for several minutes, after which, they walk inside the grounds. They walk up to the White House, and, unchallenged, walk into President Bush’s office. “Mr. President,” one of them says in an upper-class British accent, “We need to speak with you.”

in 2003, 4 horsemen were observed riding towards Buckingham Cathedral, The papal spokesman made no comment on the horsemen, and refused to answer questions about what their purpose in the Holy British Empire might be.

in 2004, when Ako Elma is not heard from, several Elders appear at the White House, demanding to see her. They are let into the Oval Office, where Dr. Carrera’s device is used on them. One manages to escape before being turned into the grey goo, and he alerts the other Elders to what is happening in Washington. The Elders give President Gore an ultimatum – cease the attacks on Elders, or suffer the destruction of his city.


TIAH HALLOWEEN CONTEST

In order to provide for the upkeep of our new historian, Today In Alternate History is sponsoring its first contest - make a donation at our Paypal link, then email us up to 3 alternate history entries for October 31st, 2005. The best 10 entries will make up the entire content of the post on October 31st, Halloween day. Boring contest information is available on our Forum link below. Enter early and often!

Also, we still have our standard offer - everybody who donates $10 or more through our Paypal link will become alternate history entries on the site. When you donate, I will email you asking your preference for a day & timeline; if you don't reply to me, I'll place you in a day that seems to fit your name :) Thanks for your continued support!

Forum Link - Boring legal info on the TIAH Halloween Contest!
Fresh New Poll - Shall we use future dates in our entries?

Warp and Protocols still available; also, see the script I submitted for Bravo's Situation: Comedy. Speaking of which, the winning writers have been announced; not the ones I voted for, but you can make up your own mind by seeing the pilots at http://aol.com/situationcomedy

Still wishing...

As your humble alternate historian enters the downhill slope of the 40's, he still has his birthday wish - a contract with a publishing company like Workman Publishing to produce a page-a-day calendar of TIAH. If you are an editor for such a company, or can place us in touch with one, please fulfill this belated birthday wish!

Death

	In 1980, Marxist leader Robert Mugabe won a sweeping election victory to become Zimbabwe's first black prime minister. Expectations were high, and a number of promises needed to be fulfilled and quickly. First and foremost, Mugabe had sworn he would publicly hang Ian Smith in the capital city of Salisbury.
Robert Mugabe

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	In 1759, Brigadier General James Wolfe wrote a letter to Major General Jeffrey Amherst in which he said ~ If, by accident in the river, by the enemy's resistance, by sickness or slaughter in the army, or, from any other cause, we find that Quebec is not likely to fall into our hands (persevering however to the last moment), I propose to set the town on fire with shells, to destroy the harvest, houses and cattle, both above and below, to send off as many Canadians as possible to Europe and to leave famine and desolation behind me.

But we must teach these scoundrels to make war in a more gentleman like manner. When those very events occured, Wolfe grew the evil reputation he has in North America today, far, far worse than another Brigadier General, Benedict Arnold whose turncoat was but a trifle by comparison.

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	In 1949, the Security Council of United Nations recommended membership for Palestine following the withdrawal of British forces two years before. Zionists led by David Ben-Gurion gain world attention for the plight of the Jewish settlers in the State. However Anglo-America had decided to respect Arab Unity in order to keep the Soviet Union out of the Middle East and reneged on the 1917 Balfour Declaration which promised the State of Israel.

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	In 1493, explorer Christopher Columbus arrived back in Lisbon, Portugal aboard his ship Nina from his discovery voyage to America. Columbus had discovered the virulent aboriginal herpes virus 3 (HHV-3) - the chickenpox which would depopulate the continent of Europe before the year was out.

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In 1977, the First Cray-1 supercomputer was shipped to the Los Alamos National Laboratory, New Mexico.

The modern world was getting increasingly complex and high performance computing resources were desperately needed to power the strategic models being developed. Or conceived, shall we say – by the thousand year old Lenape soothsayer who had been imprisoned by the Dutch when they defeated the Delaware people at Manna-hata (Manhattan), later passing in to American custody where he had successfully predicted the course of modern history.

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In 1829, an unruly, drunken crowd of President Jackson's supporters overrun the White House during Jackson's inaugural party. During the riot, the mansion catches fire, and President Jackson resolutely takes command of the crowd and gets them out before the building is destroyed. His term is served out in the Vice President's house as workmen rebuild the White House.

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In 1805, the Italian city-states and regions are united under a single ruler for the first time since Rome fell when Giuseppe Corlesconi negotiates the loyalty of all of the disparate noblemen to himself in the Treaty of Sardinia. He places his capitol in Rome, and the newly united country is named the New Republic of Rome. The N.R.R. is one of the first European nations to join the Congress of Nations in the 1860's.

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In 1992, culinary inventor Christian K. Nelson died at his home in Moorhead, Iowa. Although his candy treats were favored in his native Denmark, he tried something different in America, and that proved to be his undoing; he resurrected the old recipe for ice cream, dipping it in chocolate in the hope of making it more palatable to the American taste buds. Unfortunately, it flopped, and nearly drove his chocolate and sweets company out of business.

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Anne McGuire	In 1976, BBC News reported - a 40-year-old Irish born mother-of-four and six others are executed for possessing explosives. Their convictions are later considered unsafe. Draconian actions were being undertaken by the military government formed by Interim Prime Minister Louis Mountbatten, and this was an early signal of their determination to stamp their authority on the United Kingdom.
Innocent

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	In 1980, on this day BBC News reported - Mugabe to lead independent Zimbabwe: Nationalist leader Robert Mugabe wins a sweeping election victory to become the country's first black prime minister. Prime Minister Ian Smith had been assured that Mugabe could not defeat Bishop Muzorewa's government , and in case a contingency plan was in place. In fact two plans. Although the full details of Operation Quartz have never been made public, some aspects of the plan have been revealed by former members of the security forces. It was divided into two parts: Operation Quartz, an overt strike against the terrorists, and Operation Hectic, a covert strike to kill Mugabe and his key personnel
Robert Mugabe

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Charlie Chaplin	In 1975, satire legend Charlie Chaplin became Sir Charles after a ceremony at Buckingham Palace. Chaplin is most famous for scripting the Great Dictator, a biting satire of US President Charles Lindbergh.
Great Dictator

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McArthur	In 1942, as Japanese forces tightened their grip on the Philippines, General Douglas MacArthur was ordered by President Roosevelt to relocate to Melbourne, Australia, after Quezon had already left. With his wife, four-year-old son, and a select group of advisers and subordinate military commanders, MacArthur left the Philippines on PT 41 commanded by Lieutenant John D. Bulkeley, and successfully evaded an intense Japanese search for him.
Return?

War Plan Orange (commonly known as Plan Orange or just Orange) was invoked. Predating the Rainbow plans, which presumed allies, Orange was predicated on the U.S. fighting Japan alone. It anticipated a withholding of supplies from the Philippines and other U.S. outposts in the Western Pacific (they were expected to hold out on their own), while the Pacific Fleet marshaled its strength at bases in California, and guarded against attacks on the Panama Canal. After mobilization (the ships maintained only half of their crews in peacetime), the fleet sailed to the Western Pacific to relieve American forces in Guam and the Philippines. Afterwards, the fleet sailed due north for a decisive battle against the Imperial Japanese Navy, and then blockade the Japanese home islands. The Imperial Japanese Navy developed a counter-plan to allow the Pacific Fleet to sail across the Pacific while using submarines and carrier attacks to weaken it. The Japanese fleet attempt to force a battle against the U.S. in a 'decisive battle area', near Japan, after inflicting such attrition. This is in keeping with the theory of Alfred Thayer Mahan, a doctrine to which every major navy subscribed before World War II, in which wars would be decided by engagements between opposing surface fleets[1] (as they had been for over 300 years). It was the basis for Japan's demand for a 70% ratio (10:10:7) at the Washington Naval Conference, which would give Japan superiority in the 'decisive battle area', and the U.S.'s insistence on a 60% ratio, as 70% superiority was believed to be necessary for a successful attack. Disasterously the American war planners failed to appreciate that technological advances in submarines and naval aviation had made Mahan's doctrine obsolete. In particular, the American planners did not understand that aircraft could sink battleships, nor that Japan might put the U.S. battleship force (the Battle Line) out of action at a stroke. American plans changed after the failure of War Plan Orange. Even after major Japanese defeats like Midway, the U.S. fleet favored a methodical 'island-hopping' advance, never going far beyond land-based air cover. Moreover, by their obsession with 'decisive battle', the Imperial Japanese Navy would ignore the vital role of antisubmarine warfare. Germany and the U.S. would demonstrate the need for this with their submarine campaigns against Allied and Japanese merchant shipping respectively. The American campaign ultimately choked Japan's industrial production. Japan also notably failed to institute an anti-commerce campaign themselves.

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In 1933, the Parliament of Austria was suspended because of a quibble over procedure. Chancellor Adolf Schicklegruber initiated authoritarian rule by decree

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