Published: October 1st 2023, 8:26:42 pm
On December 14, 2008, an Iraqi journalist flung his shoes at President George W. Bush. Both missed; Bush gave his classic smirk. But… what if they didn’t? What if a shoe perfectly hit Bush on the jaw, instantly killing the 43rd President of the United States?
Well, this is What Why How, and that’s what the video’s about.
While medics struggle and fail to resuscitate the glass-jawed Texan, news reaches America that code-name Trailblazer has fallen; Vice President Dick Cheney, pleasantly surprised at the turn of events, gathers Bush’s lameduck cabinet in Washington DC. There, the Vice suggests that the United States has a new war on its hands: that either Iran or al-Qaeda, or maybe even both (in a rare moment of Middle East unity) killed the president. A response is needed! Within two hours, George Bush is pronounced dead; Cheney is sworn in as the 44th President of the United States.
Within days, riots erupt in Iraq, celebrating the death of Bush. Shias and radical Sunnis take up arms and vests and assault US bases in the largest surge of violence since 2006. US soldiers crack down violently, with some going on rampages. Back in America, George W. Bush’s funeral is attended by President Cheney and President-Elect Barack Obama, set to take office within a few weeks. They meet behind closed doors; shouting can be heard by mourners, and Obama stomps away from the meeting early.
Over Christmas, Dick Cheney plots; he’s surrounded by landmines: Obama will be sworn in too soon to give Cheney breathing room to take revenge for Bush’s murder and to end the surge of violence in Iraq. Meanwhile, the economy plummets even further; there’s also the Great Recession going on! Cheney makes dozens of calls to bizarro constitutional scholars about delaying the transition of power, he has late night ranting sessions with ex-Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and their buddy Paul Wolfowitz and even begins to propose strange conspiracies to FBI Director Robert Mueller and CIA Director Michael Hayden. A plan formulates in Cheney’s mind (and not really anywhere else): using some made-up national security threat, Cheney will extend Congress’s recess over and over until January 20, at which point he’ll swear himself in as president again. Some in the military-intelligence complex like this idea; messages are passed about in the last few days of 2008, threats brainstormed. Dick Cheney, stressed out of his mind, is in the midst of another rant to Rumsfeld when he’s suddenly struck with one of his frequent heart attacks. He drops the phone, then crumbles to the ground. Within an hour, Cheney is dead.
The nation, shocked, watches as power skips over the empty Vice Presidential seat to none other than Speaker of the House Nacy Pelosi. A dumbstruck Nancy Pelosi is sworn in as the 45th President of the United States. She serves for twenty days before Obama is inaugurated as the 46thpresident on January 20, 2009.
So, how does Obama’s presidency turn out? Well, the events in Iraq quickly die down; American troop levels were at their highest there since the start of the war, so there’s plenty of boots on the ground. This means Obama can stick to the planned US troop withdrawal schedule; more people wantto get the hell outta Iraq after the confusion of December. Now, plenty of conservatives view this as a betrayal. Maybe they nominate Rick Santorum or Newt Gingrich instead of Mitt Romney in 2012, but Obama still wins.
What truly changes in the end, then? Well, let me tell you a little story. In 1811, in the face of destruction by the forces of William Henry Harrison, the Native American leader known as the Prophet put a curse on the US Presidency: every twenty years, the president would die. When Harrison was elected president in 1840, he soon afterward dropped dead. Who was elected in 1860? Lincoln. 1880? James Garfield, shot dead. 1900? McKinley, shot dead too. 1920? Harding, by heart attack. 1940? Roosevelt, dead. 1960? JFK, blown away. And 1980? Ronald Reagan, shot nearly to death, but narrowly saved by modern medicine. 2000? George W. Bush. The curse is back, looming over whoever wins the 2020 election.
But that’s a video for another time. If you like this video, consider subscribing. Thanks to Mangofett on my Discord server for coming up with the idea. And thanks to userseq and Marklin for supporting the channel on Patreon. If you want to get your name in the credits and an early peak at the script, all it costs is a buck a month. Adios.