Geronimo : What if Osama Bin Laden was killed prior to 9/11?
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Part 58: Building Blocks
Part LVIII
Building Blocks
Israel - Palestine
2005 had rocked Israeli politics. After the traditionally conservative Prime Minister Ariel Sharon had successfully, over the virulent opposition of his party’s right flank, withdrawn Israeli forces from Gaza. The decision was supposedly a pragmatic one, an acceptance of the fact that Israel could no longer maintain its de-facto occupation over the heavily Palestinian majority territory, without sewing a violent backlash and growing foreign disapproval.
The withdrawal policy was called ‘Hafrada’ or alternatively ‘Hahafrada’ by the international and Israeli press, phrases that meant ‘separation’ or ‘disengagement’ in Hebrew. Both were uncomfortable phrases that evoked aspects of either apartheid or surrender to different groups. Though its staunchest advocates insisted that it was the basis for a successful two-state solution. But most international criticism was related to its scope, it was too small, limited to the Gaza territory while Israel maintained control over its air and maritime space while allowing continued expansion into the Palestinian-majority West Bank.
The withdrawal had been extremely politically contentious, and Sharon had been careful to mask his greater objectives to get the ball rolling on greater withdrawal. “The attitude is growing, an Israel without Gaza, without the West Bank, is stronger than one with them,” said Dr Dan Schueftan senior Israeli scholar and policy advisor to the PM, who practically wrote the withdrawal manifesto in the 90s, “Sharon knows this, that Israel will be all the better for these decisions”.
Following the Gaza withdrawal, in August, PM Sharron came public with his plan for a wider disengagement from greater sections of the west bank. “This is a fateful hour for Israel the threshold for a decision, I have repeatedly and openly said that I am willing to make painful compromises in order to put an end to this ongoing and malignant conflict between those who struggle over this land and that I would do my utmost in order to bring peace.”.[1]
[2]
(Left) Prime Minister of Israel Ariel Sharon, (Right) Map of the Withdrawal Plan
The Sharon Withdrawal Plan called for Israel to pull out from over 2/3rds of West Bank territory, up to the under-construction West Bank Barrier in the west, while maintaining control over the Jordan Valley border region for 'security reasons'. The announcement was immediately controversial among both pro-Palestinian and Zionist groups. The barrier included all of East Jerusalem and other highly populated Israeli settlements beyond the country's internationally recognized borders while placing thousands of Palestinians on the opposite sides of the wall. Sharon further announced the plan in personal letters to U.S. President and other world leaders, where he expressed that the decision to implement a withdrawal plan was based on improving Israel's security and would substantially aid future negotiations for permanent peace and a potential Palestinian State, not (as the plans left-wing detractors saw it) to permanently derail them and annex Jewish majority areas.
The response from world leaders was mixed, to say the least, President Edwards wrote back and hesitantly agreed with the move provided it led to renewed substantial peace talks, “We are generally supportive of this idea, it is a bold idea and hope that it produces genuine progress on the pathway to peace … and a two-state solution”. Other nations were more nuanced and critical, lodging complaints that the outlined plan still didn’t equate to a full withdrawal. The EU for instance rejected, urging renewed talks first, between the sides to avoid a unilateral move like this one saying it "will not recognize any change to the pre-1967 border other than those agreed by both sides.". Kofi Annan of the U.N. reiterated his belief that the move would be illegal and a spokesman for Palestinian leader Arafat said that “borders are only determined by international legitimacy, this plan is of no concern to us”.
The withdrawal plan quickly gained significant political opposition inside Israel and especially from within Sharon’s own Likud Party. The party had already been fractured, following the Gaza withdrawal and to keep power Sharon had to forge an alliance with the center-left Labor Party to keep control over the government. Senior party leaders and ministers resigned their membership including former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who vowed to halt any unilateral withdrawal that wasn’t put to a national referendum. “A pullout would be a surrender, a victory for Arafat, Hamas, and Islamic terror, everyone can see this, running away under fire, in exchange for what? Nothing!”
Netanyahu laid out his wider opposition in a press conference, backed by half a dozen Knesset members. Their resignation from the government marked the start of a new right-wing Zionist party to oppose the government's withdrawal called ‘Hineini!’ (Hebrew for 'Here I Am!'), and he and 6 other Likud member's resignations meant that the country would face early elections in the new year and derailed attempts to approve the scheme before then.
The country nervously prepared for the January Elections, with the issue of the season squarely on Sharon’s total withdrawal policy. The country was quickly split between the blues (pro withdrawal more secular liberals) and the oranges (anti-withdrawal, more Zionist, conservatives, and nationalists) and people were all too happy to sport their respective teams’ colors across the country, even newspapers (mostly anti – withdrawal) bore the stripes above their headlines urging people to back the west bank settlers. The colors were draped so much and supporters became doubly passionate, cladding their cars, clothes, and children in their ‘sides’ colors so that the whole country became reminiscent of a giant ongoing soccer match, and an occasionally violent one at that. It even caught innocent bystanders in the crossfire, as tourists were harangued at airports and restaurants for their choice of outfits.
(Top Left) Former PM and Hineini leader Netanyahu (Top Right) Anti-Withdrawal Supporters
(Bottom Left) Pro Withdrawal Supporters (Bottom Right) PM Ariel Sharon
They chanted their slogans “No jew left behind” and “A strong and safe Israel” but despite the fanfare and loud pronouncements, the polls remained stiff, sturdily in favor of Sharon’s premiership and proud of his tenure despite the controversies (including a corruption scandal that landed his son Omri with a 9-month prison sentence). But Netanyahu and the other right-wing parties got to work on a ruthless campaign, whipping up crowds into frenzies on the danger of unilateral withdrawal. While Sharon emphasized, that it was time to stop “wasting time, the task ahead is peace”.
But then a fire bell rang out, and with less than a month left in the campaign, Sharon was hospitalized by a stroke, though he remained fully conscious of worries about his health impact on the election reverberated, and raised further questions about his fitness for office. Regardless he insisted he was “ready to get back to work and move forward”. But only a few weeks later, and a few days before the first ballots would be cast, Sharon was laid low by a second far worse stroke, left battling for his life.
The country's chief rabbi went on the national radio to ask for prayers for the prime minister, and condolences poured in from across the world, even from some Arab nations including Mohammed Abbas the Palestinian premier. But Sharon failed to recover and remained in an induced coma. Incapacitated, his responsibilities were delegated to Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.
With the country reaching a pivotal crossroads, politics paused and the date of the country's elections was pushed back a couple of weeks. The headlines days ago, dead set against him, were packed with praise for Sharon, and the acting PM Olmert sought to reassure the public "If I could speak with him this morning and ask: 'Arik [Sharon], what would you tell us? What would you want us to do?' he would say: 'I appreciate the fact that you are all concerned about my health. Thank you; but get to work.’ And this is what we will do.”
The election had been especially humiliating for Netanyahu who had slipped down the polls into a humbling 6th place with 7 Knesset members. The tumble was due to his campaign failing to catch amongst any particular voting bloc as more hardcore nationalists, Russian speakers, and the orthodox Jewish community opted for other political options, though his background and determination he was still left with room to maneuver in Israeli politics.
Olmert was not a particularly good speaker, and it was clear that he had won his government from the weight of Sharon's tenure alone nicknamed ‘Smolmert’ by the opposition for his timidness and supposedly secret left-wing views. But he pledged to carry out Sharon's vision to remove the “obstacles of peace” and move Israel's economy away from “horrific war and back home where it belongs … Israeli democracy has spoken its piece and in a loud and clear voice it has chosen … Israel wants final, secure borders and peace”.
Prime Minister of Israel Ehud Olmert next to former PM Sharon's empty chair
Ms. Tymoshenko is suspected of misspending money Ukraine received from the selling of its carbon emission rights under the Kyoto Protocol.
The United States
The first year of John Edwards's presidency had gone well, an unheard-of achievement in recent U.S. politics where incumbents saw their popularity quickly tumble once their campaign promises hit against the brick wall of actually governing. Edwards had managed to keep his approval ratings more or less where they were when he entered the office in the mid to high 60s.
President Edwards at a memorial for Coretta Scott King
Achieved through legislative pushes, some successful like the Medicare expanding drug bill, others ongoing, like his efforts to raise the minimum wage, as well as his active role in the aftermath of Katrina and the Gulf region's subsequent recovery efforts, all while the Republican party had tried to mount a sturdy opposition only to be undone by leadership scandals and a steady drip of Bush Jr era exposes.
Come January 2006, it was clear that the boyish ‘inexperienced’ senator of the campaign was gone and the 44th President was here. Everyone could see that there was a different air in Washington now, marked by the departure of one of the country's most powerful men, Alan Greenspan the long-time Chairman of the Federal Reserve was replaced with the Clinton-era treasury secretary, Larry Summers. And now in his first State of the Union, he made a bombastic announcement that harkened back to a presidential address made over 40 years ago.
He first recalled the hurricane, an issue that had quickly become the central theme of the administration and had clearly affected the President personally before moving onto the central theme of the speech.
2006 State of the Union
2006 State of the Union, Audio Recording
“We all have seen the images from the horror of Katrina, people fighting to survive, huddled in the Superdome, left with nothing, except the clothes on their backs…
…I want to thank Congress for moving swiftly and in a bi-partisan fashion, to provide emergency funds and programs to empower the Gulf to recover from this tragedy. The world has seen one side of America, victims and survivors in the wreckage of their homes, but now the world will see the other side, Americans working to rebuild what is theirs, and thousands upon thousands of others helping them to undo a tragedy …
… as we address the crisis in the Gulf states we must also do more to address the tragedy of poverty across all fifty states. poverty existed before Katrina and it will persist after the Gulf region is fully rebuilt, if we let the images that we have watched on the news fade from our memories as they fade from our television screens
It is wrong that a country of such wealth and prosperity has millions of men women and children waking up in poverty every single day, it is my commitment that the spirit of unity that allowed Congress to act on this should continue to act, to renew and win a new war on poverty.”
2006 State of the Union
It was electrifying in the room, as an upper rostrum brimming with Katrina survivors cheered and applauded. A striking declaration from the President, setting the goal to eliminate poverty by 2030 through a series of programs designed to create jobs, provide housing and raise worker pay. Echoing President Johnson's 1964 speech, it was bold, to say the least, especially in a midterm year.
Republicans did their best to grit their teeth through the speech and right-wing critics unleashed on what they saw as a “disastrous ultra-liberal approach to government … John Edwards was elected because many Americas saw him as a moderate, shunning the Democratic party establishment, instead, he has shunned those voters by pinning himself to one of the biggest failures of our government, the egregious war on poverty” said conservative economist Larry Kudlow and in the Republican party official response by Virginia Senator George Allen he derided the Presidents vision as a “typical tax and spend scheme, that will only cost Americans billions while failing to create real jobs or make real growth, the President needs to do the right thing and stay away from our lives, he’d be surprised to learn just how successful we can be”
The unveiling of the President's new anti-poverty agenda was coupled with more good news for him, after months of cross-party negotiations with moderate Republicans and Democrats in the Senate, a deal to raise the minimum wage had been reached by coupling the raise with overhauls to bankruptcy law, an objective Republicans had long sought.
On the wage side, the agreement would up the federal minimum wage to $8.30 at staged 60-cent increases over the next 5 years and would fix the minimum wage so that it was tied to inflation, nixing the need for further debate on the issue.
Meanwhile, the bankruptcy reforms would make it substantially harder to declare bankruptcy, a measure heavily backed by credit card companies and banks to allow them to more easily recover ‘lost’ assets.
The move to bundle the two reforms together in the Senate was extremely contentious among left-wing advocates who heavily scrutinized the bankruptcy reforms seeing it as a giveaway to the nation’s most powerful financial groups and harmful to the middle class. For instance, Harvard professor Elizabeth Warren noted that the bankruptcy reform would overrulingly target ordinary families as opposed to the wealthy and advised Democrats on numerous amendments.
And right-wing Republicans who desperately tried to whittle down the wage increases. Egged on by Republican minority leader Roy Blunt who made sure his party stayed seated through most of the President’s State of the Union and dismissed the compromise as “politically underhanded, this President has routinely pitted Americans against each other … we don’t need his class warfare”.
But the tightrope was walked, one-time tax relief for small businesses, closing wealthy asset loopholes, dropping efforts to raise tipped workers’ pay, carve-outs for medical debts (a measure heavily backed by the first lady Elizabeth Edwards a former bankruptcy lawyer in a very public bout with cancer) but in the end the Senate and House backed the Fair Minimum Wage and Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention Act with decent bi-partisan approval.
The President thanked Congress “This is a huge moral win, no longer will the richest country on earth, accept, that hard-working people can live on $5.15, it will improve our economy substantially and de-politicize this issue, no longer will people have to worry about what Washington thinks when they look in their wallets … this is the first major step on the road to end poverty”.
President Edward's agenda was lofty, and somehow vaster and more contentious than his presidential campaign led on, and it would all be put to the test in the election year of 2006 as he pursued other substantial reforms to the country's labor and union laws.
President of the United States, John Edwards
...
Egyptian Engineer, Muhammed Atta
[1] Sharon never announced the plan in OTL but does so earlier here due to the 2nd Intifada ending sooner
[2] Based off numerous proposals from the time
[3] This election took place later in OTL after Hamas won the Palestinian elections, ITTL there have been no such elections
Building Blocks
Israel - Palestine
2005 had rocked Israeli politics. After the traditionally conservative Prime Minister Ariel Sharon had successfully, over the virulent opposition of his party’s right flank, withdrawn Israeli forces from Gaza. The decision was supposedly a pragmatic one, an acceptance of the fact that Israel could no longer maintain its de-facto occupation over the heavily Palestinian majority territory, without sewing a violent backlash and growing foreign disapproval.
The withdrawal policy was called ‘Hafrada’ or alternatively ‘Hahafrada’ by the international and Israeli press, phrases that meant ‘separation’ or ‘disengagement’ in Hebrew. Both were uncomfortable phrases that evoked aspects of either apartheid or surrender to different groups. Though its staunchest advocates insisted that it was the basis for a successful two-state solution. But most international criticism was related to its scope, it was too small, limited to the Gaza territory while Israel maintained control over its air and maritime space while allowing continued expansion into the Palestinian-majority West Bank.
The withdrawal had been extremely politically contentious, and Sharon had been careful to mask his greater objectives to get the ball rolling on greater withdrawal. “The attitude is growing, an Israel without Gaza, without the West Bank, is stronger than one with them,” said Dr Dan Schueftan senior Israeli scholar and policy advisor to the PM, who practically wrote the withdrawal manifesto in the 90s, “Sharon knows this, that Israel will be all the better for these decisions”.
Following the Gaza withdrawal, in August, PM Sharron came public with his plan for a wider disengagement from greater sections of the west bank. “This is a fateful hour for Israel the threshold for a decision, I have repeatedly and openly said that I am willing to make painful compromises in order to put an end to this ongoing and malignant conflict between those who struggle over this land and that I would do my utmost in order to bring peace.”.[1]
(Left) Prime Minister of Israel Ariel Sharon, (Right) Map of the Withdrawal Plan
The Sharon Withdrawal Plan called for Israel to pull out from over 2/3rds of West Bank territory, up to the under-construction West Bank Barrier in the west, while maintaining control over the Jordan Valley border region for 'security reasons'. The announcement was immediately controversial among both pro-Palestinian and Zionist groups. The barrier included all of East Jerusalem and other highly populated Israeli settlements beyond the country's internationally recognized borders while placing thousands of Palestinians on the opposite sides of the wall. Sharon further announced the plan in personal letters to U.S. President and other world leaders, where he expressed that the decision to implement a withdrawal plan was based on improving Israel's security and would substantially aid future negotiations for permanent peace and a potential Palestinian State, not (as the plans left-wing detractors saw it) to permanently derail them and annex Jewish majority areas.
The response from world leaders was mixed, to say the least, President Edwards wrote back and hesitantly agreed with the move provided it led to renewed substantial peace talks, “We are generally supportive of this idea, it is a bold idea and hope that it produces genuine progress on the pathway to peace … and a two-state solution”. Other nations were more nuanced and critical, lodging complaints that the outlined plan still didn’t equate to a full withdrawal. The EU for instance rejected, urging renewed talks first, between the sides to avoid a unilateral move like this one saying it "will not recognize any change to the pre-1967 border other than those agreed by both sides.". Kofi Annan of the U.N. reiterated his belief that the move would be illegal and a spokesman for Palestinian leader Arafat said that “borders are only determined by international legitimacy, this plan is of no concern to us”.
The withdrawal plan quickly gained significant political opposition inside Israel and especially from within Sharon’s own Likud Party. The party had already been fractured, following the Gaza withdrawal and to keep power Sharon had to forge an alliance with the center-left Labor Party to keep control over the government. Senior party leaders and ministers resigned their membership including former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who vowed to halt any unilateral withdrawal that wasn’t put to a national referendum. “A pullout would be a surrender, a victory for Arafat, Hamas, and Islamic terror, everyone can see this, running away under fire, in exchange for what? Nothing!”
Netanyahu laid out his wider opposition in a press conference, backed by half a dozen Knesset members. Their resignation from the government marked the start of a new right-wing Zionist party to oppose the government's withdrawal called ‘Hineini!’ (Hebrew for 'Here I Am!'), and he and 6 other Likud member's resignations meant that the country would face early elections in the new year and derailed attempts to approve the scheme before then.
The country nervously prepared for the January Elections, with the issue of the season squarely on Sharon’s total withdrawal policy. The country was quickly split between the blues (pro withdrawal more secular liberals) and the oranges (anti-withdrawal, more Zionist, conservatives, and nationalists) and people were all too happy to sport their respective teams’ colors across the country, even newspapers (mostly anti – withdrawal) bore the stripes above their headlines urging people to back the west bank settlers. The colors were draped so much and supporters became doubly passionate, cladding their cars, clothes, and children in their ‘sides’ colors so that the whole country became reminiscent of a giant ongoing soccer match, and an occasionally violent one at that. It even caught innocent bystanders in the crossfire, as tourists were harangued at airports and restaurants for their choice of outfits.
(Top Left) Former PM and Hineini leader Netanyahu (Top Right) Anti-Withdrawal Supporters
(Bottom Left) Pro Withdrawal Supporters (Bottom Right) PM Ariel Sharon
They chanted their slogans “No jew left behind” and “A strong and safe Israel” but despite the fanfare and loud pronouncements, the polls remained stiff, sturdily in favor of Sharon’s premiership and proud of his tenure despite the controversies (including a corruption scandal that landed his son Omri with a 9-month prison sentence). But Netanyahu and the other right-wing parties got to work on a ruthless campaign, whipping up crowds into frenzies on the danger of unilateral withdrawal. While Sharon emphasized, that it was time to stop “wasting time, the task ahead is peace”.
But then a fire bell rang out, and with less than a month left in the campaign, Sharon was hospitalized by a stroke, though he remained fully conscious of worries about his health impact on the election reverberated, and raised further questions about his fitness for office. Regardless he insisted he was “ready to get back to work and move forward”. But only a few weeks later, and a few days before the first ballots would be cast, Sharon was laid low by a second far worse stroke, left battling for his life.
The country's chief rabbi went on the national radio to ask for prayers for the prime minister, and condolences poured in from across the world, even from some Arab nations including Mohammed Abbas the Palestinian premier. But Sharon failed to recover and remained in an induced coma. Incapacitated, his responsibilities were delegated to Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.
With the country reaching a pivotal crossroads, politics paused and the date of the country's elections was pushed back a couple of weeks. The headlines days ago, dead set against him, were packed with praise for Sharon, and the acting PM Olmert sought to reassure the public "If I could speak with him this morning and ask: 'Arik [Sharon], what would you tell us? What would you want us to do?' he would say: 'I appreciate the fact that you are all concerned about my health. Thank you; but get to work.’ And this is what we will do.”
Following a dramatic campaign finally on the 31st of January 2006, Israelis went to the polls in the important election. Despite the large shadow of Sharon, the polls remained stubborn and spelled out what had been long predicted a strong Likud victory with 1/3rd of the total vote and 40 seats. But in the highly fractured coalition-centric politics of Israel Olmert needed a coalition, cobbling together a deal with the 2nd place Labor party and the Pensioners List single-issue party creating a government that excluded any of the more openly nationalist parties.[3]The election had been especially humiliating for Netanyahu who had slipped down the polls into a humbling 6th place with 7 Knesset members. The tumble was due to his campaign failing to catch amongst any particular voting bloc as more hardcore nationalists, Russian speakers, and the orthodox Jewish community opted for other political options, though his background and determination he was still left with room to maneuver in Israeli politics.
Olmert was not a particularly good speaker, and it was clear that he had won his government from the weight of Sharon's tenure alone nicknamed ‘Smolmert’ by the opposition for his timidness and supposedly secret left-wing views. But he pledged to carry out Sharon's vision to remove the “obstacles of peace” and move Israel's economy away from “horrific war and back home where it belongs … Israeli democracy has spoken its piece and in a loud and clear voice it has chosen … Israel wants final, secure borders and peace”.
Prime Minister of Israel Ehud Olmert next to former PM Sharon's empty chair
Opposition Leader is Arrested in Ukraine
A Ukrainian court has ordered the ‘indefinite arrest’ of one of the country's key opposition party leaders, Yulia Tymoshenko as part of an investigation into alleged tax evasion and theft of government funds in the 1990s.
She has denied the allegations, saying she is being targeted for standing up to President Viktor Yanukovych.
Ms. Tymoshenko is a key member of the Ukrainian opposition to President Yanukovych and has consistently labeled him a ‘sham president’ and called him a ‘dictator’ due to the controversial 2004 presidential election.
Ms. Tymoshenko has alleged that her arrest is payback, ‘terror against the legitimate opposition’ with the goal to deny her party success at the polls in upcoming parliamentary elections.
A judge has declined to release her even as a few thousand of her supporters protested on the streets outside the courtroom, waving white and red flags, and blaring Ukrainian folk music, facing off against riot policemen.
Mrs. Tymoshenko faces multiple years in jail at a time when the country faces important elections and international negotiations
over gas prices and trade with Russia. While President Yanukovych has been accused of corruption, abuse of power, and efforts to halt any Democratic progress
Her lawyers had appealed for her release on multiple grounds including a petition by hundreds of prominent Ukrainians including the head of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church
Multiple other opposition figures have also lent support to Tymoshenko despite their fractured network of alliances; however, this did not include former prime minister and presidential candidate Victor Yushchenko who has released a statement that “Ukraine deserves candidates able to live up to the ideals of the reform movement”.
Her lawyers had appealed for her release on multiple grounds including a petition by hundreds of prominent Ukrainians including the head of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church
Multiple other opposition figures have also lent support to Tymoshenko despite their fractured network of alliances; however, this did not include former prime minister and presidential candidate Victor Yushchenko who has released a statement that “Ukraine deserves candidates able to live up to the ideals of the reform movement”.
The United States
The first year of John Edwards's presidency had gone well, an unheard-of achievement in recent U.S. politics where incumbents saw their popularity quickly tumble once their campaign promises hit against the brick wall of actually governing. Edwards had managed to keep his approval ratings more or less where they were when he entered the office in the mid to high 60s.
President Edwards at a memorial for Coretta Scott King
Achieved through legislative pushes, some successful like the Medicare expanding drug bill, others ongoing, like his efforts to raise the minimum wage, as well as his active role in the aftermath of Katrina and the Gulf region's subsequent recovery efforts, all while the Republican party had tried to mount a sturdy opposition only to be undone by leadership scandals and a steady drip of Bush Jr era exposes.
Come January 2006, it was clear that the boyish ‘inexperienced’ senator of the campaign was gone and the 44th President was here. Everyone could see that there was a different air in Washington now, marked by the departure of one of the country's most powerful men, Alan Greenspan the long-time Chairman of the Federal Reserve was replaced with the Clinton-era treasury secretary, Larry Summers. And now in his first State of the Union, he made a bombastic announcement that harkened back to a presidential address made over 40 years ago.
He first recalled the hurricane, an issue that had quickly become the central theme of the administration and had clearly affected the President personally before moving onto the central theme of the speech.
2006 State of the Union
“We all have seen the images from the horror of Katrina, people fighting to survive, huddled in the Superdome, left with nothing, except the clothes on their backs…
…I want to thank Congress for moving swiftly and in a bi-partisan fashion, to provide emergency funds and programs to empower the Gulf to recover from this tragedy. The world has seen one side of America, victims and survivors in the wreckage of their homes, but now the world will see the other side, Americans working to rebuild what is theirs, and thousands upon thousands of others helping them to undo a tragedy …
… as we address the crisis in the Gulf states we must also do more to address the tragedy of poverty across all fifty states. poverty existed before Katrina and it will persist after the Gulf region is fully rebuilt, if we let the images that we have watched on the news fade from our memories as they fade from our television screens
It is wrong that a country of such wealth and prosperity has millions of men women and children waking up in poverty every single day, it is my commitment that the spirit of unity that allowed Congress to act on this should continue to act, to renew and win a new war on poverty.”
2006 State of the Union
It was electrifying in the room, as an upper rostrum brimming with Katrina survivors cheered and applauded. A striking declaration from the President, setting the goal to eliminate poverty by 2030 through a series of programs designed to create jobs, provide housing and raise worker pay. Echoing President Johnson's 1964 speech, it was bold, to say the least, especially in a midterm year.
Republicans did their best to grit their teeth through the speech and right-wing critics unleashed on what they saw as a “disastrous ultra-liberal approach to government … John Edwards was elected because many Americas saw him as a moderate, shunning the Democratic party establishment, instead, he has shunned those voters by pinning himself to one of the biggest failures of our government, the egregious war on poverty” said conservative economist Larry Kudlow and in the Republican party official response by Virginia Senator George Allen he derided the Presidents vision as a “typical tax and spend scheme, that will only cost Americans billions while failing to create real jobs or make real growth, the President needs to do the right thing and stay away from our lives, he’d be surprised to learn just how successful we can be”
The unveiling of the President's new anti-poverty agenda was coupled with more good news for him, after months of cross-party negotiations with moderate Republicans and Democrats in the Senate, a deal to raise the minimum wage had been reached by coupling the raise with overhauls to bankruptcy law, an objective Republicans had long sought.
On the wage side, the agreement would up the federal minimum wage to $8.30 at staged 60-cent increases over the next 5 years and would fix the minimum wage so that it was tied to inflation, nixing the need for further debate on the issue.
Meanwhile, the bankruptcy reforms would make it substantially harder to declare bankruptcy, a measure heavily backed by credit card companies and banks to allow them to more easily recover ‘lost’ assets.
The move to bundle the two reforms together in the Senate was extremely contentious among left-wing advocates who heavily scrutinized the bankruptcy reforms seeing it as a giveaway to the nation’s most powerful financial groups and harmful to the middle class. For instance, Harvard professor Elizabeth Warren noted that the bankruptcy reform would overrulingly target ordinary families as opposed to the wealthy and advised Democrats on numerous amendments.
And right-wing Republicans who desperately tried to whittle down the wage increases. Egged on by Republican minority leader Roy Blunt who made sure his party stayed seated through most of the President’s State of the Union and dismissed the compromise as “politically underhanded, this President has routinely pitted Americans against each other … we don’t need his class warfare”.
But the tightrope was walked, one-time tax relief for small businesses, closing wealthy asset loopholes, dropping efforts to raise tipped workers’ pay, carve-outs for medical debts (a measure heavily backed by the first lady Elizabeth Edwards a former bankruptcy lawyer in a very public bout with cancer) but in the end the Senate and House backed the Fair Minimum Wage and Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention Act with decent bi-partisan approval.
The President thanked Congress “This is a huge moral win, no longer will the richest country on earth, accept, that hard-working people can live on $5.15, it will improve our economy substantially and de-politicize this issue, no longer will people have to worry about what Washington thinks when they look in their wallets … this is the first major step on the road to end poverty”.
President Edward's agenda was lofty, and somehow vaster and more contentious than his presidential campaign led on, and it would all be put to the test in the election year of 2006 as he pursued other substantial reforms to the country's labor and union laws.
President of the United States, John Edwards
...
The Doctor’s words surrounded him, they were instructions, orders without compassion or endearment, but purely and wholly devoted. A stream of unending commitment, indivisibly cold passion. It alienated some who yearned for a loving embrace or a morality tale to soothe their human frailties. But those were from the times of the Sheikh, who spoke of the greater war, the Doctor understood the numbing steel and the repetitive technicalities of real warfare. The Sheikh drew from the infinite pool of loving fury, the Doctor concentrated it into an unyielding sharp-edged vengeance.
He would transfer that to his students, while they ate and studied and slept from the trenches and mountains, drilling it into them until they understood their roles deeper than they knew themselves. To resist urges and temptations to understand patience and timing and how to keep their dirty mouths shut. A team he had picked out personally some he had fought beside in the caucuses; others would make up with practice and practice and practice.
This operation would be more dangerous and important than ever before, to strike at the heart of the rotten project infecting the faithful, the first step on their march, to kill the President.
- The Perfect Soldier, The Life and Death of Mohammed Atta
Egyptian Engineer, Muhammed Atta
[1] Sharon never announced the plan in OTL but does so earlier here due to the 2nd Intifada ending sooner
[2] Based off numerous proposals from the time
[3] This election took place later in OTL after Hamas won the Palestinian elections, ITTL there have been no such elections
Great stuff. Good to see Sharon’s ambition win out and an intriguing twist of having Bibi exit Likud, rather than Sharon/Olmert. How did you do the Edwards recording, some kind of AI program?
That last stinger leaves me nervous…
That last stinger leaves me nervous…
John Edwards getting assassinated?! What are you talking about?
Probably the 2005 assassination attempt on Bush IOTL but could've succeeded without extra security precautions sparked by 9/11.
Pretty sure its the President of Afghanistan that is going to have the assassination attempt happen to them.
That makes sense - more immediately available to Atta
Okay I saw it and yes, I did read the timeline and have been reading it for a while now. I just didn't see that part the first time I read that update.
I just don't like people talking to me in agitated way
Honestly I think both parties here have gotten their wires crossed, any perception of a personal attack being intended is a mix up. At least in my opinion, as both of you seem to be genuinely civil contributors and active members across the board.
Yes, he is a talented infoboxes maker and active member, so I never wanna having an unpleasant argument with him
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A successful assassination of Edwards just a year into his term definitely puts him into JFK territory in terms of public opinion and probably makes 9/11 look quaint in terms of public backlash against jihadism, especially with 9/4 still in TTL America’s consciousness. The setup around Edwards’ SOTU suggests to me this may the direction you’re headed
That being said, I’m intrigued by @The Ghost of Danton suggesting that it could be the Afghan President that Atta is planning on attacking.
I wouldn't see a reason for Edwards to be at the WTC for an assassination attempt, other than perhaps a February 26th memorial
