Dixie Forever

Chapter 63: The Nineties

The Presidency of Arthur Fletcher (CSA)

President Fletcher spoke at his inauguration on the success of the Confederacy in achieving integration of all its peoples without special hand-outs or set-asides but by challenging everyone to achieve by hard work, faith, and family.  He promised peace and no new wars in the Confederacy, and working with Poland to help integrate their country together, and to help Europe rebuild after the devastation of communism.

For his part, Fletcher kept the CS out of the first Iraq War of the United States, as he saw no vital national security interest in the war, but he did allow companies to sell arms to the US and other US allies, which did boost the economy, also aided by the US collapse of the Savings and Loans, causing Americans to invest money in the Confederacy for safety and a more secure dollar.  He signed the NAFTA agreement, as the Confederates long believed in free trade, despite warnings from some Americans like Ron Paul, and some Confederates, like former President Goldwater that it would cause jobs to leave for Mexico.

President Fletcher appointed Justice Clarence Thomas of Georgia, the second black justice on the CS Supreme Court, in 1991.  His first choice for Secretary of War, John Tower, was rejected on accusations of his alcoholism and womanizing being a stain on the office of Secretary of War.

Cabinet:


Richard Darman (Treasury, TX), Paul Thayer (War, OK), Dr Sandra Moore (State, VA), Alberto Gonzalez (A.G., NM), William Sanchez (Interior, CU), Leon Dorsett (Agriculture, SC), Mickey Cantor (Commerce, TN).

As with other presidents, President Fletcher tried to bring in members of various states into his cabinet to ensure he had a perspective from across the Confederacy, rather than one region.  His Commerce Secretary was instrumental in getting NAFTA passed during his administration, and getting Confederate goods into the former communist nations through exclusive trade deals with those nations for infrastructure and machinery contracts, rather than foreign aid gifts.  Interior Secretary Sanchez helped revitalize the national parks of the Confederacy and increase funding, while Dr. Moore, as the first black female Secretary of State helped improve relations between Tanzania, Kenya, Namibia, South Africa, Rhodesia, Togoland, Gold Coast, and Kamerun, the most advanced, freest, and most prosperous of the African nations.

The CS got into no foreign wars during Fletcher's presidency, and its defense spending was much lower than that of the United States, as it only had a standing army of 80,000 officers and men, with the Confederate armed services remaining nearly entirely in the State Guard system, which would be nationalized by an act of Congress, providing over 1.4 million additional troops if necessary.  Much of the defense spending was maintenance and upgrades, with some cost offsets due to selling older used equipment to pay for new equipment.

The budget of the CSA ended in 1994 at $87 billion on revenues of $87.6 billion, the increase over the years of over $30 billion due to defense spending and assistance in Europe with restructuring the formerly communist countries.  Poland especially took an interest in the CS government, rewriting its constitution to match the Confederate one closely, with a 'strong president' and bicameral legislature.  Budget hawks were alarmed at the increase in spending and were afraid Fletcher would turn into another Lincoln.

A new condition called 'Mad Cow Disease' appeared in 1993, first in Canada, then in the United States, where scientists discovered that cows and sheep fed meat-and-bone meal developed the disease, and humans who ate the meat would then get the disease.  President Fletcher ordered an immediate embargo to all Canadian and American beef and mutton and cow/sheep products, and products at the borders and ports were seized and impounded.  It was a huge disruption to a lot of businesses and homes, and caused a number of disruptions to many businesses.  Meat was then ordered from other countries, and within the next few years, the home-grown beef and mutton industries grew much larger, creating a permanent reduction in US and Canadian meat and dairy imports, even when many US farmers shifted away from the MBM meal they were feeding their cattle.  Congress responded by banning all meat imports fed a diet of MBM from any country, and would later ban imports of meat or dairy fed growth hormones or non-free range (in the early 2000s); states began banning the use of MBM, growth hormones, and non-free-range meat practices in their own ranches and farms, at various rates, so that by the early 2000s, all meat and dairy products were hormone free, free-range, and non-MBM.

President Fletcher continued the ban on aspartame and other artificial sweeteners, leaving a number of US candies, diet sodas, cakes, and other desserts, resulting in the development of sweet treats using stevia leaf, honey, monk fruit, erythritol, allulose and other natural, low calorie sweeteners.  Diet Coke in the Confederacy was sweetened with stevia, rather than aspartame, and regular Coke was soon sweetened not with cane sugar, but a blend of honey, stevia, and monk fruit.  Candies like Reese's, Zippers, Tangeroos, and others were sweetened with honey and erythritol rather than high fructose corn syrup like in the USA.

While the United States focused on President Fletcher as being the first black Confederate President, Fletcher himself didn't focus on his race, but instead tried to focus on his being a Confederate, equal to any other.  He did promote black entrepreneurship and civil participation, though, and marked the 125th anniversary of the end of the war in Richmond with a huge celebration and a very conciliatory and patriotic speech, as he wanted to continue the good will with the Americans that he felt during Kemp's presidency.  One portion of it: "We celebrate the achievement of our dream, that of independence and self-government.  That was the hope of the American Revolution and the Spirit of '76, and it was the hope of the Confederate Revolution and the Spirit of '61.  It has been the dream of blacks in North America for over three hundred years, having left Africa in chains.  It took black and white working together to achieve it, and it is my sincere hope that today and all our tomorrows we remember that it is by all Confederates of all races working together, that we achieve our dreams.  It is not by separating and complaining about past mistreatments that we build up and advance.  Divide and conquer is how we are destroyed from within.  Distracted and divided, we are weak and we lose our hard-fought rights. Don't let anyone tell you that we should pay any reparations.  No one alive today is a slave and no one alive today is a slaveholder.  You stand and fall on your own efforts in life.  The blood of hundreds of thousands of Confederates of all races bought our freedoms and paid all reparations, and it is by Confederate honor and faith in God that freedom was extended to all in due time, not in a mad rush for political considerations."  And he concluded, "It is an honor to be your president, and I ask you to judge me as any other president, by my fidelity to the constitution and to the independence of these Confederate States.  God bless you, and God bless the Confederate States."

Economically, President Fletcher benefited from a continuance of the economic boom from President Kemp, and enjoyed high approval ratings during his presidency.  Historically, he is remembered for his deft handling of the fall of communism and extending loans to the former Warsaw Pact that did not try to bankrupt them or tie them into the CSA with debts they couldn't pay off.  Plenty of Confederate churches and 'aid societies' (charities) sprang up to help the former communist countries with food, clothes, toys, books, and other goods to help them get on their feet.  And unlike a lot of UN aid, Confederate aid actually reached the people it intended to help.  Due to President Bush's recession in the United States, some sectors of the economy did experience slowdowns, though there were enough people in the press who laid the blame on the US-slowdown that it was not blamed on the Fletcher administration, realizing those areas of the economy depended on US-based products.

One important piece of legislation passed during Fletcher's presidency was the High-Speed Information Communications Act, which authorized the funding of a CS-wide fiber-optic data network for defense purposes to all capitals and cities of 250,000 persons or more.  This would later be allowed access for civilian use, creating a confederation-wide high-speed internet for cities that would later expand to rural areas (50,000 persons or more) by the late 1990s.  Despite opposition to the HSIC Act from large numbers of Representatives and Senators, who feared that allowing such an obvious infrastructure project under 'defense' claims would open the door to future projects in violation of the constitution under similar claims.  President Fletcher promised to veto any attempt to hide boondoggles using the line-item veto that Confederate Presidents held, and he did use his line-item veto more than President Kemp.  During Fletcher's administration, fifteen new national monuments were dedicated, seven to black Confederate veterans of the Confederate Revolution, Spanish-Confederate War, World War I, and World War II.

Environmentally, the Interstate Business Clean Air and Water Act was passed, regulating businesses that operate interstate, rather than intrastate.  It provided that businesses needed to clean up their own operations, specifically of their wastewater, and install scrubbers to reduce CO₂ emissions and other noxious gasses.  Rather than justify it out of some form of earth-worship or gaea-worship, the Confederates in Congress cited that it was their biblical duty as caretakers of God's Creation to clean up after themselves, and to take care of the entire Confederacy, not just their own states.  They said states were responsible for business operating solely within state lines.  The Supreme Court, when this law was challenged, cited its provisions regulating only interstate businesses, not intrastate, and thus authorized in Article 1, Section 8, Clause 3.  Earlier laws regarding clean air and water had similarly cited this provision, though attempts to use that clause to allow intrastate business to be regulated when its pollution flowed down the river were struck down.

While it was a less celebrated anniversary, the 130th anniversary of Southern Independence began in 1991, where President Fletcher celebrated in Richmond, Virginia with his wife and children at the old Confederate White House, with fireworks, and a speech on the progress of the Confederation.  He said, "My fellow Confederates, we are here today because of our ancestors in 1776, believing in the right of the people to self-government, and the affirmation of that right in 1861 that legitimate government comes with the consent of the governed, and when that consent is withdrawn, it is the right of the people to choose a new government.  My ancestors fought with Generals Forrest, Cleburne, and Lee, and were freed because of them and their actions on the field, and behind the scenes.  We are all free today because we hold true to that belief that government that governs least is best.  We hold true that our cities, counties, and states take care of the matters that suit their unique positions, while our Confederation Government handles its delegated authority, as a true confederation should.  May we ever be guided by a true reading of our constitution and the limits it places on government, and may God bless these Confederate States."

Forty-Third Amendment (1995)

Beginning with the wider availability of internet communications, came the early forums that people used to share stories, thoughts, pictures, and opinions.  The upside is that people could connect more through services like Dixie Online, but the downside was that some people began using this to discriminate against others for disagreeing with their opinions.  One such case was found in eastern Tennessee near the border with North Carolina, in a city with a number of US-immigrants.  John Williams was fired for having 'offended' someone with a yankee joke, off-work, and off the campus of his business.  His boss, Bryan Caswell, gave some 'administrator-speak' excuse that middle management tyrants often gave in the US.  Another person, James Lee, was fired for something he posted online that was seen by another person at work, who got him fired.  David J Amerling, a North Carolina representative originally from Ohio, used the power of his office to get someone fired for printing a story critical about him and some local laws he supported.  Cassie Duguid, a young missionary working in Louisiana from Texas, was fired for having spoken to some Catholics about the Pope being unbiblical, stranding her in Louisiana while on a missionary assignment.

These cases continued, mostly in northern Alabama, eastern Tennessee, southeastern Kentucky, western North Carolina, Atlanta, spots of Texas, and some places in Baja California, capturing the fascination of the public with tales of Yankee values invading the south on the internet.  Beginning in 1991, several states proposed an amendment to attempt to restore some semblance of freedom, because if you were scared to speak, then what good was the freedom of speech?

The text of what became the 43rd Amendment was:

1. The right of the citizens to freedom of speech shall include all speech made by electronic means in text, video, audio or other forms, and shall include all political, religious, or otherwise legal speech.  
2. The right to free speech shall include the right of the citizens to sue any business of any kind which shall attempt to abridge that right under any pretense for political, religious, or otherwise legal speech; no business shall take any action against any employee for political or religious speech made off work or off property or both.
3. Freedom of speech does not include the right not to be offended. No person shall be sued for speech that offends another person, nor shall a person have his life, liberty, property, family, employment, education, or livelihood threatened or otherwise impaired for offensive speech. 
4. The freedom of speech and of the press shall include the right to criticize any person, including public officials or persons holding any public trust, and to publicize, report on, and critique on the public actions of those persons, including any crime or corruption.
5. No appointed or elected official to any office or public trust shall use their office or position to censor, abridge, or infringe upon the speech of the citizens through intimidation, bribery, or other means, or to impair or infringe upon the life, liberty, property, family, employment, education, or livelihood of any citizen for any criticism or reporting of corruption or crimes of any elected or appointed official.
6. Congress shall have the power to regulate businesses which cross state lines such that they shall not make any employment decisions based upon nor infringe upon the freedom of political or religious speech of their employees, made off-work or off-property or both, or such speech made while working that does not impair the normal function of such business; the burden of proof for such being upon the business. 
7. Any business which provides a means of communication or financial transactions shall not discriminate on the basis of political or religious belief or speech made by their customers or employees in any business decision.

Cajun Telecom was sued in 1995 after this passed for denying service to some Huguenots in northern Louisiana, who won the case in Davis County (OTL Lincoln), forcing the Telecom not to discriminate against the Protestants.  David Amerling was recalled out of office when it was discovered he had bribed a local business to fire the person who had criticized him.  John Hogg was sued and jailed for trying to badger Michael Daniels for 'offending' him and for getting him fired from his job, which threatened to get his family kicked out of their apartment in Asheville.  Ashley Jones sued the University of Kentucky, whose President came from Massachusetts, and won the case for discriminating against her admission because she had made 'offensive' comments about New England's 'political puritanism'.  The university president apologized publicly, and Ashley got a free ride to the university as a result of the case.

With this amendment, people had free speech, and were now protected from interstate businesses and communications companies.

The Presidency of George H.W. Bush (USA)

President Bush promised a continuance of the Reagan Revolution, but his term soon found the United States in the Iraq War in 1991, and his going back on raising taxes, which cost him a second term.

President Bush invaded Panama in 1989, when its leader, Manuel Noriega invaded the Panama Canal Zone, a US territory that had not been ceded back to Panama since the creation of the zone, and which still gave both the US and CS a nice income each year from ships passing through.  The CS allowed the Americans to interfere, as their territory had been attacked, but President Fletcher did urge Bush to cede the canal zone to avoid this problem in the future, to which Bush politely declined.  In private, the US President used some 'questionable terms' to refer to President Fletcher; when he found out, Fletcher took the high road, calling Bush a stereotypical yankee, and saying "General Lee was right about those people."

Communist governments began to fall in 1989 in Eastern Europe, with the Warsaw Wall falling in November 1989.  Germans from the Volgaland People's Republic also flew in to Posen or crossed in to Kalisch, a German border city with its Polish counterpart, East Kalisch.

During the 1980s, the US had funded the Iraqi invasion of Iran by Saddam Hussein, lasting from 1980-1988.  Due to Hussein's threats on Israel, the loans to Iraq were not continued, and faced with huge debts and low international oil prices, Hussein decided to take the country of Kuwait on its southern border.  This was accomplished in August of 1990, and Bush imposed sanctions on Iraq, and assembled an international coalition to oppose him.  The two countries had about 20% of the world's oil, with Rashidi Arabia having another 26%, so he wanted to discourage other countries from similar aggression.  A UN resolution was approved in November 1990 authorizing use of force if Iraq didn't withdraw by January 15, 1991.  Gorbachev supported this, ensuring its passage.  The CS didn't commit troops, but it committed money and materials to the effort, as there was no national security interest to go to war in Iraq.

In speaking to Congress, he asked for a joint resolution authorizing war against Iraq, in which he outlined one objective as "a new world order," the source of a number of conspiracy theories in the future.  With approval, the US bombed Baghdad for 39 days, and invaded Kuwait on February 23rd, evicting Iraq by the 27th.  A ceasefire was arranged on March 3, and the UN established a demilitarized zone between Kuwait and Iraq.  Bush left Hussein in control of Iraq, as he didn't want to have to resolve the issues raised by occupation of Iraq.

President Bush attempted to improve relations with North China, despite its human rights abuses, and issues with South China.  While his efforts helped and brought North Chinese goods into the US, it did strain relations with Korea and South China, whose relationships with Canada and the Confederacy strengthened.  After the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989, the US quickly imposed sanctions and cut economic ties, but through secret channels soon re-established economic ties with North China.  The Confederates cut ties at the same time, and limited their economic relations with North China to the few things that could not be obtained from South China.

The US President signed the Americans With Disabilities Act, which prohibited discrimination based on physical/mental disabilities and required reasonable public accommodations for people to access businesses.  Southern newspapers reacted negatively to this, saying it was a federal overreach, and properly a state issue, while northern press called it a positive step to ending discrimination against certain Americans.  During the 1990 budget negotiations, Bush went back on his promise of 'no new taxes' when he let Democrats know he would support increased taxes along with reduced spending to reign in budget deficits, as the Federal Reserve Chairman, Alan Greenspan, refused to lower interest rates unless Congress could get the deficits under control.

Economically, the US re-entered a recession at the midway point of Bush's presidency, with high-profile reports of large companies laying off employees, including those who also had business in the Confederacy.  Growing deficits also began affecting the US economy, after years of increased defense spending under President Reagan to the amount of hundreds of billions of dollars.

The President signed the Immigration Act of 1990, which increased immigration into the United States by 40%, and added a 'diversity visa' to the immigration policy, which would go on to be criticized due to the random nature of the lottery, accusations of racism in favoring non-European nations, and many of the lottery 'winners' going on to commit heinous crimes in the United States.

Culturally, the term 'political correctness' or 'politically correct' began to crop up more and more from the political left, where it was used to define the terms of political debate, and declare certain phrases off-limits, reframing things and causing many to self-censor to avoid criticism, and then start censoring others as well.  In the South, serious political commentary began categorizing this as the beginnings of 'thought police,' or 'liberal fascism,' calling the Democrats up north the 'liberal fascists' who 'care you to death.'  Parody shows and magazines began depicting American Democrats and media personalities, who would more often than not agree with the Democrat party without outright saying so, as "Yankee nazis."  Both Libertarian and Southern Republican, the two larger parties, critiqued Yankee politics, noting its leftward trend, their calling it out causing a more rightward drift in the south away from any centralizing tendencies and causing more efforts to buttress the power of the states and restrain federal power and more vigilence regarding federal employees and policies.

Fall of the Warsaw Wall (1989)

In November of 1989, the Warsaw Wall opened due to a variety of miscommunications and once the flow of people began, the communists in charge did not seek to stop the flow, essentially spelling the end of the eastern Polish nation.  

President Fletcher visited Hungary, both Budapest, Csíkszereda, and Großschenk, which caused some tensions with the Romanians, as they felt the Transylvanian portions of Hungary should fall to them, but neither Fletcher nor Bush supported their claims.  Fletcher visited Warsaw in 1990 along with President Bush from the United States, avoiding the appearance of gloating over the fall of communism to avoid antagonizing nascent democratic movements and communists, but did advocate peaceful transitioning to free markets and free governments.

In the USSR Gorbachev tried to slow-roll the democratization of satellite states and suppressed nationalist movements, but in 1990, starting with Lithuania's proclamation of independence, for which Fletcher and Bush took no action to intervene, the movement could not be stopped.  Fletcher and Bush mildly protested Gorbachev's attempts to suppress the movement but did not directly intervene.  Bush made an address in 1991 labeled the "Chicken Kiev speech," cautioning against 'suicidal nationalism,' while Fletcher made a more well-received speech that 'freedom and self-determination and self-government should be the right of all peoples when they are able to defend that right against an aggressor nation on their borders.  When you cannot reasonably defend that, you should remember your people and culture but seek out allies and exhaust all options for peace before choosing any form of war.'  His speech was in keeping with Confederate history and was better received internationally as both more nuanced and more principled.

In July of 1991, Bush, Gorbachev, and Fletcher signed the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START I), reducing nuclear weapons by 30%.  A month later, hard-line communists attempted a coup against Gorbachev, but it quickly fell apart.  The coup did, however, break his remaining power and caused his resignation that same month, with Russian President Boris Yeltsin ordering seizure of Soviet property.  Gorbachev tried to hold on to power till December of 1991, but the USSR dissolved.  Yeltsin met with Bush and Fletcher in 1992, declaring a new era of friendship and partnership, and signed the START II in 1993 to further reduce nuclear arms.

Once the USSR collapsed, a number of American companies tried to swoop in and capitalize on the chaos, buying up mineral rights and businesses, leeching money out of Russia as the US would have done to the Confederates had they lost the war so long ago.  Countering this, the Confederates provided political assistance through their Secretary of State, agricultural assistance through their Secretary of Agriculture to avoid Russians starving, and technological assistance through the Secretary of Commerce, all of which was provided on loan with a 25-year repayment at 3.5% interest.  The difference between the US and CS was made all the starker in how they 'helped' Russia after the collapse of its government, and the 'help' provided by the US was much less helpful and benefited large US-based corporations that were politically connected more often than it helped Russian people, whereas Confederate aid often bypassed the so-called 'Russian oligarchs' and reached the people, with food, clothes, Bibles, books, magazines, cards, 'care packages,' and even gifts of tractors and cars.  By the late 1990s, a lot of Russians sported Confederate flag patches on their clothes or decals on their cars with 'спаси́бо' written on the white portion, or flew Confederate flags or Russian flags with a little Southern Cross in the canton as an expression of gratitude.  Members of what would later be termed the 'deep state' begin working on plotting on making Russians a 'big bad' again as a strategic counter to the US, despite their economy being in shambles, and positioning them and the CS against the US in propaganda.

Less dwelt upon was the situation between South Turkey and North Turkey, as they were set up after WW2.  Greece had been restored to Constantinople after the first world war, mainly to prevent Russia, and later the Soviet Union, from gaining access to the Mediterranean.  The Soviets were allowed North Turkey as an occupation zone by the allies over Greece's objection to prevent them from having access to the Mediterranean, while Greece wanted North and South Turkey to reunite its five-centuries-long occupied territory, in their view.  After the revelations of the Axis Turkish massacres of Christians, the Allies deported the Turks from South Turkey; a total Turkish population of about 13 million in 1945, after over 4.8 million deaths during the war, were all removed from the southern Turkish state to North Turkey to live under Soviet domination for fifty years.  During that time, the Soviets would deport millions to the other soviet republics, notably Kazakhstan, to work in their heavy industry in conditions little better than 1850s northern US factories or camps in France during the war.  Death rates were high, and by the fall of the communist Turkish government, there were about 13.5 million Turks left in the North Turkish People's Republic.  The Turks in North Turkey claimed the area of South Turkey and that of the Aegean and Kurdistan, and would not cede those claims until 1998 when they signed a treaty with Greece and the European Economic Community and the United States for development aid.  Unfortunately, during the 1990s, Turkey, as it wanted to be called, would suffer slow growth, high crime, unemployment, substance abuse, corruption, and suicide rates well above the international average.  Some Turks returning to Turkey from Kazakhstan could not even speak their language, having been forced to speak Kazakh or Russian, and being barely employable in the emerging market economy in Turkey, fueling further unemployment, resentment, and crime.

1992 Presidential Election (USA)

Missouri governor William Clinton, whose father moved from the CS to Missouri for a job, won the Democrat nomination on a large field of candidates, many who ran in 1988 also. Paul Tsongas, a former Massachusetts Senator and a Senator from West Virginia, initially won the New Hampshire primaries but lost the nomination to Clinton, who named him his VP candidate.


Clinton-Tsongas, 92

The ticket ran as fiscally conservative, as Tsongas was quite fiscally conservative, criticizing the Bush presidency for its spending, deficits, and raising taxes.  Bush ran against some opposition from Harry Stassen and a Union League leader, Bryan David, whose racial positions were quite extreme, including demanding a return to segregation and a completion of Lincoln's dream of colonization, and he was not taken seriously.  It would later be revealed that Bryan David was a registered Democrat and had voted Democrat for ten years prior, buut had been paid out of the Clinton campaign to delegitimize US Republicans.

The campaign was rough, as there was a budget of over $1.2 trillion at stake, which could buy a lot of favors, and in the end, Clinton won 355-152.  There was a lot of opposition to Clinton from a number of people.  Some claimed he wasn't a natural-born citizen because of his father's questionable move into the US, while conservative talk radio hosts like Rush Limbaugh focused on his obvious corruption in Missouri.  Uniquely, Clinton would use the Confederate flag in Missouri in campaigning due to the large amount of Confederate heritage in that state.  Clinton made one or two gaffs in reference to President Fletcher's race, which were seized upon by the Bush campaign and even Rush Limbaugh, a now popular US radio host.  The US media shrugged it off, saying 'he's not racist, that's just how people talked in Missouri when he was growing up.'  Later, when a Republican Missourian used the same term as Clinton, the media effectively forced him out of office, calling him racist.


1993 Presidential Election (CSA)


Gore, Perot, Harris, Miller, Buchanan, Campbell

Senator Gore brought some energy to the Libertarian ticket which was hoping to distance itself from the troubles in its founding.  Gore helped push through environmental legislation within Tennessee and some legislation in the Congress over federal waters and territories that the Secretary of the Interior managed, hoping to make that a statement for other states to follow, since the federal Congress had no authority over territory within any state other than that purchased by it for defense purposes.  He was contested by Zell Miller of Georgia, but Miller came in 3rd.  As a Senator, Gore co-sponsored a bill 'High-Speed Information Communications Act', which would make famous his claim "I took the initiative in inventing the internet."

Southern Republicans had a contest between Pat Buchanan, a conservative Virginian, Joe Harris of Georgia, Carroll Campbell of South Carolina.

Texas oil tycoon Ross Perot announced his candidacy in a surprise August announcement, with former Admiral John Thach of Alabama as his VP candidate.  His major issue was trade and over-dependence on the US for the economy.  He made a huge deal about the recently signed NAFTA deal, which both Gore and Buchanan supported.  Having lost a chance in the SR party, he formed the Independent Party and ran there.

In the election in November, Perot won Texas and its 71 electoral votes, but his candidacy was a spoiler for Buchanan, drawing just enough support to give Gore the Presidency, 283-230-71.  Gore had to win at least 18 states, which he did, thanks to several island states that felt the Southern Republican Party had not been worried about them regarding defense, environment, and infrastructure (local issue).


Gore had served in the Tennessee State Guard for the required two years, and stayed in the State Guard Reserves for four years.  His two years were spent being called up to service by President Goldwater working with NATO in rebuilding parts of Germany, West Poland, and parts of Africa, something that was unpopular in many states, and was ended in 1971.  Once he returned home to the reserves, Gore finished college at the University of Nashville, then joined the State Legislature for 4 years, then Congress in 1980 until his election to President in 1993.  While many who knew him would say he was smart and likeable, he was also awkward and could often claim to do things that other people did to boost his own ego.

1996 Presidential Election (USA)

President Clinton was personally popular in the US, though not so much in the CS, and faced opposition from Senator Bob Dole from Kansas.  He was able to win 433-74, with Dole taking the midwest but none of the states east of the Mississippi but Indiana, and Democrats taking California for the first time in several elections, which was blamed on the Diversity Visa and the Mexican Trains, trains going from Mexico non-stop to the US which were rumored to contain dozens to hundreds of illegal aliens sealed in Mexico, and opened in the US.  At this point there estimated about 3 million illegal aliens, a majority coming on the trains, as the Confederates kept a tight border, but were allowing the trains through without inspection if they simply went straight through without stopping.

There were questions before and during the election of Democrat fundraising, with Tsongas picking up hundreds of thousands of dollars from a Buddhist Monk temple in Sacramento, despite their vow of poverty, and allegations of North China buying influence at the White House with their donations, and Clinton 'selling' the Grant Bedroom for donations.  The Clinton administration also transferred missile secrets from the Department of Defense to the Department of Commerce so they could then be sold to the North Chinese, it would be revealed in 1998.  When asked about it, Clinton's Secretary of State, Olivia W. Albright, said she didn't believe the U.S. and C.S. should be the only superpower nations.

Presidency of Bill Clinton (1993-2001)

President Clinton's two terms in office were a time of relative peace at home, along with continued prosperity from the 1980s.  NAFTA was ratified, and the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, authored by Senator Biden, was signed into law, instituting harsher penalties for crack cocaine and other offenses.

Clinton appointed Stephen Breyer and Ruth Ginsberg to the Supreme Court, despite Ginsberg's quite "unique" views on many subjects, and both were confirmed.  His 1993 Omnibus Budget was thought to help shed the 'tax and spend' image of Democrats, as Republicans often compared budgets to the much smaller Confederate budgets to their south, who often ran even or a slight surplus.  A combination of spending cuts to Medicare and the military was offset by tax increases on gas and income over $100,000, which would close the deficit by about $250 billion over five years.  One of the early efforts he passed was the Family Medical Leave Act (1993), which provided 12 weeks of unpaid medical leave for family and medical reasons, including pregnancy.

Mrs. Clinton, an Illinois native and devotee of Saul Alinsky and Abraham Lincoln, became the champion of his healthcare reform bill of 1993-1994, which would have instituted single-payer health care like Canada, providing government-paid insurance for those without employer insurance, and expand government regulation in something called "managed competition" where government would set a minimum level of benefits, and forbid charging different rates based on age or pre-existing conditions by insurers.  Several corporations supported this proposal, believing it would reduce their own costs, but more people attacked it as government overreach, alleging that it would lead to health-care rationing, reduced choices, increased costs, huge wait lines in the US hospitals like in France's single-payer system.  Clinton refused to compromise on the bill, and with a unified Republican front, combined with talk radio hosts talking against it, Clinton abandoned the effort in September 1994, but the damage was too late, and the Republicans won Congress for the first time in decades.  The damage done by Mrs. Clinton was even seen in the South, with a marked reduction in the number of women elected in 1993 across the South, and many women actively deciding not to run so as not to be seen as 'pushy' as she.

After the victory of the Republicans in 1994, Clinton 'triangulated,' and began to take a more moderate stance for the US.  He signed the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (1996) that allowed people to keep their health insurance if they switched jobs.  Senator Kennedy from Massachusetts helped get passage of the Children's Health Insurance Program (1997) to provide health care coverage for the children of working poor via a 75¢ tax on cigarette packs.  This was lampooned on Rush Limbaugh's program by suggesting that everyone who smokes should be congratulated for smoking, because they were funding children's health care.  President Clinton signed welfare reform (Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act), which encouraged those on welfare to find work and put limits on the amount of welfare one could get.

The economy was in a boom, whether natural or artificial, and the stock market and everyone's 401k were growing.  Government income went from $808 billion in 1993's budget to $1.39 trillion in the 2001 budget, and spending went from $1.409 trillion to $1.862 trillion.  GDP increased to $8,802,461,000 USD ($8.8 trillion) for the entire United States, with national debt coming to $3,940,300,000,000 ($3.9 trillion)

Through lobbying efforts, Clinton passed the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA), which repealed part of the old Glass-Steagall Act requiring banks to classify themselves as either a commercial bank (with FDIC and federal oversight) or an investment bank.  He also passed the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000, which deregulated derivatives trading, including the "Enron Loophole," which lessened the regulation of energy trading by companies like Enron, and the Telecommunications Act (1996), which deregulated media ownership somewhat, making possible a series of mergers, reducing the number of media companies over time to 6 large companies by 2016.  In 1996, he signed the Defense of Marriage Act, which outlawed same-sex marriages, despite calling it unnecessary and divisive.  He signed the Brady Act in 1993 providing for background checks on gun purchases, along with a ten-year 'assault rifle ban' on AR-15s; this resulted in a swell in cross-border gun purchases by Americans, which was soon stopped, causing US prices to swell on AR-15s.

Controversially to the CS, he signed the National Voter Registration Act of 1993, which was called "motor voter," allowing same day registration as voting and made it much easier to register to vote, something the CS believed would cause more voter fraud, and was criticized heavily in the south and on US talk radio.  The only reason the Confederates cared was because many elected officials saw the Democrat party up north as corrupt as the southern Democrat Party was before it collapsed, and were worried about their increasingly socialist policies coming south.  In 1998, the Digital Millennium Copyright Act was signed, providing a way for sound recording copyright owners to get royalties and clarified 'fair use' for copyright materials, and exempting ISPs from responsibility for transmitting copyrighted works.  Unfortunately, Clinton passed the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA), which encouraged banks to make loans to low-income persons, people who would otherwise not be able to afford a house, if they were minorities or face harsher federal attentions, creating the adjustable rate mortgage.  While this was a noble goal, this resulted in the financial crisis of 2007-2008.

Henry Longest at the EPA approved a rule authorizing the use of 'biosolids' as fertilizer across the United States in 1993 as a result of lobbying efforts from agricultural and waste treatment businesses.  Wastewater from sewage treatment plants would be separated into liquid and solid, and the leftover matter, because it has carbon in it, was allowed to be called 'organic.'  Human waste, still containing birth control drugs, recreational drugs, pharmaceutical drugs, hormone replacement therapy drugs, pesticides, infectious agents, and other chemicals remained in the biosolids because the companies selling, purchasing, and using the biosolids paid big money in lobbying to Congress to make and keep this practice legal, to the present day.  This biosolid matter was then resold to farmers across the United States, with the potentially cancer-causing substances not having been cleaned out, being reintroduced into the food supply of Americans, and anyone to whom they sold foods.  As a result, when the use of bio-solids was discovered in the Confederate States, imports of American non-organic food was cut dramatically; however, the Americans made this up with more exports to Africa and Asia.

Clinton used the US military in 'peacekeeping' operations like Bush did.  Bush sent 25,000 US Soldiers to Somalia on a 'peacekeeping' mission, and the Mogadishu raid was a huge embarrassment for the Clinton administration in late 1993, and shortly afterward he removed troops after getting a peace deal in early 1994.  Criticism from Confederate news sources and internally prompted renewed debates about the role of the US Military around the world in the post-Cold War era.  Clinton did not intervene in an internal dispute between the Hutu and Tutsi, resulting in the deaths of 800,000 people within 3 months, which he called his worst mistake.  

Keeping out of the Caribbean, which the US jokingly referred to as the "Confederate Sea,"  Clinton supported Confederate President Fletcher's intervention to protect their state of Santo Domingo from being overrun by fleeing Haitians before and during his administration.  Four battleships and a carrier with 3 destroyers approached in early 1993, convincing the military junta to step aside and have new, more honest elections.  Roger Pascal, a Louisiana-educated Haitian, won the presidency in 1994, and with Confederate assistance began a period of intense development in Haiti via loans and bond issues via Confederate businesses, creating the first reliable electric, water, and sanitation systems in the country in decades, but also mowing down large tenements that were barely habitable or safe in favor of apartments, which were more expensive than the Haitians could afford, but they were allowed to live there provided they worked.

Clinton intervened in the break-up of Yugoslavia when Serbian Slobodan Milošević had taken power and invaded 'safe zones' established by the UN, sending in air strikes starting in May 1994.  In response to Bosnian advances, Milošević agreed to begin peace talks, which took place in Dayton, OH, dividing Bosnia into 2 autonomous regions.  In 1998, a war broke out in Kosovo, an autonomous province of Serbia, where ethnic Albanians sought independence, attacking the Serbian forces, who responded with ethnic cleansing.  NATO was reluctant to get involved, and Russia threatened a veto.  Again, Clinton began another bombing campaign until he agreed to withdraw troops and let NATO station forces in Kosovo.

Over the objections of the Confederate States, Clinton managed to get Hungary, Poland, and Czechia into NATO, despite domestic resistance as well and resistance from Russia, which feared expansion of the military alliance closer to its borders.  Confederate President Fletcher and his successor, Gore, both thought it unwise to expand and considered even withdrawing from NATO over the issue.  Clinton worked with Yeltsin who gave his reluctant assent to NATO expansion, hoping for assurance against Baltic accession, which Clinton didn't want to do.  With Confederate help, Clinton was able to help Russia avoid a depression and reform their economy, and quietly helped Yeltsin win reelection in 1996, and helped them enter the G8 conference.

President Clinton had several opportunities to capture or kill bin Laden, a wealthy Saudi citizen who was funded by the CIA in the Soviet-Afghan War via the organization 'Al Qaida' who was linked to the 1993 New York World Trade Center bombing, and the bombing of two US embassies in East Africa, and the bombing of a ship in Yemen.  Clinton ordered retaliation in Sudan, not hitting anything but 'empty aspirin factories,' as criticized by Rush Limbaugh on his national radio show.  The US President also tried to mediate the Arab-Israeli conflict as other US presidents had done before, but got nowhere.  Clinton maintained the Iraq no-fly zones from the Persian Gulf War, and retaliated against Iraq for an attempted assassination of former President Bush.  A PR debacle occurred in the early 90s when the Springfield Bombing occurred by Gulf War veteran Timothy McVeigh and Bryan Angling, and President Clinton blamed it on talk radio, namely Rush Limbaugh, a talk show host from Missouri; later he excused it by saying he meant 'right-wing militia short-wave radio' groups, but had to walk this back as well, as the entire Confederacy's military was 'militia'.

To help Mexico's government, the US and CS gave the nation a total $35 billion loan package to avoid defaulting on its loans, which it is still repaying as of 2021.  Clinton normalized relations with Vietnam in 1995 despite opposition from veterans and conservatives and visited that same year, also visiting Slovenia, Bechuanaland, and South Africa.

Clinton would be remembered, however, for being the first President since Lincoln to be impeached, for lying under oath to a grand jury during a deposition.  He was not convicted, unlike Lincoln, due to a tied Senate.

For the 104th Congress, he had a 226-213 R/D House, and a 35-33 Senate.  For the 105th, it was a 34-34 Senate, which prevented his conviction, but the House was 230-205, allowing his impeachment.

Presidency of Al Gore (1994-2000)

Al Gore won his election largely due to Perot, but Perot woke a realization in a number of people of the dangers of multilateral trade treaties.  His Libertarian Party was able to take a slim majority and passed NAFTA, promising even more jobs.  Being from Tennessee, Gore was passionate about science and technology along with the environment, and passed a ban on resource development in National Parks (not that there was much of that in the first place).  Like other Confederate Presidents, Gore had a small administration, as most governing was done at the state level.  Despite this difference with the American President, Gore was an advocate for science and technology, and some see his more public stances on science, technology, and the environment as pushing the 'dot com boom' of the 1990s and the spread of the internet.

Gore did make several misstatements, such as "I took the initiative in inventing the internet," a claiming of credit for the HSIC Act going through the Senate during President Fletcher's term.  He also claimed in 1997 that "In ten years, Greenland will be ice free if we don't do anything about global warming."  Despite several such incidents, Gore was a favorite of the US environmental movement, and had a very close relationship with US President Clinton, to the criticism of many in the states' media outlets.  His use of the early term "information superhighway" long after most people used the term 'internet' and his unique pronunciation and cadence became the butt of many jokes on late night television.

President Gore's time in office was remembered by people who lived in it as a time of a rapid improvement in computers, standard of living, and other technologies.  There were no wars or 'peacekeeping operations' as in the United States, but many people would remember Gore as a lightweight intellectually who masqueraded as someone much smarter than he really was.  

Businesses in the South operated differently than in the US, as upper management were required by custom and by law to pass on profit increases to their employees before they passed to their CEOs and upper management.  So a business whose profits increased by $200 million would pass those profits out to their employees, and if it had 98,000 employees, each would get a little over $2000 in bonuses for the year, resulting in a huge boom in the economy, something that caused a huge flourishing across the South, and causing northern eyes to get jealous, resulting in a dot-com boom in places like Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York, with money chasing after any tech business, regardless of its fundamentals.  Southern businesses tended to focus not just on quarterly results, but on long-term goals, research, innovation, and employee happiness.  Businesses were more loyal in the South to their employees, rather than the US tendency, beginning in the 90s, of hiring out to cheaper workers under the guise of becoming a 'service economy.'

Vacationing grew much more common with new hotels and resorts, and the Florida Six Flags drawing a huge number of visitors each year and creating the 'Worlds Fair' Park, similar to Epcot's layout, but with larger 'countries' and two rides per country.  Income grew with increased productivity due to more widespread use of computers in many aspects of business, and with agriculture getting more mechanized, allowing many to move into technical, industrial, and service jobs.

Cabinet of President Gore:

 
James Gritz (VP), Anne Petera (State VA), Fred Cowan (War KY), Lloyd Bentsen (Treasury TX), Bruce Babbit (Interior AZ), Mark Espy (Agriculture MS), Norman Mineta (Commerce TN),  Mark White (A.G. TX)

President Gore attempted to nominate Janet Reno from Florida, but after she was nominated, she made a bungled response to the Maryville (OTL: Maravillas) Crisis which torpedoed her nomination.  The Maryville Crisis involved several religious extremists who were involved in drugs and guns, which were speculated to have been brought in from Mexico to try to create a false flag to stir up public opinion against guns and drugs, to try to federalize both issues.  There is no mainstream evidence of this, however, but it is widely believed.

Gore also attempted to create a nationalized Environmental Protection Agency like nations in Europe had, and the United States has had since the 1970s.  The regions in the proposal were:
I - Atlantic (VA, NC, SC)
II - Gulf (GA, FL, AL, MS)
III - Bluegrass (KY, TN, AR)
IV - Plains (TX, OK, LA, WA, RG)
V - West (CA, AZ, NM, SN)
VI - Southwest (DU, VC, JF)
VII - Caribbean (CB, PR, SD, VI, BH, GU, MT, GY)
VIII - Pacific (AK, HI, MI, NC, PL, SM)

The proposal was made soon after his inauguration, with notable backing of a number of northern media talking heads, and a corresponding backlash from state governors, irate at trying to take control of the environments of their states.  This proposal, along with the proposal to merge state banks into one Confederation-wide banking system called the Bank of the Confederate States, ostensibly to provide greater security for deposits after the recession of 1992-1993, along with lower operating costs, lower charged interest rates, and easier electronic access to money across state lines without fees, with most people still operating largely with cash rather than debit or credit cards.  Both proposals were very costly to President Gore's party in the 1995 congressional elections, though his party regained a few seats in the 1997 elections after the economy picked up and people moved on from it in the news.

A side effect of the proposals was an increase in the discussion about the environment in the various states, most beginning to require greater efforts at clean air, clean water, and for businesses to dispose of their pollution responsibly, rather than dump it somewhere.  The banking proposal pushed several states to allow better cross-border ATM access with lower fees through bank partnerships and common interbank transfer protocols, updated for the first time since 1973, but the ban on interstate bank branches remained, which allowed Confederates to avoid the US problem of 'too big to fail' banks.

In foreign policy, President Gore supported the accession of Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic into NATO, as did the United States President, Clinton.  Gore said that it would help bring security to Europe if these nations were to join the NATO alliance, though he privately worried about any further expansions, for fear of pushing Russia.

Inaugural of President Gore

President Fletcher, honored guests, I am humbled by your trust and honored to be here, having taken the oath of office that only twenty-two other men have taken since the founding of our confederation.

While this ceremony takes place in the midst of winter, it looks forward to the renewal of spring, and a renewal of the promise of our confederation. We celebrate Lee-Jackson Day, two of our greatest generals, and we celebrate the peaceful transfer of power from one party to another, and from one president to the next.

Our founders sought to preserve the way of life their grandfathers and fathers secured when they declared independence from the United Kingdom, in declaring independence from the United States. But to secure that independence, Dixie had to change, and not everything would stay the same. Change had to occur, and because we valued independence more, we took our own way to emancipation, rather than have it forced upon us at gunpoint. But that change made us stronger, and showed us that white Confederates and black Confederates, who have lived together for centuries, needed each other. And over time, those who had once been servants became equal citizens before the law.

On behalf of our confederated republic, I wish to salute my predecessor, President Fletcher, for his more than 30 years of public service to the Confederacy. I wish to thank the millions of men and women who served in our army and militias, protecting us against the dark forces of fascism in the second world war.

We are a people steeped in tradition, and with a deep love of family. A generation that was raised during the Cold War assumes the responsibility of leadership in a world facing a new dawn of freedom, where the dark night of communism retreats and the possibilities of freedom bloom. Europe is now healing and recovering from communist occupation, and as a friendly republic, we should offer a helping hand where possible to guide them. Our memberships in NATO and the United Nations are valuable arenas to promote collective defense and diplomatic solutions to the world's problems.

Our economy is among the strongest in the world, and undoubtedly among the freest. Every state competes with the others to attract the best and brightest, not blended into some dull amalgam of nationalized mediocrity, but with vibrant, strong, and unique cultures that show our Confederation's strength is not just in our unity as Confederates, but in our liberty as Virginians, Georgians, Texans, Tennesseans, and every other state in our republic.

A part of that economy is the environment. Some of it is protected in national parks, from Shenandoah to the Channel Islands, and from Kobuk Valley to Mount Otemanu, but we should endeavor to do more at the state and federal level to protect the environment from the pollution that comes with advanced society. We must protect against the threat of global warming to the fragile ecosystems of the world so they will remain for future generations.

I firmly believe that technology is one of the keys to that protection. In taking the initiative in establishing the information superhighway in the Senate, we have made it possible to work remotely rather than having to commute daily to work, saving us thousands of tons of smog and CO₂, and potentially enabling families to spend more time together than in traffic. Our railways must be modernized so that new high-speed rail can take some of the strain off the airlines and highways.

The strength of the Confederacy is in our innovation and experimentation, and we should endeavor to make this government a place for bold, persistent experimentation. The federal government should be a government for our tomorrows, not our yesterdays.

I believe that we must renew Dixie to meet the new challenges of this brave new world. The global economy grows more connected with each passing year, and we must be a part of that community. To promote peace, we should act with the United Nations in limiting the growth of nuclear arms. To promote health, we should combat the world AIDs epidemic with new innovations and experts. To promote progress, we must turn to new ideas from our new generations. That is the strength of our confederation, the strength of our ideas, which are being embraced in the newly freed people around the world.

As our fathers have done for centuries in planting in the spring to reap the fall harvest, with your votes you have sown the seeds of progress, and we must now tend the fields to ensure that work does not go unrewarded.

It is to that work I now turn with the authority of the charge you have entrusted to me. I ask the Congress to join me in building the future. But it cannot be done at the federal level alone. Every one of you, my fellow Confederates, must play a part in the renewal of Dixie. I challenge the new generation of Dixie to service - help the poor, the widow, the orphan. Rebuild and reconnect in your towns and cities and revitalize them. Dixie is more than a flag, we are a people, and a tradition.

Our freedoms and liberties were born in revolution, and confirmed in our second revolution. At the dawn of the 21st century, let us begin with energy and hope, faith and discipline, and let us work until the harvest comes in. As scripture tells us, "And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up."

Today we celebrate an inauguration, a change in the officeholder, but let's continue the work of our ancestors in making the Confederacy a bastion of freedom and progress.

God bless you, and God bless the Confederate States of America.

Comparison of Incomes, Prices, and Taxes

Annual income in the CS would be roughly $14,100 by 1997, with gold being $130/oz, while the US was $358.50/oz and an average income of $37,005.00. A different comparison is that a Confederate income bought 108.46 t oz of gold, while a US income bought 103.228 t oz of gold, before taxes. The US spent $1.635 trillion in 1987, with revenue of $1.58 trillion, while the CS spent $74.193 billion on revenues of $76.055 billion, that around $2 billion being returned to the states through the Sovereign Wealth Fund.

Confederates had much more take-home pay throughout the 1990s as they had no federal FICA or income tax, a sovereign wealth fund that paid into their retirements from Confederate mineral and resource wealth, and reduced state spending as well.  In the US, biweekly pay would be around a thousand dollars, and at least $10,000 of that $37,000 would be paid to the government for income tax and social security. 

Prices in the US (1997)
Cost of a new home: $146,000.00
Cost of a new car: $ 21,000
Median Household Income: $37,005.00
Cost of a first-class stamp: $0.32
Cost of a gallon of regular gas: $1.19
Cost of a dozen eggs: $1.04
Cost of a gallon of Milk: $3.22
Cost of a loaf of bread: $1.17

Prices in the CS (1997)
Cost of a new home: $84,200.00
Cost of a new car: $ 14,800
Median Household Income: $14,100
Cost of a first-class stamp: $0.15
Cost of a gallon of regular gas: $0.90
Cost of a dozen eggs: $0.78
Cost of a gallon of Milk: $1.97
Cost of a loaf of bread: $0.87

To put another way, when comparing the gold price, 36¢ CS is $1 US, and $2.76 US is $1 CS. 

President Gore did attempt to get Congress to devalue the Confederate dollar by half, to 72¢/$1 US, in order to improve the Confederate trade balance, but after early negotiations between Clinton and Gore about new trade options were leaked by the Richmond and Nashville press, the news spread like wildfire that Gore was trying to cut everyone's salaries in half and raise everyone's grocery prices.  Some breathless stories claimed he was trying to take food out of the mouths of babies and hungry children, while other more 'neutral' press said his plan would be helpful to devalue the currency so that Confederate goods wouldn't be so expensive to foreigners.  Whatever the reason, the effort to revalue the currency failed and became a non-starter for over a decade by any president.

Price increases and Regulations in North America

Prices in both nations went up, however.  Confederate price  increases involved mild additional regulations for safety and sanitation in food items, as well as laws preventing glyphosate from entering the country, as some studies showed it could cause in increase in cancer.  A number of scientific studies in both Atlanta and Petersburg, VA, showed a possible link between soybean oil and various unhealthy side effects, including the newly termed 'autism,' Alzheimer's, anxiety, depression, and other neurological diseases, resulting in states banning its use in any product made within those states, with a cratering in soybean production across the CSA.  By the end of the 1990s, the Confederate government in Davis, DC banned all importation of products containing soybean oil in all its forms, including the popular 'partially hydrogenated' form in the US.  Aspartame had been banned for human consumption since the 1960s in the CSA, with Stevia leaf being a popular diet drink ingredient in its place.  Coca-Cola's 'Diet Coke' thus had 2 formulations - one with aspartame for the US and Canada, and the other with Stevia leaf for the CSA and Europe, which had also banned aspartame.  While studies were produced, many leading US scientists cast aspersions on them regarding high fructose corn syrup, which the CSA banned as a sweetener in 1993.  Americans complained it was just a way to hurt US corn producers and act as protectionism for local Confederate producers in violation of NAFTA, while Confederates countered that it was dangerous and contributed to weight gain and potential cancerous effects in lab mice they tested.  Either way, the ban went into effect, and Confederates were now no longer able to purchase American products that used high fructose corn syrup.  American producers who wanted to sell to the Confederacy would have to use either real sugar or Stevia leaf.  Several other sweeteners were added to the mix, including Erythritol, Xylitol, and Yacon syrup, most of which were also, conveniently enough, available more cheaply in the Confederacy than in the USA, due to their now 25+ year usage in the southern states.

Confederate dairy producers began noticing issues with pus and bacteria in the cow's milk they were selling in the late 80s, and found out that it was in the cows treated with recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone, which in other 10-year+ studies had been linked to lung, prostate, and breast cancers in labs in Nashville, Dallas, and Havana.  By 1995, the CSA banned all use and importation of rBGH and rBGH-tainted products (meat, dairy, etc).  Studies also began linking genetically modified corn to cancer starting in 1994 by Dr. Rami Barakat, a Coptic Egyptian-Confederate from Columbia, SC.  His studies led to the ban on GMO corn, and by 1999, all GMO crops were banned in the CSA federally and on a state-by-state basis.  The Confederate Surgeon General, a military medical officer which worked in an advisory capacity to the Secretaries of Agriculture, Commerce, Interior, and State, made the recommendation based on Dr. Barakat's advice, leading to the import ban on GMO crops, glyphosate-laden crops, and rBGH products.

A long-term study also came out that linked the US-created polio vaccine to a spike in cancer rates amongst all the people who took it, and an increase in the rates of polio, leading to an outright and complete ban on US-made vaccines, coupled with the debacle, oft-referenced, of President Ford from the US trying to order people to get vaccinated resulting in deaths and debilitating diseases.  Research in the CS into an amino acid called lysine, which disrupts arginine, an amino acid that fosters eruption of dormant viruses, along with hydroxychloroquine, zinc, and various vitamins begin establishing viral prevention techniques involving more natural methods rather than vaccines, which in the CS gained a reputation for causing more problems than they solved.

The Confederate media had a field day with all the various studies which piled on again and again on products coming from the United States, with some pundits speculating that the "Yankees couldn't beat us on the field, so they're trying to poison us at home with their cancer crops!"  Others cautioned against such inflammatory rhetoric, including President Fletcher and President Gore, who were trying to keep the friendly relations between the two nations going.  But the public mindset had begun turning against GMO crops and things like vegetable oils, glyphosate, and US-made vaccines.  Confederates which had had positive views of their northern cousins were turning against the Yankees, thinking they enjoyed poisoning themselves and others all in the name of making money.

Video Games

Sega Genesis

The SEGA company wanted to leapfrog Nintendo, as its Master System was a distant second in North America and losing in Japan.  Its Alex Kidd franchise was not too popular, and despite winning a legal battle and showing its MS as more powerful than the NES, it lacked powerful franchises that Nintendo had already developed.  So SEGA developed its Mega Drive / Genesis, released in August of 1989, sporting 'arcade graphics' and more impressive visuals and audio than the NES could.

The system had a 16-bit Motorola 68000 CPU clocked at 7.6 MHz, and a Zilog Z80 provided the audio processing and backwards compatibility with the Master System via a cart adapter.  It had 64KB RAM, 64KB video RAM, 8KB audio RAM, and can display 61 colors from a palette of 512 at once.  It had 3 buttons to Nintendo's 2, theoretically providing more gaming options.  Starting with the arcade port Altered Beast, (later replaced in 1991 with Sonic the Hedgehog), the Genesis game library grew with impressive arcade ports, more detailed sports games, starting with Megaman (the first game re-released in 16-bit and allowing Megaman to fire in 8 directions, rather than just straight ahead), Altered Beast, World Championship Soccer, Mystic Defender, Ghouls N Ghosts, Castlevania, and Alex Kidd.  Megaman II was released for it in 1990.



TurboGrafx16

NEC released their PC Engine in North America in August of 1989 at the same time as the Genesis, hoping to make a market in the four big nations there.  Its TurboGrafx-16 was called 16-bit, but had an 8-bit CPU running at 7.6 MHz.  However, it had a 16-bit video color encoder and video display controller, and were capable of displaying 482 colors at once out of 512, slightly better than the Genesis.  It had 8KB RAM, 64KB Video RAM, and had a PSG built into the HuC6280 CPU running at 3.58 MHz to run audio, along with a 5-10 bit stereo PCM.

The system did not sell as well as the Genesis, but had games like Bonk, Bomberman, Adventure Island, R-Type, and Gradius, and sold well enough to keep going until 1994.

Super Mario 3

In Japan, they had been playing this game since 1988, but this was finally released in North America in early 1990, and blew away all sales numbers, and proved that the 8-bit NES could still make great games, and it bought time for Nintendo to release its own 16-bit system.  Giving Mario a raccoon leaf, tanuki suit, new levels, and varied bosses, this game sold millions in the US, CS, and in Canada, catapulting Nintendo far ahead of both Atari and Sega in the 8-bit world, and forcing Sega and NEC to up their game for the 16-bit world to draw audiences away from the NES.

SNES

The Super Nintendo was released a year after the Genesis and TurboGrafx-16, and sported ready-made franchises for its launch, with Super Mario World as a launch title, along with F-Zero and Pilotwings, showing off advanced Mode 7 graphics that neither of its competitors could hope to copy.

Technically the system was superior to either of its competitors, with a Ricoh 5A22 CPU at 3.58MHz, slower than the Genesis, but had 128KB RAM, 64KB Video RAM, 32,768 colors and 256 on screen at once, 128 16-color sprites, with a Sony sound processor running separately from the system at 24.576 MHz with stereo sound and 8 voices using 8-bit audio samples and effects.  This gave the SNES much better sound than the other two systems, as it had musical instrument samples embedded which it varied the pitch and tone to reproduce orchestral music, a far cry from the tinny Genesis audio.

The SNES competed with other more powerful follow-ups with games like Donkey Kong Country, Super Mario All-Stars, Megaman Mega Collection (all the NES games in 1 16-bit redo), Super Metroid, Super Castlevania IV, and games that utilized polygon chips like the Super FX that allowed it to have advanced graphics similar to the Panther.

Atari Panther


Into this already crowded field, Atari decided to try to leapfrog Nintendo and Sega with their new 32-bit system, the Atari Panther.  With 3 buttons like the Genesis but a phone pad like other earlier systems, it came out in late 1991 with three games, Raiden, Cybermorph, and Alien v Predator.

Regular and Pro Controller.

Atari released the Pro Controller to coincide with its release of Street Fighter II on the Panther in August 1992, offering arcade-level graphics at home, something the SNES and Genesis couldn't do.  Once released, it became the standard pack-in controller for the system.  F-Zoom, a hovercar racing game, became the first to use the L and R buttons for leaning and made it a necessary accessory.  The graphics and gameplay were like F-Zero, amplified.

Panther version of Street Fighter II

Panther got a number of games, including Doom (1993), Tempest 2000, Wolfenstein 3D, and a number of arcade ports that showed off the graphic and sound abilities of the system.  It soon became a favorite of arcade enthusiasts, as SNK released its arcade games first on the Panther, including Fatal Fury, Art of Fighting, Samurai Shodown, The Last Blade, World Heroes, The King of Fighters, and Metal Slug, being relatively faithful adaptations and better looking than the SNES or Genesis adaptations.  Capcom released every Street Fighter game on this system, and several of its prior hits, including Megaman X, on this system.  Despite its abilities and popularity, it managed third place in this generation of gaming systems, but a very close 3rd to Sega's 2nd place.

Games like Gundam Wing and Transformers: Energon Quest showed off early polygonal power on the system, with game mechanics similar to Starfox in flight scenes.

Sega CD

To compete with the SNES, a two-year-younger rival, Sega released an add-on to allow it to compete visually, audio-wise, and with larger games, using the new CD format.  It had a 12.5MHz Motorola 68000 processor, 1Mb of boot ROM, 6Mb RAM, 512Kb PCM waveform memory, 128Kb CDROM data cache memory, and a 1MB RAM cartridge was released in 1993 to help improve data speeds.  Audio was supplied by a Ricoh RF5C164 in stereo with sampled instruments providing audio on par with the SNES, and 16-bit color (65,536 total colors, with 512 on screen at once) at 512×478 resolution, higher than the SNES but not what modern computers would consider SD resolution.  Sega included its own Sega Virtua Processor to enable some polygonal games and equivalent Mode 7 graphics.  Still, this enabled games like Sonic CD, Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter II, Lunar, Dragon Quest, and other games to be made that looked impressive, despite costing about $10-$20 more than their SNES counterparts.  Some games were marked as "Sega CD enhanced" games, which meant that the game would have better audio, video, and speed when played on the combined unit.  Sonic 2 and Sonic 3 were two such games.  A six-button controller was released in 1992 to help with games like Street Fighter II, which played better with 6 buttons.


First model Sega CD

To reduce costs on both systems, Sega released a separate revised version of Genesis and Sega CD.


For this system, Sega had a polygonal chip added to the Genesis enabling early polygonal games called the Sega Virtua Processor, with performance somewhere between Nintendo's Super FX and Super FX2 chips.  With this, Virtua Fighter was able to be released on the Sega CD, creating the first home 3D fighting game, spurring Nintendo's own Killer Instinct game for the PlayStation.

Sega CD's Virtua Fighter.

Virtua Fighter also benefitted from the RAM cartridge which helped load times on the slow CD drives.


SNES Playstation



Seeing the potential of this new CD format, Nintendo wanted to continue releasing cartridges because they made more money for Nintendo and copy protection was much easier, but Sony convinced them that they could have adequate copy protection on CDs, and Sony would get a cut of the action as well, and the two partnered to create the SNES Playstation.  Its CPU was a 32-bit processor at 25MHz, 2 MB RAM, and 1MB V RAM, and a 2x CD ROM.  The CD add-on breathed new life into the SNES, and also made better cartridge games possible.  It had 16.7 million colors, 640x480 resolution, 32 levels of transparency, 24 sound channels and higher polygonal and sprite abilities than the Super FX could allow.

Nintendo and Sony released Ridge Racer, Tekken, Battle Arena Toshinden, Mortal Kombat 3, and Super Mario World 2 for the system in 1994, to record sales despite the $299 price for the add-on.  But Nintendo also released cartridges for the system like Killer Instinct 2, which was even more impressive than without the add-on.  CD RPGs became a staple on the SNES Playstation, including Harvest Moon, Chrono Trigger, Final Fantasy VII, Earthbound, and Super Mario RPG, as well as games like Ridge Racer, Battle Arena Toshinden, Tekken, Pitfall: The Tomb Raider, and Gradius IV.  The add-on became a must-have, and with agreement with Sony, a combined unit was sold in Japan and the US, moving the CD tray to the top to avoid getting caught in controller cables, and a later update looking like the Japanese model SNES was released with a CD tray added.


Killer Instinct 2 was released on the PlayStation, along with Donkey Kong World, both containing pre-rendered graphics that were heavily helped by the better graphics chip and the space of the CD format.  Super Mario World 3 was released as the pack-in game for the add-in, fueling sales for the system, with 128 levels, 16 bonus levels, and allowing 4-player competition for points and advancement to face off against Bowser, with Princess Toadstool and Toad both being playable characters for the first time since SMB2 on the NES.  The Ice Flower showed up, allowing you to freeze enemies and use them as blocks to reach new heights, along with the cape, fire flower, star, and hammer suit.

Sega 32X and Sega Saturn

In competition with Nintendo, SEGA wanted to catch up again, and released an add-on device, the 32X, to the Genesis to give it 2 32-bit processors at 23MHz, polygon handling through the Sega Virtua Processor 2, and adding in 2 MB of RAM.  


This resulted in a peripheral system, a Sega Neptune standalone 32X system, and the all-in-one Sega Saturn system which had even better memory, CD speed, and polygon ability than the original 32X peripheral.  Games for the Saturn were completely compatible with the 32XCD combination, but worked better on the Neptune and CD combination.  Games for the Saturn were on par with the SNES Playstation.

Atari Jaguar

The Panther was not as successful as Atari had hoped, but they were successful enough to keep Atari in the video game console business, and had about 240 games for the system.  They heard rumors of the new Nintendo Ultra 64 from Japan, and were eager to try to beat them to the punch on that, despite their Playstation continuing to do well.


Prototype unit.  CD tray was more integrated in the final version and was released with the pro controller.

Released in 1997, the Jaguar was visually improved over the PlayStation and the Saturn, but the N64 soon came onto the scene with its own CD drive system.  Atari released a cheaper model in 1999, called the 'Jaguar Duo,' shown above in prototype gray, it was released in Atari Black and had a faster CD drive and slightly more RAM, resulting in faster and smoother graphics.

Aside from a large library of Panther games, the Jaguar included a swath of NeoGeo games, with its most popular games being Tempest 3000, Conker's Mixed-Up Adventure, Doom, Space Invaders, and Jungle Strike, a game with a custom character creator for male and female superheroes fighting in various world jungles defeating various super-powered enemies.

Nintendo 64 (1997)


Prototype 1 and 2 of the N64, former Ultra 64.

Nintendo had been working on a follow-up to the SNES CD / PlayStation, and its test versions were variously called the Ultra 64, Nintendo 64, PlayStation 2, and PlayStation 64, finally settling on the PS64 moniker for the follow-up, continuing their partnership with Sony for sound and CD components.  The final production model looked like the second prototype with a CD tray, which was upgraded to a 4x DVD-ROM drive in the final production model, which also acted as a 24X CD-ROM drive.  It had 32MB of RAM, and had a RAM upgrade port to add 4MB more, which was used to preload DVD/CD information, allowing the system to act much faster.  The second model placed the 4 controller ports on bottom, out of the way of the DVD tray, unlike the first version.

Super Mario 64, Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Pilotwings 64, F-Zero 64, Goldeneye 007, Final Fantasy VII, and Metroid 64 were the best-selling games of this generation on PS64.  Metroid 64 had a 3D world, using Zelda's Z-targeting to help players target enemies.

Dreamcast (1998)


Sega's Saturn kept the company in the game business, but it wanted something more innovative for the next generation and got it with the Dreamcast.  This 64-bit system was much easier to program for, and often received ports of games from other systems that were as good as, or better than, the others.  Its prototype controller had 4 face buttons, but this was changed to 6 in later pre-production (bottom image), before changing again to a more sideways orientation and then a 'comfort controller' (third image) with 6 face buttons.  Like the PS64 and Jaguar, the Dreamcast had a 64-bit CPU, but only 24MB of RAM. 

The popular SEGA Sports titles, like Madden 98 and Madden 99, MLB 99, and several others, used the VMU unit to allow players to select plays privately, so that other players wouldn't get an advantage over them.  The VMU would be one of the more popular features of the system, allowing a rumble pack for force feedback and memory card functions.  Sonic 3D Dreamscape became its best-selling game with over 11 million copies sold worldwide, along with Virtua Fighter 99, Virtua Racing 98, Hovercar Racing Virtua Edition (a SEGA version of F-Zero), and Final Fantasy VIII.

Television

Star Trek: The Next Generation (1987-1994) - lasting seven years, this show is a sequel to the original with Captain Pierre Gustav Cailloux (Jean Beauregard of Louisiana), Commander Will Riker (Jonathan Frakes), Counselor Irena Troi (Kim Morris), Data (Brent Spiner), Lt La Forge (Levar Burton), Dr Crusher (Rebecca Holden), Lt Worf (Michael Dorn), Tasha Yar (Karen Price) exploring space and the unknown.  The series was action-packed and has aged remarkably well like the original.  Captain Cailloux is a man of action like Kirk, but spends time guiding Riker into his own command.  Season 1 opened with a grand view of the ship and a face-off against Q, testing humanity to see if they had moved past the hopelessly corrupt 20th century of exploiting lesser civilizations for monetary gain and power plays between nations to 'enslave' other nations with debt and poison them into obedience, showing them a mid 21st century courtroom where soldiers are controlled with drugs.  Season 3 ended on the infamous Borg cliffhanger, when Beauregard's contract was up.  He ultimately decided to return and the first spin off with Riker was conceived on the USS Titan.  Dark Mirror, the season 2/3 cliffhanger is one of the highest regarded season closes in any Trek series, and features dark versions of Troi (who mentally violates prisoners for information), Worf (a more violent Klingon paid by the captain to be on his crew and acts as an enforcer), Yar (a more violent person from a failed colony who takes out her aggressions on prisoners), and even Cailloux is more violent and crueler.  This series, set up by Gabriel Roberts to be more of an ensemble than a trio like the first series, intentionally gave the senior crew at least 3-4 focus episodes each season to advance their storylines, and plenty of nods for the fans and acknowledgments of the original series.  The season 3/4 cliffhanger Best of Both Worlds was a great followup in its epic scope, showing a new collective enemy, the Borg, assimilating Cailloux into their collective consciousness, and the Enterprise needing to rescue him.  Various lines from this episode would become classic within Trek and sci-fi ("Resistance is futile," "You will become one with the Borg," "Your distinctiveness will be subsumed into us.").  It also showed several dozen 'new' ships, kitbashes of old ship designs (New Orleans class, Cleburne Class, Forrest Class, Georgia Class, Hébert Class, and several others), a few Miranda kitbashes, an Excelsior, and two Constitution-class ships flying into place for all of 38 seconds as the Admiral told Riker he was maneuvering every ship he could find to make a stand against the Borg; the fight wasn't shown, and the second part showed the Enterprise arriving too late to help them, seeing only the graveyard of broken ships.  Season 7 ends with 'All Good Things,' a follow-up to the first episode with Q telling Cailloux that the trial never ended, humanity is tested every day, and Cailloux does show him that he can think outside the box and outside of 'linear time' as Q does, for which he is congratulated by Q, who offers him Q-dom, which Cailloux mulls over for a moment, then smiles and turns him down, saying that he doesn't want infinite power to make other species do as he wishes, he wants to earn their trust and change their opinions, and bring them along for the ride of their own free will.  Q smiles and tells him 'there's hope for humanity yet.'

Star Trek: Titan (1992-1999) - Series featuring Riker's first command, bringing Troi and Yar with him, while Worf took over tactical on the Enterprise, and a new crew with more aliens are shown, including an Andorian for the first time since the original series.  After Voyager adds an Orion engineer, Titan adds a female Orion science officer, which does help boost ratings.  It does have an episode featuring the Voyager vessel before it departs for DS9, giving a glimpse into the original crew before they leave for the Delta Quadrant.  One other famous episode is the return to the Guardian of Forever with Riker going back to the 1860s and seeing the war first-hand, with Desilu having a reenactment troop come in for some scenes.  Both TNG and Titan show different sides of Starfleet and have crossover episodes between them but the writers are not afraid to take chances and keep things fresh.  Each season of both show at least 2 new Starfleet ships, and 1 new Klingon, Romulan, or other alien ship, expanding out the fleets so it's not just the same Excelsior and Miranda ships over and over again.

Star Trek: Deep Space Nine (1994-2001) - featuring the first black lead, Sisko, from Louisiana, in charge of a Cardassian space station, this is a darker series exploring more series concepts and themes with a little more spy episodes, more alien races, alien diplomacy, and the dark side of war with the Dominion.  The Dominion's use of starvation techniques, planetary devastation via incineration, and other techniques have to southern eyes, obvious parallels to the tactics of the Union army against the South in the War of '61.

Star Trek: Voyager (1995-2002) - Running 7 years, featuring Captain Catherine Janeway (Leisa Sheridan), the first female lead captain, on a ship stranded across the galaxy, trying to come home.  Her crew is a mixed Maquis-Starfleet crew, as her small 203-person ship lost several crew in the trip across the galaxy.  Chakotay is the lead of the Maquis and becomes her trusted first officer.  His engineer, Bevin Holz, is a half-Orion struggling with her race's reputation and she tries to overcome it by burying herself in engineering and technology.  Harry Kim becomes friends with Nick Locarno, a character from TNG, who is trying to find redemption, while Kim is trying to be a by-the-book officer.  The entire crew tries to get along with the first two seasons being the most conflicting between the Maquis and Starfleet way, and the ship begins showing visible signs of damage and alteration without being near a starbase.  They encounter various aliens, friendly and not, and find ways to shorten their journey home, before eventually finding the way back in the finale.  This Janeway acts more like a female Kirk and has a number of romantic encounters along the way, and eventually acts as a mother-figure to Annika Hansen (resembling a taller Erin Ellington with blonde hair), a rescue from the Borg who eventually relearns her humanity, giving a positive portrayal of a survivor of indoctrination.

Power Rangers (1982-present) - running for a decade already, the Power Rangers franchise had steady fans but was in danger of being canceled when it was retooled for the new season based on Zyurangers from Japan.  Five new cast members were brought on board and a sixth ranger was added to the cast, the first in several years.  The logo started with the dinosaur dino-coin logo from within the show, and a new name "Power Rangers Dino Force."  With younger actors, the show took a slightly lighter tone than others, which was criticized, but soon found its balance between seriousness and humor, toning down the deaths and obvious objectionable content from Japan to make the new show work.  It was a hit, and Power Rangers flew off the shelves and got massive ratings, and martial arts became super popular across the Confederacy.  The sixth ranger, Tommy, was also popular, so when the Zyuranger show killed off their green ranger, Tommy simply 'lost his powers,' and with the huge letter-writing campaign of fans, he was brought back with clever editing of footage to allow his ranger to return.  Power Rangers had 50 episodes, then asked for an additional 15 episodes to bridge the gap to the next season from Japan, resulting in what's been called "Zyu 2" footage, with a female yellow ranger (a male in the original Zyu footage).  Each episode was used as a "nostalgia" tour with guest shots from past Power Ranger teams teaming up with the Dino Force Power Rangers, and newly filmed Zord footage from Japan using the Dragonzord Fighting Mode and Megadragonzord combinations more frequently due to fan letters requesting it.

The 1994 season became "Power Rangers Thunder Force" with a new team and a new villain - Lord Zedd.  After ten episodes however, the original team was replaced with an all new team, Rocky, Adam, Aisha, Katherine, Trey (Tom DiFillipo), when Zedd used Party Vase Monster to trap the rangers and steal their power coins.  Zordon called in a new team and the old rangers passed their powers on to their friends, who had been introduced in the last 10 episodes to get to know them.  The new team quickly became adjusted to being rangers, and when Zedd created more powerful putties and monsters, Zordon brought Tommy back as the White Ranger to help them.  To help bridge the gap between teams, the Dino Force rangers were brought in for a two part special 'Dino Thunder', with both zords and teams fighting the monster of the week.

For the 1995 season, Power Rangers: Ninja Force, a new team was brought in including Richie, Curtis (Zack's cousin), Corey, Lisa, and Jenny McLaughlin.  With the success of the last 2 seasons, the Confederate producers asked the Japanese team, who originally had a white female lead, along with male red, black, blue, and yellow rangers, to have 2 female rangers, so the Japanese producers added a female pink ranger, and made the female white ranger the sixth ranger.  The original ninja-style costumes were changed to have animal-style heads like PRDF had, based on the new ninja mecha (ape, wolf, frog, bear, crane, falcon).  The white ranger was Sammy Permenter, who joined the team early on in the run and had great chemistry with Richie.  

The 1996 season, Power Rangers Zeo brought back Jason as the gold ranger, who had great chemistry with Emily, the Pink Ranger, and helped Jenny Hunter, the Zeo Yellow Ranger, out of her issues with trust.  Zeo Blue was Shawn, Danny as Zeo Red, and Billy (not the same as Dino Force) as Zeo Green.

With the surge in ratings for Power Rangers, VR Troopers was brought over from Japan, using footage from a series called Metal Heroes, with a crossover between them and Power Rangers to establish them in the same 'universe.'  Beetleborgs would also cross over to Power Rangers and VR Troopers, and Kamen Rider would continue as Masked Rider, with a lone hero on his motorcycle.  Kamen Rider Black RX was brought over for the third season of Power Rangers in a cross over, as a new high school student visiting Angel Grove and helping the Power Rangers.  In his own series, Dexter Griffin and his family moved to nearby Mariner Bay when he discovers the RX Accelerator, giving him the Masked Rider armor.  He is not an alien and doesn't like insects like OTL 'Dex.'  Masked Rider continues on, using older footage from the prior series until 'Kamen Rider Kuuga' footage became available during Power Rangers: Time Force, when it became Masked Rider DX.

Gridman: Cyber-Squad (1994) - using the Japanese Gridman series as footage, this would involve a group of four kids being given access to their Servo Accelerators and accessing an English-language only gridsuit for each to make them a little more like Power Rangers

Beetleborgs (1994-1999) - using the B-Fighter subseries of Metal Heroes, a five-year sub-series that often crossed over with Sentai and the Metal Hero Police series.  Some parents voiced concerns when the lead actress portraying Jo began 'developing' early and quite well, becoming tall and quite attractive, leading to increased attention on the series.

Defenders: The Animated Series (1992-1997) - animated adventures of Captain Confederacy, Dixie, Armor Man, Rampage, Hercules, and Blue Streak and other Defenders who fight the bad guys no one hero could.

Armor Man (1996-1998) - animated adventures of Andy Strong, a wealthy genius who built a powerful suit of armor to save his life.

Fabulous Five (1995-1997) - five-member hero team with Scorch, Frost, Shield, Strongman, and Ventura facing cosmic and local threats to Earth.  Scorch has heat powers, Frost is his sister with ice powers.  Shield is Frost's sister who can create force fields and use them to fly and shield herself from harm or increase her strength.  Strongman has high strength and durability and intelligence, with a stereotypical hero body but the mind of a computer geek, while Ventura was once a wallflower woman gifted with a perfect body, gaining strength, endurance, and beauty.

Television runtimes in the USA would be 45-46 minutes of content per hour, while Confederate runtimes would be 52-55 minutes per hour.

Movies

Star Trek experiences a renaissance on television, and in the movies:
Star Trek: Garden of Deception (1990) - Kirk's ship is stolen and taken to a planet near the galactic core, where no ship has gone before, through the first stable wormhole found in the galaxy.  The thief turns out to be Spock's brother, Sybok, who has had visions of the planet, which presents itself as a garden paradise.  Sybok encounters an entity that presents itself as 'God' but turns out to be an evil entity trying to escape its prison planet, and the garden fruits allow the crew not to be deceived by the entity, allowing them to see through the deception.  Sybok sacrifices himself to allow his brother to escape, and saves the Enterprise.  Spock feels his death and tells Kirk what the entity was - a consciousness older than the galaxy that was locked away by beings more powerful than Trelane or the Organians so that life in the galaxy could survive.
Star Trek: The Undiscovered Country (1992) - Final voyage of the Enterprise A with the original crew, where Kirk meets with the Klingon Chancellor to negotiate peace, but gets accused of assassinating him.  It is discovered that it's a conspiracy between Klingons and humans to continue the war so that weapons manufacturers on both sides can continue to profit as can people in both governments.  The movie ends with Kirk revealing the plot and saving the Federation president and the conspirators being arrested.
Star Trek: Generations (1994) - the first movie with the Next Generation cast, they find a man who can cause supernovas in stars, threatening every solar system in the galaxy.  One planet he threatens with his weapon had a moon that exploded nearly a century ago, and happened to have been the moon where the Enterprise A disappeared.  The Enterprise D attempts to discover how to stop the man, who's gotten in league with the Duras sisters, and his plan causes a temporal fissure, bringing the Enterprise A into the future, with Kirk and everyone else on it.  They stop the Klingons, but the man with the weapon escapes, and Kirk and the A crew meet the future Enterprise crew.  Both ships finally find him, attempting to destroy the Vulcan sun, but the Enterprise D manages to destroy his weapon system that he installed on the Duras Bird of Prey, but his weapon detonates one of their nacelles, forcing crew evacuation, and tearing a rift in time near Vulcan.  Kirk on the 1701A helped stop the Duras Bird of Prey before they got destroyed, and tries to help save the D, but Cailloux tells him he needs to go through the rift to return to his own time.  He does, and the D evacuates to Vulcan, but the landing critically damages the saucer.  Riker and the Titan crew come in and help rescue the crew and they also get to meet Kirk during the course of the movie.  The end shows Kirk and the Enterprise A returning through the fissure, and ends with the Enterprise B launch, with Kirk, Spock, and McCoy musing that the future is in good hands.
Star Trek: First Contact (1996) - The Borg return to attack Earth and send a sphere back in time to assimilate Earth in the past.  Cailloux rescues the crew of the Titan and the Defiant on his new Sovereign class Enterprise E, and they follow the Borg into the past.
Star Trek: Galaxy's End (1998) - The Enterprise E and the Titan discover the secret behind the energy barrier at the edge of the galaxy when a group of Romulans want to use it against the Federation to give themselves mental powers.
Star Trek: Dark Mirror (2000) - The Enterprise E encounters their mirror universe counterparts again, as they try to cross over into our universe to conquer our galaxy.

Animation continued with the US company Disney releasing some of its best work in the 1990s, and the Universal Animation Studio releasing its own animated movies that are on par with, or surpassed Disney's animation quality, storytelling, and musical numbers.  Animated films:

Disney (USA):
Beauty and the Beast (1991)
Aladdin (1992) - US film with Aladdin gaining a magic lamp and a genie
Lion King (1994)
Pocahontas (1995) - a broadly overgeneralized film focusing on Pocahontas, with her falling for John Smith, rather than Rolfe.
Hunchback of Notre Dame (1996)
Hercules (1997)
Mulan (1998)
Tarzan (1999)

Universal (CSA)
Rumpelstiltskin (1990) - a miller's daughter is said to weave straw into gold in this animated film; "A King should be Smart" is the most famous song from the movie, seen as ridiculing a lot of US politicians who seem to be quite dim.
Briar Rose (1991) - CS film of the Grimm fairy tale of sleeping beauty, named Rosamund, who is cursed to sleep a hundred years; a prince awakens her a century later after seeing her asleep for years, initially believing her a statue.
Rapunzel (1992) - CS film telling of the girl locked in a tower by an evil sorceress, and a traveling prince who is enchanted by her singing.
The Voyage of Captain Drake (1993) - CS film about the English explorer who circumnavigated the globe
The Swan Princess (1994)
The Adventures of John Smith (1995) - CS film focusing on the amazing adventures of John Smith, including his adventures in Virginia, ending with his retirement in England to tell the tales of Virginia.  Smith's life is saved by Pocahontas, who goes on to marry John Rolfe.
Snow White and Rose-Red (1996) - a film with two sisters, Snow White and Rose Red who meet a talking bear and take him in during the winter, and leaves in the spring. They find a dwarf, and discover he turned a prince into a bear, and killing the dwarf broke the curse.
The Goose-Girl at the Well (1997) - a woman forces a count to carry her burden up a hill, and he sees an ugly girl at the well.  When the moonlight shines on her, she turns beautiful.
Jorinde and Joringel (1997) - a Texas German film also released with an English audio version in and out of Texas, telling a classic Grimm tale of a man whose fiancée is turned into a bird and him into a statue, and laughed he would never find her again.  He sought a flower that would free her, and eventually does, and ends the witch's magic.
The Life of Bobby Lee (1998) - an animated adaptation of Robert E Lee's life up to the time he decides to leave the Union Army and join the Confederacy, with his reasoning to stay to defend Virginia faithfully retold.
Snow White (1999) - a more faithful adaptation of the original tale, though with the violence (the huntsman needing to cut out her heart) not shown directly.  Disney attempted to sue, but lost because the movie was different enough from their 60-year-old version in music, pacing, voice, animation, and was based on a foreign fairy tale, which could not be copyrighted in the CSA.

The Six Flags of Florida and in Texas began offering 'character meet and greet' with characters from their movies, including Snow White, Rapunzel, Briar Rose, the Swan Princes, Bobby Lee, Jorinde, and several others.

Computers Go Mainstream

Up in the United States, MicroCom, often abbreviated MCS, was using its OS/2 operating system in league with IBM, achieving widespread success with OS/2 Version 3.1, which had built upon steady improvements over the years in OS/2.  It had a DOS virtual mode so it could run DOS programs without crashing the computer, virtual memory, RealType Fonts (highly legible fonts), and a new Launchpad where you can drag and drop programs for quicker access.  A followup version, OS/2 Version 3.12, called "OS/2 for Workplace" featured networking add-ons to allow internet browsing on the system using the newly affordable dial-up modems coming out, and was fully 32-bit, using a new, more secure kernel, and offering backwards compatibility with 16-bit programs, but dropping development support for any new 16-bit systems as of 1992.  Users could open Canvas to do simple image editing, or use Video Player to watch short movies or movies stored on CD-ROMs, like the newly popular multimedia encyclopedias coming out.


In 1996, MicroCom released its new OS/2, Warp 4, to much fanfare, with a more modern interface, updating the Launchpad and making it a permanent feature across the bottom of the screen.  Key features were available from the Launchpad, and a Shredder was available to give users a chance to recover files that might be accidentally deleted.

OS/2 Warp 4 was given laudatory press but was seen as similar to both Windows and to Mac OS System 7.  Its MCS Desktop Publishing software, PageMaker, bought from another company a few years back, was often cited as a reason to switch to OS/2 Warp 4 when a business standardized on this DTP program, over Apple's Pages, or Microsoft's Publisher.  MCS released Warp 4.1 in 1997, and Warp 4.3 in 1998, bringing in FAT32 support, USB, MMX, and some new multimedia enhancements and theme support.  Given the more complete 32-bit nature of OS/2 Warp 4, however, it earned a reputation for stability as opposed to Windows 95, which often had users using 16-bit applications, which would crash more often than native 32-bit programs, a problem that solved itself as companies moved to 32-bit.

In the Confederate States, Microsoft released Windows 3.01, its more successful follow-up to Windows 2.0, but still 16-bit.  Uniquely for an operating system, it offered French, Spanish, German, Dutch, and Portuguese language options out of the box, without having to purchase a different language version of the system, letting you choose the language during installation, and continued the 'Region Sets' from before which kept the OS country-neutral but served multiple languages.  The Windows 3.22 added networking, several bug fixes, and a few newer program versions like Paint, Notepad, Scribe, and Network Navigator (an early internet browser).  For businesses, it released a Windows XT 3.22, a 32-bit version of the OS for businesses that was more secure and more stable than the 16-bit version.  Early multimedia programs were released at this time, like Composer (for music creation), Video Studio (for video editing), and Digital Encyclopedia.  DaVinci, the Microsoft Photoshop competitor, reached version 2.5 at this time, with all the same tools as Photoshop, most along the top of the screen rather than the side, and added support for over a dozen file formats, making Windows the go-to place for graphics editing in the Confederacy, DaVinci being $259, $100 cheaper than Photoshop ($359 CS, $895 US, the same price), while Photoshop in the US became popular on the Mac, and gaining audience when it was ported to Windows and OS/2.



The 3.01 version added support for Russian and other Slavic languages, Cyrillic and Greek fonts, and TrueType fonts in a cooperative effort with MicroCom and Apple to spread TrueType fonts as opposed to PostScript Adobe fonts, which were available at a large cost to users at the time.

English only Price: $149.95 US, $60.05 CS; Language Sets
Language Sets (by mail order) ($179.95 US, $72.95 CS):
Celtic (Irish, Scots Gaelic, Cornish, Breton, Manx, Welsh)
English (US/CS, Canada, UK, Australia, New Zealand, Patagonia, South Africa, Kenya, India, Rhodesia)
Romance (Italian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Romanian, Catalan, Galician, Occitan)
Germanic (German (DE), German (Aus), German (HE), Dutch/Flemish, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish)
West Slavic (Polish, Czech, Slovak)
East Slavic (Russian, Belorussian, Ukrainian)
South Slavic (Bulgarian, Slovene, Bosnian, Serbian)

Region Sets
Americas (English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, German)
British (English (UK), Welsh, Scots Gaelic, Scots, Manx, Irish, Cornish)
Western Europe (French, Breton, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Occitan, Galician)
Central Europe (Dutch, German, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish, Czech, Slovak, Hungarian)
Southeastern Europe (Greek, Bulgarian, etc)
Eastern Europe (Polish, Ukrainian, Russian, Belorussian)
Baltic (Finnish, Latvian, Estonian, Lithuanian)
India (Hindu, Sanskrit, Urdu, Punjabi, Bengali)
Stand-Alone: Mandarin Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Tagalog, Hindu

Windows 3.1 was available in any single language for the same price as the English version, unless the language were less than 10 million speakers and/or didn't have a version out already.  Microsoft would create an official translation for mail order if at least 10,000 signatures were received and postmarked from the location where a language was spoken, and it would accept user-submitted translations for languages as guidelines.

In 1995, Microsoft released Windows 4.0, commonly called Windows 95, with great fanfare, and a simplified interface to make the system much easier to use, and releasing it in 32-bit only; Windows XT 4.0 was released at the same time with the same new interface, and much of the same feature set.


In 1996, Microsoft released "Service Pack 1" for the system, updating it to 4.2, adding drive compression, FAT32, a standard allowing up to 2GB of hard drive space, developed in coordination with MCS in the US, wallpaper stretching, icon and pointer customization packs with sounds called 'theme packs,' a number of bug fixes and 32-bit core upgrades, Music Player upgrades, Video Player upgrades, 1024x768 resolution, and a few 'fun' programs to enhance the OS's reputation amongst the less hobby-oriented public.  This was followed up by the SP2 upgrade, which added USB (a technology developed in partnership with MCS and other companies) support, support for several hard drives in one chassis in RAID configurations, MMX support, and a number of bug fixes that could also be downloaded online as well.

During the 90's, other big computer companies began developing software for these two large OSs, namely Acorn, Amiga, Atari, Texas Instruments, Fairchild, and a few others, while ceasing production of their own proprietary operating systems.  The AmigaOS and AtariTOS would become freeware, developing new kernels with a reputation for security and stability by their fans, with online distributions of very core operating systems, then distributing software via built-in software menus, an early form of online software store, just without having to pay for most of the software.

Microsoft moved away from Language Sets and Region Sets, moving all languages into Language Packs from its own website, and vastly increasing its database of languages, including smaller languages like Breton, Icelandic, French (Louisiana), French (Quebec), Rhaeto-Romance, Corsican, Flemish, Luxembourgish, Walloon, Latin, Sanskrit, and so on.  Language Pack Maker was released on the company download site allowing users to create their own language packs for other languages, including fictional languages, even setting the new system font and tracking system message translation progress.

Fun programs included Music Maker (allowing you to position instruments in a 3D space to change where you heard them in 5.1, tempo, song genre, etc), Pinball, Othello, Chess, Solitaire, and 3D Chess, with more included online.

What became Windows 97 was version 4.5 with internet integration into the OS with live wallpaper, and a news scroller using the newly created RSS feed standard to keep users updated on news as it happened for any site that created a feed URL.  Atomic clock synchronization was built-in.

Chapter 65: Dixie Progresses

25th Presidential Election (2005)

Coming into the 2005 election season, voters were getting antsy about involvement in the American War in Iraq.  Dixie doesn't occupy other countries, and doesn't try to rebuild them, the refrain went.  President Rogers knew the people wanted out, and said that plans were in the works, but didn't want to make any decision that would influence the election one way or another.

In the Southern Republican field, his Vice President, Jessica Howard, came out as a candidate first in May.  Unlike the United States, the Confederacy kept its election season shorter, usually about 6 months or so, as most people had more important things to do than focus on the President; state elections in the confederation were always more important.  The field for both parties was quite diverse, with candidates coming from all around the Confederacy.

Southern Republican Candidates

Howard, Yen, Cleburne, Johnston, Kirby-Smith
(SC, SN, AR, VA, TX)

Libertarian Candidates

Graham, Edwards, Martinez, Lopez
(FL, NC, CB, DU)

Former Cuban governor Willy Martinez was a favorite to win the Libertarian nomination, though Graham put up a tough contest for the Libertarian Party, as did Senator Edwards from North Carolina and Miguel Lopez of Durango.  The Party was trying to create enthusiasm for its platform after several lackluster candidates, and several key issues arose: returning home from Iraq and Afghanistan quickly, cooperation with the United States on trade and opening up to North Chinese goods, and amending the constitution to make interstates and railroads a federal responsibility to quicken repairs and planning new roads.  Eventually the field narrowed to Miguel Lopez, former Senator from Durango, and John Edwards, a Senator from North Carolina.

In the Southern Republican party, James Yen of Sonora, a former Representative, City Councilman, and Governor, was a favorite of many in the western states, and gave great debate performances and public appearances with very enthusiastic crowds, but the Vice President, Howard, came off as professional and witty, and had enough foreign experience in negotiating trade deals in concert with existing ambassadors, that she quickly grew to be a favorite of many crowds where she appeared to be gaining momentum. A reporter from the US asked her about how she feels making history as the first major Confederate female presidential candidate, and she replied, "I'm not the first, and I won't be the last."  Asked again, she replied, "Does being a woman make me better? No.  Does it make me worse? No.  I'm a Confederate, same as any man or any woman, black, white, Asian, Indian, or otherwise.  It's not the body that counts, it's the person inside.  Judge me by my results, not my gender."  Kirby-Smith campaigned on his family name, being descended from the general of the same name, and his time as an ambassador in the 90s giving him foreign policy experience, while Cleburne emphasized his civil rights legacy and his family's key role in emancipation, though Kirby-Smith quipped back "That was 140 years ago.  What're you doing now?"  Cleburne didn't have a quick retort, and some believe it hurt his campaign chances as his campaign popularity diminished after that.

From May to August, candidates campaigned around Dixie, and Howard soon took the lead when voting occurred in August.  By this time, the Confederate political parties had taken a 'time zone primary' system that began each presidential race with a different time zone, Eastern, Gulf, Central, and Western (with the islands).  This time, the Eastern Zone began primaries.  Howard won the critical state of Virginia, along with South Carolina and Georgia.  Kirby-Smith won Florida and North Carolina, and Johnston won Cuba and the Caribbean states.  During the second round, Yen did better in Kentucky, with Cleburne taking Arkansas and Tennessee, Kirby Smith getting Mississippi, and Howard capturing Texas.  In the third round of primaries, Yen got California and Sonora, but Kirby-Smith and Cleburne were running low on campaign cash, and Howard was able to make more campaign stops and see more people, and she got majorities in the western and Central states, with Cleburne and Kirby-Smith bowing out of the presidential race.  By the nominating convention at the end of August in Atlanta, Jessica Howard captured the Southern Republican party nomination, and had promised Cleburne and Kirby-Smith a position as ambassador or in the cabinet.  At the same time, Howard revealed her VP pick, Larry Elder, a political commentator, author, radio host, and a former governor from Louisiana (born in California, raised in Louisiana) who often gave speeches in fluent French and German, working with Texas governor Georg Schneider, a Texas German.

During her acceptance speech, she asked Dixie not to judge her for her looks or being a woman, but on what she has done and could do for Dixie.  She asked women not to vote for her because she was a woman, but because she would be the best candidate for the job.  She emphasized that judging for or against a candidate for their gender would be the sexism that had long since gone out of fashion in the South.  She emphasized that she was a traditional southerner and mother, and most certainly not a feminist (a term that had widespread negative connotations in the south since the 1970s for a 'Yankee-like screeching, man-hating woman' according to one comedian), just a regular Confederate woman.



Larry Elder, VP candidate on the SR ticket.

The Libertarian Party ran the same primary schedule, but on Mondays, rather than Tuesdays, and Edwards had early momentum in North Carolina, South Carolina, and Guyana, Graham taking Virginia, Georgia, and Florida and their 110 delegates (same as their congressional delegation size).  Lopez and Martinez split the Caribbean states of Puerto Rico and Cuba, and the southwestern states as well, but Graham secured Texas and its 78 delegates, and then California's 64 delegates, and neither Lopez or Martinez could compete, leaving Graham the party nominee and Edwards his VP choice.  Graham's acceptance speech was really good, and earned praise from various media outlets and even from Southern Republicans for its patriotic calls towards true Confederate liberty, despite disagreeing with some of his party stances.  When Lopez and Martinez bowed out, Graham promised both cabinet positions if he were to win the presidency.
-
With the nominations over, the two tickets, Howard-Elder and Graham-Edwards, again took to the trail across Dixie.  One major gaffe by the Graham-Edwards campaign was releasing a bikini shot of Howard with her three kids, attempting to imply she was somehow wearing something inappropriate, but it backfired in a major way, the picture instead showing off her well-maintained physique for a roughly 40-year-old mother of three running a political campaign, and earning her a lot of female sympathy and support, as well as a lot of male support online.  When questioned about it in the media, the Graham-Edwards campaign blamed it on a staffer they had fired for trying to embarrass the Vice President inappropriately.  When she was asked about it, Howard quipped, "I work hard to stay in shape.  I think it says a lot that I can keep in shape, keep up with the duties of my office and this campaign, and be a good mother to my children all at the same time, doesn't it?"

There were 3 debates for the presidential candidates, and one VP debate between Elder and Edwards, all scheduled in October, once a week, while the campaign continued.  The debates took place in Richmond, VA, Dallas, TX, and Jacksonville, FL, on the 6th, 13th, and 27th, with the VP debate in Memphis on the 20th.  The Presidential debates centered on foreign policy, second on domestic policy, and the final on the Constitution, tradition, and other issues, with the VP debate on a mix of issues.  Given that a number of minor parties, such as the Green Party, Constitution Party, and the Independent Party had also gotten a substantial number of votes, the Green candidate, Joseph Clancy, and the Constitution candidate, Richard Bowen, Jr., were included in the debates as well.

During the first debate, Howard showed an impressive command of international issues, as she had participated in a number of national security briefings with the President, Hank Rogers, and had helped secure international cooperation in Iraq and Afghanistan, and helped gain the release of four German hostages from Libya.  Graham was quick on his feet, though when Howard was asked about working with the US, Graham said we should work more with the United States and build that relationship more, Howard quipped, "Do you want to rejoin the United States too?"  The remark got a lot of laughs from the audience and flustered Graham, but she continued, as the question got to her, "I agree with President Reagan on one thing, 'trust but verify.'  We should follow President Washington's advice about entangling alliances, and cut ties when they're no longer needed.  If we don't need to continue working with the US in Iraq and Afghanistan, we need to pull out, and let the United States handle their nation-building.  It would be my policy to leave when the two nations are stable and leaving won't cause more problems than it solves.  We should work with the United States when it is our interest to do so, and not work with them when it would not benefit us.  That's simply self-interest for our confederation."  

The Graham campaign seized on that comment, trying to make it sound like she was going to leave NATO and the UN and destabilize international relations; Howard's campaign responded deftly to the southern ear, "Sometimes you need to say 'kiss my grits' to dictators, and stop kissing their rear ends.  Other times you can sweet talk, and sometimes you need a swift punch in the gut.  We don't need to bow down to every other country in the world."

Election night came on the 8th of November, and it was a close election with the popular vote, though the electoral college vote came to 440-244

Graham was able to take Florida, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, New Mexico, Washington, Rio Grande, Jefferson, Puerto Rico, and a few other island states, while Howard was able to capture the key states of Virginia, Texas, Cuba, and California, along with a number of other states.  She certainly made history, becoming the first woman to be the president of a North American nation.  Both Graham and Howard made their speeches that night, being gracious and conciliatory.

Graham's Speech:
Thank you my friends.  Tonight we have come to the end of a long journey.  Our Confederation has spoken, and have spoken clearly.  Just a few minutes ago, I had the honor of calling Vice President Jessica Howard to congratulate her on being elected the next President of the confederation that we both love so dearly.

This contest has been long, difficult, and trying at times, but the success of the Howard campaign should command our respect for her perseverance and dedication to this republic.  Here in the South we look towards the content of one's character, and what they accomplish as the measure of a man, or woman, rather than give set-asides that subtly condescend to people that they cannot make it without special help.  I can say for sure that all women of Dixie should be proud tonight that a woman can make it to the Executive Mansion without any special hand-up or hand-out.  Mrs. Howard won this contest fair and square.

While we may disagree on our policy preferences, I know that we can trust Vice President Howard will work towards the betterment of our confederation for all Confederates.  I urge all Confederates who supported me to join in not just congratulating her, but in offering our next president our prayers for her and her administration, our goodwill, and our earnest efforts to find ways to work together for Dixie to leave this republic better than how we found it.

Whatever our differences, we are Confederates, whether we are Virginians, Texans, Baja Californians, Cubans, Bahamans, or Hawaiians, and that binds us together in love not only of God but of God's creation, and the freedoms God gave us that we protected in 1776 and in 1861.  It's natural to feel some disappointment at our loss, but we must move beyond it, and work together for Dixie, not sit in resentments and ill-will.  We are not two separate factions vying for an elected kingship, our attentions all absorbed in what the capital is doing all day, every day.  Our Presidency, by the grace of God, is one of very limited powers, and President-elect Howard has been chosen to steward the confederation into the future, because the people of our several states believed she would best represent them, and I ask all those who voted for me to give her the chance to show what she can do, and see in her what those who voted for her see in her.

I am deeply grateful for all your hard work and the honor of your support during this long campaign.  While I wish the outcome were different, I will always cherish the support and friendships given and built during this time. Words fail to express how much it has meant to me and to my family, and to Senator Edwards and his family.  I want to thank them for their sincere and earnest efforts and hard work on this campaign.  I thank Dixie for allowing me to serve for more than three decades not only in the military but in public office as well, and there comes a time to return to private life and let a new generation lead. 

I ask all Confederates to believe in the promise of the Confederacy - the right to govern yourself without outside interference, the right to independence and free association, and all those other cherished liberties in our Constitution.  Dixie never quits, and we never surrender.  May God bless you and these Confederate States.

Howard's Speech:
In Dixie, anything is possible, and no one can doubt that tonight.  The Confederate States are a republic where anyone can make it.  Our ancient rights, so cherished by the authors of the Declaration of Independence in 1776, and the authors of secession in 1861, have been preserved safe and intact to this day.  Those rights include the right to self-determination, which is all we here in the South have ever wanted, from a king across an ocean, and a tireless puritan minority intent on consolidating power, and today we have again exercised that right intact.  The power of our republic has proven itself strong as ever.

Our Confederation has shown that we can overcome when left to our own devices and not forced to do what we are told to do by people who have not our best interest at heart, but their own financial gain at heart.  Our Confederation ended slavery not instantly, but humanely and by integrating nearly 1/3 of the population, rather than letting them 'root, hog, or perish' as one Illinois politician suggested, and today we can count former President Fletcher as one of our great and honored Presidents.  We integrated Chinese and Japanese immigrants into our Confederation, and now we can count General Edward Chen and Governor Yen of Sonora amongst our honored servicemen.  We integrated many islanders into Dixie, and we can count so many as honored representatives and servicemen.  By respecting their own self-government, we brought in so many different people through the power of real federalism, showing that we are not Libertarian states or Southern Republican states, but we are the Confederate States of America.

In the 1910s and 1920s, we amended our constitution to give the right to vote to women, something states had begun to do already, and we slowly began integrating women into the political process.  Women have so much to do in the family that is critical to the functioning of a free society, that many remained home, but answered the call of Dixie during two world wars, and afterwards found a way to integrate work and family together, not by angry agitation and confrontation but by peaceful demonstration and persuasion, and by voting at the ballot box, bringing in numerous representatives, senators, governors, and even a President.  I may be the first, but I do not believe I will be the last female President of the Confederacy.

I ask for all Confederates to judge me not on my gender or my party, but on my results, and on my fidelity to the solemn oath I will take on Lee-Jackson Day next year.  That is the standard by which I should be judged, as should any public servant.  This office is on loan from you, the people of the states confederated together, and every official should be ever mindful of that grant of trust.

I just finished a very gracious call from Senator Graham.  He fought long and hard on his campaign this year, and has fought for many years for the good of the people of Florida, and of the Confederate States as a whole.  We should all thank him for his service not only in the naval forces of these Confederate States, but for his time and dedication in the Senate of the Confederate States.  I have worked with him on many an occasion as the presiding officer, and while we might not always agree, he has always been a southern gentleman and a respected member of that body.

I would also like to thank my partner in this campaign, Larry Elder for his dedication and energy and his wisdom, without which we would not be here tonight.  My husband, James Howard, is the rock of our family and the love of my life, and without him I could not have made it here tonight.  My three beautiful children, Jessie, Jeff, and Jimmy, I love you three so much, and thank you for your patience - I'll just need a little more for about six years...and you'll get that new kitty you asked for.  While my great grandmother Bakey is no longer with us, I know she's watching from heaven just waiting to break in the office with a game of gin rummy.  I miss you too, and you helped make me the woman I am today, as did my mother and father, John and Emma Howard, two of the truest Confederates you ever saw.

More than that, this victory belongs to you, the voters.  I was not the most likely candidate for the Presidency, as my tendency to speak honestly can sometimes be too honest for some.  But You always know where you stand with me and you can trust that I will be honest and work hard for Dixie, not to line my own pockets as we see in other countries.  This campaign began not in Davis, D.C. but among the porches of Charleston and Savannah and San Juan, and the backyards of Nashville and Austin and Havana, and in the farms of Jackson and Monterrey and Tijuana.  

You didn't do this just to win an election or for mere power, but we know the enormity of what must lie ahead of us.  As we celebrate tonight there remain Confederate servicemen overseas that must be brought home, and there are rumblings in the economy that must be quelled.  I will be asking my former opponents for their help either in the cabinet or in their respective states, to help push Dixie forward for the better.  For all those who voted for Governor Graham, I ask for your prayers as well, and for your help in keeping me honest to my oath of office to our constitution.  For all those who voted for me, pray for me to have wisdom, and that I remain true to the faith you placed in me.

Tonight I ask all of Dixie, men and women together, to work with us to make the South what it was always meant to be, an oasis where men can be free to pursue their dreams, worship God freely, and govern themselves without busybodies telling them what to do.  For four hundred years in America, and for centuries before in England and elsewhere, that's been our dream and that of our ancestors - freedom and independence.  I ask everyone to summon that feeling, that love, that patriotism.  Be proud of what we've accomplished, and let's work together for that brighter tomorrow. 

Our Confederation is built on a mutual respect for the differences of each of our sovereign states for one another and for the different peoples of those states, that is the genius of the Confederate States, and the stumbling block for so many petty politicians, tyrants, and dictators.  Power remains in the states, where it should always belong, not in an all-powerful centralized government.  As President, I have delegated powers which I will be circumspect in obeying because I respect that each state has a different way to do things, and my way might not be the way Texas, or Puerto Rico, or Baja California might do it, so I won't try to assume that power from them or any other state.

Dixie has come so far tonight, and can go further in the days and and years ahead.  We have put men on the moon, and I believe that we will go even further into God's vast universe if we keep grounded in His Word, His natural law, and in our Constitution and its limits on what we ask of the federal government as opposed to our states.  The Confederate Dream is alive and well, the dream to be the best of humanity without government interference, to be so much more than we ever thought we could be, so long as we keep artificial roadblocks out of our way.  

I want to thank you all for your confidence, and for your prayers.  They mean more to me than I can ever hope to convey.  May God bless you, and may God bless these Confederate States of America.

Housing Boom Across the South (2004-2006)



As shown above, southern houses in many places, rather than focusing on the garage, which is most often a side, or rear portion of the house, focus on the porch and often the front yard in places where there is room to have a front yard.  Two-story houses are frequent, as it allows people to have more yard, which is important in many places for people in the South to feel connected to the land, to have room to party, and to have room to garden.  Rocking chairs on the porch with some sweet iced tea, a fan providing a breeze, and having relatives over is a common sight across the South, while the kids run around the yard and the adults enjoy each other's company.  Earlier houses had the master bedroom on the 2nd floor, but starting in the 1960s, master bedrooms were often on the first floor, with many veterans of the Great War not wanting to trudge upstairs in their golden years.  With the housing boom across the South, houses are often 2200 ft² or bigger began running over $135,000, about $20,000 more than expected, but the materials weren't as 'mass produced'-feeling as those in the US, so houses felt more like they had a personality, or some care put into their construction, rather than the ones built north of the border.  Houses in Texas felt like Texan houses; houses in Virginia felt like Virginian houses; rather than mass-produced, all over houses that made everywhere feel like everywhere else.  Houses in each state felt like they belonged in that state.  Most yards were over a quarter acre, from at least 1/3 to 0.4 acres, sometimes .5 acres in most suburbs.


Northern-style homes that sprang up across the north from the early 2000s.  You can see obvious panel lines, small yards, and a focus on the derided 'garage box' where the garage is the most prominent feature of the house, as opposed to the front door itself.  Most new northern houses are tans, browns, and grays, with quickly and cheaply produced materials that have a 'pre-fab' feel to them and as a result of the boom in money going into housing, a 1800 ft² house is now going for $225,000, much more than before the boom in housing construction.  The houses were often very plain, boring, and unremarkable-looking rectangles and cubes with almost no ornamentation, and the interiors often had cavernous 'open concept' houses that became fashionable at that time, where walls were not present to give an 'open feeling,' meaning that rather than rooms, people had 'areas' that they called 'rooms' despite there being no separation between them.  While ceilings were higher than older houses, the interiors were rather plain, carpets cheap (and would often separate from the floor and bunch up), and kitchens were often corners of larger rooms rather than a real room in and of themselves where the cooking could be done.  All in the name of being 'trendy.'

Yards up north were often less than 1/5 acre with these new houses, sometimes less than 0.18 acres; southern yards were often 1/3 to 1/2 acres at a minimum.  Most northern new developments were strip malls, while most new southern developments were street-front with rooftop restaurant additions.


Northern new strip-mall developments (1, 2) vs southern street-front developments (3, 4)

Many times, northern new developments would plow down older buildings in favor of newer buildings, not keeping any of their history alive for the 21st century, while southern developments would often reuse older buildings and build new buildings in the same style as the older buildings to make them fit in better. Older downtowns, like Jacksonville in Florida, redeveloped their business areas to keep the Furchgott's, Cohen Bros, and other department stores the centers of the downtown, with apartments above many businesses keeping people living and working downtown, like in New Orleans, Savannah, Atlanta, and other historic towns, preserving their histories rather than plowing down for generic businesses with exteriors you could find anywhere that have no tie to the communities, and businesses that take money out of local communities to be sent to a nameless, faceless corporate headquarters several states away with no interest in building up the local economies.

In the third and fourth images above, you can see examples of southern towns keeping their quaint, street-fronting businesses with on-street side parking; often a parking garage would open up nearby to help alleviate the need to walk too far. Many small businesses would help invest in local schools and other local activities, reducing the need for governments to tax people to fund public schools. Many schools were funded by tuition and minimal taxation anyhow.



Northern-Style Apartments (1-4) vs. Southern-Style Apartments (5-8)

Northern apartments often tried to be 'fresh' or 'bold' or 'unique' or 'trendy' to catch attention, and were often resultingly unaesthetic in appearance, rushed with cheap construction that looked good at the start but would need frequent refreshes given the cheap, but nice-looking materials that were used would break within a few years.  Southern apartments would vary from 3-10 floors depending on the city, but would more often than not follow established architectural styles of the area or historic styles, such as the Klutho Chicago style, Jacobethan, Mediterranean Revival, Victorian, Palladian, Queen Anne, and so on.  Southern architects intentionally tried to harmonize their apartment buildings with their cities and neighborhoods so that it would meld with the area, rather than standing out and resultingly looking garish and jarring.  Psychologically, 'good looking' buildings make people feel better, and 'ugly looking' buildings cause an unconscious sense of unease, according to research by the US's CIA.

Inauguration of President Howard (2006)

On the 19th of January, Jessica Howard took the oath of office to a huge crowd in front of the Capitol Building, facing east, with her husband holding the family bible that had been in her family since 1805.

Inaugural address:

My fellow Confederates, Vice President Elder, Mr. Chief Justice, President Rogers, President Gore, President Fletcher, President Kemp, President Carter, President Kirk, reverend clergy, and distinguished guests:

On this historic day, marked by the celebration of General Lee and General Jackson, and the sexennial ceremony, we've gathered to celebrate our enduring Constitution of 145 years and the wisdom of our Confederate Founding Fathers, which unite our sovereign states together in peace and prosperity while continuing to protect their unique cultures and ways of life.

I am grateful to the people of the several States for their trust and for this honor, and I am mindful of the tremendous weight of history that precedes me and the expectations that fall upon this office. It is my firm promise to execute my oath to the best of my ability, and to ensure our liberties and freedoms are transmitted intact to the next president uninjured and hopefully expanded.

As I'm sure you've noticed, I am the first female President of the Confederate States. Like all our past presidents, I am as much a Confederate patriot as they have been, and my successors will be. I ask to be judged on my fidelity to my oath, and to be held to the same standards as my predecessors. Being a woman does give me different strengths and women experience the world with different eyes, just as men have different strengths and see the world differently. Our republic needs to be seen with a new set of eyes, as each President does, and every problem requires different strengths to confront, as each President has. Judge me by my results, not my gender, as all Presidents before me have been, and all those after me will be.

We have stood for nearly 150 years in peace with our former compatriots, the United States, and for over 60 years with our southern neighbor, Mexico, and have counted upon the oceans to help protect our peoples. Our peace was shaken in 2001, but with the firm leadership of President Rogers, we have ended the threat from afar, but it is now time to return our troops home as we promised, rather than continue in a project of nation-building.

It is not our duty to force other people and other nations to create a government to our liking, as their history and circumstances are not ours, and such a government will not long endure without the true consent of those it governs, and without a history of the rule of law, property rights, and a culture of liberty, which for us was given by our faith in God. As President Davis said, "Obstacles may retard, but they cannot long prevent the progress of a movement sanctioned by its justice and sustained by a virtuous people."

It is not our duty to bend and change our ways so that other nations stop hating us. We are who we are, and we do not need to liked, just feared and respected. That includes having a strong defense, modern equipment for our militias and for our armed forces. That includes reasonable security measures for those entering from abroad to ensure our security without burdening our people with unreasonable infringements on their own liberties.

Liberty survives here in Dixie with our eternal vigilance. We cannot go adventuring about the world toppling governments. That isn't freedom, it's imperialism. To ensure our own liberty, we must maintain a strong defense, but also a strong defense against encroachments from within, from alien ideologies that try to pervert our speech with political correctness, split us against one another with feminism and racialism, turn rich and poor against each other with ideologies like communism and socialism, and use business and industry to impose government edicts to bypass the protections of our Constitution against political foes. That is the real threat we face. Just because we share history with other nations does not mean we must adopt any fancy new ideologies or ideas from them.

Our unique heritage began with the English Charter of Liberties, the Magna Carta, the English Bill of Rights, the Articles of Confederation, the US Constitution and its Bill of Rights, and finally our own Constitution and its amendments. In each iteration, we've sought to protect against the government's natural tendency to grow and infringe upon our rights, to protect property, to protect liberty, and to increase the amount of liberty and freedom to the people. The truth of that special heritage must be defended, and must be taught to our children. Without a faith, love, and admiration of that special heritage, and our own history, our children will lose their love of the Confederacy, and turned into a willing uneducated and violent mob ready to destroy the freedom of Dixie. It is the states' responsibility to educate their people, but I implore each and every state, as a mother, to ensure that they educate the truth of our Confederate Revolution and our Constitution against the lies we hear from other countries and foreign ideologies.

We have a unique heritage captured by President Davis's saying "All we ask is to be let alone." That's all we ever want, to be left alone, and that's one of the jobs of government - not to do things for us, but to get out of the way and leave us alone so we can govern ourselves. As others before me have said, the bigger the government, the smaller the people. Our confederation is built on consent of the governed, which is why we try so hard to keep the federal government as small as possible, and try not to go adventuring abroad. We will support republican and democratic movements abroad, but it must be within the bounds of our constitution, and we will not go on imperial adventurism.

We seek peace, but let any nation know that any attack upon us will be answered swiftly and decisively. Attacks come in many forms, whether it is by missile, invasion, or even by new and exotic means. Any kind of attack or infringement of our territory by any form will have a response.

It is fashionable now for some to think that freedom is the freedom to do anything including whatever feels good, outside the bounds of morality. That's not liberty, that's libertine. We are a Christian nation, and our actions should be bound by the norms of our culture and our faith, and parents must reign in their children, and not think it's the school's job to parent your children, and pastors must remember to chastize their flock, to urge repentance from sin, and call out sin where they see it, otherwise it will continue until it becomes a cancer on society. Most parents and pastors do this already, but you must be vigilant, just like every voter must be vigilant regarding the government. Eternal vigilance is the price of freedom.

Vigilance is the duty of our soldiers as well, and they have done their duty well. Working with the United States, we pass the burdens of Iraq and Afghanistan to them, and we will bring our troops home. We thank each of them for their service, their honor, and their integrity. Their work reminds us that life can be fragile, and that there is evil in the world to be defeated.

Vigilance is the duty of each State, to ensure that their reserved powers are not infringed by the federal government. Each State must ensure that their infrastructure is modernized, their schools and universities are teaching the truth, and not brainwashing with ideologies, and that foreign nations are not unduly influencing them or taking advantage of the people.

Vigilance is the duty of every Confederate of every State to expand liberty and freedom. Like the United States, our nation had slavery, but valuing independence more than that, we emancipated and expanded freedom and liberty, bringing former slaves into equality before the law, not by a sudden shock, but in a concerted and deliberate manner that brought us closer together rather than build resentments. We expanded the franchise to black Confederates, and then to Confederate women, and finally to those on active duty 18 years of age for their service. Over time, liberty has expanded. We expanded liberty, true liberty, and today I believe the Confederacy is a freer republic than when we were founded.

Rather than declaring ourselves a new order for the ages, our motto is "God will vindicate us." Hold true to your faith in God, who is the author of our rights, not government. All liberties and rights first came from God; they are not bestowed by governments. Our vindication of the righteousness of our cause is in our continued liberty and our continued faith in Almighty God.

Each inauguration is an opportunity to renew our commitment to our liberties, our freedoms, and our Constitution. The Confederacy is a young republic and I believe our best days are still ahead. May God bless you, and may God continue to bless the Confederate States of America.

President Howard's Presidency (2006-2012)

President Howard begins her term of office having to appoint 3 new Supreme Court Justices, as the Confederate States have a limit of 18 years for the court, to avoid problems associated with old age affecting the court.  On the 31st of January, she delivers her first State of the Confederation, which each President since Breckinridge delivered in person for the first, and since Goldwater each was delivered in person.  As is often the case, President Howard attended Super Bowl 45 in person in Michigan, the Tennessee Titans defeating the Pittsburgh Steelers for the first time. 

The first year of her presidency was luckily spent without much international intrigue.  President Howard met with the Liberian President, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, who also spoke at the Confederate Methodist Conference in Texas on her trip in March.  Behind the scenes, Sirleaf thanked Howard for the Confederates helping keep their neighborhood in Africa stable, avoiding the presence of EHMs from the United States, and Confederates actually investing with an eye towards the long-term benefit of Liberia as well.  As it stood, her small country had about 28,000 white people in it, of which about 4,300 were Confederate, mostly businessmen and their families, who worked in Monrovia or Davistown.  President Howard made comments on Confederates who had bought second homes in the US to sell now, because housing prices were declining up north; US media scoffed at her comments, saying she didn't know what she was talking about, and insinuating that her gender meant she didn't know what she was talking about.  

The next week, President of Nigeria Obasanjo met President Howard in the Executive Mansion and gave a speech in Nashville on African development, with dozens of southern businessmen attending.  Obasanjo thanked the businessmen for their investment in his country and their part in helping raise the standard of living for his people, and paying them a living wage, not just a minimum wage ($43.69 USD/month).  A series of tornadoes blew through Tennessee in early April, prompting a disaster declaration by its governor, Bill Haslam.  On the 26th of April, President Howard attended the Memorial Day services at the Capitol Cemetery in a somber ceremony to honor those who fought and died for Southern independence.

President Howard spoke with President Putin later on in 2006, congratulating him on Russia joining the WTO, while behind the scenes working on the beginnings of an alternate interbank money transfer standard outside of SWIFT, which is controlled mostly by the United States.  After the 2006 congressional elections result in a return of the Democrats to Congress, in January, they elect Nancy Pelosi as the first female Speaker of the House, before the Confederates.  In an off-the-cuff remark, President Howard is asked about how she feels about the United States having the first female Speaker, to which she responds, "Having two X chromosomes doesn't make a difference.  It's what she does and how she leads that matters.  You American feminists care too much about 'first woman this, first woman that' as if a job being done by a woman means it's necessarily about to be done better.  It doesn't matter whether a man or woman does the job, it matters if the job is done well.  If you want to see the real sexists, it's you feminists obsessing over women taking over for men and trying to turn men into women, and in the end, no one is happy because no one is being themselves."

Again, her response was called 'controversial' and received with breathless feigned shock in US newsrooms, to which President Howard rolled her eyes when she found out.  During 2007, President Howard made several comments to business leaders in southern technology companies, industrial companies, and other businesses that she believed the US was going to have a bad 2008, and to avoid investing in the US due to their subprime lending practices.  Up north, US media outlets poo-pooed the idea, saying she didn't know what she was talking about, and that the US economy was great, and the DJIA would hit 15,000 by the end of 2008.

The United States had invested quite a bit in southern companies, and when their housing crash came full swing in late 2007-2008, it helped take down a good bit of the southern economy as well.  The media, however, didn't lay the blame on the President for partisan political gain, as for years, everyone realized the President, while a prominent representative of the Confederacy, didn't have nearly as much power as the US President to interfere in the economy, for good or for ill.  The US central bank, the Federal Reserve, would end up printing trillions of dollars to shore up banks, in an effort to prevent a wider economic collapse, at the expense of reducing the purchasing power of the dollar.  In response, President Howard declined to change the exchange rate of the CSD vs. gold, instead opting for purchasing more gold and silver to store in the vaults that would not be monetized except in the course of regular business.  

The media spent a lot of time blaming the US and their central bank, and foreign investment as a whole, for creating the crisis, before switching to criticism solely of the US and its spending, and praise for both Rogers and Howard for their limited engagements overseas rather than the now seemingly endless occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan.

When asked about the historic nature of President O'Bannon's election for the US and her hopes for him in early 2009, she quipped, "It's not historic for us.  I hope he abides by his oath of office better than his predecessors."  Partly in response to the giant spending package passed shortly after his inauguration, President Howard asked Congress to cut back on a number of spending proposals, and for states to look to pare back on spending and start work on reductions in any debts and obligations they had:  "Our several States are sovereign in all matters not delegated in Article 1 to the general government.  I respect their sovereignty as much as any of our other Presidents, yet in light of recent events I would respectfully urge my fellow executives to find ways to reduce their debts and spending to prepare us better for unforeseen emergencies."  The 2010 budget did contain $9.8 billion in reduced spending, with any surpluses to reduce the national debt, which decreased $7.9 billion for 2010.

For a week in April, President Howard is stuck in Europe due to the eruption of the Icelandic volcano.  She uses the time to visit Berlin's WW2 memorial, see Straßburg in Germany, and attend the funeral of the Polish President, Lech Kaczyński, who died in a plane crash over Russia.  Howard leaves Europe and discusses a renewed focus on the lunar base and the Earth-orbiting space station, asking for greater private sector involvement in space exploration, to open up the 'final frontier' to the pioneers of Earth.  At the start of May, President Howard speaks with the Senate President Pro-Tempore John Forrest of Rio Grande and House Speaker Kirby-Smith of Florida about the budget, resource extraction, and the pending amendment before the states on health freedom.


Forrest; Kirby-Smith

The total focus in the US media on the bill in late 2009 and early 2010 worried a lot of states in the Confederacy, as well as the small but vocal number of students and immigrant Americans advocating for government involvement in health care, led to a counter-movement of states, starting with Texas, Baja California, and Cuba to amend the Constitution to prevent the government from getting involved in health care.  The amendment passed in 2010 as a result of numerous fears of a similar bill to the ACA coming south.

Health Amendment (#45):
Section 1

1. The right of the people to own their own bodies shall not be infringed.

2. The right of the people to refuse any medical procedure, experiment, vaccination, or medication shall not be infringed; no right or privilege of the people shall be infringed or impaired for such refusal, or be conditional to acceptance of any vaccination, medication, or medical procedure or experiment.

3. The right of the people to choose their own form of health care for themselves and their children or other dependents to prevent and treat any disease, injury, illness, or ailment of the body or mind shall not be infringed.

4. The right to fully informed consent shall not be infringed.

5. The right of the people to choose to engage or not to engage in commerce, and to choose or not to choose to buy or sell goods or services for their own health care or other needs shall not be infringed.



Section 2

1. Congress shall make no law requiring any citizen to purchase any good or service.

2. Congress shall make no law that any business require any medical procedure, experiment, vaccination, or medication of their employees, or of any school for their students.

3. No government official, officer, employee, agency, organization or otherwise, receiving any federal moneys, shall require any person to purchase any good or service, or to have a medical procedure, experiment, vaccination, or medication under any conditions.

4. Any government official or employee which uses the power or influence of their office to infringe upon any of the rights in section 1, or coerces, threatens, or otherwise causes a person to purchase a good or service, or to take a vaccination or medication, or undergo a medical procedure or experiment, or attempts or conspires to the same, shall be subject to impeachment, a fine of at least thrice the average salary for a government employee, and imprisonment for at least five years for each offense. The President shall have no power to pardon this offense.

5. Congress shall legislate against any interstate business requiring of their employees any vaccination, medication, medical procedure, experiment, or good or service.

6. Congress shall have the power to enforce the provisions of this article by appropriate legislation.


Subprime Goes Bust in the USA (2006-2008)

Chapter 67: The 16-Year Plan

O'Bannon's First Term

The media were ecstatic at the election of O'Bannon to the presidency, with gushing praise that made many see their lack of objectivity in their reporting.  The fawning coverage got to be an issue as many in the new administration realized overexposure was harming their political agenda after about 6 months of it.  Former Confederate President Fletcher quipped he'd have had an easier time with Congress if he'd had a media fawn over him like they did with O'Bannon.  When the US media asked him about the historic election of a black President he quickly replied, "We've already done that.  It's not new or remarkable, other than for a nation that practiced segregation until the 1960s." When the US media later blew up over the remark, he 'clarified' stating that many nations had legal segregation until the 1960s, including German and British former colonies, that then went on to elect black executives.  Within the first few days of coming in, O'Bannon froze all last-minute regulations from outgoing President Bush and signed an executive order closing the Corn Islands Base in Nicaragua, based on the 1914 Bryan-Chamorros Treaty, and a sore point with the Confederate States, which feared it was an excuse to station military forces near their sole remaining territory, the Providence Islands, barely 93 miles away.  His Secretary of Energy stops a regulation from former President Bush allowing outer continental shelf oil drilling, closing off billions of barrels of oil and natural gas, and ends the agreement between the US and CS to sell Confederate oil and gas to the United States, causing an immediate jump in the price of gas by 20¢/gallon.

His first bill signed was the Angela Martin Fair Pay Act, in response to a court decision about women being paid less at Goodyear, an American tire company in Ohio.  During his remarks on the bill, he noted that women in the US were paid less than men, while the Confederate States paid even less (a little dishonest, as the Confederate dollar was worth more than the US dollar), and that US companies had to do better than "those hayseeds in the sticks with their tobacco and guns."  Then-current President Jessica Howard was asked about his commentary, replying with dry wit, "If my three Masters Degrees from Florida, Germany, and Poland is the measure of a hayseed, then I'll wear that badge with honor."  After being asked about the reply, O'Bannon made a weak excuse that he was referring to mountain farmers, and an equally weak apology.  As before, the media covered for him, implying or outright saying that anyone who disagreed with him was a racist.  In February, he spoke on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's birth, speaking at the Lincoln Bicentennial Celebration.  The 16th President's reputation had been rehabilitated since the 1960s, with Democrats now claiming him as one of their own, for his work to champion a "strong, active presidency working to make our Union stronger and the government more active in bettering lives of everyday Americans."  O'Bannon called him a 'transformative' president and hoped to be as transformative for the United States; Republicans weakly countered that Lincoln was a Republican, and fought to preserve the Union unchanged (despite his 'active' government policies repeatedly violating the Constitution), which should be celebrated, but his methods left something to be desired.  Quite a few radio hosts and independent journalists shouted to their audiences that if he transformed the country like Lincoln it would mean even more secessions from the Union, possibly of the entire western states (Idaho to the Dakotas, and Montana down to Kansas and Missouri and West Virginia) leaving the US with the east, Great Lakes, and Pacific States alone.  Again, the media covered for him.

Shortly afterward, he signs the Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, spending $570 billion (roughly $426 billion CSD), ostensibly to help speed economic recovery by giving cash to welfare and social insurance recipients, aid to health, infrastructure, education, and energy, and billions to taxpayers in cash payments and tax credits.  The bill would be loudly criticized in more right-leaning US media, as much of the infrastructure and random payments went to Democrat-leaning and union-dominated businesses, ensuring that they would then be able to continue making political donations to Democrats in the next election cycle.  In his campaigning for the ARRA, he visited Pennsylvania, and toured Harrisburg and Pittsburgh with Governor Crist, a Pennsylvania native who had defeated Ed Rendell in his reelection campaign.

In late February, O'Bannon visits the Confederacy in Richmond, Nashville, and Davis, D.C. in his first foreign trip to try to smooth over the feathers he ruffled with his off-the-cuff remarks, visiting President Jessica Howard.  Their public appearance together, shaking hands, and talking in two chairs together was staged mostly for the US audience, as Confederate Presidents were much more low-key than their northern counterparts.  Their behind-the-scenes meeting was much more interesting, discussing mutual defense in NATO, trade under NAFTA that Howard was working to exit, and cooperative foreign policy regarding Europe, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and North China.  Before and after the 2-day meeting, there were press conferences about their meeting and how much respect they had for each other and their respective country's accomplishments, and there was a photo op with the two of them later on shooting quail.  Howard remarked they caught a dozen quail together, not telling that she had been the one to shoot all of it, O'Bannon missing every shot, and shouldering the gun improperly in a famous photo leaked from the expedition.  O'Bannon's remarks about Abraham Lincoln during their meetings while in the Confederate capital city don't go over well, considering the audience, likening himself to a new President Lincoln; Howard would graciously and subtly remind him that it was due to Lincoln that the South seceded, to which O'Bannon callously replied that slavery was no reason to secede.  She raised her eyebrows at that, responding that the States seceded because he tried to invade half of them, and the others because of oppressive tariffs and constitutional violations, a little more curtly.  O'Bannon retorted sharply, 'yeah, because of slavery,' resulting in his near expulsion from the Gray House before his handlers called for a break and advised him to apologize and try to smooth things over with President Howard.


Privately, President Howard remarked how self-absorbed he was, and his constant use of 'I', 'me', and 'my' when talking, and the continual condescension towards her specifically that came across as chauvinistic and confirmed the stereotype of a yankee telling other countries how they should live.  She wouldn't say it publicly, but would politely refer to 'those people' as General Lee did over a century prior, saying "having left those people to their own devices for a century and a half hasn't tempered their attitudes towards people different from them."  For the rest of her administration, relations between the two nations would be strained.

In March of 2009, he overturns regulations limiting the use of federal money going to embryonic stem cell research and to funding organizations like Planned Parenthood, and attended a G20 meeting, where President Howard notably stood apart from him and did not speak to him at any of the public meetings.  On May 4th, O'Bannon celebrates Star Wars Day, and later on, a day early, Cinco de Mayo and the Independence of Mexico.  It is a common mistake, and the media excused it as him meaning independence from the French occupation, which he knew, of course.  In April, O'Bannon met with the Tribal Nations Conference, and apologized for the US treatment of Native Americans and their expulsion to the Confederacy, with an offhanded remark about sending them to the slave-holders down south, which caused a media stir in the CS, as the south had already eliminated slavery at that point.  Radio host Rush Limbaugh talks about O'Bannon's 'apology tour' continuing, and O'Bannon having apologized to everyone but the Confederacy before his term is up.

On May 5th, President Howard traveled to Durango, and spoke with Governor Roger Vallejo about the fight against French occupation of Mexico in the 1860s in a press conference that was a subtle jab at O'Bannon's lack of historic awareness, and praising the Mexican-Confederates' contributions to Dixie, noting the valorous soldiers, including Brig. Grn. J.M. Anquera (Confederate War of Independence, Spanish-Confederate War), Brig. Gen. Philip Ramirez from Washington (Chihuahua), and Chief Master Sergeant Tony Sanchez, one of the most decorated army soldiers of WW2, without coming across as patronizing to a large group of fellow Confederates.

Durango Governor Vallejo

Shortly after, he speaks at Notre Dame in Indiana, receiving an honorary degree as a way to turn the media narrative back in his favor, and he nominates Isabella Padilla to the Supreme Court to replace the retiring justice David Richards, and she gets confirmed by August.  She was noted in alternative media for her comments about 'Puerto Rican occupation by the Confederate States' and 'historic racism of every American nation' due to 'states rights arguments.'  In another attempt to heal the rift caused by his public gaffes, he sends a wreath to the Confederation Cemetery in Arlington, Virginia, just south of Arlington House, one month after Confederate Memorial Day on the 26th of April.  In June, as a response to the bankruptcy of Chrysler and GM, he signed a 'Cash for Clunkers' bill to pay people to junk their old cars, ostensibly to improve fuel efficiency, but also to prop up US car manufacturers laden with Union pensions and overhead.  In the restructuring, a long-time US car manufacturing company, Pontiac (which had no presence in North China) was sold off to the Confederacy for a pittance of the value of its intellectual property, while other car companies got bailouts.  At this same time, he also commented on the arrest of a friend, William Howard Grossman, saying the police "acted stupidly," and that people of color were discriminated against by police more, which got him in a lot of media trouble on the right, resulting in the 'beer summit' later at the White House with the officer and Grossman in a very public photo op to try to smooth over the bad PR of the moment.  Through the later part of the year, he would travel around the country to try to build support for his healthcare reform bill.

O'Bannon spent part of his first year reducing US troop involvement in Iraq and Afghanistan, as President Howard had fulfilled her promise to remove Confederate troops from 2006-2008, necessitating an increase in US troop involvement there, which he then began drawing down.  Off-handed comments by some of his advisors, leaked out that President Howard couldn't handle the pressure in a war zone, or was taking direction from her husband, which were not well received in southern media; gracefully, President Howard ignored it or brushed it aside in a very statesmanlike manner rather than respond with bellicose counter-arguments or war posturing / threats against another nation.  By fall, he declares a national emergency due to H1N1, a flu strain, which he claims is already sweeping across the South (though the press does not investigate the claim at all) and hospitalizing the elderly and the vulnerable. He asks everyone to get a vaccine against it, though vaccination rates don't climb all that much. It would later be found out that his senior advisor and others in his administration had financial stakes in several vaccine companies, and the increase in vaccination netted them several hundred thousand dollars in stock appreciation.

In November, he visits the Tomb of the Unknown in the lower triangle of DC at Columbia National Cemetery to lay a wreath on Veterans' Day, but makes another international gaffe when talking to Rhodesian Governor-General William Lungu and his South African counterpart, Charles Motlanthe, in Washington, accusing both nations of having been involved in the slave trade and a legacy of racism 'like America's South before 1865', despite all slave-traders being from New England by easily verifiable historic records.


Governors-General Lungu and Motlanthe

Both African heads of state also traveled to the Confederate States, where President Howard and Vice-President Elder charmed the two men, and worked out a trade deal where South Africa would improve diamond mining working conditions and work to increasing outputs of precious metals to the CS and Rhodesia would send more copper to the south to help their electronics industries, and the Confederates would send over cotton and a variety of hemp-based products made across the South. Both men would return home and speak glowingly of the reception they had in the Confederate States and the warmth and generosity of their hosts to their own countries, and place Confederate flags in their government houses as a token of friendship and respect for the Confederate States.

During 2010, President O'Bannon pledged $100 million to help Haiti after a horrible earthquake there, with two former presidents being placed in charge of the US relief efforts, getting a lot of praise for his generosity (with taxpayer money), though there would be no follow-up, and much of the money would be lost in the Global Initiative's financial records without ever getting to the Haitians. Confederates in Santo Domingo pledge their help too with donations of water filters, emergency rations, blankets, clothes, and food, their generosity impressing many, though the Santo Domingans' State Guard along the border was called 'racist' in US media, who believed the Haitians should be allowed over, because Santo Domingans have more than the Haitians, and it isn't fair.  The governor of Santo Domingo, Charles Lopez, himself a black man just like the Haitians, shot back at the Americans being obsessed with race and open borders, saying that Santo Domingo has a culture and heritage he's trying to preserve but is happy to help fellow Hispaniolans.

O'Bannon holds a concert for Black History Month, with music from the 'civil rights movement' at the White House. One reporter noted his comment that unlike 'other countries' the US celebrates the achievements of their black citizens to make up for their racist past. Later asked about it, Vice-President Elder remarked 'black history is Confederate history. Our past is made of black and white people together for over 400 years. You can't have the Confederacy without white and black people, so to single one out for special attention doesn't make sense to me. My achievement or President Fletcher's achievement doesn't happen without white people and black people working together.  We don't need a special month to pat us on the head to make us feel better."

Much media attention is made for the signing of his Affordable Care Act, passed in the middle of the night on December 24, 2009 when most people had gone home for Christmas already, with provisions to force people to purchase health insurance, fines for not purchasing insurance, and measures dictating to doctors and nurses which specialties they could enter into if they got federal student loans, along with insurance payment boards to determine whether medical procedures would be paid for by the government, the so-called 'death panels.'

In April, his attendance for the funeral of the former Polish President is cancelled due to the Icelandic volcano eruption, the US sending their condolences. Much of 2010 is spent traveling the country, with hand-outs for various infrastructure projects in key states, hoping to shore up votes in the upcoming election, where spending in the months leading up to it is quickly becoming a growing issue, especially in comparison to the confederation to the south, which barely spends a hundred billion a year at the federal level.

The 2010 Congressional elections were seen by many as a referendum on O'Bannon's first two years in office, where his party lost the House and several seats in Congress. The House flipped from an expected 218-217 Democrat majority to a 228-207 Republican majority, largely on opposition to his controversial health care bill, and the Senate went 40-28 rather than the expected 45-23.


People in Missouri and West Virginia began talking about secession with all O'Bannon's illegal acts, believing life would be better in the Confederacy, which had a handful of the legislation and regulations that the US had. Citizens in both states, and even in Kansas began selling Militia-style flags with the state seal in the blue field at the fly, and a single star above them, symbolizing their addition to the Confederacy. CNN and MCNN both had anchors call those people traitors and 'closeted racists' because they didn't want to be in a country with a black President, ignoring the fact that the Confederacy had already had 2 black Presidents.  President Howard was asked about it, and was very diplomatic about the issue, saying, "A sovereign State has the right to resume the powers it delegated to its federal agent, and to chose a new agent.  If any State within the Union wishes to leave the Union, that is a matter for that State and the federal government to decide.  The Confederacy will not instigate any secession from the Union.  It must be a free choice, not a coerced choice."


During the last year of his first term, O'Bannon signed the National Defense Authorization Act, including a controversial section 517, largely written by Senator R Bryan of Ohio, which authorized the indefinite detention of Americans, essentially erasing the writ of habeas corpus, which would later become a campaign issue (not effectively argued by Romney though).

O'Bannon's Second Election

In what many in the voting bases of both parties began to realize, American political parties seem to throw a candidate up, when it's "his turn," rather than chose someone who would be able to defeat the other party candidate, in a way of 'throwing away an election' to get that candidate out of the way for a better one next time.

This time, the Republicans threw out several candidates, though none gathered national appeal.

Santorum, Paul, Gingrich, Romney, Quinlan, Sapp, Dorsett

Santorum had an Italian immigrant father who settled in West Virginia before moving to Pennsylvania, appealing to the issue of immigration.  Paul appealed to a growing libertarian wing of the Republicans, but got criticism from the other candidates saying his policies sounded like something written by the Confederates.  Gingrich, also from Pennsylvania, and a former Speaker of the House, had a 'New 21st Century Contract,' with updated policies reminiscent of his 1994 Contract with America, despite the Republicans not implementing much of that agenda after getting into power.  Romney had wide recognition from his failed 2008 bid, and somehow outraised all the other campaigns relatively quickly.  Charges of flip-flopping dogged him, and his 'Romneycare' was seen as a forerunner of 'Barrycare', so he couldn't really criticize that issue that had galvanized so many Republicans in the base.  Dorsett called him a 'vulture capitalist' with ties to Bain Capital, and its foreign involvement.  Romney countered saying America's role in the world was to make it safe for Democracy, criticizing Dorsett for wanting to watch the world burn like the Confederates with their isolationism, a comment he would have to later retract.  Ryan Quinlan was a gay rights activist and more libertarian candidate, seeking specific protections for LGB people in US federal law, criticized by some as wanting 'special set asides' or 'special rights above other Americans.'  John Sapp was Utah Governor, and opened his campaign on Liberty Island where President Reagan launched his campaign.  He marketed himself as a fiscal conservative, would get the US out of both Iraq and Afghanistan, and would cut defense spending to more 'reasonable levels.'


Liberty Island statue colorized in miniature; the actual statue is holding its staff aloft with a torch bearing the fire of liberty, lit for the entire bay to see between New Jersey and New York.

Lastly, Carol Dorsett, a Congressman from Wisconsin, announced her candidacy in her hometown of Des Moines, Iowa.  She made a mild controversy criticizing the mandatory HPV vaccine by Governor Romney in Massachusetts, saying she knew a girl who had to take it, and it caused mental retardation.  Vaccine manufacturers were roundly critical of her statement.  She made a series of other gaffes during the campaign, suspending it by summer of 2012.

By early summer, the campaign whittled down to Romney, Santorum, Gingrich, and Paul, and by June, Romney won the nomination, despite the lukewarm reception by the increasingly conservative base of the Republican party.  The campaign was a hard-fought one, though Romney made a number of gaffes himself, like calling himself a 'severe conservative' and effectively writing off the '47%' who were on welfare payments.  His criticisms of O'Bannon were tepid, as he was afraid of being called racist by the same media that always criticized Republicans much more than it did Democrats.  Despite the large national debt that had increased nearly $3 trillion, stagnant job numbers with a stock market propped up by money printing, and widespread dislike of his policies, O'Bannon was able to win the election.  His margin of 415-92 disguised the popular vote total that was several million less than his 2008 election, while also losing 14 of the 19 bellweather counties of the US that had supposedly predicted the winner off the election for over 50 years.

The opponent, Mitt Romney, gave a very gracious concession speech, which Rush complained about on the radio, that Republicans were only good for giving concession speeches, which is the only time Democrats praised any Republican - when they lost.




O'Bannon's Second Term

After winning re-election, in December, O'Bannon speaks to the US Tribal Nations Conference and hosts the newly elected Mexican President. His inauguration continued his theme from the election campaign, and used phrasing from Abraham Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation, a controversial document for its obvious illegality and the widespread belief it was an attempt to incite a slave rebellion, not only by the CS, but by a number of European nations, and included in several letters written by Lincoln after his impeachment.  He vowed to promote democracy abroad and stated that the United States must "be a source of hope to the poor, the sick, the marginalized, the victims of prejudice" around the world.  The next month he outlined his desire for gun control at the federal level, despite the 2nd amendment preventing such measures at the federal level, making it a state issue within the federal system.  By May, he presents his proposed 2014 budget, spending over $2 trillion for the first time in US history, an increase of over $300 million from 2013, a deficit of about $350 million, and increasing the national debt from $12 to $12.8 trillion.

In May of 2013, he spoke to the Mexican President on immigration, and the through-trains from Mexico going through the Confederacy that brought thousands of illegal aliens into the USA.  In June, a 911 call where Chuck Tanner was accused of 'racial profiling' a black youth before shooting him gained national attention from Ohio, despite being a state issue.  After five judges, and revelations that NBC doctored the press version of his 911 call, he was acquitted in the Ohio courts, to mass anger due to media incitement against him.  He later sued NBC for defamation and won a settlement of $2.94 million.  President O'Bannon made public remarks on racial profiling, the shooting of Daquante Morris, and race relations in the United States.  Radio Host Rush Limbaugh remarked on continued media bias, and how O'Bannon made race relations worse since his election, that race relations were better in the Confederacy (which caused a media furor, despite his evidence of it), and how people are afraid to defend themselves against black people because they'll be called racist.

The media and several Democrat politicians began making a push to increase minimum wage to $15/hr (roughly $7 CSD), where it's currently about $7-$8/hr in the United States at the federal level.  Most western states, as well as Missouri and West Virginia resisted, while California, Oregon, Washington, Illinois, Maryland, and New York went full ahead in raising their minimum wages, beginning a period of increased unemployment as small businesses cannot afford to pay the same number of people without raising prices, which they cannot afford since it would reduce sales and harm their businesses.  At an August meeting in Wales of the NATO nations, O'Bannon speaks concerning Afghanistan, while President Yen spoke in favor of pulling out of Afghanistan, and privately voiced concerns about the need for NATO considering the end of the Warsaw Pact twenty years or so before.  O'Bannon signs a block grant bill for low-income families, criticized by the right-wing media as a vote-grabbing scheme.  A Washington-based steel company in Seattle, and another in Kansas begin supplying low-quality steel to the US Navy, faking the tests for quality.  The 2014 elections resulted in the Republicans maintaining control of the US house 229-206, but the Democrats continued to hold the Senate 37-29.

Online media freedom site Kwikigietung released Clinton e-mails where she said: "My dream is a hemispheric common market with open trade and open borders sometime in the future with energy that is green and sustainable as we can get it powering growth and opportunity for every person in the hemisphere."  This would go unnoticed in the media at large, but would be taken up with worry in the Confederate States, whose borders were secure and closed, immigration tightly controlled, and whose trade was not protective, but revenue-generating, but not free trade, which would bankrupt the general government.  Government officials would seek clarification from the United States, but were given platitudes in return.  This would continue the cooling of official relations between the Confederates and the Union to the north, resulting in the Confederates to consider behind closed doors joining the 'BRICS' nations - Brazil, Russia, India, the Confederacy, and South Africa - in a counter to the United States' aggressive foreign policy maneuvers.  The move towards Russia and away from the United States moved further after the coup in February-March of 2014, when a United States supported, and Richárd Nevelt-backed color revolution resulted in an openly neo-Nazi puppet government in Ukraine.  News stories against the newly installed regime played for weeks in the South, calling it a destabilizing move and a violation of national sovereignty.

In the middle of 2015, a shooting at a black church in St Louis captured the nation's attention, where a young boy of a divorced mother, on SSRI drugs, shot several black parishioners in a majority black church near the border with Illinois.  The media show images of the boy with a Confederate flag behind him, the media focusing on it as sign of racism.  Most people in Missouri, the US state on the border of the CSA, don't consider it racist, and it would often appear there, as would the state's flag.  Even West Virginians, Marylanders, and people in southern Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, and across the western states would have a flag on their cars or on their houses, their ancestors coming from Dixie and having decided to settle in the west for land or opportunities.  His executive order near the end of his term of office redefined diversity as the military’s “greatest asset” and redefined national security as a system for maximizing employment diversity by gender, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, and other identity politics metrics, rather than the military metrics that have historically mattered such as readiness, competence, and a willingness to wage war in defense of the United States.  With this, along with his reductions in the size of each branch by over 200,000 total people, the US military was at the smallest size since 2000.

The Confederate States joined the BRICS nations, making it BRICCS, in May 2015 and the group of 6 nations began discussions for an alternative payment system to the US-controlled SWIFT system.  The nations met in Ufa, a city in Russia, where they made a joint statement against foreign intervention in the politics of a nation for economic exploitation, delivered by the Confederate President, while remarks on hardening electric systems against terrorism and sabotage were made by the South China President Hu Zhongxun, whose own nation had rapidly electrified but his system was strained as it was.  Hardened and decentralized electric systems were recommended.  The Confederate remarks were seen as a swipe against the United States, despite not specifically mentioning them, with people such as John Kerry making nonsensical replies of Confederate exploitation of women and minorities with accusations that had no basis in fact.

I'll be continuing this timeline shortly. I've gotten a few new books to read on history that will be helpful in making this timeline better.

Hi jjohnson, I joined this board in 2022 only, so TTL was under my radar, but I can see you put a lot of work into it. I'll have to remember to check it out further.

Anyway, welcome back!