Showing posts with label alternate history. Show all posts
Showing posts with label alternate history. Show all posts

Saturday, May 23, 2015

Harry Turtledove, Joe Steele.  ROC, 2015

Alternate history:   Stalin's parents emigrate to the US, and he's born here rather than in the Tsarist Empire.  He changes his name to "Steele" rather than the Russian equivalent.

He gets the 1932 Democratic Presidential nomination, after Franklin Roosevelt's unfortunate death.  Wins the election, stays President till his death.

After an interval in which it looks like the US will stop being a dictatorship, a worse man takes over:   J. Edgar Hoover.

Do I recommend it?  If you're a history buff or a political junkie, yes.  Otherwise, worth a look to see if you want to continue reading.

Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Monday February 24, 2014  "Finally, in my survey of world history in the two centuries following the fall of the Bastille, I come to the question of why the workers never took over the idea of revolution."
Kenneth Minogue, "What if Karl Marx Had Drowned in a Cross-Channel Ferry Accident (1847)"  In Nelson W. Polsby (ed.), What If. The Lewis Publishing Company, 1982

Historical point of divergence:  Karl Marx died before writing a complete exposition of his theories.  Which meant there was no adequate theory for working class revolution, and no such revolution could occur.

I place this in the "If roosters didn't crow, the Sun wouldn't rise" category.  Factory workers would have adapted some other philosophy to their needs. 

As peasants have done with Marxism in our timeline.  As groups across political and social spectrums have done with Christianity and other religions.

***The University of Minnesota's Metro-area campuses will go smoke-free in July.  The ban will include electronic cigarettes.

***From minnpost.org:

"Fake" ... Twitter followers? Nick Winkler of KSTP-TV writes: "5 EYEWITNESS NEWS audited high profile politicians in Minnesota and found they have thousands of fake twitter followers. For instance, approximately 6,000 of Governor Mark Dayton's twitter followers are not real. We checked and candidates for the Republican nominee for Governor have fake followers as well."

***From Twitter:

Brainwave Architect™ ‏@brainwavetweets You will either step forward into growth or you will step back into safety. ~ Abraham Maslow.