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Recent Discussions
The conservative view is being censored and silence by FB, Google, Twitter, etc. The left has the microphone. Their propaganda is being heard through the mainstream media and Hollywood. The Liberal agenda is being pushed on young children through the public school system and in Colleges. My question is: What can we do about it?
I love what ifs? Metal Floss has a bunch of good alternate history scenarios. Here are some of the best:
What if the South won the Civil War?
Effect: America becomes one nation again… in 1960.
Explanation: In a 1960 article published in Look magazine, author and Civil War buff MacKinlay Kantor envisioned a history in which the Confederate forces won the Civil War in 1863, forcing the despised President Lincoln into exile. The Southern forces annex Washington, DC — renaming it the District of Dixie. The USA (or what’s left of it) moves its capital to Columbus, Ohio — now called Columbia — but can no longer afford to buy Alaska from the Russians. Texas, unhappy with the new arrangement, declares its independence in 1878. Under international pressure, the Southern states gradually abolish slavery. After fighting together in two world wars, the three nations are reunified in 1960 – a century after South Carolina’s secession had led to the Civil War in the first place.
What if Hitler successfully invaded Russia?
Effect: The Fuhrer is revered in history as a great leader.
Explanation: In Robert Harris’ novel Fatherland (the basis for a 1994 TV movie), Nazi Germany successfully invades Russia in 1942. Learning that Britain has broken the Enigma code, however, the Nazis play it safe and make peace with the west. Through the magic of propaganda, Hitler is revered 20 years later as a beloved leader. It’s an alternate history, of course, but Harris was drawing a parallel with real history: this was Stalin’s Russia with the names changed.
What if Christianity missed the West?
Effect: The Enlightenment starts early – and lasts a thousand years.
Explanation: French philosopher Charles Renouvier’s book Uchronie (1876) suggested a history in which Christianity didn’t come to the west through the Roman Empire, due to a small change of events after the reign of Marcus Aurelius. In this history, while the word of Christ still spreads throughout the east, Europe enjoys an extra millennium of classical culture. When Christianity finally goes West, it is absorbed harmlessly into the multi-religious society. Naturally, this view of history was colored by Renouvier’s own worldview: while not strictly an atheist, he was no fan of organized religion.
8. What if the Romans won the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest?
Effect: No one would speak English.
Explanation: In What If? (1999), edited by Robert Cowley, historians pondered what would happen if historical events had turned out differently. Many of these were popular questions — What if the Americans lost the Revolutionary War? What if the D-Day invasion had failed in 1944? But an essay by the late Lewis H. Lapham, then editor of Harper’s Magazine, recalled a little-known confrontation in 9 AD between the Roman legions and the Germanic tribes at the Teutoburg Forest. The tribes ambushed and destroyed three Roman legions in this campaign, and the Romans would never again attempt to conquer Germania beyond the Rhine.
Lapham suggested that, if the Romans had won, world history would have been remarkably different, with a “Roman empire preserved from ruin, Christ dying… on an unremembered cross, the nonappearance of the English language, neither the need nor the occasion for a Protestant Reformation… and Kaiser Wilhelm seized by an infatuation with stamps… instead of a passion for cavalry boots.”
9. What if the Protestant Reformation never happened?
Effect: Christianity would continue to rule the world. Science, not so much.
Explanation: Renowned novelist Kingsley Amis entered alternate-history territory in 1976 with his award-winning novel The Alteration. In his imagined history, Henry VIII’s short-lived older brother, Arthur, has a son just before his death. When Henry tries to usurp his nephew’s throne, he is stopped in a papal war. Hence, the Church of England is never founded, the Spanish Armada is never defeated (as Elizabeth I was never born), and Martin Luther reconciles with the Catholic Church, eventually becoming Pope. Naturally, this turns Europe into a vastly different place. By 1976, it is ruled by the Vatican, in the middle of a long-running Christian/Muslim cold war, and technologically regressed, as electricity is banned and scientists are frowned upon.
What if the Cuban Missile Crisis escalated into a full-scale war?
Effect: The end of nuclear proliferation... except in the U.S.
Explanation: Though usually considered a branch of science fiction, alternate history stories have their own awards, the Sidewise Awards for Alternate History, which have been presented to some renowned novels, including Harry Turtledove’s How Few Remain, mentioned above, and in 1999, Brendan DuBois’ Resurrection Day. This envisions a world in which the U.S. military sabotages President Kennedy’s attempts to negotiate peace during the Cuban Missile Crisis. The United States invades Cuba, making the Crisis escalate into nuclear warfare. The Soviet Union is destroyed, the People’s Republic of China collapses, and a fallout cloud over Asia kills millions of others. Meanwhile, the United States loses New York, Washington DC, San Diego, Miami and other cities. However, all surviving nations renounce their possession of nuclear weapons – with the exception of the USA, now under martial law (as the military had planned all along).
15. What if Woodrow Wilson had never been US president?
Effect: World War II would have been avoided.
Explanation: In Gore Vidal’s 1995 novel, The Smithsonian Institution, the great political scribe made one of his rare entries into science fiction. In the book, a teenage math genius is mysteriously summoned to the Smithsonian Institution in 1939, where he glimpses the upcoming World War II. Determined to prevent it, he goes back in history to seek its origins. At one stage, he concludes that the fault lay in President Woodrow Wilson’s vision for the League of Nations. Well-meaning as the organization was, Vidal blames it for causing Germany’s struggles in the 1920s, paving the way for the rise of Hitler.
What if Germany had invaded Britain by sea?
Effect: World War II might have ended earlier—but Hitler would still have lost.
Explanation: After capturing France, Nazi Germany planned to invade Britain with Operation Sea Lion, in an air and naval attack across the English Channel. The plan was shelved in 1940, but some 30 years later, the Royal Military Academy of Sandhurst started a war-games module, set in a world where Sea Lion had happened. (Military academies, in their war-games, often speculate about how different strategies might have changed history.) According to the module, the Germans would not have been able to withstand the might of the British Home Guard and the RAF—and as the Royal Navy had superiority in the English Channel, they would not have been able to escape. It would have severely weakened the German army, and hastened the end of the war.
http://mentalfloss.com/article/54464/what-if-19-alternate-histories-imagining-very-different-world
Do you have any what ifs to share?
Dr Who and Star Wars have both became way to politically correct for my taste and made me unable to enjoy the show/movie. What about you?
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/checkpoint/wp/2018/03/12/oh-my-gosh-dude-video-shows-navy-pilots-close-encounter-with-an-unidentified-fast-flying-object/?utm_term=.c060bb3b78a6
I say that not because of the quality of the footage, but of the qualifications of those that made the sighting. I think a fighter pilot would be the last person to misidentify an unusual object.
I am not 100% this is a UFO, but I think other lifeforms in the universe is highly likely due to the number of plants we are finding, and the amount of water we are also finding on other planets. Fermi asked, "Where are they?" Perhaps they are already here, What are your thoughts?
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