[William McKinley]

I wonder how different the world would be if McKinley had not been shot. Teddy Roosevelt may still have been elected in 1904, but would he have not run in 1908 had he not served out the majority of McKinley's second term? I bet he would have.

That would totally changed the dynamic of the 1912 election. Instead of Wilson facing a divided Republican camp, with conservatives staying with the incumbent Taft and the progressives following Roosevelt to a third party, it is likely that there would not have been a third party challenge- either Roosevelt would have run for a third term as a Republican or he wouldn't have run at all. In either case, it is likely we would never have had the disasterous Woodrow Wilson administration during World War I.

And without the way Wilson handled WWI, there may never have been a WWII, never have been a League of Nations (and the subsequent UN).

[Dog Gone]

Yes, it's a very interesting exercise to consider what might have happened if something slightly different had occurred at one point in history.

It's very ironic that an anarchist's bullet probably led to Wilson's ascendancy and the world we have today.

[ConservativeDude]

on can comment extensively and correctly about TR's poor domestic policy. he was a disaster in that regad.

but in foreign policy, he would have handled things quite a bit different than Wilson, the globalist socialist with a messianic complex.

and actually it is also conceivable that had TR not become pres till '04, and then again in '08, that the foreign policy crisis then brewing would have been the battle he needed in order to distract his attention from his poor domestic agenda.

TR after all is once and for all a fighter. if he had had a fight, perhaps he would have left behind his domestic agenda.

and i can guarantee you that out of the ash heap of WWI would not have come WWII if Wilson had never taken office.