Who would have made an interesting president, but never got the shot?

[StevieM]

21. At the top of my list of Morris Udall. I don't know whether he would have won the GE if he had

gotten the Democratic nomination in 1976. By the time Election Day rolled around, Carter's margin had crumbled and he had to rely on a coalition of liberal and conservative, southern states--a coalition only available to him. Ford might very well had pulled off the long-coveted Truman-style shocking upset.

But I think Udall was the president we needed back then and would have done a good job.

I also liked Gary Hart and Mario Cuomo a lot and would have been interested in seeing either one of them elected to the White House in 1988.

It's very interesting to think of what would have happened if Al Gore was in the White House after 9/11.

All the examples I gave are ones that realistically could have happened with a couple of minor differences in the way that history played out. Gore could have won in 2000--and many would argue that he actually did. Udall could have won the nomination in 1976, and probably would have if not for Carter's shocking emergence. And he could have beaten Ford in the GE. Hart and Cuomo were both electable in 1988 vs. George HW Bush.

On the other hand, William Jennings Bryan and Adlai Stevenson were never realistically going to win their elections.

I think the most interesting what if is Henry Wallace. What if FDR hadn't dumped him from the ticket and he had become president after Roosevelt died?