The Crazy Domino Effect in the 90s That Led to Obama Becoming President
Butterflies in the mist
In the mid-90s, a new spinoff series came out with a lot of excitement and anticipation.
The first season received positive reviews from critics, scoring a 93% on Rotten Tomatoes and a 73% from audiences. However, the second season saw a significant dip, with only a 33% rating from critics and a 65% rating from audiences.
The devoted fans of the long-running series were not pleased.
With the threat of cancellation looming, the show's producers knew they had to do something drastic. So, they turned to a tried-and-true tactic of the TV industry — introducing a new character to shake things up!
Towards the end of season three, they brought in a wonderful actress named Jeri, alongside a new storyline and a huge cliffhanger at the end.
The gamble was a massive success. The fourth season received a perfect score of 100% from critics on Rotten Tomatoes. This success allowed the show to continue for several more seasons, ultimately running for a total of seven and garnering huge residuals even to this day.
But while the show’s success grew, Jeri’s personal life went the opposite. The grueling work schedule of the show simply took an impossible toll on the cast and crew.
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Happily ever after?
In 1991, Jeri married a man named Jack, a Harvard-educated investment banker who made his fortune at Goldman Sachs. Their marriage appeared solid until their busy work schedules began to break it, leading to their divorce in 1999.
The divorce proceedings were sealed to protect their son, which seemed unimportant until Jack decided to run for the Illinois Senate in 2004 as a Republican candidate. Jack had a solid campaign, but he faced a tough challenge from his Democratic opponent, who led the polls by 48% to 40%—a young upstart named Barack Obama.
To gain an edge, several parties sued to make the sealed divorce records public, including the Chicago Tribune, WLS-TV, and some of Jack's own primary opponents.
The judge agreed to make some details public while keeping others private to protect the couple's child.
The released details were quite scandalous; Jack was revealed to have a penchant for bizarre sex clubs and repeatedly encouraged Jeri to participate, despite her refusal. The revelation was enough to destroy Jack's campaign, as voters were not willing to elect a perceived sex-crazed conservative Christian as their senator.
Jack resigned less than a week after the release of the records.
No time to prepare
Republicans scrambled to find another candidate to quickly replace Jack before the upcoming election. They put a man named Alan Keyes in place in August of 2004 — with only a couple of months left to campaign.
The results were disastrous for the Republicans that year. The unprepared Alan lost by a landslide to his democratic opponent.
He only garnered 27% of the votes vs 70% for Mr. Obama.
And the rest, we know. The senate race launched Barack onto the national stage, and just 4 short years later he went on to become the 44th president of the United States.
The show that caused Jeri Ryan to get a divorce?
None other than the awesome sci-fi series called Star Trek: Voyager. And that’s how nerdy Trekkies inadvertently elected a president of the USA.
See mom? Watching Star Trek for hundreds of hours WASN’T a complete waste of time.
Written by a nerd named JJ Pryor
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Things like this happen all the time, my life is full of them. For example, if there had been room in Art class in Grade 5, I never would have met my husband. A lot of times we don't recognize the little thing that led to much bigger things.
omg. That's fascinating.