The window-of-opportunity for the NASA alternate history scenario was when Bush-Senior proposed the Space Exploration Initiative (SEI) shortly after the Cold War ended. Bush-Senior was politically sand bagged from within NASA by Admiral Richard Truly who was then Administrator of NASA. Bush became aware of Truly's actions only after Truly had successfully sabotaged SEI. Truly's motivation was to protect the Shuttle and Space Station (a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush). Bush made a hopeless attempted to repair the damage by firing Truly and replacing him with Goldin. Unfortunately, the damage was already done and SEI could not be salvage. Bringing Goldin in only made a bad situation, much much worse. Goldin later remained administrator because Bush had given up on NASA and then later on Clinton kept Goldin because Clinton simply didn't give a damn about the Space Program.

Ah, I remember the days on MSNBC and here when folks stridently touted Al Gore as the maven of space exploration. Other than the X-33 Hangar Queen fiasco, the all-knowing algore's space legacy was null.