George Wallace, as captured by photographer Herb Ritts

The Aughts in America are book-ended by George W. Bush’s caricature of the red states on one end, and Barack Obama’s idealized blue state persona on the other. Over a decade ago, it was a similar middling American uncertainty that was the creative impetus behind John Kennedy Jr.’s mid-90s launch of George magazine; and also the reason why the mag hit with a dull thud issue after issue. George was put to rest not long after Kennedy passed, and that was probably a wise decision — a political mag with no politics, but instead a pop sensibility aimed at both left and right ends up pleasing no one, and worse, ends up saying nothing.

But wouldn’t George have been a fascinating read during the Aughts? The blinding celebrity of Obama, Sarah Palin, not to mention Ariana Huffington, Cindy McCain, Michelle Obama, Bill O’Reilly, The Colbert Nation and any number of other post-reality television political figures and performance art media personalities would have been right up George‘s alley, and the bevy of celebrity benevolence (Angelina? Matt Damon?) would have provided much more satisfying, less forced cover concepts than the mag found itself using during its lifetime.

Case in point for George anticipating its cue and missing its decade: for the Cindy Crawford-draped innaugural issue, Kennedy sat down with George Wallace and asked the former pro-segregationist governor if he was prepared to die. Wallace — who will always be remembered as much for his attitutes on race as the wheelchair he was confined to — like Kennedy, the democract royal who died that famous death, lived just shy of seeing the first ever black family in the White House. But had the timelines been more elastic, wouldn’t you have loved to read them, in this magazine, sit down and talk about it?

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[George, October-November 1995: "George Wallace - The country's most famous former segregationist talks to John Kennedy about race and redemption. Photographed by Herb Ritts]