In the midst of a revolutionary situation in Democratic Party politics, where we have six women and four people of color announcing for President, the question arises whether the Democratic Party will go back to the old standard of a white male Presidential nominee in 2020.
It is often not thought about that the last three times, the Democrats nominated a man of color (Barack Obama), and a white woman (Hillary Clinton).
With the growing number of people of color in the population, and the clear cut advantage for Democrats among women, the question is whether that means the Democrats need to continue down the road they have been on, and in so doing, likely alienating many middle class and working class white males, particularly in the Midwest and South, who feel they are being overlooked and ignored.
So is it wise to nominate Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders, Pete Buttigieg, Beto O’Rourke, Eric Swalwell, Tim Ryan, Jay Inslee, John Hickenlooper, John Delaney, or Seth Moulton?
The ultimate issue is what strategy is best, so that the Democrats regain the Presidency and the Senate, and retire Donald Trump, and lead to his facing criminal prosecution.
Ronald writes, “The ultimate issue is what strategy is best, so that the Democrats regain the Presidency and the Senate, and retire Donald Trump, and lead to his facing criminal prosecution.â€
Although that wasn’t in the form of a question, I can answer it as if it was.
The ultimate best strategy is with an authentic, bold progressive who offers a vision and an agenda that will take the nation in a different and better direction—one beneficial even more for the have-nots—which gives the people a motivation to vote for the 2020 Democratic presidential nominee to unseat Republican incumbent U.S. president Donald Trump.
The demographics of the individual nominee does not matter to people who are suffering from income inequality, are in debt over medical bills and/or college tuition, and the young who don’t see any bright future for themselves.
I already know this.
If there are people who don’t know—and, yes, there are plenty who don’t—then such people are either in a bubble or they don’t actually care. “Vote Blue No Matter Whoâ€â€”the mantra of many during the 2018 midterm elections (won with overall gains by the Democrats because the incumbent U.S. president is affiliated with the Republican Party)—is moronic nonsense that will not prevail in a presidential election that is also an attempt to unseat an incumbent Republican.
I mentioned this before. I will repeat. When we get a presidential election which switches the White House party, the pickup winning Republican or Democrat is not a safe choice. A safe choice is who a party nominates as a “challenger†who fails to unseat an incumbent U.S. president. (Think 1996 Bob Dole, 2004 John Kerry, and 2012 Mitt Romney as the last three such examples.) That is the type of candidate this corporate Democratic Party Establishment wants to see nominated. (This includes 44th U.S. president Barack Obama, who recently delivered a speech in Berlin in which he basically said progressives should not fight for what they want and need—but they should, of course, get in line to vote for more empty, corporate Democrats.) If that is the type of “Democratic†nominee—a “challengerâ€â€”we will see in 2020, that will lead to re-election for 45th U.S. president Donald Trump. As I also mentioned before: There are only two 2020 Democratic presidential candidates, with a vision and an agenda, and who are authentic, who can win while unseating Trump: Vermont U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders and Hawaii #02 U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard. For those who try to get around that: What you are really saying is that you prefer re-election for Trump.
Polling right now is based on name recognition.
The reason I vote blue no matter what is because of things such as Supreme Court nominees. A Democrat is not going to appoint a nominee who will strip away my rights as a woman.
Quite frankly, I think the media is being sexist by ignoring the women in the race.
The media coverage of the candidates has been saturated with gendered-biased reporting despite the overwhelming wins by women in the 2018 midterm elections.
In 2018, women ran in historic numbers and there are now more women in the 116th Congress than ever in history.
Women have also led the resistance against Trump from the outset. The 2017 Women’s March was the largest protest in American history with more than three million marchers nationwide.
There’s no substantive reason why a woman can’t win 2020.
D, I am curious as to why you do not see Elizabeth Warren as a viable candidate to win, while you promote Bernie Sanders and Tulsi Gabbard.
I would appreciate your viewpoint on this.
Thanks!
Ronald,
It is because Elizabeth Warren, who was looking good as a potential future presidential candidate, right around the time she won her first election to the U.S. Senate, in 2012, has been fading.
She has really good policy ideas. (A recent one was eliminating college student debt.) That would make Warren better suited for possibly leading the U.S. Senate. (I would definitely prefer her, by far, over Chuck Schumer.) This is not the same as leadership at the presidential level.
Her credibility with progressives went south during the 2016 Democratic presidential primaries when she was silent on endorsing a candidate—and she was closer to Bernie Sanders than Hillary Clinton—and she waited to make an endorsement until every state was done. (That makes it harder for her to win people who voted for Sanders to the nominee from 2016.) She wasted much of the rest of 2016 trying to out-tweet Donald Trump on Twitter. And, more than two years later, Trump’s labeling of Warren is sticking as Warren foolishly misplayed her hand with boasting of her heritage. It does not bother me, personally, because I don’t care about it, but it doesn’t bode well because it makes her candidacy come across as less serious—and that has its way of making her not likely to win nomination.
Elizabeth Warren was silent on Standing Rock until it was safe for her to say anything. She voted for the $700 billion military budget from 2017. And while she has co-sponsored Medicare for All, she has also waffled on it. (It is the usual song-and-dance, from some Democrats, about also being willing to consider another option when they know the answer is Medicare for All.) And most recently, Warren has mentioned that, while she will not take corporate campaign contributions in the primaries, she would be willing in the general election.
One more reason is that Elizabeth Warren is also polling behind in her home state Massachusetts. (Source: https://www.bostonherald.com/2019/04/07/elizabeth-warren-lagging-behind-in-massachusetts-poll/ .) I mentioned first, and then you wrote about it in a separate blog topic, that every eventual Republican and Democratic presidential nominee—since all 50 states have been participating in primaries (1976 with the Democrats; 1980 with the Republicans)—carried their home state. It would not surprise me if Warren does not win Massachusetts.
Hmmm, interesting perspective, D. Thanks!
May I ask you the following:
If the Democrats nominate a “centrist”, such as Biden, O’Rourke, Buttigieg, Klobuchar, Harris, will you vote third party or not at all?
Just wondering!
Ronald asks,
“If the [2020] Democrats nominate a ‘centrist’ such as Biden, O’Rourke, Buttigieg, Klobuchar, Harris, will you vote third party or not at all?â€
The 2020 Democratic presidential primaries don’t officially start, with Iowa, for another nine-plus months. They will be influential in my general-election voting.
D, you sound like a politician, lol, hahaha, evasive! 🙂
This talks about Elizabeth Warren and Bernie. Both of them are often labelled as the two most progressive candidates in the 2020 field.
Comparing and contrasting them demonstrates that a simple embrace of the left to right continuum fails to capture the complexity of differences between candidates.
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2019/04/24/the-fallacy-of-evaluating-which-candidate-is-more-progressive/
In this segment of an interview on “Democracy Now,†with host Amy Goodman, guest Noam Chomsky shares his observations on the dynamics of the two major U.S. political parties as well as the Trump presidency.
https://youtu.be/sLyS0E91H1o
Several of the candidates were at a policy forum this week for women of color voters. The audience was tough on Bernie, especially after a series of vague answers and a particularly meandering one on the issue of white nationalism. His weakness still seems to be that he struggles when the topic gets away from his economics wheelhouse.
https://www.vox.com/2019/4/25/18514995/she-the-people-elizabeth-warren-kamala-harris-women-of-color-voters
Chomsky shows he doesn’t get it.
I believe, as Eric Swalwell says, that Democrats can walk and chew gum at the same time.
Princess Leia writes, “[Noam] Chomsky shows he doesn’t get it.â€
Please explain, Princess Leia.
Exactly, Pragmatic. The investigations are just as important as talking about the issues.
The investigations are just as important as talking about the issues.
As a guest on Ari’s show last night said – If Trump were a private citizen named John Doe, he would be facing jail time for campaign finance law and obstruction of justice.
Princess Leia writes, “The investigations are just as important as talking about the issues.â€
I disagree.
Exactly, Pragmatic. Nobody is above the law. Not even the President.
D – It’s about protecting our elections. The Russians are going to interfere again in 2020 and Trump is doing nothing to stop them.
I think that Trump needs to be held accountable for the hate crimes that have occurred on his watch because of the anti-immigrant rhetoric he uses.
Princess Leia writes, “D – It’s about protecting our elections. The Russians are going to interfere again in 2020 and Trump is doing nothing to stop them.â€
Russia did not interfere in the 2016 United States presidential election to deliver victory to Donald Trump. Vladimir Putin did not make Hillary Clinton not go to Wisconsin in the general election. And trying to make this THE issue is not going to get the Democrats re-empowered with the presidency with unseating Donald Trump in the United States presidential election of 2020.
D – It’s an indisputable fact that Russia did interfere. This is documented in the Mueller report.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_interference_in_the_2016_United_States_elections
Agreed, Rational Lefty. That’s one of the many reasons Trump does not deserve to be “president”.
These are some of Trump’s impeachable offenses.
https://www.needtoimpeach.com/impeachable-offenses/
We are amongst the 7,000,000 Americans who have signed the Need To Impeach petition.
https://www.needtoimpeach.com/
Thanks for that, Former Republican. It lays out in great detail about what Russia did.
Former Republican writes, “D – It’s an indisputable fact that Russia did interfere. This is documented in the Mueller report.â€
Read the following:
https://www.thenation.com/article/russiagate-trump-mueller-report-no-collusion/
The Nation has become rather biased, siding with Russia. I don’t trust what they have to say.
You are in denial, D.
D is a skeptic. He will never, ever believe us, no matter how many facts we post otherwise.
Former Republican writes, “[‘The Nation’] has become rather biased, siding with Russia. I don’t trust what they have to say.â€
If you are able to refute the report in “The Nation,†more will be necessary from you than writing the publication is “biased,†and “I don’t trust what they have to say.â€
The Mueller Report Didn’t Absolve Trump of Collusion
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2019/04/22/the-mueller-report-didnt-absolve-trump-of-collusion/
The Facts That Neither Trump Nor Barr Have Acknowledged
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2019/04/19/the-facts-that-neither-trump-nor-barr-have-acknowledged/
Trump Is Counting on Putin’s Help in 2020
https://washingtonmonthly.com/2019/04/24/trump-is-counting-on-putins-help-in-2020/
D – In June of 2018, the progressive news site, Think Progress, reported that The Nation is publishing Russian propaganda.
https://thinkprogress.org/the-nation-is-publishing-with-rt-434f02f16bde/
The opening statement of Mueller’s report clearly states: “The Russian government interfered in the 2016 presidential election in sweeping and systematic fashion.â€
http://src.bna.com/Htn?utm_campaign=879EF8D4-61F1-11E9-BAA5-97580F4A2151&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=lawdesk
Trump and his allies (some of whom are on the Left as well as on the Right) are trying to down play Russian interference.
Rustbelt, Princess Leia, Pragmatic, and I are in our 60s and 70s. Rational Lefty and Southern Liberal are in their 30s. Growing up, we all learned to believe that we should be skeptical of the Soviet Union and Russia. We believed that Russia’s interests were not necessarily American interests, that we should be suspicious of its motives in forging alliances with the U.S. because it didn’t have a track record of defending liberty.
I have to say that Russia DID intervene in the 2016 election and is no friend of the United States, and in fact, our major rival internationally in the years since 1945. There is much evidence in the Mueller report regarding this, and for any progressive to trust Lou Dobbs, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and their ilk, and Fox News Channel is shocking.
And The Nation has long been known to be extremely pro Russia in its orientation, even during the Cold War.
We can find fault with US policy in the Cold War years, and yet recognize the Russian threat which is present, and will be in the future.
I am shocked at how some liberals, including Alan Dershowitz, see no wrongs by Donald Trump, when he is a massive violator of the oath he took.
Mueller is criticizing Barr.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/mueller-complained-that-barrs-letter-did-not-capture-context-of-trump-probe/2019/04/30/d3c8fdb6-6b7b-11e9-a66d-a82d3f3d96d5_story.html