A lot of posts here have been concerned with the candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination. Whatever y'all said about Kamala Harris and Mayor Pete and Once in Love with Amy and the billionaire with more money than Trump, I won't be able to vote for them on St. Patrick's Day.
And now there is Elizabeth Warren, ex-candidate.
If Bernie can't take Michigan (heavy pressure on you, Jean) next week, I'll have a choice of Biden or Tulsi Gabbard.
Tulsi who? Yes. Only time I heard her she sounded like a Republican.
But Sen. Warren seemed choked up today when she said it still isn't Woman's time. Well, there is still Rep Gabbard, who seems to be able to hang on longer than Covid-19. Warren's case wasn't based on gender anyway; it was based on competence. And of the last-standing senators -- herself, Biden and Sanders -- she was the best performer in the Senate.
If Bernie is gone before he circus gets here, it must be said that if he had called himself a New Deal Democrat, instead of a Democratic Socialist, he would have avoided a) all the crap about Venezuela and Maduro, and b) have had a lot more sympathy within the party establishment, brain dead though it is. Because Bernie is not way outside the guide-rails. He is very close to a more effective Democratic senator who dropped out today. Even I have trouble with a non-Democratic Party member running against a non-Republican Party don.
But on March 17 I'll have very little say about what's coming up in November.
Sorry to see that Warren has dropped out of the race. What was needed was a compromise candidate between Bernie and Biden that could unite the party.
ReplyDeleteBernie and Biden no matter how the debates and primaries turn out will not be able to unite the party with enthusiasm. There will be a lot of Democrats in the fall voting for a Democrat as the lesser of two evils.
I hope Warren does not endorse either before the convention but uses her position to keep both candidates from dividing the party. That might earn her the nomination in 2024 unless Trump defeats himself.
Detroit News polls showed Bernie third behind Biden and Bloomberg. Today Gov. Gretchen endorsed Uncle Joe because her mother and Joe's son died of the same brain cancer if the local news sound bite can be believed.
ReplyDeleteBUT ...
It was Michigan above the I-96 corridor that put Bernie over Hillary in 2016, and the Detroit papers tend to think the state line ends at Lansing. In addition, a gubernatorial endorsement means very little to Michigan residents up north, who see state government as caring only about Detroit.
We are also an open primary state, so expect Trumpublicans to crossover to vote Bernie.
DeleteI wonder if it's possible Warren could be Biden's veep in the event he is the nominee? She is at least a bit younger, and has experience as a congress-person. Would provide some ticket balancing for progressives.
ReplyDeleteI don't know what Tulsi's long game is. Maybe she doesn't have one and is just stubborn.
I'd think Warren would be a strong candidate to be Biden's VP. She's provide some progressive balance for moderate Joe. And she is excellent at going after Republican stupidity, which of course has been on display in record volumes the last four years.
DeleteKlobuchar would provide a bit more regional balance (if that counts for anything), and some age balance as she is a decade or so younger than Warren. Personally, I think she comes across as more likeable than Warren. And she may not have Warren's flair for going after idiocy (not many people do) but she's no slouch - she's had her moments.
If Bernie gets the nomination, I don't think Warren would be a good choice - I think Klobuchar would be a stronger bet.
Klobuchar also has the upper Midwest identity, which Democrats are thought to need to win, but maybe even better would be someone from Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio or Pennsylvania. Sherrod Brown for veep?
What about Stacey Abrams?
DeleteNow that you mention it: Why and How is Tulsi still in the line-up?
ReplyDeleteMaybe she read too much into The Tortoise and the Hare.
DeleteZero delegates, I believe, and no longer qualifies for debates. What does it really mean to say that she's still running?
DeleteTulsi actually got 2 delegates from American Samoa. She as vowed to stay in the race until the convention. Maybe her two delegates will place her in nomination? She appears frequently on Fox news and some people think she is angling for a regular position there after the primaries. She used to appear a lot on CNN (at least before 2016 when I ceased watching). Evidently the news media is attracted to her.
DeleteJack, that thought occurred to me also. She could be Fox's gesture toward "balance". She is pretty, which you have to be to qualify.
DeleteAnd she won't have to pass a Roger Ailes audition.
DeleteWhy should Gabbard stay in?. The two other candidates are old, and the establishment candidate is really showing signs of it. If Biden forgets where he is while up at the podium, she may pop up as the only Bernie alternative. All Biden has to do is pull off a really good Biden with a little aged confusion thrown in. The Democratic establishment would then be forced to go to her.
DeleteWhy her though? Couldn't they ask one of the others who got more than two delegates to step back in?
DeleteActually wouldn't they have to go with Bernie, like it or not, if Joe showed signs of rapid onset dementia and had to drop out?
Katherine, I am just putting out a hypothesis. Maybe, if Biden warps out before the primaries are over, she could pick up delegates.
DeleteGiven the ages of Biden, Sanders and Trump and their vulnerability to the virus, we could have a whole new set of characters on both sides come convention time.
DeleteMaybe Trump will be so afraid of the virus that he will forego going to rallies.
DeleteFrom what I've read Klobuchar and Buttigieg have suspended but not "ended" their campaigns. Perhaps that's why they still have delegates, meaning they could come roaring back if Jack's scenario comes into play.
Delete"Woman's time." I think this decreasingly resonates with women. Hillary was tone deaf to women outside her Second Wave college-educated, white-wine-drinking, feminist cohort over 50.
ReplyDeleteWarren, who I think is a very good Senator and clear thinker, often sounded too much like Hillary. And that pinky promise thing was so precious it made me want to heave.
For good or ill, I do think she may have single-handedly ousted Bloomberg, though, by relentlessly hammering on his "jokes" about women and NDAs.
I was more annoyed by her drinking beer out of a bottle on TV, not that it really mattered. It seemed too stagey. I have no problem with a grandmom being a president, especially if that grandmom has an IQ of 400. Just heard a Warren female operative on Democracy Now whining about patriarchy. Enough with the identity politics already. I will admit that Warren was originally my favorite candidate and I was disappointed that Bernie came in splitting the progressive vote. But now he's all I have. We really didn't need two progressive candidates who eventually would lock horns. Progressive views are still struggling to return to the Democratic Party and this competition did not help.
DeleteYeah, I agree, enough with the identity politics. There have been plenty of women heads of state, think Angela Merkel and Theresa May, among others. I don't think being a woman was why HC lost in 2016. I would gladly have voted for Warren against Trump. But voting for a woman solely *because* she is a woman doesn't cut it for me, or most people.
DeleteI would say that a woman whom many people find unlikeable lost to a man whom many people find unlikeable. Where gender fits into that story, I'm not sure how to untangle. I would guess that many men "process" an unlikeable woman different than an unlikeable man. But I could be wrong.
DeleteI found Hillary "unlikeable" (relative to Bernie not Trump) because of her record and corporate friendliness, not her personality. It turned out, as I feared, that Obama was really no different than Hillary other than the irrelevancies of gender and color. Obama presented himself as a change from Clintonianism in the Democratic Party. He was not. I personally hope that we get a woman president soon so we can check that off and get it out of the way. Not an Iron Lady Republican, please.
DeletePlease. It's not about Hillary being "unlikable." It's about her alienating many people, including women, by bragging about her devotion to health care reform (which she killed), about not making cookies and standing by her man (as if women who did were dupes), about dismissing criticism about Benghazi (they're dead, so what does it matter) and her e-mails, and about not having the faintest notion about the kinds of systemic reforms needed by the job-union working class.
DeleteFor a Lenten Penance I tried to watch Trump last night on Fox News's Town Hall. OY! Martha McCallum, one of the moderators must have thanked him fifteen time for coming on the show, as the audience (in Scranton, PA) showed their appreciation by standing and clapping til their hands fell off.
ReplyDeleteTrumps is so fat; he looks positively gross hanging off his super-high chair. Okay that' mean, he can't help it; that's just the way he is and who he is.
The moderators seemed to do a good/bad cop routine with McCallum's soft-ball approach and Brett Baier trying to edge-wise in some follow up questions that hinted at but did not achieve critical standing.
The audience clapped and cheered with one blondie, in a page boy hair cut, behind Trump nodding enthusiastically at everything he said. Do they hire actresses and actors for the spot. I think she was on a Purina dog food ad...
Well...some penance... I finally had to turn it off it was so infuriating and appaling to watch a president of the U.S. behaving like a total ass..
Trump says whatever is at the top of his brain...and he will go not only for the jugular with Biden; he will try to rip out his heart.
Good job, Margaret. We miss so much when we resist the full Donny, but it is so ugly in that it has to be a Lenten penance or it would be masochism.
DeleteThe Better Half argues that it is important "to know your enemy," and so he will sometimes sit through a Trump or other sinful performer. Even he wouldn't take the bait last night. Lent you know.
DeletePutting the Amen Corner behind the candidate (in front of the camera)--any candidate--is really annoying. I have no doubt that these people are coached to nod, cheer, and look adoringly at the candidate. I've noticed more African Americans with "Blacks for Trump" showing up in the background to imply wider support than the president likely has.
DeleteSounds like an aural and visual hairshirt.
DeleteOne of my sons isn't very political but he does perfect voice impressions. To get under his brother's skin he was doing a dead-on DT impression last Saturday. His brother is used to him, didn't take the bait.
Jean, about the "amen corner", it reminds me of the old days when the sit-coms on tv always had a laugh track. It was lame then, and the coached audience is lame and annoying now.
DeleteThis background was pretty good, though.
Deletehttps://youtu.be/J4pcZdJcpbs
Yes Stanley...the young man looks dubious.
DeleteStanley, love the plaid shirt guy!
DeleteSomebody got fired for letting him in.
Delete