# Howard Schultz considers run; urged against. **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [January 27, 2019, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511 "2019-01-27T23:58:17Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/101 "2019-01-29T18:15:15Z")
> [@Lemur866](#): > > Why are you bringing up how many yards the other team got, when what’s important is how many touchdowns they got? Because “yardage” here is an analogy for an important metric of growing vs “constantly-shrinking”. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/102 "2019-01-29T18:15:55Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > Yes it is more basic, perhaps we should elevate your understanding of the firm. > > That’s like saying the president is accountable to the electoral college. This is what some would call a pedantic understanding, but not a practical understanding. It’s miles better than your libertarian fantasy of the CEO answering to the customers. That is a pleasant dogmatic fiction which lets libertarians tell themselves that private industry will always be for the greater good, on the assumption that customer satisfaction will be first and foremost on the mind of any successful industrialist, while the ones driven by greed above all will just automagically fail. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/103 "2019-01-29T18:20:37Z")
> [@snoe](#): > > 1. How many of those Republican candidates were conservatives, by your definition? Or by the standard definition? Or by the multitude of non-non-standard definitions that exist? And does voting for a Republican make you a conservative, anyway? > > 2. We have a growing population of voters. How’s the GOP vote **share** in 2018 compare historically to other midterms? > > 3. Are votes cast a good way to think about whether the population of “conservatives,” absolute or relative, is growing or shrinking? Why or why not? 1. Most of them. Not always, but there’s a high degree of overlap. 2. Lower than 2014 and 2010, higher than 2006. 3. For “absolute”, sure. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/104 "2019-01-29T18:23:05Z")
> [@FlikTheBlue](#): > > Exactly. I wonder how all the people supporting a Schultz run would feel if say, Mitt Romney ran as an independent. There’s no need to wonder. Most of us would hate it, just as your side hates the idea of Schultz campaign. All that high-minded rhetoric about the importance of democracy goes right out the window when it looks like it might cost you a win. ---
**Author:** ![WillFarnaby](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/willfarnaby/32/514_2.png) [@WillFarnaby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WillFarnaby)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/105 "2019-01-29T18:31:50Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > It’s miles better than your libertarian fantasy of the CEO answering to the customers. That is a pleasant dogmatic fiction which lets libertarians tell themselves that private industry will always be for the greater good, on the assumption that customer satisfaction will be first and foremost on the mind of any successful industrialist, while the ones driven by greed above all will just automagically fail. Profit comes from the difference between lower valued inputs and higher valued outputs. Please tell me how a greedy businessman can make money without taking lower values inputs and offering higher valued outputs. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 6:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/106 "2019-01-29T18:46:44Z")
if he doesn’t run then all these tantrums will be wasted ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/107 "2019-01-29T18:59:48Z")
Here’s my take: Perot led in the polls in mid-1992 before he went flaky and started talking about being spied on and dropped out. If Schultz is looking at a lead in the polls in June, or even 2nd place, he should run and run hard. But if he’s stuck in single digits or even a strong third, he should get out. There’s no harm in running. There is harm in getting on the ballot if he can’t win. But just assuming he can’t win is wrong. Third party candidacies can win under the right circumstances, as in, not a crazy person and the two parties have extremely unappealing candidates. ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 7:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/108 "2019-01-29T19:02:18Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > Profit comes from the difference between lower valued inputs and higher valued outputs. Please tell me how a greedy businessman can make money without taking lower values inputs and offering higher valued outputs. Um, many many. Monopolistic practices. Lying. Outright theft. Lowering cost by avoiding regulation. Bribery. Lobbying for protectionist governmental policies. Union-busting to avoid paying higher wages. That’s just the start. History is replete with examples of corporations pursuing policies that are clearly counter-customer best-interest to enhance revenue. Even lives are not always enough to control such impulses. If such things didn’t happen routinely we wouldn’t need regulatory bodies like the EPA, FDA, Department of Labor and so forth. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 7:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/109 "2019-01-29T19:04:56Z")
> [@WillFarnaby](#): > > Profit comes from the difference between lower valued inputs and higher valued outputs. Please tell me how a greedy businessman can make money without taking lower values inputs and offering higher valued outputs. This little jaunt through Microeconomics 101 would normally be just plain _fascinating_, I promise you, but it’s only of trivial relevance and I see Jonathan Chance hit on many of the obvious real-world issues while I was typing. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/110 "2019-01-29T19:16:33Z")
Edit: nvm n9t worth it ---
**Author:** ![foolsguinea](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/foolsguinea/32/14751_2.png) [@foolsguinea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/foolsguinea)\ **Post date:** [January 29, 2019, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/111 "2019-01-29T22:57:01Z")
I find it puzzling that Democrats think an airhead businessman is 1) a serious threat & 2) going to hurt _them._ Ross Perot had his protectionism & a (correct) sense that the GOP had turned away from national growth to a philosophy more unpatriotic—even if he was, in personality, a bad candidate for President, his message had a fair point at core, and he had media friends to put that out there. Carly Fiorina & Herman Cain just got attention by playing tokens onstage. I don’t see how “man with a name so ordinary I keep forgetting it” from the coffee-bar business gets any of that: He says blandly & without conviction things that are the opposite of populist; his appeal is that of a bad imitation Perot without policy, from a food & drink industry; he’s whitebread Herman Cain, & he will get nowhere. If you’re serious about him hurting Democrat chances in 2020, that seems bizarre to me. Is the present ranting about Mr. Schultz just an excuse to write clickbait? ---
**Author:** ![BigT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bigt/32/12044_2.png) [@BigT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BigT)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2019, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/112 "2019-01-30T00:56:27Z")
He’s the Starbucks guy. Everyone knows Starbucks. If he were a nobody, it wouldn’t be an issue. We need as many people who are uncomfortable with Trump voting Democratic as possible. Trump, despite all conventional wisdom, is a serious threat, as we saw in 2016. ---
**Author:** ![adaher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/dec6dc/32.png) [@adaher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/adaher)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2019, 2:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/113 "2019-01-30T02:39:11Z")
If you believe that, nominate a candidate who people uncomfortable with Trump will vote for, AND that would keep Schultz out of the race. ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2019, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/114 "2019-01-30T03:21:27Z")
Schultz could throw the election to Trump even if he only gets voes in the low single digits, a la Nader in 2000. (Which Giore actually won, but Ralph made it close enough for the GOP to steal.) ---
**Author:** ![Jonathan\_Chance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jonathan_chance/32/701_2.png) [@Jonathan\_Chance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jonathan_Chance)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2019, 3:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/115 "2019-01-30T03:27:13Z")
Mmm. I wouldn’t necessarily believe that, adaher. I believe Shultz is, to a certain extent, believing his own hype. I once, no shit, interviewed one of the richest and most successful businessmen in Ohio. Without irony, he said “I have been successful in all of my business efforts. The state government should just do what I tell them to.” It’s that sort of hazard Shultz may represent. It’s an attractive - though entirely unproven - position that success in one field must therefore translate to success in all fields. Hell, success in one field doesn’t even necessarily translate into success in another, closely related field. Look at the [example of Ron Johnson](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Johnson_(businessman)#J._C._Penney). He was the Apple exec who flagshipped the entire Apple Store concept and made it wildly successful. He attracted so much attention - media, peers and so forth - that when JC Penney was failing they made him CEO as a ‘retail expert’ who could update and make cool and successful - i.e. duplicate his success - a brand that had been flagging for years. He failed. Utterly and spectacularly. He didn’t understand the store, the market or the brand and openly disdained the existing customer base. It led to one of the worst retail quarters ever and Johnson - the magic man at Apple, recall - was fired in two years. ---
**Author:** ![jasg](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/f0a364/32.png) [@jasg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jasg)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2019, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/116 "2019-01-30T03:52:55Z")
Here in Seattle we assume that if elected, he will move the US Capitol to Oklahoma… ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2019, 4:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/117 "2019-01-30T04:15:38Z")
> [@Jonathan\_Chance](#): > > Yeah, if the last two years have taught us anything it’s that the skill set required to run a for-profit organization is entirely dissimilar to that required to run the worlds largest non-profit organization. I don’t know if ‘look the other way while Russians launder money by buying overpriced real estate’ is a skill set. ---
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2019, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/118 "2019-01-30T04:21:55Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > You might be working from a flawed worldview, or a non-standard definition of “constantly-shrinking” if you believe this. In the 2018 elections, Republican candidates in the House received ~51M votes. That is, I believe, the most they’ve ever received in a mid-term election. They got 63 million votes in 2016, whats your point? ---
**Author:** ![SlackerInc](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slackerinc/32/275_2.png) [@SlackerInc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SlackerInc)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2019, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/119 "2019-01-30T04:58:49Z")
You can’t compare midterms with presidential cycles. If we did, then Democrats did much better in 2016 than in 2018. That’s just not how it works. Jonathan, I remember that whole JCP fiasco. We were Penneys customers at the time, and although we weren’t thrilled with the prices, I wanted it to work partly just because I like Ellen a lot and she was the face of the shakeup. I don’t know if you intended it, but there’s sort of an indirect Howard Schultz connection there. Myron Ullman was the Grover Cleveland to Johnson’s Benjamin Harrison, as Ullman was succeeded by, and then subsequently replaced, Johnson as JCP chief. Now Ullman is Starbucks CEO, having taken over from Schultz in 2018. ---
**Author:** ![Pork\_Rind](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pork_rind/32/111_2.png) [@Pork\_Rind](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pork_Rind)\ **Post date:** [January 30, 2019, 5:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511/120 "2019-01-30T05:26:11Z")
> [@jasg](#): > > Here in Seattle we assume that if elected, he will move the US Capitol to Oklahoma… Yeah, and he’d probably pick David Stern as his running mate. Asshole. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/howard-schultz-considers-run-urged-against/828511.md?page=7)