I’m of the opinion that once you’ve had one significant run at the presidency and lost, that trying again is a bad idea. That’s a large part of why I supported Sanders over Clinton in 2016 and Warren over Sanders and Biden in 2020.
FWIW, I always thought Harris was too far right to be viable in the general (why vote for a faux Republican when you can have the real thing?) and I was initially prepared to cast a write-in vote in protest if Biden dropped out. I chose to cheerlead for her instead because beating Trump was important, but unfortunately my first impression turned out to be correct.
Wow too far right ? I agree she veered to the centre on some issues as did many other democrats but she is certainly not far right. Even her detractors in the democrat party don’t call her too far right.
My feelings exactly. I voted for Harris, and yes, she was handicapped by a number of issues that she largely had no control over. But Trump has proven that there are just too damn many people who are racist and misogynist. They will turn out in droves to support some white, male bigot (Vance very possibly) or won’t show up to vote for a female POC.
BUT, it depends on what other options turn up for (D) for 2024. Whatever candidate looks to be the best chance to recover our country from the next four years of damage is the best bet. And sadly, Trump’s two wins prove that anything easily “otherable” to the white Christian bigots is a very hard sell.
This I don’t agree with - because those were issues but not major in terms of overall magnitude, however Fox and even the rest of the main-stream news kept harping on them, magnifying them in the extreme.
And with most media outlets bending over backwards to deflect Trump’s attention, or getting hit with vexatious lawsuits… it’s going to be hard to fact check any of Fox’s or Trump/Vance’s claims in 2028. There will be plenty of Trumped up (emphasis intended) crisis to blame the Democrats for, and Kamala will have fewer dodges than a new candidate as they can claim she was “part of the problem” as the prior administration.
NOTE - avoiding the ongoing debates (pro/con) as to Trump going full fascist and demanding to run again (presuming he doesn’t drop dead in the next 4 years) and just assume that if he survives he will be a very vocal part of the next campaign no matter who the official candidate is.
She and Clinton both outraised Trump and look where that got them.
Not “far right” - just too far to the right to get liberals and young people out to vote, and most of her campaign seemed to be focused around going after Dubya Republicans who don’t care for Trump. She barely talked about healthcare or the housing shortage, I don’t recall her ever bringing up a living wage, she was mostly silent on LGBT issues, and overall she didn’t say much that would’ve been out of place in a Republican platform circa 2005.
Add to that her aloofness and the general trend among Democrats to act like talking directly to the American people is somehow below them, and the result was that Biden voters stayed home and Dubya voters went for the real Republican instead of the Democrat cosplaying one.
I’m fine with her running again. But I think she would lose the nomination. Too many Democrats are now convinced a woman cannot win.
If I am wrong, and she gained the nomination, it would only be after she did an outstanding job in the primary debates and the rest of primary season campaigning. Then she would have proven herself.
I’m wondering which GOP candidate she would do best against. If the GOP nominates a woman, that would alleviate concerns over nominating a woman.
If those two issues hadn’t existed, the Republicans would have found something else and made that the most important issue facing Americans in our lifetime. That’s what the Republicans do; they invent problems and then claim they’re the solution. Which works for them because it’s real easy to declare victory over a problem you invented after you’re done using it to get elected.
A winning Democratic candidate needs to be able to either beat the Republicans on the battlefield of their choosing or to shift public opinion over to another battlefield. Harris did not manage to do this.
Trying again may be a bad idea for the candidate personally. But I do not think it is so bad for the party.
Biden defeating Sanders, in 2020, signaled that Biden was an appealing moderate differentiated from Sanders and his unpopular socialist label.
If Harris ran and lost, in the 2028 primaries, say to Shapiro, or even Gallego, if would signal that the Democrats were no longer so beholden to identity politics. This would annoy rock-ribbed progressives, but that’s just eight percent of the electorate. The rest of us would be fine with it (as I am fine with Harris winning the nomination should she becomes a better campaigner).
I see many posters are not supporting the idea of a female candidate in 2028. Someone has to break the glass ceiling…as they say records are meant to be broken one day.
Inspite of the contrarian views expressed here I still feel Kamala can be the candidate in 2028 and win.
Ofcourse I respect the other povs expressed here.
Are you not excited at the prospect of seeing a “Madame President” in 2028 ? I sure am.
I would be delighted to see the U.S. elect a women to the presidency.
But, that said, as has been noted, last month’s results strongly suggest that there is still a significant element of sexism among voters (even beyond people who were always going to vote for Trump anyway), and I’m not sure how long it’s going to take before American society gets over its own damned self on that subject.
You still seem to be avoiding the central issue here. You’re acting as if Harris running for President is the same as Harris getting elected President. Obviously this is not the case.
I don’t believe americans are more sexist than people in other countries. My country India elected a female PM way back in the 70s, other Asian countries too and we are way more conservative.
Even UK, Germany,Italy etc have female heads of state. Even muslim countries like Pakistan and Bangladesh had female PMs.
I don’t agree America is more sexist than these other countries.
I feel if she runs she has better chances of winning than other candidates. Ofcourse no one can predict with 100% certainty but she has better chances than other potential candidates.
One important note: as I understand it, the office of prime minister in those countries is not a position in which a candidate is voted on by the general population (unlike the U.S. presidency). They are a leader of their party, which wins enough seats in parliament to have a majority government – as I understand it, the PM only has to win their particular local constituency in an election.
I think the idea that the Democrats are beholden to identity politics is just another Republican lie. The party that nominated Joe Biden, John Kerry, Al Gore, and Bill Clinton doesn’t have a problem with white men. And the Democrats have also nominated Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Kamala Harris, and Matt Santos.
It’s the Republicans, with its history of 100% white male presidential candidates, which practices identity politics.
I should point out here that, of the last four Democrats elected to the U.S. presidency, three of them (Carter, Clinton, Obama) were fairly unknown on the national stage four years before their election. It is entirely possible that the “best Democratic candidate” in 2028 is someone that you, or I, are only barely aware of today, if we’ve ever heard of them at all.
That is correct technically. But in reality politics here is driven by personalities than parties. Here in India this is the Modi era…not the BJP era. In the 1970s it was the Indira era rather than the Indian National Congress party era.
Just as Modi is bigger than the BJP, Indira was bigger than the INC.