I’m liking Mayor Pete less with every interview I see of him. I’ve probably watched a handful by now. He spends more time saying how he has more executive experience than the Pres/VP and how he has more military service than both of them and how young he is than he spends on what his policies are.
When asked about automation of jobs, he says that he’s willing to look into UBI, but he has no ideas or plans about it. When asked about healthcare, he says he wants a public option to let the people decide. When asked about climate change, he just reiterates that the problem is a big one.
Those aren’t solutions. They’re just acknowledgements that big problems exist. The more I hear him speak, the more I think his policies aren’t very well-considered.
In the meantime, he says that he needs $500K by the end of March to hit an internal deadline.
In contrast to someone like Elizabeth Warren, whose policies are very specific, Buttigieg’s policies are very vague.
I’ve already made it clear I’m not super high on Mayor Pete, but I’ll defend him on this one. If there’s anything we should want our candidates to emulate Trump on, it’s not being too specific on policies. As long as you are vague, more voters are likely to think you are singing their tune–as long as you are charismatic. This is what I like about Beto. Demanding that candidates get super specific is demanding that they reduce their appeal for no particular reason I can see.
I really like the guy, he’s charismatic and smart. I just don’t see people of color or blue collar white voters voting for a gay guy. If the Dem can’t win the industrial midwest OR African Americans AND has no chance of turning out Latinos in any great numbers, just hand the election to Trump now. Despite being from Indiana, if he were the nominee, I suspect he’d only do well in Democratic strongholds. He’d lose MI, PA, WI, FL, OH, NV, IA, NC, VA, with no chance of picking up anything like GA or AZ.
I could get behind a “Buttegieg for HUD 2020” campaign, however.
Yeah, some Democrats seem to be treating this primary like they are perusing bespoke, personalized fashions at a trendy boutique. It is imperative to get Trump out of there–and we now know Mueller’s not saving us–so I hope like hell most Democratic primary voters have a more realistic and pragmatic outlook.
He’s definitely interesting. Intelligent, multi-lingual, war and counter-terrorism experience, well spoken, etc. I’m fairly blue even though I ride center 90% of the time, but he’ll get my vote if it’s down to him and Gabbard. Gabbard is the anti-thesis of modern Democrats. Old Democrats, sure. I see PBG advancing and O’Rourke floundering. If somehow Bernie gets the DNC nod, I suspect he’ll pick Pete for his VP.
That said, about 35% of this country won’t vote for Pete because he’s gay and married to a man. And I caution labeling those people as Republicans because there’s a lot of Democrats who don’t actually like the whole gay thing even though they’re liberal.
If the UK is any guide, you’re very wrong. Most people here don’t give two hoots. My own local MP is gay and was married to a man - they’ve now separated - and is a Conservative.
The UK is not a guide on this particular point, trust me on this. The UK is far more socially liberal than America, even amongst its conservatives. The mere fact that a gay man had the temerity for run for public office is sufficient to cause frothing in a sizable percentage of the US population.
A friend of mine attended Buttegieg’s appearance (it was intended to be more of a meet-and-greet than a rally but they had five times the anticipated turnout) in Rock Hill, SC and she livestreamed it for those of us further afield. I though Pete acquitted himself well in his speech and in his responses to audience questions. He’s still avoiding too much details on policy positions, which is normal for this stage of the game, but I heard much that I liked and nothing that I didn’t. He gives thoughtful responses, but also understands that sometimes you need a bumper sticker (his is “Freedom, Democracy and Security”, according to him). It’s still early but I’m not saying no yet.
Someone compared Buttegieg to Adlai Stevenson recently with this quote, which seems apt:
Female support: “Governor, every thinking person would be voting for you”.
Stevenson: “Madam, that is not enough. I need a majority.”
If he really wants the job, he’s going to have to figure out a strategy to appeal to the frothers.
My elderly parents (Dad is 83, Mom is 75) watched him on The View last week. My mother, who has always voted D, thought he was fantastic. She donates to non-partisan political organizations like LWV, but not to candidates. She told me she’s writing him a check. My father, who has mostly voted R in the past (though he voted Libertarian in 2016 for President, and straight D in the 2018 midterms–he really dislikes Trump), was impressed by his intelligence and liked him. I’d say Dad would probably fit as an old northeastern Republican–socially tolerant and fiscally conservative–so Buttigieg’s sexual preference isn’t material to him, although he’d probably be uncomfortable actually talking about it. I suspect people like Dad are already lost to the Republicans at this point, though, so it doesn’t much matter who the Dems nominate.
Maybe the debates will raise his profile enough to keep him in until the caucusing/voting starts.
This Pew Research study shows that 31% of Americans believe that “homsexuality should be discouraged.” The number is substantially higher among Americans who are more religious, particularly those who are members of conservative faiths / denominations.
Now, most of the “frothers” are probably people who wouldn’t vote for any Democratic candidate in this election…but, as you note, probably not all of them.
Buttegieg, as one of the more moderate candidates with crossover appeal, just got a boost from the Mueller investigation.
If Trump had been seriously implicated and was very likely to lose in 2020, it would make sense for the Democrats to take the opportunity to put a real progressive in the White House. But with a stronger Trump, the Democrats need to abandon the far left candidates and find someone who has a lot more crossover appeal and can pull away the Trump voters who are more likely now to stick with Trump.
I thought Hickenlooper or Klobuchar might be the ones to take that role, but Hickenlooper keeps making a fool of himself and Klobuchar’s reputation for being a nightmare boss and poor in-person campaigner is turning out to be a problem. Beto O’Rourke might be able to do it, but stunts like livestreaming his dental cleaning makes him look like a flake.
As someone who would like to see Trump gone, I’m worried that the Democrats are going to run someone like Warren or Sanders against him. If so, say hello to four more years of Trump.
Not to argue with what you say here, because it’s sadly accurate, and because running for the presidency is a much more complex thing than running for House or even senate or the governorship…but it’s interesting to note the geographical distribution of the few LGBTQ folks who hold these positions at present. While they don’t generally come from West Virginia and Idaho and Alabama and other deeply Republican states, neither do they generally come from Massachusetts and Washington and Illinois and other heavily Democratic states.
There are two US senators who identify as gay or bi: Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin and Kyrsten Sinema of AZ. The first has a long history of support for progressive candidates and causes. It also produced Scott Walker and Ron johnson, and going back further Joe McCarthy, and it voted narrowly for Trump in 2016. Arizona hadn’t elected a Democratic senator since 1988 and hadn’t voted for a Dem for president since the nineties. These are not deep blue states, and yet openly non-straight candidates won them.
Governors–there are currently two, Polis in CO (trending Democratic) and Brown in Oregon (pretty safely Democratic).
House members–two from CA, one from NY, one from RI, one from MN, one from WI, one from NH, one from KS. I don’t know much about the individual districts, but this certainly isn’t a list of the most liberal districts in the country. My own congressman (NY) is a married gay man and father of three kids who represents a long-time swing district that voted for Trump in 2016.
Yes, their numbers are few. But they demonstrate that strong gay candidates CAN win not just in Democratic strongholds, but also in much more marginal areas–including New Hampshire, Wisconsin, Colorado, Arizona, and Minnesota, states that the Democrats certainly could stand to win but aren’t exactly in the bag. We can hope!
Sam Stone, I cosign the general thrust of your argument that we need to be very pragmatic about ousting Trump. But your leap to “therefore, let’s nominate Buttigieg” makes me think of the Far Side cartoon with the step “A Miracle Occurs”. Having a virtually unpronouncable name; being in a gay marriage (something African Americans, whom we need to turn out en masse unlike 2016, are not super keen on); being super young and looking even younger, like he’s Topher Grace’s nephew; being the mayor of a small city that’s unable to match the population of such metropolises as Greeley, Colorado or League City, Texas…what am I missing here? (I would add that “learned Norwegian to read an obscure foreign author” is NOT a selling point with low-information, middle-of-the-road voters, sad as that may be.)
FTR, that “livestreaming his dental cleaning” trope about Beto is basically fake news. He showed his mouth for context for maybe a second or two, and then the whole point was interviewing his hygienist, a Latina immigrant, about border issues.
I can only really comment on Wisconsin (my home state), but Mark Pocan (to whom you’re referring) represents the 2nd Congressional District, which is dominated by highly-liberal Madison.
Yes, I think it’s progress, but if a gay candidate was going to win in a Wisconsin congressional district, that’s the one.
(I would add that “learned Norwegian to read an obscure foreign author” is NOT a selling point with low-information, middle-of-the-road voters, sad as that may be.)