I think we should pick the candidate who is most likely to beat Trump. I think Trumpism (not just the man, but what he represents) is by far the most significant challenge to America.
And given how Trump has behaved, I think we can drop that leader of the free world label for our presidents. I’m not sure it has ever been true, but it’s certainly not true now that Trump has squandered any good will America had in the free world.
So it wasn’t here that i heard the cries of “They ran the one candidate in the world who could lose to Donald Trump!” after the 2016 elections?
Because if it’s such an apparently commonplace quality to have, the ability to beat Trump in an election, then our standards should be higher than “The first we see who isn’t Hillary!”
Obviously, Democrats were wrong about a lot in 2016 and they continue to be wrong about 2016. I don’t think there’s much value in continuing to rehash it. I wasn’t a fan of Clinton, I didn’t vote for her in the primary (nor did I vote for Sanders), but I did vote for her in the general election. I don’t think it’s terribly productive to keep rehashing who said what about 2016.
I think that if we treat 2020 as a re-litigation of 2016 that the outcome could be disastrous. I don’t care about the feelings of the Clinton or Sanders supporters, I care about getting Trump out of office. I think it’s important that we find the candidate with the best chance of winning and that we leave nothing to chance. We need to continue to raise more money than the Republicans and to put them on the defensive in states that they won easily in previous presidential elections. Every dollar they spend in deep red America is a dollar they’re not spending in a battleground state.
The candidate with the best shot at unseating Trump will be the candidate who can beat him and possesses the other characteristics that separate them from all the others who can beat Trump. We need more than ‘can beat’ Trump. We need “will beat” Trump.
All that being said, we also don’t want to let the perfect become enemy of the good.
No. That leads to defeat. Job1 is to get trump out- with a Democrat in. Put in the man who has the highest chance of beating Trump. Nothing else is important.
That man might be a woman.
I didn’t highlught it; I capitalized it. I frequently capitalize where others wouldn’t. The pejorative I used against Gillibrand was to call her a “defense attorney for Philip Morris.” And the same paragraph called her “[one of] the most promising possibilities the D’s have right now!”
The only two Senators elected President since Harding, JFK and BHO, were both Junior Senators, and both were very charismatic great Presidents.
Perhaps Gillibrand would make a fine candidate and a President. Heaven knows the D’s need a great candidate. None of the possibilities seem inspiring to me right now. 
Yes. The likelihood of winning the general election should be the only criterion for the Democratic nomination. Evaluation of a candidate’s suitability for the office is relevant only because some voters will respond to that. Am I partisan? Only if opposition to a cabal of thieves and liars is partisanship.
Yeah, losing to the guy who Trump whipped but good.
I think you are forgetting the fact that he has more recently served 8 years as the vice president and was pretty popular in that position. I think that is more relevant and recent experience than his prior performance in primaries.
Yes it is and yes it is.
It’s time to end the gerontocracy. The elderly may certainly be able to work, but perishingly few of them can do so at their full capacity. How many people, in any field, have done their best work over the age of 70? Face it: nobody peaks at 78, and America deserves someone at their peak. It’s no coincidence that all of America’s greatest presidents were in their 40s and 50s when they were first elected.
Colonel Sanders did his best work in his 70s and 80s :).
Yes. Let me repeat a recent post in another thread:
Joe Biden would be 78 years old when inaugurated for his first turn.
“Eighty is the new seventy”? Fine, but look at the history of 70-year old Presidents:
[ul][li] Before Reagan and Trump, Eisenhower was the very first President to ever be in office at age 70. And he was a young 62 when first inaugurated.[/li][li] Before Eisenhower, only five men aged 59 or more were ever elected to a first term of President. (Adams, Jackson, Harrison, Taylor, Buchanan.)[/li][li] When Bush-41 was inaugurated at age 64, he was older than all but two prior first-inaugurees (Harrison, Buchanan). Removing the “first” stipulation adds only three names (Jackson, Eisenhower and, by just a few days, Truman).[/li][/ul]
Thus we’re not being asked to believe “Eighty is the new seventy,” We’re being asked to believe “Eighty is the new sixty.”
This. The best analogy is to Joe Lieberman leading the field at this point in the 2004 cycle.
Yup, every week there will be a new poll with a new front runner (and a new thread in Elections). I think Biden’s value will be to help whoever is the nominee campaign.
I have been saying for years the worst thing to happen to this country was Joe Biden’s son dying, it took him out of the race and forced Hillary Clinton on us. If Biden had run he would have destroy Donald Trump and we would have an adult running the country. He has a ton of experience and I agree with most of his positions
I sure hope he will run and be nominated so we can end the madness.
Is it even possible to highlight something in a post? In any case I wasn’t referring to typography, but to “highlighting” in the sense of “emphasizing.”
You were posting to say that Gillibrand isn’t a strong candidate in your book (along with saying the same about Landrieu), and so I assumed that the two things about her you emphasized (lawyer for a tobacco company and junior senator) were intended to paint her as a weak candidate. It would be odd if they weren’t!
Anyway, I wondered why you would be impugning junior senators, and now I guess I have my answer–you weren’t. Which makes me wonder why you put in at all, but oh well, one of life’s little mysteries I suppose! Thanks for clarifying.
I notice that the GOP doesnt seem to care much about age, but the best Dem candidates are being attacked due to age.
Seems like more propaganda coming from the Kremlin and the GOP.
Maybe, instead let us focus on qualifications and electability.
Let’s not let the GOP select the Dem candidate.
In case anyone’s missed it, I plug Biden on the regular around here, lately with Booker as his running mate. But my own particular preference would be with Biden as VP. As long as he’s ok with playing that role again, since he’s already proven he’d be excellent in the position, it’s a no-brainer. But if he wants the big office, he deserves it and should run for it with the understanding that he and Booker will be swapping roles in 2024, a proposition which shapes the prospects of such a ticket quite nicely, IMO.
The Republicans don’t have a problem electing a total asshole, either, but that doesn’t mean that the Democrats should too.
Besides, the Democrats need to be younger than Republicans. It’s their brand as well as their voter base. It’s also a matter of principle: conservatives look to the past, and are therefore old; liberals look to the future, and are therefore young.