Yeah, he’s chubby, but he’s a cute chubby. I don’t see that as a problem.
The Albuquerque Journal has a fairly good series on Richardson.
Here is part one. I think the Lee case is in part three.
My opinion is that he has the foreign policy acumen that the US will need in next President. Probably more than any other candidate in either party.
The problem with Richardson is, you don’t vote for a resume, you vote for a candidate. Richardson is clearly highly regarded in New Mexico, but hasn’t yet given many people outside his home state a reason to get excited about him. He’d better start, if he wants to dispel the idea that he’s really competing with Mark Warner for veep.
No, the Democrats haven’t nominated someone out of the mainstream of the Democratic Party since 1972.
That’s a different matter entirely.
Why would Democrats care about appealing to the *Republican * mainstream? All we need are your moderates and fence sitters, and we have a landslide.
Right.
List for me those Democratic landslides in that period, please.
Warner dropped out months ago. Is there talk about him that I haven’t heard about?
The mainstream of the Democratic Party, like the mainstream of the Republic party, are mainstream to the general population pretty much by definition. This is proved by the fact that neither party has been able to completely dominate the government for more than a few electoral cycles.
The Greens and the Libertarians are the ones with nominees outside of the American mainstream. If the Democrats were as radical as you claim they are, they’d similarly be a political non-entity.
Remember, to be in the mainstream you don’t have to be in the exact political center, merely close enough that you don’t automatically turn them off. Reagan was undeniably conservative, yet very much in the mainstream. Ditto GW Bush, although his specific policies are less and less popular these days. Kerry, Edwards, and Obama, to name a few, are more liberal than your average Republican, perhaps more liberal than your average American. That doesn’t mean that their policies are unpalatable to them.
Kucinich is a Democrat out of the mainstream, and he’ll never get the nomination.
But then, I’m pretty cynical about electoral politics these days. I think once you’ve got policies that are palatable to the majority of Americans, and aren’t obviously * unworkable, the rest comes down to dirty tricks (both evading and using), advertising, and above all else, charisma and presentation. It doesn’t really matter if your policies are actually better than the other guy’s, it’s just if you can sell them along with yourself better than the other guy. This is why Bush beat Gore and Kerry. This is why I predict Obama to win pretty big once the campaign starts in earnest.
Dude’s so pretty. And he’s obviously smart without coming off like an arrogant prick.
- I know, I know. Shut up.
His Latino heritage is well-known in this neck of the woods.
It’s far too early to decide, and by the time Colorado decides, it’ll be far too late to make a difference, but I’m reasonably impressed by him. He’s done a lot of jobs, and done them well. That demonstrates more general competence than a couple/three one-term Senators have been able to show.
For veep? Lots. Rumor has it his yearning for veep is one of the main obstacles to his running for Senate in '08, rather than governor in '09.
Still time for him to get back in. The best way to get chosen as running mate is probably to run for the big job, still.
The Albuquerque Journal has run a five-part personal history of Richardson: Page 1
I haven’t read it all yet, but I’m posting to comment on this Freeper page I stumbled across. There are some worrying accusations of corruption… but I can’t take them too seriously, because the underlying logic seems to be, “He’s Mexican, so of course he’s corrupt.”
(One poster there claimed that Richardson was trying “to bully and intimidate Americans into accepting Mexican hegemony.” :rolleyes: Then another genius asked, “Could Richardson be an illegal by any chance?” :rolleyes: So another started in on how Richardson’s family weren’t real “Americans” because his father & grandfather worked most of their adult lives in Latin America. Real nice, guys. Do you kiss your sister with that mouth?)
Wow, you conservatives really are in denial about Bill Clinton …
1992 Electoral Votes (270 needed to win)
Clinton Bush Perot Other
370…168…0…0
1996 Electoral Votes (270 needed to win)
Clinton Dole Perot Other
379…159…0…0
pwnt
I think he meant popular vote landslides.
Yeah, there’s no way I consider Clinton’s victories to be landslides. I saw those as demonstrations of the democratic invalidity of winner-take-all elector assignment, just as much as the Florida mess in 2000.
How about, um, that he’s part-Mexican?
In response to what?
Seems it’s not the place to be coming from with the furor over immigrants and the US always selecting for the presidency people who are as white as they come.
:dubious: Does that really matter?
Giuliani: Italian
McCain: vaguely Scot-Irish
Romney: Mormon (which is practically a different culture to many)
Brownback: limited appeal, funny name
Gingrich: really funny name, known for treating his ex-wife like used Kleenex
H. Rodham-Clinton: Anglo-Irish, rode on her husband’s career
Edwards: Ken doll
Obama: biological father Kenyan, huge appeal anyway
Biden: from the imaginary state of Delaware
Dodd: vaguely AngloSaxon
Richardson: Anglo with a really deep tan.
If you’re going for pure white-man appeal, you’re down to… McCain or Dodd, who are both reasonable choices. Everyone else can go home.
But I think there are enough of us with Latino sympathies that it won’t matter that much. All the Mexican-baiting by the last Congress didn’t save the Pubbies last time around.
I think you’re right. The people who will be driven away by his Mexican heritage were already not voting Democrat. The most extreme aren’t voting for either Dems or Pubs.