JudasMyGuide
Ancient Mariner
You know, sorry for being so cynical, but considering the fact the most likely candidates are a septuagenarian and an octogenarian, I would say it's rather wild to plan or to count on anything happening even in '24.
USA Politics
- Thread starter Genghis Khan
- Start date
I'm not sure this is the case, or if it is, it's only because he's an unknown. The challenges of elevating an unknown politician to a national race is that 1) stuff can come out that hasn't been previously disclosed, and 2) no national record to run on, so people can read into all sorts of stuff.
Jer
'Til Tomorrow
The last 3 successful Democratic candidates before Biden (Carter, B. Clinton, Obama) were all national unknowns with personal charisma who ran as (for their time) center-left candidates.
Phillips' flipping of a congressional seat in a district that had elected Republicans since 1960, then winning reelection by increasing margins for the next two elections, proves that he can effectively win over and retain swing voters in a center-right electorate.
Writing off Phillips while assuming Newsom would be a great general election candidate seems a bit weird when held up against history.
So, first of all, no, they weren't. Jimmy Carter was the closest thing to unknown, but he was still governor of a state. He won as a dark horse in a year that a stick painted blue would have won the presidency. Bill Clinton was governor of Arkansas, and had been for 8 years. He may have been unknown to the general public, but he wasn't unknown to the average Democrat, having been touted as a possible candidate in 1988 and having given a keynote address at the 1988 DNC. He spent 4 years building his national profile so that when he entered the 1992 primaries, he was well known by Democratic party voters, who very nearly rejected him anyway. Obama had very aggressively raised his national profile as well; he was given the keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention and then as Senator basically spent the whole time running for President, even if he wasn't yet running for president, if you know what I mean.
Obama didn't run as a centre-left politician in most ways. He campaigned on public health care, which is absolutely not a centre-left ideal. Clinton and Carter were more centre-left, of course, but that was in a much different time. The centre is very nearly dead. The GOP has realized this. The Dems need to.
Dean Phillips, by comparison, is an unknown to most Democrats, even wonky folks. Not as unknown as Mike Johnson (lol) was three weeks ago, mind you. He has no national profile, very few national alliances with other politicians. He has a nice feather in his cap - winning a district that was held by Republicans for a very long time. He has sponsored five bills that passed the House since he has been Congress. Two became law. One was to rename a post office. One was to extend the time businesses had to repay PPP loans. Hardly something for the average Democrat to run on.
I'm absolutely not writing off Phillips as a campaigner. I don't know how skilled he is at national campaigning because he's never done it. He's campaigned in the Minneapolis suburbs, and by all accounts, extremely well. That's significantly different to campaigning across the USA. Newsom has been quietly campaigning for years and he's good at it. He has supporters in the Dems across the country, not just in California, and he's good at getting on TV. Meanwhile, Phillips is trying to stab the sitting president in the back. Even with Biden's weaknesses, that's not going to earn him any friends in the establishment, nor is it going to earn him any friends among other Democratic lawmakers. Even the ones who don't like Biden. Look at what happened to Eugene McCarthy. He did the same thing - tried to beat LBJ in NH, and almost pulled it off and humiliated LBJ. He ended up not running for re-election to the Senate and endorsed Reagan.
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Jer
'Til Tomorrow
Seems like you're moving the goal post here from "unknown politician" to "unknown-within-the-party politician". Very few people outside of engaged Democratic party members and people who lived in or next to the candidates' home states had any idea who these three people were before they launched their presidential primary bids. They might have heard Clinton's and Obama's names if they'd watched a lot of political shows on cable news during the previous presidential cycle, or if they were dedicated enough to watch the Democratic convention speeches in '88 and '04, but otherwise not so much. If you want to stick with "unknown-within-the-party politician" I'll concede the point, but I don't think the original comment holds up.
The health care point is true, though he also ran on energy independence (albeit including green energy in that push), and in 2008 he was formally against gay marriage. He wanted a "team of rivals" like Lincoln and he put Republicans in his cabinet. Those were some pretty centrist positions alongside his more left-leaning ones.
Well, that's pretty demonstrably not true. I think you're confusing the escalating ideological polarization of the active membership of the Democratic and Republican parties with the views of the general electorate. The people in general didn't become more extreme, but their major party representatives did.
Uh, you're the one who said "unknown politician", which to me, means a true unknown. Someone who has no profile outside of their local profile. Like a Chester Arthur rising to the VP spot in 1880, for example. I noted that the guys you called unknowns weren't unknowns within the power structures that they needed to exploit to gain national status.
You're really leaving out a lot of the left wing pieces he campaigned on. Closing Guantanamo (failed), pulling out of Iraq (failed), Repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell (succeeded), improve financial regulation (succeeded), DREAM act (failed). His energy independence politics were never "drill baby drill" politics and were almost entirely around reducing domestic oil use and expanding green energy. And he did indeed put 2 Republicans in his cabinet to start, one of whom was the sitting DefSec Robert Gates, one of whom was a retired GOP congressperson (he nominated a sitting GOP senator as well for a position but Moscow Mitch managed to outmaneuver Obama on that one). I think it's not nearly as centre-left as he ended up going, which is why lefties feel like Obama betrayed them.
I absolutely believe that poll, because it's a meaningless one. People being open to a theoretical third party are fairly irrelevant, because once a party is established and picks positions, then there's something for people to dislike. I am sure they would check it out, then most people would go home and vote their usual party. And regardless of that, it has nothing to do with the actual reality, which is that the majorities won by Obama, Trump, and Biden came from motivating new/lapsed voters ideologically identified with their bloc, not by getting former Dems to vote GOP or vice versa. That stuff did happen, but it's not the key.
Check out the exit polling from 2020. These are people who made their decisions early - 50% before the election really heated up. 95% of people who voted Biden approved of him and 96% of people who voted for Biden disapprove of Trump. The ideological questions break right down the middle too. Maybe a middle party would find a niche. The GOP donors behind No Labels seem to think that's true. But I strongly suspect that as soon as a party established and started picking positions they'd get edged out.
Diesel 11
As you scream into the web of silence...
Looks like it was a great night for the Dems yesterday. In Virginia they’re now holding the majority in both the House and the Senate. District 30 even elected our state’s first trans person to the Senate. This coming after Republicans ran hardcore on anti-trans and anti-abortion issues is a big sign that those talking points are starting to lose supporters. I won’t speak on other states cuz I haven’t looked into them enough, but it looks like blue swept a lot of the votes there too.
I try not to extrapolate these results to possible 2024 results - off year election and pretty much everybody was running on state wide issues. The trend among all the states though seems to be that people are really not a fan of the authoritarian/restrictive policies that have been championed on the right recently. But without trying to read too much into the tea leaves, I think it is interesting that Democrats continue to overperform in these right leaning/middle of the road states when the Democratic president is historically unpopular. Particularly this year being the first time since 2016 that Trump isn't really a factor (obviously he's still around but the main issues people are thinking about when voting this year aren't really related to Trump). Abortion continues to matter to folks and it might be the sort of thing that keeps voters from supporting Republicans despite worries about Biden's age.
As usual in off years, Virginia is probably the most relevant state. Last night is going to do a lot to kill the Glenn Youngkin hype and provides yet another example of Republicans fumbling their abortion messaging.
As usual in off years, Virginia is probably the most relevant state. Last night is going to do a lot to kill the Glenn Youngkin hype and provides yet another example of Republicans fumbling their abortion messaging.
Is this true? I thought Virginia had trans people in the state Senate already.
Diesel 11
As you scream into the web of silence...
Yep, Danica Roem. Not just that, she’s the first openly trans state senator in the entire southern US, which is a huge win. It’s not her first election though, she’s been in the VA House since 2018.
Jer
'Til Tomorrow
Minnesota Supreme Court dismisses effort to block Trump from state's primary ballot
A group of voters have been trying to ban Trump from the 2024 GOP primary and general election ballots based on 14th Amendment grounds.
www.nbcnews.com
So, kicking the can down the road unless/until Trump becomes the formal nominee.
____no5
Free Man
Now even David Axelrod is openly questioning whether Biden should step aside.
Former Obama strategist wonders if Biden should stay in presidential race
"What he needs to decide is whether that is wise," David Axelrod said of Biden.www.politico.com
I wanted to post this, happy you did. It's wrong to say Joe Biden is not fit to govern due to his age. The man is not fit to govern period. At least as far as World Stage is concerned. Newsom or Philipps or RFK Jr would be far better presidents than him. RFK fucked up as he exited too early though, all my hopes to Philipps for now.
Looks like the Newsom Joe Rogan theory starts to make sense
Told ya!
Step down Joe!
Vaenyr
Ancient Mariner
Newsom or Phillips? Sure. RFK though? The anti-vaxx conspiracy nut whose many insanse statements are easily disprovable, yet he keeps doubling down on them? No way. That man isn't fit to be a politician of any position.
It seems more like Newsom is going to run in 2028. If he were to run for 2024 he would've started his campaign earlier.Looks like the Newsom Joe Rogan theory starts to make sense
Manchin Says He Will Not Seek Re-election, Dealing Blow to Democrats
The decision by Senator Joe Manchin III will leave open a seat in a deeply red state, threatening Democrats’ hold on the Senate.
Expected news, but pretty much guarantees that Democrats' best case scenario in 2024 is a 50/50 Senate again unless somehow FL and TX become competitive (and even in that scenario it's entirely possible that those two states are making up for other losses). Even if Manchin did run, it seems like he was facing a really tough race.
There are rumors that he is going to run for president on the No Labels ticket. Frankly, this quote has me worried that he might be doing just that:
“I have made one of the toughest decisions of my life and decided that I will not be running for re-election to the United States Senate, but what I will be doing is traveling the country and speaking out to see if there is an interest in creating a movement to mobilize the middle and bring Americans together.”
____no5
Free Man
He was anti-vaxx long before Covid though. The man is honest; he doesn't read scripts.
Having the balls to speak unpopular truths as a politician or as anything for that matter, is a virtue in my book.
Being anti-vaxx isn't an unpopular truth, it's a conspiracy theory that gets people killed. There's virtue in speaking the truth; there's no virtue in a mass murdering lie.
Vaenyr
Ancient Mariner
That's not in any way a positive stance. He claims that vaccines cause autism for example. Not only is there no evidence, whatsoever, to support that claim; it has been thoroughly debunked for ages. I don't know about you, but I don't see the value in electing somebody who peddles debunked conspiracy theories for monetary gain. Such a person should not have any power, ever.
____no5
Free Man
The difference here is that the guy is anti-vaxx twenty years or more now, way before this became trendy with Covid. So at the very least I can trust his sincerity. He might be wrong but not a liar.
And I don’t see where’s the monetary gain comes from. The man is clearly against Big Pharma. Monetary gains come when you work with the lobbies not against them.
And I don’t see where’s the monetary gain comes from. The man is clearly against Big Pharma. Monetary gains come when you work with the lobbies not against them.
Vaccines causing autism isn't just a debunked claim, it was an out-and-out lie designed to enrich disgraced former doctor Andrew Wakefield, and he continues the grift to this day.