Liz Sidoti (AP), CNN and triton seem to be on the same wave length. Here's Sidoti on October 4:
"McCain can't prevail without holding onto most of the states that Bush won, and he's now virtually tied or trailing in public polls in at least 10 of them — Colorado, Florida, Indiana, Iowa, Missouri, New Mexico, Nevada, North Carolina, Ohio and Virginia — as he tries to fend off Obama's well-funded advertising onslaught and grass-roots efforts.The GOP nominee also is only playing in five states that Democrat John Kerry won in 2004 — Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Minnesota, New Hampshire and, now, Maine — and he's running behind."
CNN and triton are saying almost the same thing, though I admit surprise that Obama is currently LEADING in several states that were Red for dubya: Florida, North Carolina, Virginia, Ohio, Missouri, Colorado, and Nevada. I'm not yet ready to put any of these in Obama's column, since we still have nearly four weeks until the election, and the polls are fluid. Still, I believe Obama will win at least some of them.
Today I'm putting Iowa and Connecticut into Obama's column. The Lieberman Effect, which caused me to classify CT as a Tossup, seems to be absent. Weeks ago I put New Mexico in Obama's column, and he's solidified his lead since then. Indiana is going for McCain, so that's off the table as well.
The only state I've moved from my Tossup list to McCain is Arkansas. The Clintons have all but disappeared from this election: no news, no appearances, no interviews.
The five blue states where McCain is putting his money--Maine, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Minnesota--will go for Obama, though McCain could get one vote from Maine, depending on the voting pattern in the state’s four electoral districts. Maine and Nebraska are the only states that allow their electoral votes to be split. And that could, under one particular circumstance (keep reading), be an important single vote. Obama, by the way, will get no electoral votes from Nebraska.
That leaves Ohio, which I have called the key state to this election. Perhaps no longer: so many Red states are now in play that Obama may actually not need to win Ohio to win the election. Ohio is still pretty much a dead heat, though Obama is leading there in four polls and McCain in two.
If Obama wins the states I've listed as his, and wins even only one Tossup state except Nevada, he'll be our next President with more than 270 electoral votes. Nevada's 5 electoral votes will give him 269 votes, and a tie with McCain. In that case, the House of Representatives decides who becomes President, and there's an excellent chance the House will still have a Democratic majority, even more strongly than now.
However, if Obama wins all of the states that I've listed in his column, plus only Nevada from the Tossups, but McCain wins one of Maine's four votes, then Obama will have 268 votes and McCain will have 270 votes. And John McCain will be President.
If, however, Obama wins any one of the other Tossup states instead of Nevada, Barack Obama will be our next President. Right now, late at night, looking at the polls' statistics, I think Obama will win more than one Tossup state, could even win most of them.
Two words of caution: (1) the polls can change radically in 26 days, as they have changed in the last month; (2) I don't know how or even if racism will play a significant role. But if racism does enter significantly, silently or not, Sarah Palin may be too close to the presidency for comfort.
And now the states as I see them lining up:
McCAIN
Alabama 9
Alaska 3
Arizona 10
Arkansas 6
Georgia 15
Idaho 4
Indiana 11
Kansas 6
Kentucky 8
Louisiana 9
Mississippi 6
Montana 3
Nebraska 5
North Dakota 3
Oklahoma 7
South Carolina 8
South Dakota 3
Tennessee 11
Texas 34
Utah 5
West Virginia 5
Wyoming 3
Currently 22 states with 174 electoral votes for McCain
----- ----- -----
OBAMA
California 55
Connecticut 7
Delaware 3
DC 3
Hawaii 4
Illinois 21
Iowa 7
Maine 4
Maryland 10
Massachusetts 12
Michigan 17
Minnesota 10
New Hampshire 4
New Mexico 5
New Jersey 15
New York 31
Oregon 7
Pennsylvania 21
Rhode Island 4
Vermont 3
Washington 11
Wisconsin 10
Currently 21 states + DC with 264 electoral votes for Obama
----- ----- -----
TOSSUP
Colorado 9
Florida 27
Missouri 11
Nevada 5
North Carolina 15
Ohio 20
Virginia 13
Currently 7 states with 100 electoral votes are Tossups, most of them with Obama holding a small lead on October 7, 2008.
-- triton --
Showing posts with label Bill Richardson. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bill Richardson. Show all posts
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
Saturday, July 5, 2008
#35 The "Tossup" States, and Projected Electoral Vote Totals; Obama and the NYTimes
Second things first. The lead editorial in yesterday's NYTimes chastised ("chided" is too gentle a word for the Times' tone) Barack Obama for changing his positions on (a) financing his own campaign, (b) unlawful eavesdropping, (c) using public funding for religious organizations' use on social issues.
Their arguments are cogent, and I can't disagree with those arguments. These are issues on which Obama has apparently changed the positions he took during the primary campaign. On the one hand, if he has changed his position for political expediency, he should be called on it. On the other hand, as the Times says, "We are not shocked when a candidate moves to the center for the general election." The editors are calling him, however, on an implied hypocrisy, "because he was the candidate who proposed to change the face of politics, the man of passionate convictions who did not play old political games."
Give me a break. The Times' editors are being either naive or disingenuous. Whatever else he is, Barack Obama is a politician, and apparently (so far at least) a smart one. He knew, instinctively or intellectually, how to appeal to the left wing of the Democratic party for the states' primary and caucus season, an easy job for him since he has been the Senate's most liberal senator in the short time he has been a member.
Obama also knows how to attempt to seize the center of the political spectrum now on the national level. Which he has to do in order to be elected.
And which, incidentally, the Democrats have been unable to do since Bill Clinton campaigned for president. Al Gore and John Kerry allowed the Evil Karl Rove to manipulate the 2000 and 2004 campaigns so that, unbelievably in retropsect, dubya was able to pose as a centrist. The bottom line is, We can't tell from a presidential campaign what an elected president will actually do under the real circumstances he or she will actually face. dubya claimed to be a "uniter" when he ran in 2000, an ironic use for self-promotion of his own party's national divisiveness by bringing Clinton up on impeachment charges of lying under oath (note that Nancy Pelosi has refused to bring dubya up on impeachment charges despite his violating constitutional rights). dubya has succeeded in one sense only: he has united the electorate against him more strongly than any president in polling history.
Obama has to use dubya's unpopularity, and whatever weaknesses McCain's policies may have, to move toward the political center and to unite enough American voters in order to gain at least 270 electoral votes on November 4.
What a nimble segue to the originally planned topic for this post...
Here, again, are my currently listed TOSSUP states:
Arkansas 6 (Republican?)
Colorado 9
Connecticut 7 (because of Lieberman)
Iowa 7
Minnesota 10 (possibly depending on the Republican’s VP)
Missouri 11 T (Republican?)
Montana 3
Nevada 5
New Mexico 5 (Democrat?--depending on what Bill Richardson does)
Virginia 13 (depending on the Democrat’s VP)
West Virginia 5 (Republican?)
Currently 81 electoral votes are tossups, with 22 leaning Republican, 5 leaning Democratic, and 54 still up in the air.
Arkansas will likely go Republcian, but strong campaigning by Bill or Hillary there might shake up the Democrats enough to vote on election day.
Colorado has normally voted Republican but is beginning to move toward the Democratic candidates, even nationally: its governor and one of its senators are Democrats. Maybe holding the Democratic convention there this year--if the Democrats behave, and clean up after themselves--will convince the voters to go Blue in November.
Connecticut would normally go strongly Democratic, but I don't know how significantly Lieberman's support for McCain will affect the voters. They did elect him as an independent two years ago, so we can't overlook the possibility that they may follow his lead again this November.
Iowa, though normally expected to vote Republican, is currently up in the air in part at least because of McCain's opposition to farm subsidies. Still, aside from flooding, farm states should be doing relatively well economically, with all grain prices at or near record levels. But polls have shown Iowa as too close to call, and how the feds react to recent inundation will have an effect come November.
Minnesota normally should be Democratic. From a Republican point of view, Tim Pawlenty would be a strong Vice President candidate, if they select him, to provide some geographical balance on the ticket and to put the state in play. Besides, the Republican convention is in the Twin Cities a week after the Democratic convention takes place in Denver, so Pawlenty--should he want to run for VP--could mount a subtle favorite-son campaign to be on the ticket. And whoever runs with McCain will be the leading candidate for the presidential spot in four years if McCain was serious about being a one-term president if elected this year. If Pawlenty is not on McCain's ticket, this state goes Democratic.
There's a second significant race in Minnesota this year, Al Franken running against incumbent Republican senator Norm Coleman (who, six years ago, beat Walter Mondale, the last minute substitute for the late Paul Wellstone). Whose coattails--Franken's or Obama's--will carry whom? Or will neither carry the other?
Missouri will likely go Republican (at least right now that's my thinking), but it can be very close, depending on the success of get-out-the-vote campaigns in St. Loo and KC. We saw the vote patterns in the Democratic primary and we can expect to see those patterns again, but intensified in the rural areas which are far more likely to vote Republican.
Montana will probably go Republican, though its recent trend has favored the Democrats. Still, McCain reflects the values of the rugged Montanan: veteran, fiscal conservative, "straight talk."
Nevada: the population growth that Nevada has experienced recently (as long as the housing crisis hasn't caused it to reverse) has brought more liberal voters into the state. There seems to be an increasing chance that the state might go blue this year.
New Mexico, Virginia, and West Virginia are fascinating studies for different reasons.
New Mexico went for Gore narrowly, but then not for Kerry. Bill Richardson campaigned heavily for Gore but not for Kerry. The governor is still popular in New Mexico, though not as popular as he was before moving from Hillary to the Obama camp, and could play a major role in helping Obama. However, Hispanics and African Americans have historically clashed in our larger cities, and Obama will have to spend much time in the state with the governor in order to overcome these historical obstacles.
Virginia -- one word: jimwebb. Okay, okay, so it's two words, but if you've been reading these posts you know what I mean. I think Jim Webb would be a quality VP candidate and would have an excellent chance of helping the Democrats carry Virginia. His now-quarter-of-a-century-old comments about women in the military academies may come up in the campaign if he is on the ticket, but he has long since recanted, and his actions should also speak loudly.
West Virginia has puzzled me for eight years. By all that is holy in labor, this state should be solidly in the Democratic column. Why in the blazing saddles would union members ever vote Republican? Yet, despite a long history of voting Democratic in presidential elections (except 1984, when they joined the Reagan landslide), they voted for dubya in 2000 and 2004. And Obama did SO BADLY against Hillary in the primary that I see the state as currently leaning Republican in November.
If I had to assign these tossup states to candidates, and without VP candidates having been selected yet, I would list the following:
McCain -- Arkansas 6, Missouri, 11, Montana 3, Virginia 13, West Virginia 5 = 38.
McCain would have 240 total electoral votes.
Obama -- Colorado 9, Connecticut 7, Iowa 7, Minnesota 10, Nevada 5, New Mexico 5 = 43.
Obama would have 298 electoral votes, and would be our next president.
If Pawlenty is the Republican VP candidate and Webb the Democratic, we might move Virginia to Democratic and Minnesota to Republican:
McCain would then have 237 votes, and Obama would have 301. Obama would still be our next president.
If Obama chooses a VP who cannot carry his own state, and McCain chooses Pawlenty, and Minnesota votes Republican, McCain would have 250 votes. Then, if I'm wrong about Ohio, McCain would have 270 electoral votes and would be our next president.
Obama has not much margin for error.
Disclaimer? oh my yes. Any major or even several minor events (nationally in particular, but some international problems as well) between now and November 4, and the votes could shift.
Their arguments are cogent, and I can't disagree with those arguments. These are issues on which Obama has apparently changed the positions he took during the primary campaign. On the one hand, if he has changed his position for political expediency, he should be called on it. On the other hand, as the Times says, "We are not shocked when a candidate moves to the center for the general election." The editors are calling him, however, on an implied hypocrisy, "because he was the candidate who proposed to change the face of politics, the man of passionate convictions who did not play old political games."
Give me a break. The Times' editors are being either naive or disingenuous. Whatever else he is, Barack Obama is a politician, and apparently (so far at least) a smart one. He knew, instinctively or intellectually, how to appeal to the left wing of the Democratic party for the states' primary and caucus season, an easy job for him since he has been the Senate's most liberal senator in the short time he has been a member.
Obama also knows how to attempt to seize the center of the political spectrum now on the national level. Which he has to do in order to be elected.
And which, incidentally, the Democrats have been unable to do since Bill Clinton campaigned for president. Al Gore and John Kerry allowed the Evil Karl Rove to manipulate the 2000 and 2004 campaigns so that, unbelievably in retropsect, dubya was able to pose as a centrist. The bottom line is, We can't tell from a presidential campaign what an elected president will actually do under the real circumstances he or she will actually face. dubya claimed to be a "uniter" when he ran in 2000, an ironic use for self-promotion of his own party's national divisiveness by bringing Clinton up on impeachment charges of lying under oath (note that Nancy Pelosi has refused to bring dubya up on impeachment charges despite his violating constitutional rights). dubya has succeeded in one sense only: he has united the electorate against him more strongly than any president in polling history.
Obama has to use dubya's unpopularity, and whatever weaknesses McCain's policies may have, to move toward the political center and to unite enough American voters in order to gain at least 270 electoral votes on November 4.
What a nimble segue to the originally planned topic for this post...
Here, again, are my currently listed TOSSUP states:
Arkansas 6 (Republican?)
Colorado 9
Connecticut 7 (because of Lieberman)
Iowa 7
Minnesota 10 (possibly depending on the Republican’s VP)
Missouri 11 T (Republican?)
Montana 3
Nevada 5
New Mexico 5 (Democrat?--depending on what Bill Richardson does)
Virginia 13 (depending on the Democrat’s VP)
West Virginia 5 (Republican?)
Currently 81 electoral votes are tossups, with 22 leaning Republican, 5 leaning Democratic, and 54 still up in the air.
Arkansas will likely go Republcian, but strong campaigning by Bill or Hillary there might shake up the Democrats enough to vote on election day.
Colorado has normally voted Republican but is beginning to move toward the Democratic candidates, even nationally: its governor and one of its senators are Democrats. Maybe holding the Democratic convention there this year--if the Democrats behave, and clean up after themselves--will convince the voters to go Blue in November.
Connecticut would normally go strongly Democratic, but I don't know how significantly Lieberman's support for McCain will affect the voters. They did elect him as an independent two years ago, so we can't overlook the possibility that they may follow his lead again this November.
Iowa, though normally expected to vote Republican, is currently up in the air in part at least because of McCain's opposition to farm subsidies. Still, aside from flooding, farm states should be doing relatively well economically, with all grain prices at or near record levels. But polls have shown Iowa as too close to call, and how the feds react to recent inundation will have an effect come November.
Minnesota normally should be Democratic. From a Republican point of view, Tim Pawlenty would be a strong Vice President candidate, if they select him, to provide some geographical balance on the ticket and to put the state in play. Besides, the Republican convention is in the Twin Cities a week after the Democratic convention takes place in Denver, so Pawlenty--should he want to run for VP--could mount a subtle favorite-son campaign to be on the ticket. And whoever runs with McCain will be the leading candidate for the presidential spot in four years if McCain was serious about being a one-term president if elected this year. If Pawlenty is not on McCain's ticket, this state goes Democratic.
There's a second significant race in Minnesota this year, Al Franken running against incumbent Republican senator Norm Coleman (who, six years ago, beat Walter Mondale, the last minute substitute for the late Paul Wellstone). Whose coattails--Franken's or Obama's--will carry whom? Or will neither carry the other?
Missouri will likely go Republican (at least right now that's my thinking), but it can be very close, depending on the success of get-out-the-vote campaigns in St. Loo and KC. We saw the vote patterns in the Democratic primary and we can expect to see those patterns again, but intensified in the rural areas which are far more likely to vote Republican.
Montana will probably go Republican, though its recent trend has favored the Democrats. Still, McCain reflects the values of the rugged Montanan: veteran, fiscal conservative, "straight talk."
Nevada: the population growth that Nevada has experienced recently (as long as the housing crisis hasn't caused it to reverse) has brought more liberal voters into the state. There seems to be an increasing chance that the state might go blue this year.
New Mexico, Virginia, and West Virginia are fascinating studies for different reasons.
New Mexico went for Gore narrowly, but then not for Kerry. Bill Richardson campaigned heavily for Gore but not for Kerry. The governor is still popular in New Mexico, though not as popular as he was before moving from Hillary to the Obama camp, and could play a major role in helping Obama. However, Hispanics and African Americans have historically clashed in our larger cities, and Obama will have to spend much time in the state with the governor in order to overcome these historical obstacles.
Virginia -- one word: jimwebb. Okay, okay, so it's two words, but if you've been reading these posts you know what I mean. I think Jim Webb would be a quality VP candidate and would have an excellent chance of helping the Democrats carry Virginia. His now-quarter-of-a-century-old comments about women in the military academies may come up in the campaign if he is on the ticket, but he has long since recanted, and his actions should also speak loudly.
West Virginia has puzzled me for eight years. By all that is holy in labor, this state should be solidly in the Democratic column. Why in the blazing saddles would union members ever vote Republican? Yet, despite a long history of voting Democratic in presidential elections (except 1984, when they joined the Reagan landslide), they voted for dubya in 2000 and 2004. And Obama did SO BADLY against Hillary in the primary that I see the state as currently leaning Republican in November.
If I had to assign these tossup states to candidates, and without VP candidates having been selected yet, I would list the following:
McCain -- Arkansas 6, Missouri, 11, Montana 3, Virginia 13, West Virginia 5 = 38.
McCain would have 240 total electoral votes.
Obama -- Colorado 9, Connecticut 7, Iowa 7, Minnesota 10, Nevada 5, New Mexico 5 = 43.
Obama would have 298 electoral votes, and would be our next president.
If Pawlenty is the Republican VP candidate and Webb the Democratic, we might move Virginia to Democratic and Minnesota to Republican:
McCain would then have 237 votes, and Obama would have 301. Obama would still be our next president.
If Obama chooses a VP who cannot carry his own state, and McCain chooses Pawlenty, and Minnesota votes Republican, McCain would have 250 votes. Then, if I'm wrong about Ohio, McCain would have 270 electoral votes and would be our next president.
Obama has not much margin for error.
Disclaimer? oh my yes. Any major or even several minor events (nationally in particular, but some international problems as well) between now and November 4, and the votes could shift.
Sunday, June 8, 2008
#28 Vice Presidential Musings on Richardson, Strickland, Webb, Kaine, Ritter, Salazar, Brown and Bayh
You may remember that I was a strong supporter of Bill Richardson to be the presidential nominee. I am not a strong supporter of him to be the Vice Presidential nominee, even though his presence on the ticket might help relieve some of the Hispanic opposition to an African-American at the top of the ticket. Two reasons I oppose him as the VP candidate: (1) he would bring only five electoral votes from New Mexico; (2) the Clintons view him as having "betrayed" them by coming out for Obama; and yesterday he indicated that Hillary and Bill had lost the current campaign because of the "sense of entitlement" that they projected while she ran.
With his domestic experience currently as governor and previously as part of Bill's cabinet, and his international experience as UN ambassador and negotiatior, Richardson would make a strong Secretary of State possibility. I think Hillary would make a strong Secretary of Health and Human Servies, but would she be willing to sit in the same room much less work in the same cabinet with Richardson?
Obama has a slightly different problem from McCain. Obama projects vigor, yes, but he also projects youth and inexperience. McCain projects oldness and tiredness; he'd like to project the wisdom that allegedly comes with age, but I haven't seen that yet. His handlers have some work to do. Would Obama do well to choose as his VP candidate someone fifteen to twenty years older than he? If so, Ohio's governor Ted Strickland would work well (though he was an early supporter of Hillary Clinton): he will be 67 by election time. Virginia's senator Jim Webb is 62, and can counter McCain's Vietnam experience: Webb is an Annapolis graduate and served in the Marines in Vietnam.
Or, if Obama wants someone only a decade or so older, he has more choices. Virginia's governor Tim Kaine is 50 years old, and was an early Obama supporter; Colorado's governor Bill Ritter will be 56 by the election; Colorado's senator Ken Salazar is 53 already (and might help bring some of the Hispanic vote to the Democratic ticket); Ohio's senator Sherrod Brown will be 56 a few days after the election; and Indiana's senator (and former governor) Evan Bayh is 52. Bayh, incidentally, was a national co-chair of Hillary's campaign.
However, Strickland, Brown, and Bayh are all midwesterners, and the presence of any one of them on the ticket would not provide the 'geographical balance' that either party generally prefers. Of course, as I've pointed out previously, Clinton/Gore had no geographical balance either. An additional problem with Bayh is that the Indiana governor is a Republican: were Bayh to be elected Vice President, the governor would appoint a Republican to fill his position, and the Democrats would lose a senate seat, a loss they would have to make up by replacing a Republican in some other state's election.
If Obama is looking for a VP candidate not from the midwest, then Kaine or Webb from Virginia, or Ritter or Salazar from Colorado (either could be a favorite-son candidate at the convention this year in Denver) could serve, and would provide greater geographical balance.
[For more in-depth discussion of all of these good people, see my posts # 7-9.]
Advantages to Strickland or Bayh: as strong early supporters of Hillary Clinton, either could be an additional means of healing the rift between Obama and Clinton, and might enable Hillary to campaign more strongly and convince her supporters to vote more readily for Obama. Disadvantage: both are from the midwest.
Advantage to the elite eight discussed above: they'd all be excellent candidates and would add, in different ways, to the ticket.
-- triton --
With his domestic experience currently as governor and previously as part of Bill's cabinet, and his international experience as UN ambassador and negotiatior, Richardson would make a strong Secretary of State possibility. I think Hillary would make a strong Secretary of Health and Human Servies, but would she be willing to sit in the same room much less work in the same cabinet with Richardson?
Obama has a slightly different problem from McCain. Obama projects vigor, yes, but he also projects youth and inexperience. McCain projects oldness and tiredness; he'd like to project the wisdom that allegedly comes with age, but I haven't seen that yet. His handlers have some work to do. Would Obama do well to choose as his VP candidate someone fifteen to twenty years older than he? If so, Ohio's governor Ted Strickland would work well (though he was an early supporter of Hillary Clinton): he will be 67 by election time. Virginia's senator Jim Webb is 62, and can counter McCain's Vietnam experience: Webb is an Annapolis graduate and served in the Marines in Vietnam.
Or, if Obama wants someone only a decade or so older, he has more choices. Virginia's governor Tim Kaine is 50 years old, and was an early Obama supporter; Colorado's governor Bill Ritter will be 56 by the election; Colorado's senator Ken Salazar is 53 already (and might help bring some of the Hispanic vote to the Democratic ticket); Ohio's senator Sherrod Brown will be 56 a few days after the election; and Indiana's senator (and former governor) Evan Bayh is 52. Bayh, incidentally, was a national co-chair of Hillary's campaign.
However, Strickland, Brown, and Bayh are all midwesterners, and the presence of any one of them on the ticket would not provide the 'geographical balance' that either party generally prefers. Of course, as I've pointed out previously, Clinton/Gore had no geographical balance either. An additional problem with Bayh is that the Indiana governor is a Republican: were Bayh to be elected Vice President, the governor would appoint a Republican to fill his position, and the Democrats would lose a senate seat, a loss they would have to make up by replacing a Republican in some other state's election.
If Obama is looking for a VP candidate not from the midwest, then Kaine or Webb from Virginia, or Ritter or Salazar from Colorado (either could be a favorite-son candidate at the convention this year in Denver) could serve, and would provide greater geographical balance.
[For more in-depth discussion of all of these good people, see my posts # 7-9.]
Advantages to Strickland or Bayh: as strong early supporters of Hillary Clinton, either could be an additional means of healing the rift between Obama and Clinton, and might enable Hillary to campaign more strongly and convince her supporters to vote more readily for Obama. Disadvantage: both are from the midwest.
Advantage to the elite eight discussed above: they'd all be excellent candidates and would add, in different ways, to the ticket.
-- triton --
Tuesday, June 3, 2008
#24 Obama has clinched, says AP
Online news reports from the Associated Press indicate that Barack Obama--the first term Democratic senator from Illinois, with little domestic policy experience and no foreign policy experience; with a difficult construct from his erstwhile connection with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright and the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago; with no military experience and a strongly-stated but ill-defined anti-war position about Iraq; with problems appealing to blue collar white voters--has clinched the Democratic nomination to run for president.
How can someone with so much going against him have a chance, one has to ask.
Well, someone with fewer qualifications won twice, another can answer; and we all know how george w bush has done.
Luckily, Obama is smarter than dubya, has better people working for him than dubya has, and is apparently less greedy than dubya's vice president and handlers have been.
Seriously, folks, Barack Obama may or may not become a good president, but the one we have now is an unmitigated disaster. dubya's policies (as I've tried to show in posts 19, 20, and 21) have been bad for America and for most Americans. That's why, today, dubya's approval rating stands at 28%. There should be exclamation points after that sentence. Let us remember that in any given presidential election, 40% of the voters will vote Democratic regardless of the candidate, 40% of the voters will vote Republican regardless of the candidate, and 20% of the voters are the folk the two candidates are actually fighting over. Thus it is that 30% of core Republicans have forsaken dubya (the 40% of total voters who "always" vote Republican minus the 28% of total voters who still approve of the job dubya's done; that's the 12% of total voters who normally vote Republican who think dubya's not doing well, divided by the 40% who normally vote Republicans regardless of who the nominee is). I don't apologize for the math. Math is important in this election, very important. It's almost a Sesame Street scenario: "This election has been brought to you by the number 270."
John McCain may already have won back some of that 12% but he starts behind Obama--behind virtually any decent Democrat--mathematically. And today's news indicates that Obama actually is polling ahead of McCain, even before the Democrat has received enough delegates to be nominated, and months AFTER McCain had garnered enough delegates to become the Republican nominee.
Barring a large number of racist individuals who are keeping their racism to themselves (and there may be a large number, but if they don't admit it we won't know until November), Obama should be favored to win. Can he lose it? Sure. By screwing up, or by being screwed up, either by another guilt-by-association as with Rev Wright, or by misspeaking (which McCain is more likely to do than Obama is), or by Hillary not rallying her supporters behind Obama. These are possibilities, but Obama's campaign is so well organized and he and his supporters are so articulate the odds favor their not screwing up badly.
Picking the wrong Vice President candidate is still a major possible screwup, however. Hillary should not be chosen. Not chosen. No. Hillary should be promised a position in his cabinet should he be elected. Secretary of Health and Human Services would be perfect for her, and would give her a chance to push for universal health care with what we hope will be a significant majority in both the House and the Senate. A significant point on the side here is that NY has a Democratic governor who will then appoint a Democrat replacement for her in the Senate. The Democrats cannot afford to lose Senate seats by appointing to the cabinet senators from states with Republican governors.
Similarly, Bill Richardson could be a strong possibility for Secretary of State. God knows , and so do many voters, that he has international policy experience, both from his service in the UN and from his subliminal negotiations abroad.
I still come back to Ted Strickland (my #1 choice), Bill Nelson, or James Webb (my heart-on favorite) as VP candidates. Their three states are tossups, and the presence of any one of these as VP candidate on the ticket could move his particular state into the Blue column in November.
Next time: where the electoral votes stand in June, with five months (less, by the time I post) to go.
--triton--
How can someone with so much going against him have a chance, one has to ask.
Well, someone with fewer qualifications won twice, another can answer; and we all know how george w bush has done.
Luckily, Obama is smarter than dubya, has better people working for him than dubya has, and is apparently less greedy than dubya's vice president and handlers have been.
Seriously, folks, Barack Obama may or may not become a good president, but the one we have now is an unmitigated disaster. dubya's policies (as I've tried to show in posts 19, 20, and 21) have been bad for America and for most Americans. That's why, today, dubya's approval rating stands at 28%. There should be exclamation points after that sentence. Let us remember that in any given presidential election, 40% of the voters will vote Democratic regardless of the candidate, 40% of the voters will vote Republican regardless of the candidate, and 20% of the voters are the folk the two candidates are actually fighting over. Thus it is that 30% of core Republicans have forsaken dubya (the 40% of total voters who "always" vote Republican minus the 28% of total voters who still approve of the job dubya's done; that's the 12% of total voters who normally vote Republican who think dubya's not doing well, divided by the 40% who normally vote Republicans regardless of who the nominee is). I don't apologize for the math. Math is important in this election, very important. It's almost a Sesame Street scenario: "This election has been brought to you by the number 270."
John McCain may already have won back some of that 12% but he starts behind Obama--behind virtually any decent Democrat--mathematically. And today's news indicates that Obama actually is polling ahead of McCain, even before the Democrat has received enough delegates to be nominated, and months AFTER McCain had garnered enough delegates to become the Republican nominee.
Barring a large number of racist individuals who are keeping their racism to themselves (and there may be a large number, but if they don't admit it we won't know until November), Obama should be favored to win. Can he lose it? Sure. By screwing up, or by being screwed up, either by another guilt-by-association as with Rev Wright, or by misspeaking (which McCain is more likely to do than Obama is), or by Hillary not rallying her supporters behind Obama. These are possibilities, but Obama's campaign is so well organized and he and his supporters are so articulate the odds favor their not screwing up badly.
Picking the wrong Vice President candidate is still a major possible screwup, however. Hillary should not be chosen. Not chosen. No. Hillary should be promised a position in his cabinet should he be elected. Secretary of Health and Human Services would be perfect for her, and would give her a chance to push for universal health care with what we hope will be a significant majority in both the House and the Senate. A significant point on the side here is that NY has a Democratic governor who will then appoint a Democrat replacement for her in the Senate. The Democrats cannot afford to lose Senate seats by appointing to the cabinet senators from states with Republican governors.
Similarly, Bill Richardson could be a strong possibility for Secretary of State. God knows , and so do many voters, that he has international policy experience, both from his service in the UN and from his subliminal negotiations abroad.
I still come back to Ted Strickland (my #1 choice), Bill Nelson, or James Webb (my heart-on favorite) as VP candidates. Their three states are tossups, and the presence of any one of these as VP candidate on the ticket could move his particular state into the Blue column in November.
Next time: where the electoral votes stand in June, with five months (less, by the time I post) to go.
--triton--
Saturday, March 1, 2008
#11 Strategies Two and Three
In 2000 and 2004, we saw how the Republican propaganda machine can take a decorated war hero, a veteran who served more nobly in the service than dubya did, and make him appear cowardly, inept, everything their own candidate actually was. In 2000, they attacked John McCain in the primaries; in 2004, they attacked John Kerry in the election. They may try something more obvious this time.
If, as appears increasingly likely, Barack Obama receives the Democratic nomination, we can expect the Republicans to hit him with every form of a liberal label that they can. And they will be right this time. Obama is a liberal.
And that’s precisely why they may not succeed. If he embraces the label, if he stands up proudly and has his own hatchet speakers call his opponents reactionaries or some similar, negatively connotative term (how about “floggers of dead policies that kill”? or some other mixed metaphor), we may actually see this election depending on new young voters, and middle-aged and older voters, who also embrace the label. “Liberal” is a dirty word for many Republicans, but Barack Obama could have the opportunity to reclaim the word—and the Presidency.
He must not apologize for being liberal. He must not back down from the term. He must show how his proposed policies are good for the country. NOT apologizing for being liberal, NOT backing down from embracing the term: this is strategy number two for the Democrats this fall.
Strategy number three is a contingency strategy. In case neither the presidential nor vice presidential candidate on the Democratic ticket has significant foreign policy experience, the Democrats should leak the name(s) of the one or more people who may be considered for Secretary of State (Bill Richardson is one who comes to mind, but there are others) in order to assuage the concerns of those who recognize how badly we’ve fared under dubya’s administrations. This is, incidentally, another reason why Obama’s VP candidate doesn’t have to be a governor. As I’ve indicated in post #9’s rebuttal of Liz Sidoti’s 2/23/08 Associated Press article, the Democrats also don’t need to run a governor for VP in order to get his “managerial” experience; other members of the Obama or Clinton administration can serve that function, though I suspect that Hillary—should she somehow recover and get the nomination--is a pretty darn good nitty-gritty manager.
As always, I welcome your comments, your emails, or, as one of my not-favorite televangelists used to say (one word spelled a bit phonetically), "your prayers and your corntribushuns." While he meant money, I mean your ideas on the strategies for the upcoming election.
triton
If, as appears increasingly likely, Barack Obama receives the Democratic nomination, we can expect the Republicans to hit him with every form of a liberal label that they can. And they will be right this time. Obama is a liberal.
And that’s precisely why they may not succeed. If he embraces the label, if he stands up proudly and has his own hatchet speakers call his opponents reactionaries or some similar, negatively connotative term (how about “floggers of dead policies that kill”? or some other mixed metaphor), we may actually see this election depending on new young voters, and middle-aged and older voters, who also embrace the label. “Liberal” is a dirty word for many Republicans, but Barack Obama could have the opportunity to reclaim the word—and the Presidency.
He must not apologize for being liberal. He must not back down from the term. He must show how his proposed policies are good for the country. NOT apologizing for being liberal, NOT backing down from embracing the term: this is strategy number two for the Democrats this fall.
Strategy number three is a contingency strategy. In case neither the presidential nor vice presidential candidate on the Democratic ticket has significant foreign policy experience, the Democrats should leak the name(s) of the one or more people who may be considered for Secretary of State (Bill Richardson is one who comes to mind, but there are others) in order to assuage the concerns of those who recognize how badly we’ve fared under dubya’s administrations. This is, incidentally, another reason why Obama’s VP candidate doesn’t have to be a governor. As I’ve indicated in post #9’s rebuttal of Liz Sidoti’s 2/23/08 Associated Press article, the Democrats also don’t need to run a governor for VP in order to get his “managerial” experience; other members of the Obama or Clinton administration can serve that function, though I suspect that Hillary—should she somehow recover and get the nomination--is a pretty darn good nitty-gritty manager.
As always, I welcome your comments, your emails, or, as one of my not-favorite televangelists used to say (one word spelled a bit phonetically), "your prayers and your corntribushuns." While he meant money, I mean your ideas on the strategies for the upcoming election.
triton
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
# 10 First Strategy in Jeopardy
Omy, another necessary digression before we get to strategy. On Sunday (Feb 24) Ralph Nader announced his run for president…again. My first reaction was ‘That freakin’ @$$#0!=’ but I don’t think I said “freakin.’” Then I did a little research, and realized that in 2000 he received 2.7% of the popular vote, and may indeed have caused Florida to go to dubya rather than to Gore (though I still can’t shake my own conviction that Brother Jeb had at least as much to do with that result). Okay, any voter can make a mistake once, and by 2004 most of his 2000 supporters realized that, contrary to what Nader had been saying, there IS a difference between the two parties. Hence, in 2004, Nader got 0.3% of the popular vote, and was not a factor. That’s LESS THAN ONE-HALF OF ONE PERCENT of the vote. This year, I believe, he won’t qualify for federal funding. I believe the American people, fooled once but not a second time, will dismiss his candidacy and he will, again, be a non-factor. Is he selfish, self-centered, arrogant, an egotist, and all those other negative things? Perhaps. Or perhaps he’s just lost his mind and doesn’t realize that he is at least in part responsible (from his run in 2000 that may have contributed to dubya’s becoming president) for the deaths of more than 4,000 American and Coalition service-men and -women, and countless tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians. Or maybe he did realize it, and that caused him to lose his mind.
An alternative view is that Nader isn’t senile, and that he is trying to influence the Democratic platform come August, in what he hopes will be the Democrats’ attempt to get him out of the race by adopting his views on the various issues. That would make sense, except that the Democrats already share many of his views. Further, he needs to remember that the Democratic Senate and House the last year-plus were not veto-proof, and so they had to accommodate dubya to some extent if ANYthing were to get accomplished.
In either case, Nader’s not going to make it to the finish line this year. Remember: you saw it here first. If I’m wrong…you don’t remember where you saw it.
And now, what this post was supposed to be about, BR (Before Ralph):
In one area in particular my first strategy—picking a vice presidential candidate who will balance the ticket by being a centrist from a red state that he can move to the blue—may not work out as I hope, despite the strong potential VP candidates for the Democratic party. Clearly, Ted Strickland, Jim Webb, Bill Nelson, Sherrod Brown, Bill Richardson, and possibly others, could provide a great advantage in the national election. Strickland, Nelson and Brown in particular could potentially bring a large number of electoral votes into the Democratic column if they helped to carry their home states. Any of these potential VP candidates for the Democrats will provide more talent than anyone I can think of as a VP candidate for the Republicans.
But the Republicans have the advantage in scheduling. The Democrats are convening in Denver to nominate their presidential and vice-presidential candidates from August 25 to 28, and the Republicans have scheduled their convention in the twin cities of Minneapolist/St. Paul immediately after, from September 1 to 4.
In post #8, I indicated that Minnesota, while nominally a blue state, is pretty closely contested between the Democrats and the Republicans. I don’t know if holding their convention there will actually help the Republicans. I am surprised, however, they’re holding it on the Labor Day weekend. Of course, the nominations and acceptance speeches will take place after Labor Day, so they may not lose much audience.
And maybe the Republicans don’t want a large audience for the discussion of their national platform, which will likely be strongly right-wing: anti-Choice, pro-Finish-the-Job-in-Iraq, and an echoing call to balance the budget (echoing since it will be so hollow). Oh, and maybe some form of providing vouchers, chits, or some other means of allowing people to send their children to private sectarian schools without having to pay much or anything. dubya sneaked this last item into his State of the Union speech last month (seriously!), somewhere between "Chocolate-for-Everyone" and "Tax-Breaks-for-the-Rich-Trickle-Down-to-Soak-the-rest-of-You-Slobs" (okay, so I made up those last two; but dubya would have put them in had he thought of them).
With their convention coming after the Democrats meet, the Republicans have a strategic advantage. If, for example, the Democrats were to nominate Senator Bill Nelson of Florida for VP—both because he’s qualified AND because he may bring Florida into the Democratic column in November—the Republicans could counter by nominating Charlie Crist, the 52 year old governor of Florida, or Mel Martinez, the other senator from Florida. Martinez, elected in November 2005, is much newer to the national scene than is Senator Nelson, and is much less qualified, but he is Hispanic, and he might make major inroads in the Hispanic vote nationally. A Martinez VP nomination could help swing Florida and other states with large Hispanic populations into the Republican camp. Let’s remember that Hispanics are now the largest minority in the country. That could be a lot of votes going red instead of blue in November. And please let’s not claim there’s no such thing as block voting, not when something like 70% to 80% of the African Americans voting in the later Democratic primaries were voting for BO. I have no problem with that size vote, but that looks pretty darn block size to me. Of course, in my view there's a significant difference in qualifications between Obama and Martinez, since I'm far more partial to the former as a candidate than I am to the latter.
Another possibility, with the Republican convention already in the Twin Cities, is that Senator McCain could choose Governor Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota, in order to make inroads into what had been a blue state (though weakly so) for the Democrats. I’m sure there are other possibilities for the Republicans, but frankly…I don’t care.
If his advisors are thinking ahead, John McCain will not announce his VP candidate until just before or early in the Republican convention; that is, AFTER the Democratic convention. That way, the Republicans can see whom the Democrats nominate for VP, and then adjust their own choice accordingly.
Your thoughts and comments are always welcome. Next time: Strategies Two and Three
triton
An alternative view is that Nader isn’t senile, and that he is trying to influence the Democratic platform come August, in what he hopes will be the Democrats’ attempt to get him out of the race by adopting his views on the various issues. That would make sense, except that the Democrats already share many of his views. Further, he needs to remember that the Democratic Senate and House the last year-plus were not veto-proof, and so they had to accommodate dubya to some extent if ANYthing were to get accomplished.
In either case, Nader’s not going to make it to the finish line this year. Remember: you saw it here first. If I’m wrong…you don’t remember where you saw it.
And now, what this post was supposed to be about, BR (Before Ralph):
In one area in particular my first strategy—picking a vice presidential candidate who will balance the ticket by being a centrist from a red state that he can move to the blue—may not work out as I hope, despite the strong potential VP candidates for the Democratic party. Clearly, Ted Strickland, Jim Webb, Bill Nelson, Sherrod Brown, Bill Richardson, and possibly others, could provide a great advantage in the national election. Strickland, Nelson and Brown in particular could potentially bring a large number of electoral votes into the Democratic column if they helped to carry their home states. Any of these potential VP candidates for the Democrats will provide more talent than anyone I can think of as a VP candidate for the Republicans.
But the Republicans have the advantage in scheduling. The Democrats are convening in Denver to nominate their presidential and vice-presidential candidates from August 25 to 28, and the Republicans have scheduled their convention in the twin cities of Minneapolist/St. Paul immediately after, from September 1 to 4.
In post #8, I indicated that Minnesota, while nominally a blue state, is pretty closely contested between the Democrats and the Republicans. I don’t know if holding their convention there will actually help the Republicans. I am surprised, however, they’re holding it on the Labor Day weekend. Of course, the nominations and acceptance speeches will take place after Labor Day, so they may not lose much audience.
And maybe the Republicans don’t want a large audience for the discussion of their national platform, which will likely be strongly right-wing: anti-Choice, pro-Finish-the-Job-in-Iraq, and an echoing call to balance the budget (echoing since it will be so hollow). Oh, and maybe some form of providing vouchers, chits, or some other means of allowing people to send their children to private sectarian schools without having to pay much or anything. dubya sneaked this last item into his State of the Union speech last month (seriously!), somewhere between "Chocolate-for-Everyone" and "Tax-Breaks-for-the-Rich-Trickle-Down-to-Soak-the-rest-of-You-Slobs" (okay, so I made up those last two; but dubya would have put them in had he thought of them).
With their convention coming after the Democrats meet, the Republicans have a strategic advantage. If, for example, the Democrats were to nominate Senator Bill Nelson of Florida for VP—both because he’s qualified AND because he may bring Florida into the Democratic column in November—the Republicans could counter by nominating Charlie Crist, the 52 year old governor of Florida, or Mel Martinez, the other senator from Florida. Martinez, elected in November 2005, is much newer to the national scene than is Senator Nelson, and is much less qualified, but he is Hispanic, and he might make major inroads in the Hispanic vote nationally. A Martinez VP nomination could help swing Florida and other states with large Hispanic populations into the Republican camp. Let’s remember that Hispanics are now the largest minority in the country. That could be a lot of votes going red instead of blue in November. And please let’s not claim there’s no such thing as block voting, not when something like 70% to 80% of the African Americans voting in the later Democratic primaries were voting for BO. I have no problem with that size vote, but that looks pretty darn block size to me. Of course, in my view there's a significant difference in qualifications between Obama and Martinez, since I'm far more partial to the former as a candidate than I am to the latter.
Another possibility, with the Republican convention already in the Twin Cities, is that Senator McCain could choose Governor Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota, in order to make inroads into what had been a blue state (though weakly so) for the Democrats. I’m sure there are other possibilities for the Republicans, but frankly…I don’t care.
If his advisors are thinking ahead, John McCain will not announce his VP candidate until just before or early in the Republican convention; that is, AFTER the Democratic convention. That way, the Republicans can see whom the Democrats nominate for VP, and then adjust their own choice accordingly.
Your thoughts and comments are always welcome. Next time: Strategies Two and Three
triton
Saturday, February 23, 2008
#9 The Senators, Part 2: Indiana, Colorado, Florida, Virginia, Ohio.
But first, a Timely Digression/Regression.
On February 17, in post #7 I talked about the Democratic governors who might be considered as VP candidates to run with Barack Obama or Hillary Rodham Clinton. Associated Press writer Liz Sidoti discusses six Democratic governors (published on Saturday, Feb. 23).
---------- ---------- ----------
[quoting from Sidoti's article:]
1. Janet Napolitano, Arizona. Age 50, she has proven that she can attract independents and crossover Republicans. In any other year, she could help Democrats capitalize on a changing Southwest. This year that would be tough; McCain is an Arizona senator. But she backed Obama and he might find it advantageous to choose a woman if he wins the nomination.
2. Kathleen Sebelius, Kansas. She knows how to win — twice — in a state that's solidly Republican in presidential elections, which could help the Democratic nominee expand the playing field. Age 59, she has a moderate image and is politically savvy. She's another woman who backed Obama and campaigned for him.
3. Bill Richardson, New Mexico. He ran for president this year but dropped out after poor showings in a celebrity-packed field. A Hispanic who is 60, he appeals to an up-for-grabs constituency in a politically shifting region. He has foreign policy experience.
4. Ted Strickland, Ohio. A big-time Clinton backer, he probably would only be considered for the slot if she wins the nomination. Strickland, 66, had a generally moderate voting record in Congress, and could help deliver the pivotal state for her.
5. Tim Kaine, Virginia. He's another Democrat who ran as a moderate and proved he can win in a state that leans Republican in presidential elections. Virginia, too, is a potential swing state that he could help turn Democratic. Kaine, 49, backed Obama early.
6. Joe Manchin, West Virginia. This first term governor, 60, is popular in the state, and could help put a state that Bush won twice into the Democratic column. He is known nationally for his legislative efforts following several deadly mine accidents.
---------- ---------- ----------
Sidoti maintains that a governor would make a good running mate because the governor has “management experience” that the senators running as the presidential candidates don’t have. That’s a good point. But not good enough. Members of the cabinet can be managers; presidential advisors can be managers; hell, managers can be managers. Besides, no Vice President is going to “manage” a president. Oh. Wait….
Before I move on to the Senators, Part 2, let me comment why I think that four of Sidoti’s ‘nominees’ probably wouldn’t work out for the Democrats.
Napolitano and Sebelius because they’re women, and the Democrats will have either a minority or a woman at the head of the ticket. Somewhere in there they need a white male. Too bluntly stated on my part? Sure. But let’s be honest about what we're probably asking the American voting public to accept: either an African American or a female to be president, when we’ve never had either nominated at the head of a major party ticket? Add a female in the VP slot (or, if HRC gets the presidential nomination, two females on the ticket)? I don't think so. I’m hoping, Hoping, HOPING that our country is ready for an African American or a female to be our president; I’m not willing to push the envelope all the way to the edge. If we do, John McCain will be the next president. He may be, anyway, but let’s at least have a fighting chance.
Richardson and Strickland were on my post #7 lists. Richardson is eminently qualified but would bring only five electoral votes with him. Strickland might help carry Ohio, as might the state’s Democratic senator, Sherrod Brown (see below in the main body of this current post); neither would provide much geographical diversity but, if either can carry Ohio for the Democrats, who cares?
Neither Tim Kaine (Va) nor Joe Manchin (WVa) made the cut onto my VP list, not through any failings of their own, but because I had other, in my view stronger, possibilities. If we’re going to make a play for Virginia’s thirteen electoral votes, I think Sen. James Webb (see below) would make a stronger candidate; and West Virginia (like New Mexico) has only five electoral votes.
Any one of my five choices below is more likely to bring more electoral votes to the Democratic column in November, than are Kaine and Manchin.
And that’s my goal in this blog: to examine how the Democratic ticket can get 270 electoral votes. It ain’t sexy, but it's practical, and the more I learn about John McCain’s proposed policies, the more I realize a Democratic victory in November is very necessary.
End of digression/regression.
At least four of the following senators (and possibly all five) could provide a major boost to the Democratic ticket in November. Their records in elected office portray them as moderates, centrists, whatever it is in the middle of the political spectrum; and they have shown surprising strength in their political races, even though one of them actually won very narrowly (against an incumbent who put his foot in his mouth, in a state that dubya had won two years earlier, 54% to 46%).
(1) Evan Bayh may be from Indiana, but he’s no(e) Dan(e) Quayle(e). dubya won Indiana very easily--60% to 39%--in 2004. Evan Bayh is former governor of the state, and is the son of Indiana’s former senator, Birch Bayh, a progressive Democrat in the 1960s and ‘70s. Evan Bayh is in his second term as senator, but it’s hard to tell what he has actually accomplished. His website is surprisingly unsubstantial: ‘Senator Bayh has helped with this, and participated in that’ sort of listings. So I might add, “And he’s no Birch Bayh either.” Nonetheless, he’s from a state that would go a long way toward putting a Democrat in the White House if it could go blue in November. And Bayh looks the part of a VP. Too superficial? Of course. And he might not work as VP candidate if Obama becomes the presidential nominee—too geographically close; besides, Bayh has already endorsed Hillary. Nonetheless, I’m having trouble getting past the thought of Indiana’s eleven electoral votes possibly in the Democratic column. Bayh does present a potential logistical problem for the Democrats if he runs for VP and is elected: Mitch Daniels, the Republican governor of Indiana, would appoint a Republican as the replacement senator. So, unless the Democrats pick up additional Senate seats, they could actually lose the slim Senate majority they now enjoy.
Give me a minute; maybe I’ll get past my consideration of Evan Bayh…. Nope, I didn’t. Bayh is a dark horse VP candidate, especially should HRC get the nomination.
(2) As I mentioned in discussing the governors, the Democratic national convention is in Colorado this year, and the governor is a Democrat. So is one of the senators, Ken Salazar, elected in 2004. His political positions are all over the map—strong national defense and homeland security, economic opportunity, agriculture, health care affordability, protecting the environment. In other words, he seems to average out as a centrist. And he might be able to bring some of the Rocky Mountain states into the blue column.
(3) Lordy lordy, but I hate to bring up Florida, given its 2000 debacle. “If you like the way we vote, you should see us drive!” was one of the many jokes that came out of that election. dubya was another, but much less funny. Still, I have to bring Florida to the blog, and with good reason. Senator Bill Nelson describes himself as “a principled family man, a staunch advocate for all Floridians and a moderate voice in the increasingly partisan world of national politics.” His position as a political moderate is reinforced by his being a member of the centrist Democratic Leadership Council
Even before being elected to the Senate in 2000 (and certainly since then), he has worked to prevent oil drilling off Florida’s coast; he has worked to insure that veterans and their spouses get the benefits and health care they deserve; he has worked to provide Medicare prescription drug benefits for seniors at a government-negotiated lower cost from the drug companies. His support of veterans and senior citizens are virtuous positions, and he has at least one additional advantage: in January 1986, Bill Nelson spent six days orbiting Earth as a mission specialist aboard the space shuttle Columbia. So he really can claim to have a global view of what's going on. Literally. He may not be John Glenn, but he’s got a lot of strengths that can help the Democratic ticket. And he would provide a big boost in an important state that could, once again, swing the election.
One potential problem: the governor of Florida is a Republican who, should Nelson become VP, would appoint a Republican senator, possibly eliminating the Democratic majority in the Senate.
(4) This would not be a problem if Jim Webb of Virginia were the VP nominee. Tim Kaine, the governor of Virginia, is a Democrat (is that POSSIBLE??), and would appoint a Democrat. dubya won the state in 2004 by more than a quarter million votes, and I remember the ultimately joyous near-all-nighter I pulled to watch Webb defeat the self-besieged George Allen in 2006.
Webb has many strong attributes that he could bring to the Democratic ticket in November if he were to be nominated as VP. To some degree, he could counter John McCain. Webb is a Naval Academy graduate; he was first in his class of 243 at the Marine Corps Officers' Basic School in Quantico, Virginia; and he served with the Fifth Marine Regiment in Vietnam. Webb received his J.D. at Georgetown University Law Center in 1975, and has extensive experience with Veterans Affairs.
But there’s another side to Jim Webb that I find particularly appealing: he’s literate. He has written eight books, “including six best-selling novels, and has worked extensively as a screenwriter and producer in Hollywood. He taught literature at the Naval Academy…, has traveled worldwide as a journalist, and earned an Emmy Award…for his PBS coverage of the U.S. Marines in Beirut.” He was an embedded journalist in Afghanistan in 2004; he is an original co-sponsor of bills pertaining to “stronger ethics rules, prescription drug pricing negotiations, the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, stem cell research, energy/global warming, college affordability and rebuilding the military” (quoted from his website).
In other words, he’s a Renaissance Man. I think he would be a tremendous asset to the Democratic ticket.
On the down side, he presented the Democratic response to one of dubya’s speeches last year, and wasn’t energizing. But he was thrust into that artificial situation early in his senatorial career. Senator Webb can be worked with in his speechifying, as President Eisenhower was many years ago when it was obvious that Ike had trouble expressing what were actually pretty intelligent thoughts.
(5) Sherrod Brown was elected to the Senate from Ohio in November 2006, defeating the Republican incumbent 56% to 44%. That is a very impressive win in a state whose citizens, two years earlier, had trouble touching the voter-screen, much less voting intelligently. Seriously, at 55 years old Brown has a long and popular history in Ohio, and could be a great asset to the Democratic ticket. If one looks at his accomplishments in his several elected offices, one would think he’s an Eagle scout. And, actually, he is. If BO heads the ticket, having two candidates from the Midwest would not provide geographical diversity, but Brown looks like a centrist to me, and clearly appeals to “middle America.” If Brown were to become VP, Democratic governor Ted Strickland would appoint a Democrat to replace him, thus protecting the party’s very slim majority in the Senate (even if they don’t gain seats in November).
These last three blog-posts (#7,8,9) contain discussions of possible VP candidates on the Democratic ticket from among current Democratic governors and senators. I invite your ideas and comments. The next post will discuss a potential problem that can arise from the currently scheduled national conventions of both major parties.
triton
On February 17, in post #7 I talked about the Democratic governors who might be considered as VP candidates to run with Barack Obama or Hillary Rodham Clinton. Associated Press writer Liz Sidoti discusses six Democratic governors (published on Saturday, Feb. 23).
---------- ---------- ----------
[quoting from Sidoti's article:]
1. Janet Napolitano, Arizona. Age 50, she has proven that she can attract independents and crossover Republicans. In any other year, she could help Democrats capitalize on a changing Southwest. This year that would be tough; McCain is an Arizona senator. But she backed Obama and he might find it advantageous to choose a woman if he wins the nomination.
2. Kathleen Sebelius, Kansas. She knows how to win — twice — in a state that's solidly Republican in presidential elections, which could help the Democratic nominee expand the playing field. Age 59, she has a moderate image and is politically savvy. She's another woman who backed Obama and campaigned for him.
3. Bill Richardson, New Mexico. He ran for president this year but dropped out after poor showings in a celebrity-packed field. A Hispanic who is 60, he appeals to an up-for-grabs constituency in a politically shifting region. He has foreign policy experience.
4. Ted Strickland, Ohio. A big-time Clinton backer, he probably would only be considered for the slot if she wins the nomination. Strickland, 66, had a generally moderate voting record in Congress, and could help deliver the pivotal state for her.
5. Tim Kaine, Virginia. He's another Democrat who ran as a moderate and proved he can win in a state that leans Republican in presidential elections. Virginia, too, is a potential swing state that he could help turn Democratic. Kaine, 49, backed Obama early.
6. Joe Manchin, West Virginia. This first term governor, 60, is popular in the state, and could help put a state that Bush won twice into the Democratic column. He is known nationally for his legislative efforts following several deadly mine accidents.
---------- ---------- ----------
Sidoti maintains that a governor would make a good running mate because the governor has “management experience” that the senators running as the presidential candidates don’t have. That’s a good point. But not good enough. Members of the cabinet can be managers; presidential advisors can be managers; hell, managers can be managers. Besides, no Vice President is going to “manage” a president. Oh. Wait….
Before I move on to the Senators, Part 2, let me comment why I think that four of Sidoti’s ‘nominees’ probably wouldn’t work out for the Democrats.
Napolitano and Sebelius because they’re women, and the Democrats will have either a minority or a woman at the head of the ticket. Somewhere in there they need a white male. Too bluntly stated on my part? Sure. But let’s be honest about what we're probably asking the American voting public to accept: either an African American or a female to be president, when we’ve never had either nominated at the head of a major party ticket? Add a female in the VP slot (or, if HRC gets the presidential nomination, two females on the ticket)? I don't think so. I’m hoping, Hoping, HOPING that our country is ready for an African American or a female to be our president; I’m not willing to push the envelope all the way to the edge. If we do, John McCain will be the next president. He may be, anyway, but let’s at least have a fighting chance.
Richardson and Strickland were on my post #7 lists. Richardson is eminently qualified but would bring only five electoral votes with him. Strickland might help carry Ohio, as might the state’s Democratic senator, Sherrod Brown (see below in the main body of this current post); neither would provide much geographical diversity but, if either can carry Ohio for the Democrats, who cares?
Neither Tim Kaine (Va) nor Joe Manchin (WVa) made the cut onto my VP list, not through any failings of their own, but because I had other, in my view stronger, possibilities. If we’re going to make a play for Virginia’s thirteen electoral votes, I think Sen. James Webb (see below) would make a stronger candidate; and West Virginia (like New Mexico) has only five electoral votes.
Any one of my five choices below is more likely to bring more electoral votes to the Democratic column in November, than are Kaine and Manchin.
And that’s my goal in this blog: to examine how the Democratic ticket can get 270 electoral votes. It ain’t sexy, but it's practical, and the more I learn about John McCain’s proposed policies, the more I realize a Democratic victory in November is very necessary.
End of digression/regression.
At least four of the following senators (and possibly all five) could provide a major boost to the Democratic ticket in November. Their records in elected office portray them as moderates, centrists, whatever it is in the middle of the political spectrum; and they have shown surprising strength in their political races, even though one of them actually won very narrowly (against an incumbent who put his foot in his mouth, in a state that dubya had won two years earlier, 54% to 46%).
(1) Evan Bayh may be from Indiana, but he’s no(e) Dan(e) Quayle(e). dubya won Indiana very easily--60% to 39%--in 2004. Evan Bayh is former governor of the state, and is the son of Indiana’s former senator, Birch Bayh, a progressive Democrat in the 1960s and ‘70s. Evan Bayh is in his second term as senator, but it’s hard to tell what he has actually accomplished. His website is surprisingly unsubstantial: ‘Senator Bayh has helped with this, and participated in that’ sort of listings. So I might add, “And he’s no Birch Bayh either.” Nonetheless, he’s from a state that would go a long way toward putting a Democrat in the White House if it could go blue in November. And Bayh looks the part of a VP. Too superficial? Of course. And he might not work as VP candidate if Obama becomes the presidential nominee—too geographically close; besides, Bayh has already endorsed Hillary. Nonetheless, I’m having trouble getting past the thought of Indiana’s eleven electoral votes possibly in the Democratic column. Bayh does present a potential logistical problem for the Democrats if he runs for VP and is elected: Mitch Daniels, the Republican governor of Indiana, would appoint a Republican as the replacement senator. So, unless the Democrats pick up additional Senate seats, they could actually lose the slim Senate majority they now enjoy.
Give me a minute; maybe I’ll get past my consideration of Evan Bayh…. Nope, I didn’t. Bayh is a dark horse VP candidate, especially should HRC get the nomination.
(2) As I mentioned in discussing the governors, the Democratic national convention is in Colorado this year, and the governor is a Democrat. So is one of the senators, Ken Salazar, elected in 2004. His political positions are all over the map—strong national defense and homeland security, economic opportunity, agriculture, health care affordability, protecting the environment. In other words, he seems to average out as a centrist. And he might be able to bring some of the Rocky Mountain states into the blue column.
(3) Lordy lordy, but I hate to bring up Florida, given its 2000 debacle. “If you like the way we vote, you should see us drive!” was one of the many jokes that came out of that election. dubya was another, but much less funny. Still, I have to bring Florida to the blog, and with good reason. Senator Bill Nelson describes himself as “a principled family man, a staunch advocate for all Floridians and a moderate voice in the increasingly partisan world of national politics.” His position as a political moderate is reinforced by his being a member of the centrist Democratic Leadership Council
Even before being elected to the Senate in 2000 (and certainly since then), he has worked to prevent oil drilling off Florida’s coast; he has worked to insure that veterans and their spouses get the benefits and health care they deserve; he has worked to provide Medicare prescription drug benefits for seniors at a government-negotiated lower cost from the drug companies. His support of veterans and senior citizens are virtuous positions, and he has at least one additional advantage: in January 1986, Bill Nelson spent six days orbiting Earth as a mission specialist aboard the space shuttle Columbia. So he really can claim to have a global view of what's going on. Literally. He may not be John Glenn, but he’s got a lot of strengths that can help the Democratic ticket. And he would provide a big boost in an important state that could, once again, swing the election.
One potential problem: the governor of Florida is a Republican who, should Nelson become VP, would appoint a Republican senator, possibly eliminating the Democratic majority in the Senate.
(4) This would not be a problem if Jim Webb of Virginia were the VP nominee. Tim Kaine, the governor of Virginia, is a Democrat (is that POSSIBLE??), and would appoint a Democrat. dubya won the state in 2004 by more than a quarter million votes, and I remember the ultimately joyous near-all-nighter I pulled to watch Webb defeat the self-besieged George Allen in 2006.
Webb has many strong attributes that he could bring to the Democratic ticket in November if he were to be nominated as VP. To some degree, he could counter John McCain. Webb is a Naval Academy graduate; he was first in his class of 243 at the Marine Corps Officers' Basic School in Quantico, Virginia; and he served with the Fifth Marine Regiment in Vietnam. Webb received his J.D. at Georgetown University Law Center in 1975, and has extensive experience with Veterans Affairs.
But there’s another side to Jim Webb that I find particularly appealing: he’s literate. He has written eight books, “including six best-selling novels, and has worked extensively as a screenwriter and producer in Hollywood. He taught literature at the Naval Academy…, has traveled worldwide as a journalist, and earned an Emmy Award…for his PBS coverage of the U.S. Marines in Beirut.” He was an embedded journalist in Afghanistan in 2004; he is an original co-sponsor of bills pertaining to “stronger ethics rules, prescription drug pricing negotiations, the recommendations of the 9/11 Commission, stem cell research, energy/global warming, college affordability and rebuilding the military” (quoted from his website).
In other words, he’s a Renaissance Man. I think he would be a tremendous asset to the Democratic ticket.
On the down side, he presented the Democratic response to one of dubya’s speeches last year, and wasn’t energizing. But he was thrust into that artificial situation early in his senatorial career. Senator Webb can be worked with in his speechifying, as President Eisenhower was many years ago when it was obvious that Ike had trouble expressing what were actually pretty intelligent thoughts.
(5) Sherrod Brown was elected to the Senate from Ohio in November 2006, defeating the Republican incumbent 56% to 44%. That is a very impressive win in a state whose citizens, two years earlier, had trouble touching the voter-screen, much less voting intelligently. Seriously, at 55 years old Brown has a long and popular history in Ohio, and could be a great asset to the Democratic ticket. If one looks at his accomplishments in his several elected offices, one would think he’s an Eagle scout. And, actually, he is. If BO heads the ticket, having two candidates from the Midwest would not provide geographical diversity, but Brown looks like a centrist to me, and clearly appeals to “middle America.” If Brown were to become VP, Democratic governor Ted Strickland would appoint a Democrat to replace him, thus protecting the party’s very slim majority in the Senate (even if they don’t gain seats in November).
These last three blog-posts (#7,8,9) contain discussions of possible VP candidates on the Democratic ticket from among current Democratic governors and senators. I invite your ideas and comments. The next post will discuss a potential problem that can arise from the currently scheduled national conventions of both major parties.
triton
Sunday, February 17, 2008
#7 The Governors
My freshman chemistry instructor years ago was a graduate student who tried to teach us to go with the results of our experiments, and then find a way to validate those results by “making the math come out right.” I never understood how that could work, when the math part was less susceptible to human error than was my spilling the chemical residue out of the test tube before weighing it.
Based on the last two presidential elections, I am not very confident that a large majority of voters will necessarily vote for the candidate who has strong qualifications and the best proposals for dealing with the problems our country faces. In 2000, dubya was in no objective way more qualified than Al Gore (though I suspect that some voters thought dubya had more personality, and voted for him for that reason. Go figure. yeesh.). And by 2004, it should have been clear--God knows it was clear to me, and I’m not that good at reading subtleties--that dubya and his advisors were clueless and, worse, careless about how to create policies that would be good for America and the rest of the world. In other words, somewhere along the line in these last two presidential elections, a whole bunch of voters spilled their chemical residue on the way to weighing it, and never did get the right answer.
Still, I cling to the hope that Reason will prevail, and that American voters, having seen the disastrous results of dubya’s economic, educational, environmental, and foreign policies, will vote to change the direction in which our country has been heading for eight years.
Theoretically, the way to win a presidential election is to have the right candidates and the right policies. Practically, the way to win the election is to get 270 or more electoral votes. That’s the math.
The Democrats need to select a qualified presidential candidate (we happen to have two qualified candidates right now), AND find a way to make the candidate palatable to enough red state voters so that the candidate can win enough electoral votes to be elected. That means, holding on to the blue states and shifting eighteen 2004 red state electoral votes to blue. That’s also the math.
I believe this year that choosing the right Vice Presidential candidate is particularly important in order to ‘make the math come out right.’
Balance, Geographically and Politically: the Governors
Whether BO or HRC is nominated as the presidential candidate, the VP candidate needs to be viewed as more of a moderate, possibly needs to come from a different region of the country, and almost definitely needs to come from a state that was weakly blue (and perhaps can be firmed up) or that went red in 2004 and might be able to shift on the spectrum to blue. It might be helpful if the VP nominee were not also a senator, though I don’t think this is a major issue. In 1992, Clinton and Gore violated most of the precepts I just listed, and they won; but that was Bill’s doing…and the economy’s.
Obviously, given my own oft-stated preference for him in all matters presidential, Bill Richardson, governor of New Mexico, looks like a good VP choice. He certainly has name recognition from serving in the House of Representatives, serving as UN ambassador, serving as Clinton’s Secretary of the Interior, serving now as Governor of NM.
Two problems surface: New Mexico has only five electoral votes, and Richardson—as qualified as he is on paper and in real life—doesn’t excite a crowd, doesn’t ignite a passion among the masses who voted differently four years ago.
From not so deep down in my own mind, another concern arises. In 2000, with Richardson campaigning vigorously and publicly, Gore carried New Mexico by 366 votes. Yes, you’re reading that correctly: Gore and dubya each received 48% of the votes, with Nader picking up the other 4%. During the 2004 campaign, however, Richardson all but disappeared, and dubya carried the state by a little under six thousand votes. I don’t know why Richardson wasn’t more visible in support of Kerry, but he wasn’t. New Mexico would not have made the difference in the election, but I expressed surprise at the time at the lack of more party visibility by the governor.
Despite this last reservation, I can’t rule Richardson out as a possible VP candidate behind either BO or HRC, though a Clinton/Richardson ticket might provoke an unpleasant sense of déjà vu about the other Clinton’s administration. Bill Richardson would make a fine vice president, I agree with many of his policies, and he has had to deal first hand with immigration, which may or may not appear again as a significant issue in this campaign. If the economy continues to be the number one concern in poll results, can concern with immigration’s effect on our economy be far behind?
Besides, as VP, Richardson would be a heartbeat away from the presidency. Ask yourself whom you would rather have a heartbeat away—Richardson or Cheney.
Other governors are also possible candidates. Wisconsin narrowly went to Kerry in 2004, a difference of eleven thousand votes out of nearly three million cast. That narrow margin was surprising: Governor Jim Doyle and both senators are Democrats. Thus, it’s a blue state that the Democrats have to hold on to this year. Doyle attended Stanford before graduating from Wisconsin (Madison) and receiving his law degree from Harvard. He was elected governor in November 2002 against a seated governor, by running as a centrist who supported stem-cell research and a woman’s right to choose. He’s not well known outside the region, and his fundamental Wisconsin political positions are more left of center than the Democrats can use as balance on the ticket. Besides, if BO becomes the presidential candidate, the Democrats might do well not to have the VP also from the Midwest.
That would also work against Chet Culver, current governor of Iowa. The difference is that Iowa went narrowly for dubya in 2004 (fewer than sixty thousand votes out of one and a half million), and the Democrats could use its seven electoral votes in the blue column this year. Not enough to swing the election, but it’s a start. Culver, however, is also not well known, but he or Doyle could serve as geographical and gender balance if HRC gets the presidential nomination.
I’d love to see Kathleen Sebelius, governor of Kansas, and Jennifer Granholm, governor of Michigan, be considered seriously, but we may be pushing our luck to have a female VP candidate behind either HRC or BO. Besides, two years after Sebelius was elected, Bush won Kansas by twenty-five percentage points(!). Despite her personal popularity in the state, I don’t see Sebelius moving KS over to the blue states this year. Michigan almost seemed touch-and-go on election night four years ago, but then later in the evening moved solidly into Kerry’s camp. I expect Michigan to remain Democratic this fall, so we probably don’t need a Michigander on the ticket to secure the state. Probably.
On the other hand -- Ted Strickland became governor of Ohio a year ago, after some unsuccessful and then successful campaigns for the House of Representatives. In 1992, in fact, Pat Robertson, Pat Buchanan, the NRA, and anti-Choice forces (I refuse to call them “Pro-Life”) campaigned against him, but failed to defeat him. From my point of view, he’s got strong credentials. And we all know how important Ohio’s twenty electoral votes can be in a presidential election. Again, if BO is the presidential nominee, Strickland as a fellow Midwesterner would not help geographical diversity, but if he can carry Ohio for the Democrats….
One more gubernatorial possibility, especially with the Democratic convention there this summer: Colorado has nine electoral votes, and dubya won it four years ago by fewer than 100,000 votes. Bill Ritter was just elected governor in 2006 (taking office in January 2007), and so may be too new to his position to become involved in a national campaign. But he has very strong human services credentials (Alternatives to Violence through Education; United Way; the first Victims Services Network in the U.S.; food distribution as a Catholic missionary in Zambia). If not a figure of national prominence this year, then maybe in four or eight years?
If HRC gets the nomination, any of these governors save perhaps Bill Richardson could serve as the VP nominee. If BO gets the nomination, the Midwestern governors would not provide geographical distribution, which may not be as important as the electoral votes they might bring to the blue side.
As I gathered my thoughts on these VP prospects from among the nation’s Democratic governors, I was actually quite impressed by how qualified several of them are. It bodes well for the Democratic party for future national elections, even if none of these is chosen to run as VP this year.
Next time: The Senators
Based on the last two presidential elections, I am not very confident that a large majority of voters will necessarily vote for the candidate who has strong qualifications and the best proposals for dealing with the problems our country faces. In 2000, dubya was in no objective way more qualified than Al Gore (though I suspect that some voters thought dubya had more personality, and voted for him for that reason. Go figure. yeesh.). And by 2004, it should have been clear--God knows it was clear to me, and I’m not that good at reading subtleties--that dubya and his advisors were clueless and, worse, careless about how to create policies that would be good for America and the rest of the world. In other words, somewhere along the line in these last two presidential elections, a whole bunch of voters spilled their chemical residue on the way to weighing it, and never did get the right answer.
Still, I cling to the hope that Reason will prevail, and that American voters, having seen the disastrous results of dubya’s economic, educational, environmental, and foreign policies, will vote to change the direction in which our country has been heading for eight years.
Theoretically, the way to win a presidential election is to have the right candidates and the right policies. Practically, the way to win the election is to get 270 or more electoral votes. That’s the math.
The Democrats need to select a qualified presidential candidate (we happen to have two qualified candidates right now), AND find a way to make the candidate palatable to enough red state voters so that the candidate can win enough electoral votes to be elected. That means, holding on to the blue states and shifting eighteen 2004 red state electoral votes to blue. That’s also the math.
I believe this year that choosing the right Vice Presidential candidate is particularly important in order to ‘make the math come out right.’
Balance, Geographically and Politically: the Governors
Whether BO or HRC is nominated as the presidential candidate, the VP candidate needs to be viewed as more of a moderate, possibly needs to come from a different region of the country, and almost definitely needs to come from a state that was weakly blue (and perhaps can be firmed up) or that went red in 2004 and might be able to shift on the spectrum to blue. It might be helpful if the VP nominee were not also a senator, though I don’t think this is a major issue. In 1992, Clinton and Gore violated most of the precepts I just listed, and they won; but that was Bill’s doing…and the economy’s.
Obviously, given my own oft-stated preference for him in all matters presidential, Bill Richardson, governor of New Mexico, looks like a good VP choice. He certainly has name recognition from serving in the House of Representatives, serving as UN ambassador, serving as Clinton’s Secretary of the Interior, serving now as Governor of NM.
Two problems surface: New Mexico has only five electoral votes, and Richardson—as qualified as he is on paper and in real life—doesn’t excite a crowd, doesn’t ignite a passion among the masses who voted differently four years ago.
From not so deep down in my own mind, another concern arises. In 2000, with Richardson campaigning vigorously and publicly, Gore carried New Mexico by 366 votes. Yes, you’re reading that correctly: Gore and dubya each received 48% of the votes, with Nader picking up the other 4%. During the 2004 campaign, however, Richardson all but disappeared, and dubya carried the state by a little under six thousand votes. I don’t know why Richardson wasn’t more visible in support of Kerry, but he wasn’t. New Mexico would not have made the difference in the election, but I expressed surprise at the time at the lack of more party visibility by the governor.
Despite this last reservation, I can’t rule Richardson out as a possible VP candidate behind either BO or HRC, though a Clinton/Richardson ticket might provoke an unpleasant sense of déjà vu about the other Clinton’s administration. Bill Richardson would make a fine vice president, I agree with many of his policies, and he has had to deal first hand with immigration, which may or may not appear again as a significant issue in this campaign. If the economy continues to be the number one concern in poll results, can concern with immigration’s effect on our economy be far behind?
Besides, as VP, Richardson would be a heartbeat away from the presidency. Ask yourself whom you would rather have a heartbeat away—Richardson or Cheney.
Other governors are also possible candidates. Wisconsin narrowly went to Kerry in 2004, a difference of eleven thousand votes out of nearly three million cast. That narrow margin was surprising: Governor Jim Doyle and both senators are Democrats. Thus, it’s a blue state that the Democrats have to hold on to this year. Doyle attended Stanford before graduating from Wisconsin (Madison) and receiving his law degree from Harvard. He was elected governor in November 2002 against a seated governor, by running as a centrist who supported stem-cell research and a woman’s right to choose. He’s not well known outside the region, and his fundamental Wisconsin political positions are more left of center than the Democrats can use as balance on the ticket. Besides, if BO becomes the presidential candidate, the Democrats might do well not to have the VP also from the Midwest.
That would also work against Chet Culver, current governor of Iowa. The difference is that Iowa went narrowly for dubya in 2004 (fewer than sixty thousand votes out of one and a half million), and the Democrats could use its seven electoral votes in the blue column this year. Not enough to swing the election, but it’s a start. Culver, however, is also not well known, but he or Doyle could serve as geographical and gender balance if HRC gets the presidential nomination.
I’d love to see Kathleen Sebelius, governor of Kansas, and Jennifer Granholm, governor of Michigan, be considered seriously, but we may be pushing our luck to have a female VP candidate behind either HRC or BO. Besides, two years after Sebelius was elected, Bush won Kansas by twenty-five percentage points(!). Despite her personal popularity in the state, I don’t see Sebelius moving KS over to the blue states this year. Michigan almost seemed touch-and-go on election night four years ago, but then later in the evening moved solidly into Kerry’s camp. I expect Michigan to remain Democratic this fall, so we probably don’t need a Michigander on the ticket to secure the state. Probably.
On the other hand -- Ted Strickland became governor of Ohio a year ago, after some unsuccessful and then successful campaigns for the House of Representatives. In 1992, in fact, Pat Robertson, Pat Buchanan, the NRA, and anti-Choice forces (I refuse to call them “Pro-Life”) campaigned against him, but failed to defeat him. From my point of view, he’s got strong credentials. And we all know how important Ohio’s twenty electoral votes can be in a presidential election. Again, if BO is the presidential nominee, Strickland as a fellow Midwesterner would not help geographical diversity, but if he can carry Ohio for the Democrats….
One more gubernatorial possibility, especially with the Democratic convention there this summer: Colorado has nine electoral votes, and dubya won it four years ago by fewer than 100,000 votes. Bill Ritter was just elected governor in 2006 (taking office in January 2007), and so may be too new to his position to become involved in a national campaign. But he has very strong human services credentials (Alternatives to Violence through Education; United Way; the first Victims Services Network in the U.S.; food distribution as a Catholic missionary in Zambia). If not a figure of national prominence this year, then maybe in four or eight years?
If HRC gets the nomination, any of these governors save perhaps Bill Richardson could serve as the VP nominee. If BO gets the nomination, the Midwestern governors would not provide geographical distribution, which may not be as important as the electoral votes they might bring to the blue side.
As I gathered my thoughts on these VP prospects from among the nation’s Democratic governors, I was actually quite impressed by how qualified several of them are. It bodes well for the Democratic party for future national elections, even if none of these is chosen to run as VP this year.
Next time: The Senators
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)