Bernie's "electability"

At this point in 2016, the consensus among the talking heads was that Donald Tr*mp could never win the Republican candidacy, much less the presidency.  Surely, they opined, Tr*mp was too extreme, too unorthodox: the nominee would be a far safer candidate.  (Remember Jeb Bush?)

What the punditry missed was that it was Tr*mp's unorthodoxy – his disregard the "rules" – that powered his candidacy.  Tr*mp was a disruptor – a norm-breaking agent of change – and change was just what many voters desperately wanted.  It was the same impulse that helped Obama win in 2008.  (The black guy just had to be different – right?)

For decades, American optimism has been in decline.  Only a third believe their children will be better off than they are, and the data indicate that the majority two-thirds are probably correct.  Over the past three years, nothing has happened to change those attitudes.  A low unemployment rate makes it easier to find a second job when your first job won't pay the bills, but that's not a recipe for life satisfaction.  In the critical Rust Belt states, Tr*mp's trade wars have reduced the number of well-paid manufacturing jobs; and insecure "gig" jobs with no benefits offer little comfort.

The face of change this time around is Bernie Sanders, and his plan for disrupting the status quo centers around redistributing wealth from the obscenely rich to the rest of us.  Granted, the USofA already may be too corrupt for that goal to be attainable, but that doesn't make the goal any less attractive to the many who feel left behind, or any less valid if we hope to salvage some of what we call "democracy" in America.

Tr*mp's own weaknesses could make him vulnerable to any potential Democratic opponent (with the possible exception of Joe Biden), but cautious incrementalism doesn't inspire voters to flock to the polls.  The real "swing voters" aren't cautious moderates; they're angry malcontents.  Like it or not, Bernie is the Democratic Party's best chance to win over those voters and take the presidency.

Choices

For quite a while now, Americans have had a sense that something has been going wrong in their country — but they're not at all sure what it is.  In 2008, they took a chance on "Hope and Change." Those voters got cautious incrementalism, and the banks that had tanked the economy got a bailout.  In 2016, America wanted change again, and got Tr*mp and his insane reality show of a presidency.  Corporate America got its massive tax cut, political polarization sharpened, and that sense of "wrongness" grew more acute.

While the super-rich might prefer a Republican candidate with a more rational approach to international relations and trade, they are stuck with Tr*mp for 2020.  Meanwhile, Democrats are sorting through two dozen contenders — but the basic choice they have to make is binary: either a return to the cautious incrementalism of the reigning Democratic establishment, or a sharp move to the left.  Those worried about "electability" have to figure out just what it is that will motivate voters this time around.  Are they still hungry for change, or sufficiently traumatized to long for the unsatisfying but predictable patterns of the past?

Joe Biden, widely considered the anointed candidate of the Democratic establishment, looked terrible in the first debate: not just old, but confused and unprepared.  Perhaps he'll do better next time, but it's hard to imagine him ever being exciting.  Still, it's not too late for some other "moderate" to gain institutional support.  On the left, Sanders would be the easiest target for Republican scare tactics, but Republicans will happily call Tulsi Gabbard a  socialist should she somehow happen to win the nomination.

Personally, I believe we should reserve our strategic voting for general elections, and cast primary votes based on our beliefs and values. If we don't, our beliefs and values might never matter at all.

"Electability"

Joe Biden had a long, successful political career in Delaware; in part because he's good at local retail politics, in part because of consistent support from corporations and LLCs that flock to Delaware for tax advantages.  With regard to legislative decisions, Biden's approach has been "go along to get along" — a habit he likes to call "bipartisan cooperation."

Joe and Clarence, 1991

In national contests, Biden has been far less successful, due in large part to a bad case of foot-in-mouth disease.  He is notoriously gaffe-prone, and not especially good at explaining himself afterwards.  Needless to say, political junkies are gleefully anticipating his performance in the upcoming debate.  With nine others on the stage, though, he won't have time to say much of anything at all – so he's likely to survive.

So far, in the current presidential campaign, Biden's missteps have not resulted in any crippling pratfalls, but they haven't passed unnoticed.  For Anita Hill, it was much too little, much too late.  Then, there was his overnight reversal on the Hyde Amendment — just a little too fast to claim he'd "evolved" — and one only can wonder how he'll defend his strong support of the pro-bank, anti-consumer "bankruptcy reform" legislation of 2005.

As for working with arch-segregationists Eastland and Talmadge, he really had no choice: they were senior legislators at the time, and Biden was very junior.  Still, it was totally tone deaf to choose them as his examples: and anyway, they were Democrats.  Couldn't he name any conservative Republicans to trot out as his examples of collegiality, like Ted Stevens or John Tower?  That's what his campaign managers would have advised — if he'd asked.

Yes, it's understandable that many long for the relative sanity of the Obama administration, but too many people had had enough of that by 2015 — and Biden is unlikely to inspire the younger voters Democrats will need to win back the Senate.  Americans wanted change in the last presidential election, and they want it even more this time around.  Biden is just more of the same.

And for tonight's entertainment...

I just abandoned watching the Republican debate because I can't stand it anymore.  The South Carolina crowd is especially rowdy.  I wonder if they let them bring their guns?  And, if not, why not?  Republicans are supposed to be all in favor of such "liberty."

The craziest thing is that the only one making any sense at all is Tr*mp, who was (properly) dissing George W for lying about the weapons of mass destruction.  The crowd, all establishment donor class according to Tr*mp (and Cruz this time) was upset by that, and Jeb! got his panties all in a twist because Tr*mp was "attacking" his brother.  (Well, if he didn't want his brother attacked, he shouldn't have had a brother who got us into a self-destructive war.)  "Knowing what he knows now," would Jeb! still have invaded Iraq?  Tonight, for a while there, it was hard to say.

As for Antonin Scalia, you might think I'd be overjoyed by his death, but I'm not.  For one thing, I'm not overjoyed when anybody less than a decade older than me dies.  The other problem is that his death is bad news for Bernie.  Suddenly, "electability" gets a lot more prominent in the Democratic contest, so I imagine the Hillary people are dancing for joy tonight.  Crap.

Back to the Republicans: based on the hour of debate I was able to tolerate, the only one who might have had a bit of a boost was Jeb! — but then those are his donors filling the house, right?  Mostly, though, the candidates were merrily ripping each other to shreds, and I can't help but think the shredding is likely to take, and that whoever eventually survives the nominating process will not garner much enthusiasm among potential Republican voters, much less independents.

So although McConnell and the Senate won't confirm anybody Obama nominates for the Scalia seat, I still feel quite confident that a Democrat will get to nominate whoever eventually is confirmed.  I hope it's Bernie.  He could amuse me a great deal by nominating Obama.  After that, the Senate just might confirm anybody else.