All early polls are implicitly name recognition polls.
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Heās gotten like zero media attention, but I think heāll do well in the debates. Heās very used to being in front of the cameras.
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Itās really not.
Last paragraph is right on the money. (Sorry. I scrolled ahead.)
I hope the Democrats pick among the younger field. Joe may be a great guy, but he is a bungler on the fly. Bernie will be painted as some crazy socialist and both are too OLD. My biggest worry is that the field is too big and there will be to many in the primaries watering down the vote among some really good candidates. The group needs to be weeded out early, so one or two besides Joe and Bernie can emerge. I know that every election it is said that this is a critical election, but this has to be the most critical in history. Trump is pure evil and the GOP doesnāt care as long as they keep the WH.
On an aside, I hope the DEMs hold hearings, jail the bastards that wonāt show up, but stop short of impeachment. Let the daily news cycle with hearings educate the public and do the damage to Trumpā¦drip, drip, drip. While this is going on, they need to tackle healthcare and drug prices. That seems to be the #1 issue people everywhere are concerned about. Climate and trade are big issues in the middle of the country too. Trump has some real vulnerabilities.
I have some qualms about Beto but there is still time for him to get his act together.
Charm alone wonāt do it, but itās a critical factor. My personal mantra about elections is that theyāre 2/3 marketing and 1/3 policy, and that may be too generous on how important selling policy is. There is a reason why Kennedy and Obama were successful, and it wasnāt much about policy.
Trump has the authoritarian version of high charisma. He nails it for a certain type of voter who wants a Daddy figure. That was Reaganās appeal too.
I agree that we shouldnāt be looking only at high charisma and nothing else, but we sure could use a bucket-load of it this time as an added factor, like we had with Obama.
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The media take Iāve read on Booker so far, is that his main message is Love thy Neighbor including Republicans, we need to pull the country together etc. And that message is landing with a thud because Dems are looking for a fight with Trump. Well, thatās the media take anyway. Not sure how accurate that is, but that does seem to be how heās planning to set himself apart from the rest of the crowd.
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But I think thatās similar to many othersā, like Pete and Beto. Thereāre nuances but Iām not sure thatād be enough.
I think the problem with Betoās charisma is that the media was pushing it too hard for him (the VOGUE cover, etc.) so thereāre some backlashes right now. He does have some charisma, but the more the media gets involved, the riskier it becomes, because you donāt know what the media will do next.
Biden would be 78 at his swearing in. Heās really old. Heās a corporate Dem in an age when thatās no longer a good look. The Bankruptcy Bill will be made to hurt. I think heāll get skunked in Iowa and fizzle from there.
Bernieās core support will hold but he has no room to grow. Heās almost eighty.
After that, itās hard to see where this is going. You can make a case for several of the others.
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Polls have little meaning until the debates. Thatās when Senator Warren will reduce many to āuh, me too.ā Iāve seen her live. Her depth and breadth of knowledge and steadiness are unmatched, she connects well in a debate setting - and can really can deliver zingers.
I think she has real staying power for a long primary. And we need someone who can show the ridiculous side of Trump.
Weāve got some great candidates. Iāll be impressed by something about one of the others, only to think, What does he/she give us that Warren doesnāt? Then they tend to go on my backup/VP/cabinet list.
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I am reasonably certain that Hillary is much too smart to want to do that to herself again.
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Hey, but it would shake up the race, right? Give her a do-over? The media would love it.
Terrible on the optics though. It would look like pulling the rug out from under all the other female candidates in the race, who deserve their shot this time around. Nah, sheās smart enough to sit back and lend support from the sidelines.
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I donāt think she would either, but to the extent that she isnāt considering it b/c she doesnāt feel that sheād get a fair shake from the media, she should ignore that. These last 3-4 years have showed us how much of their stuff (and comments from other critics) is all bad faith, disingenuous, hypocritial nonsense.
Good take. Heās got a million dollar smile for sure, and articulates positions clearly and easily. I see heās launched a climate platform just today at Yosemite on twitter. All he needs now is bit of tiger instinct. Stare hard into the cameras and challenge Trump at every turn.
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I saw that too. If Beto will get energized and make some moves then Iām hoping heāll emerge from the pack. I would love it if he could have the same affect on the rest of the country he had on Texas. Especially young voters.
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Warren and Biden have a long history. Back during the bankruptcy bill debate Joe was the Senator from the credit card industry. He was anything but a populist. Liz was the leading academic fighting the bankruptcy bill from hell. Joe won and we have been saddled with a really crappy bankruptcy law.
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Yep. Really the GenXerās candidate. I didnāt follow closely in TX. But I think the post-mortem was that he didnāt go hard after Cruz. May just be lack of experience in the trenches.
I was not here for most of the campaign - I was in Taos. We got back for the end of it. I donāt think he did go after Ted. He had a campaign platform and he pretty stuck to it.
I was particularly impressed with his ability to make young evangelical women kick their pastors and their anti-choice positions to the curb and support him and vote for him (and I suspect swoon quite a bit too)
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Amen