There are so many announced Democratic candidates for president I confess that I have lost count. I have been an observer of too many elections to admit to, but I find this one the most frightening and challenging one in my lifetime. On my side of the political world, I have never seen so much passion to defeat a political incumbent as we are currently experiencing. President Nixon was deplorable and George H.W. Bush was frightening, but nothing matches the feelings about the people who want to dump Donald Trump from office.
It is fair to say that the field of current candidates ranges from the very young to the very old. The youngest of the crop, Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Ind., is an articulate and attractive candidate but somehow I have a hard time seeing him at a sitdown with Vladimar Putin. In the end, Buttigieg and Beto O’Rourke may cancel each other out with the youth movement. There are a number of governors, members of Congress and non-political people, but in the end the final choice will be the person who the voters think can best run the country.
Most of the candidates have associated themselves with strong positions on healthcare, pay equity, reforming the electoral system, women’s rights and climate change. One or two are one-issue candidates, such as Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee, who is focusing on climate change only. To my surprise, none of the declared candidates has uttered a word about foreign affairs and the challenges we face around the world.
Observers of the 2012 Clinton campaign will remember her commercial asking who do you want to answer the hot line at 3 a.m. when there is an international crises? That advertisement was her way of contrasting her foreign affairs expertise with Barack Obama. I know that our country faces many domestic policy issues, but isn’t restoring our relationships with NATO countries, developing a real Middle East policy and keeping Russia out of our elections just as important? The only person who is most capable of facing those challenges is former Vice President Joe Biden, who has yet to announce whether he is running.
All of the currently announced candidates seem to be reading from a printed list making sure that each box is marked to please some constituency. But passing some groups’ purity test is not the way to convince the voters that a particular candidate should be the chosen one. The country is anxious to anoint a person of real substance who can take on Donald Trump and send him back to his Tower and that’s the challenge to the current crop of contenders.
So for now let’s talk about the announced field. There is no question that all Americans want access to healthcare. Sen. Bernie Sanders is promoting “Medicare for All.” Some of his fellow candidates are supporting his version or some portion of it, but in my opinion “Medicare for All” is a losing issue. The voters are not stupid. In today’s climate voters are smart enough to ask who is going to pay for big promises? They will quickly learn that Sanders’ solution will cost trillions and result in massive layoffs of insurance company employees and not every American is willing to cancel private insurance to be in a government program.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren wants to break up the tech companies. Once upon a time she wanted to break up the banks. How does the federal government break up multibillion- dollar companies, absent a dictatorship? Kamala Harris has some good proposals, including raising the national pay level for teachers, which is sorely needed. Amy Klobuchar comes across as a moderate, deep thinking mid-Westerner. Corey Booker is a good senator with some passionate ideas, but he isn’t Barack Obama. New York’s Sen. Kirsten Dems sGillibrand doesn’t sound presidential and isn’t attracting much attention.
The great irony at this current stage is that Vice President Biden leads in every poll and is not an official candidate. It may be that the longer he stays out the better off his chances will be. For now the battle lines are blurred and your guess is as good as mine.
