THE PRAIRIE EDITOR: Not A Few Skeptics

There are not a few skeptics about the political spectacle we are all
about to witness as an historic number of candidates compete to
become the Democratic nominee for president.

On one hand, there are those who think the political process ahead
will be instructive, substantive and useful in the eventual choice of
the Democratic nominee. On the other hand, there are the skeptics
who think most of the campaign will be little more than a bizarre
unreality show pitting publicity and other self-promotion gambits
against each other in an outpouring of sloganeering, manipulative
propaganda, and cynical deceptions.

The latter, the skeptics, also point to the excessive media bias on
both the left and the right as proof that only a minimum of authentic
information will be made available to the voting public, especially
before the first candidate debates in May and June.

So what can a voter do to avoid a spectacle of campaign duplicities
which might lie ahead?

I think a few key matters to look for when attempting to assess the
numerous candidates this cycle include personality, originality,
excessive promising (especially of new entitlements), experience,
and communication skills.

Let me detail each of these with some specifics.

Personality is always important. Not every candidate will have what
is called “charisma,” but a successful winner of a presidential
nomination almost always has an attractive and distinctive manner
and appearance.

Inevitably, the winning nominee brings some original aspect to his or
her campaign, either in strategy, fundraising, communications, or
choice of issues.

Politicians invariably make promises --- most of which are not kept.
Democrats, who usually favor increased government activity, often
promise more or new entitlements without credibly explaining how
they will be paid for or sustained. Free college education, Medicare
for All, and the Green New Deal each have huge price tags. Voters
need to hold candidates accountable for how they will pay for what
they promise.

Although it is clear that many Democratic voters are looking for new
faces, successful political management experience remains a
valuable trait for serving as president. Critics of both Barack Obama
and Donald Trump cite each of them for lack of such prior experience.
This is not about the age of a candidate. An older candidate might lack
experience, and a younger candidate might have a excellent resume.

A president has many roles, including initiator of domestic policy,
director of foreign policy, commander in chief of armed forces, and
spokesperson of the nation. Each of these require good if not
exceptional communication skills if a president is going to inspire
confidence and persuade citizens to follow his or her lead. Abraham
Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt and Ronald Reagan
excelled in communicating their successful presidencies, although each
were very different. Harry Truman was effectively plain spoken, and
John Kennedy was eloquent. Unsuccessful presidents often
communicate unsuccessfully.

These are just some suggestions for how to navigate the turbulent
nomination contests ahead, especially for Democrats who must
choose from such a large number of candidates. There yet might be
a contest for Republicans --- who would need to apply no less scrutiny
of their choices.

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Copyright (c) 2019 by Barry Casselman. All rights reserved.

THE PRAIRIE EDITOR: Our Peter The Great

He was America’s first public philanthropist. He made the first steam locomotive.
He invented Jell-o. He was one of the handful of men who was responsible for
the first transatlantic cable.  He put the first elevator shaft in a building, and did it
before the elevator was invented. He was the nation’s early equivalent of a
billionaire, who was an ardent abolitionist and also promoted the cause of Native
Americans.  At 85, he ran for president of the United States. He still is the oldest
person ever nominated by a notable political party. He lost (but probably affected
the outcome of one of the closest elections in U.S. history).

Yet few, outside his home town, remember his name.

Peter Cooper was born in New York in 1791. (George Washington was in his
first term as president.) He died in 1883. He was one of the greatest American
capitalists of the 19th century, and an historically important innovator, but what
made him a true visionary was his original and compassionate notion that,
having made a fortune, he needed to give much of it back to the community in
which he lived. Born in modest means, he routinely gave his money to
institutions and causes for the poor and for political reform. In 1876, at the
age of 85, he ran for president of the United States as the nominee of the
National Independent (Greenback) Party, He received only 1% of the vote, but
many of his then radical ideas later became normal standards of public policy
today.

His most enduring and visible contribution was a building, the Cooper Union,
which was completed in 1858. It was then, and is now, a school of architecture,
engineering and fine arts. It was intended for the poor of New York who
otherwise could not attend classes. Then, as now, no one paid to attend the
school’s classes. The only requirement was superior intelligence. Men and
women could attend, as could the young and old. It also provided the only
public library in the city of its kind, open to all. Since the day it opened,
there has not ever been a vacancy in its classes. It lists great artists and
architects, famous engineers and a Nobel prize winner among its graduates.
Over the years, its faculty and students became more and more
distinguished. Today, with 600 students, it is one of the finest schools of its
kind in the nation.

But Peter Cooper had a second purpose in mind with his Cooper Union. In
the building’s basement, he constructed a Great Hall, then holding 1100
persons, that was to be a forum for new and exciting ideas.

The most famous speech given there was, of course, Abraham Lincoln’s
two-hour address on the evening of February 27, 1860. Lincoln, at that
moment, was the darkest of dark horses for the Republican nomination
for president in 1860. The new party which had replaced the Whig Party
in 1856, now had a chance to elect a president, because the crisis of the
slavery issue had split the Democratic Party into a northern faction and a
southern faction. New York Republicans, however, thought that their
governor, William Seward, then the frontrunner for the GOP nomination,
could not win the general election. They planned a series of speeches, to
be given by prominent Midwestern Republicans, to find a candidate who
could win. Among those they invited, was Lincoln,  a successful railroad
attorney who had served one term in Congress, but had lost an 1858 senate
race in Illinois to Stephen Douglas (who by 1860 was the almost certain
Democratic nominee for president). Lincoln, however, could not come to
New York for the scheduled autumn, 1859 speeches at the New York
YMCA, but was able to come in February, 1860. By that time, the
organizers had moved the venue to the larger Cooper Union, opened only
a year before.

Lincoln’s speech is arguably the most important political speech in
American history. Not as poetic as the more famous Gettysburg Address
or his Second Inaugural, his bold Cooper Union speech destroyed the
pretense of the intellectual argument for slavery, and electrified his
Cooper Union audience. Lincoln had also cagily arranged for copies of
his speech to be distributed to the press, and within a few days, he was a
political sensation in the North and among Republicans. This speech
almost certainly made him the eventual nominee and president.

Cooper Union continued to be a forum for important American speeches
and ideas throughout the 19th century, the early 20th century, and to the
present time. After Lincoln’s speech, Susan B. Anthony, Horace Greeley,
Mark Twain, Ulysses S. Grant, Robert Ingersoll, Victoria Woodhull and
Thomas Huxley spoke there, In recent years, Bill Clinton has spoken there.

When I got out of graduate school and moved to New York in the early 1
970’s, I lived for a while in the lower east side, and passed Cooper Union
to and from work every day.  I did not ever go inside, although I knew it
was an historic building still in use. Later, I learned about Lincoln’s
speech there, but I still did not know until much later the full story of the
school and its remarkable founder, Peter Cooper --- a man who changed
history in so many ways.

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Copyright (c) 2007 and 2019 by Barry Casselman. All rights reserved.

THE PRAIRIE EDITOR: Twenty-Four Years Ago.....

Twenty-four years ago, I was the part-time executive director of a
non-profit, non-partisan foundation that had two main functions --- first,
holding periodic national conferences on timely public policy issues,
and second, hosting and escorting foreign public figures in the U.S.,
primarily those who were part of the United States Information Agency
(USIA), and later U.S. State Department, international visitor program.
I had co-founded the foundation in 1989 with my friend, the late Julius
Smith, a prominent attorney and local public figure.

Our first project was a  national symposium on low-income housing in
1990 with the new Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Jack
Kemp as the main speaker. I had gotten to know him in my full-time
job as a journalist who covered national and presidential politics, and
he graciously agreed to come to Minneapolis for our event. We also
invited prominent local and national Democrats, as well as non-partisan
low income housing activists and developers. The symposium was
about a then somewhat controversial subject, and running it was quite a
learning experience. We did not get much media notice outside
Minnesota.

For the next five years, the foundation’s primary activities were with
international visitors. Over the years, we hosted locally or escorted
around the U.S. more than 500 foreign elected officers, public officials,
businesspersons, journalists and cultural figures from almost 100
nations.  It was an eye-opening experience, but a story for another time.

Early in 1995, I felt it was time for another symposium. As an opinion
journalist and reporter about national politics, I had formed some views
about the importance of the so-called “political center” in
American public life.  I sensed that a national symposium discussing
“Locating the new political center in America” might be useful and
timely. Once again, using contacts I had made as a journalist, I invited
some prominent centrist U.S. figures to participate, including members
of President Bill Clinton’s administration, leaders of major centrist
organizations, including the Democratic Leadership Council (DLC), a
centrist think tank from where Mr. Clinton had emerged earlier,
prominent Republicans including then Speaker of the U.S. House
Newt Gingrich, and well-known independent and third party figures.

Although my roster of invited speakers was perhaps initially ambitious,
some surprise events propelled the symposium into unexpected
national prominence as its mid-December date approached.

First, it was the third year of President Clinton’ first term, and it was a
problematic time for his administration. A year before, Newt Gingrich
had engineered an historic realigning mid-term election, and
Republicans took control of the U.S. house for the first time in four
decades. Gingrich’s policy initiatives (many of them centrist) had put
Clinton on the defensive, and there was talk of some challenging the
president’s upcoming 1996 renomination or running as a third party
candidate.

Perhaps the most prominent of these potential revolts came from a
group known as the “Secret Seven” that included prominent centrist
Democrats former Senator Paul Tsongas of Massachusetts, New Jersey
Senator Bill Bradley, former Governor Richard Lamm of Colorado,
former Congressman Tim Penny of Minnesota, and former Senator
(and 1984 presidential candidate) Gary Hart, as well as former 1980
independent presidential candidate John Anderson and independent
Maine Governor Angus King.  Former Republican Connecticut
Governor Lowell Weicker was later listed in the group (causing it to
have a new media name, “the Gang of Eight”). Each of them were
self-described centrists unhappy with the leadership of both parties.
It was also rumored that Bradley and Weicker might run for president
in 1996.

When I asked Tim Penny to participate in the symposium, he quickly
realized that the event could be an ideal way to formally launch the
“Secret Seven” plan to push the major parties toward the political
center. I agreed to let members of his group headline the symposium
dinner, The luncheon keynote speaker was to be Speaker Gingrich
who I had gotten to know years before when he was a relatively
unknown congressman.

Although only three of the Secret Seven spoke at our symposium in
Minneapolis, it was major national news. Suddenly, our efforts to gain
a bit of publicity for the symposium exploded into front-page headlines
across the nation and in nightly network news stories. Some of our
invited guests who had been reluctant to commit to coming to frigid
Minnesota in December now virtually begged me to participate.

The second unexpected event, older readers will recall, was that our
symposium date ended up in the middle of a contentious government
shutdown pitting President Clinton against Speaker Gingrich. As the
the event approached, my staff and my friends all advised me we were
going to lose Gingrich as our keynoter. When I contacted him with
foreboding, I was pleased to learn that he fully expected to appear,
provided we could arrange for his live televised remarks by satellite
from a studio in Washington, DC to our event.  We scrambled to do
so, and some of generous  sponsors came up with the extra funds to
make it happen. Needless to say, Speaker Gingrich’s live remarks at
our symposium drew a standing-room-only crowd and national media.

Steve Scully of C-SPAN had grown up in Erie, PA, as had Tom Ridge
(then governor of Pennsylvania and a speaker at several of our
symposia), and as I did. I don’t think Steve and his colleagues needed
much persuading to televise our event. Usually, C-SPAN broadcasts a
program such as ours only once, but because of the government
shutdown, they lacked timely material --- so sessions of our
symposium were broadcast repeatedly for several weeks. 

(I realized C-SPAN’s impact when I made my next visit to Washington,
DC a few months later, and I was actually stopped in the streets several
times by persons who had seen me speak at the symposium!)

Al From and Will Marshall, the leaders of the DLC came and spoke, as
did Elaine Kamarck representing the president and Vice President Al
Gore. My friend Mike McCurry, the presidential press secretary (whom
I had met in 1988 when he was press secretary to Bruce Babbitt, then
running for president), graciously arranged for representatives of
President Clinton, including former Governor George Sinner of North
Dakota, to hold a press conference responding for the White House to
Speaker Gingrich’s remarks at the symposium.. Ross Perot’s 1992
campaign manager Orson Swindle participated as did Michael Lewan,
former chief of staff for Senator Joe Lieberman (later Democratic vice
presidential nominee), policy guru Grover Norquist, former President
George H.W. Bush senior staffer Jim Pinkerton, Ross Perot’s pollster
Gordon Black, several other DLC staffers, and many national and local
figures. Over the next decade, we held a number of successful national
conferences, but thanks to our outstanding 1995 participants, an
excellent symposium staff, and a huge attendee turnout, this one was a
high point of the foundation’s symposium history.

National pundits, including David Broder, Michael Barone, Tony Snow,
Jack Germond and Jules Witcover, weighed in, as did most of the nation’s
major newspapers, Also Time Magazine (which had  broken the initial
“Secret Seven” story), U.S. News & World Report, The Weekly Standard
and so many others, I stopped counting. The TV networks --- ABC, CBS,
NBC, PBS, CNN, UPN, CONUS --- showed up in force,, as did many
national and local radio programs. Participant and presidential scholar
David Kozak wrote a long piece about the symposium in Presidential 
Studies Quarterly. Virtually overnight we had become a big national story.

Why have I imposed on the reader with this little account of a
now-forgotten symposium that occurred twenty-four years ago?

We have just endured a government shutdown that matched a
controversial first-term president and a powerful speaker of the house.
Elements of both major parties are alleged too extreme, and after a
period of passivity, the political center and its issues appear to be
reasserting themselves. In 2019, many specific issues are different from
those in 1995, but many broader issues of taxes, spending, accountability,
transparency, and bureaucracy remain in the forefront.

After 1995, Bill Clinton moved decidedly to the center, and soon
compromised with and adopted several of Newt  Gingrich’s policies.
Budgets were balanced. There is no “Secret Seven” today, but there
are major figures in both parties, and independents, who speak out to
refute extreme views,  unsustainable policies, political correctness, and
just plain bad ideas.

In 1995, virtually the entire national media embraced the news story of
a potential political revolt from the center, and did it mostly fairly..
In 2019, a similar story is being treated by many (but, to be fair, not all)
in the media as almost a threat to national security

The political center is like the earth’s magnetic pole --- it keeps moving
according to forces in the core of public opinion --- just as the magnetic
pole is moved by forces from the earth's core.

Where is the U.S. political center today?

The answer might tell us more about 2020 than any poll numbers.

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Copyright (c) 2019 by Barry Casselman. All right reserved.

THE PRAIRIE EDITOR: Flipping A Coin With More Than Two Sides

The media appetite for measuring the prospects of individual
candidates for president has probably not ever been greater,
especially with so many nominally serious candidates in the
field for the 2020 Democratic nomination.       

At the same time, the attempts at ranking and measuring the voter
support for these candidates have probably not ever been so fraught
with obstacles and uncertainty.

The first obstacle was already apparent as the 2016 votes were tallied,
and its historic upset not anticipated in the interpretation of the polls,
even those published on the eve of election day. As has been pointed
out in their defense, many national polls were relatively accurate in
measuring the final overall popular vote (carried by Hillary Clinton).
But the presidential election is constitutionally an electoral college
contest state-by-state, and the nation-wide polls did not predict the
actual result.

Polling today has many problems beyond just pundit interpretation,
including locating voters willing to be polled, finding them available,
determining if they are likely to vote, and accumulating a sample size
that will result in an accurate measurement. Finally, at this very early
stage, polls reflect name recognition and little more. Only some of the
many expected to run have formally announced their candidacies, there
have been none of the all-important debates, and for now at least, the
first presidential caucuses and primaries are a year away.

Depending on a decision by the New Hampshire secretary of state, the
first-in-the-nation primary could be moved up a month or more, and if
it is, presenting extraordinary technical difficulties for the Iowa
caucuses which are supposed to precede New Hampshire.  To make
matters even more complicated this cycle, the largest-in-the-nation
primary, California, has been moved from June to just after New
Hampshire. There is a reasonable possibility that individual campaigns
might downgrade Iowa and New Hampshire, and concentrate their
early efforts in the much larger state and its much bigger number of
delegates. A decision by New Hampshire won’t be made before
September (7 months from now). The earliest debates in Iowa are
tentatively set for August.

In recent presidential election cycles, eventual nominees showed their
strength only after debates and primaries/caucuses began, and that
occurred with usually far fewer serious contenders than apparently
will compete for the Democratic nomination this cycle.

To further complicate assessing the whole field, the first big surprise
was the emergence of a serious possible independent presidential
candidate, Starbucks CEO and billionaire Howard Schultz. The leftward
march of so many Democratic Party hopefuls has not stopped, but party
strategists were reminded that their party still has many centrist liberal
voters.

About a dozen major Democratic candidates are now officially in, but at
least another dozen or more are likely to announce their candidacies,
including the man who leads in all early polls, former Vice President Joe
Biden.

A characteristic of many (but not all) recent cycles, especially for
Democrats, has been the emergence of previously less well-known
candidates.  Eugene McCarthy in 1968, Gary Hart in 1984, Howard Dean
in 2004 and Bernie Sanders in  2016 each made waves, yet fell short. On
the other hand, Jimmy Carter and Barack Obama won nomination and
election. It is interesting to note that, although the favorites won the
Democratic nomination in 1968 (Hubert Humphrey), in 1984 (Walter
 Mondale), in 2004 (John Kerry), and in 2016 (Hillary Clinton), they each
lost in November.

The most well-known Democratic presidential candidates in this cycle
are Joe Biden, Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren and Michael Bloomberg
--- all senior in age. The same is true for Hillary Clinton who has not
ruled out another run. But there are at least 20 younger and less
well-known probable candidates. How can such a large field be usefully
polled or otherwise ranked at this time?

The answer is: It almost certainly can’t be.

Months from now, at least one or two candidates, perhaps a few more,
will emerge. Until then, polls are mostly meaningless (if not misleading),
and predictions are like flipping a coin with more than two sides.

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Copyright (c) 2019 by Barry Caselman. All rights reserved.

THE PRAIRIE EDITOR: Media Daggers

Many punditry and other media daggers are already slashing away not
only at Howard Schultz, the independent billionaire centrist likely to
run for president, and at Michael Bloomberg, the former New York City
mayor who is also a centrist and a billionaire (but running as a Democrat)
--- their rhetorical daggers are aimed at any centrist, liberal leaning or
conservative leaning candidate, as an obstacle to the self-styled crusades
either to defeat Donald Trump’s re-election next year or to keep him in
office.

The decibels are louder on the left in this matter for  the simple reason
that the net loss of the large and critical number of centrist, moderate
and independent voters would likely hurt a Democratic nominee who
embraces the party’s currently fashionable radical agenda more than it
would hurt the president at the ballot box in November, 2020.

The anti-centrist campaign makes the usual arguments, including the
assertion that the current national political environment is so polarized
to the left and right; that centrists, moderates and independents don’t
know what they want because they have no ideology; and of course that
centrist are too few to elect one of their own. Each of these assertions
contains some validity, that is, a certain intense left-right polarity does
exist today, centrists are not usually ideologues, and this group of voters,
while large, probably cannot prevail with a candidate of their own on a
third party ballot in a general presidential election.

But, as with so much media bias these days, the anti-centrist arguments
distort reality and ignore critical facts.

Centrists, independents or moderates (some of these voters fall into two
or more of these categories) often avoid ideology because it frequently
results in stalemate of public policy. Ideological orthodoxy often
precludes political compromise. The way the national U.S. political
system works, compromise is a vital component of transforming policy
ideas into working solutions.

As for the argument that centrists, independents and moderates are too
few to elect one of their own, its presumption depends on the fact that
no independent has ever won a presidential election (Teddy Roosevelt
came the closest, finishing second in 1912). But Ross Perot did briefly
lead both his major party opponents in the polls in 1992 (and got almost
20% of the popular vote. determining the winner). Until 1960, no
Catholic had ever been elected president;  until 2008, no Afro-American
had won; and until 2016, no woman had been nominated by a major
party. And speaking of breaking precedents, until 2016, no one like
Donald Trump had ever won the presidency.

The sudden emergence of centrist political figures in this cycle, however,
is more than just about  a centrist candidate winning. It is perhaps more
about the fact that one major party has seemingly been moving too far
off center. To be fair, it could also be argued, as both Mr. Schultz and Mr.
Bloomberg do, that the other political party is led by too controversial a
figure.

In any event, the political canter in the U.S. appears to be reasserting its
veto over political party extreme movements.

Senators Joe Manchin, an atypical and moderate Democrat, and Susan
Collins, an atypical and moderate Republican, are examples of centrist
forces in the U.S. senate, and there are numerous similar examples in the
U.S. house. Several centrist state governors of both major parties also
defy ideological and parochial stereotyping.

There are occasions when centrist figures occupy the White House, such
as during the Eisenhower and the Clinton administrations. And inevitably,
voters reject candidates they perceive as too off-center as they did in
1964 and 1972.

So let the media daggers slash where they may. I suggest that, like stage
weapons in theater plays, they try to create an effect, but are only made
of harmless rubber. The drama of the 2020 presidential cycle, so far only
a comedy, is only in Act One.

Let’s see how this show plays out.

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Copyright (c) 2019 by Barry Casselman. All rights reserved.

THE PRAIRIE EDITOR: Minnesota Special Election Upset

A blue wave hit Minnesota in 2018 when all the statewide races were
won handily by Democrats (called the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party
or DFL in this state). State Republicans had hoped for better results in
2018, following Donald Trump’s surprise performance in 2016 when he
almost carried the state. But the DFL organizational, fundraising and
GOTV superiority carried the day as the liberal party won back control
of the state house, won all the constitutional offices, two U.S. senate
seats, and picked up two previously GOP congressional seats. The only
good news for the conservatives was their pick-up of two previously
DFL congressional seats and an expected win in a state senate special
election for a seat they previously had held. (The rest of the state senate
senate seats were not up in 2018.) The GOP now held a tenuous one-seat
majority in the state senate.

When new DFL Governor Tim Walz subsequently chose a DFL state
senator to join his cabinet, most observers expected the resulting special
election on February 5 to be won by a DFLer, especially since the
son and grandson of the incumbents who had held the seat for decades
immediately announced his candidacy.

The northern half of the district included part of the city of Duluth,
and had elected a DFL state representative. The southern half was rural
and had a GOP state representative. Donald Trump has carried the
district in 2016, and although there was no state senate race in this
district in 2018, when the two house race totals were combined, the DFL
had won by only 33 votes.

The GOP promptly endorsed and nominated the local GOP state
representative for the senate seat. A popular local figure, an electrician
and a member of a local trade labor union, he even obtained the rare
support of a few local labor unions for a GOP candidate. Yet he had to
overcome not only the well-liked family name of his opponent, but the
traditional advantage of superior DFL and big labor union GOTV
efforts. This formidable GOTV apparatus had, in fact, enabled the DFL
to head off a serious intraparty primary challenge only weeks before
the special election.

With so much at stake for the new DFL administration’s legislative
program (the GOP had only a one-seat seat majority), the DFL poured
considerable resources and effort into the campaign.

Hoping the DFL nominee’s youth and lack of experience, and the fact
that he did not live in the district prior to the election, would keep the
race competitive, and knowing that President Trump had carried the
district by almost 10 points in 2016, enabled the state senate campaign
effort, under Senate Majority Leader Paul Gazelka and his chief
campaign strategist Mike Campbell, to try for an upset, realizing that
their tenuous one-seat majority would become a much more
comfortable three-seat majority if they won.

Unknown and unpredictable factors were possible lack of support by
the DFL faction which had supported a woman challenger who
narrowly lost the party primary, and the notorious Minnesota winter
weather which is often at its snowiest and coldest in early February.
A factor favoring the DFLer was the fact that the DFL part of the
district traditionally outvoted the GOP part by about 10%. A factor
favoring the GOP was the presence on the ballot of a Legalize
Marijuana Party candidate who might likely draw votes from the DFL.

As it turned out, it was a relatively cold day, with little snow, and the
third party candidate received 2% of the vote. But apparently the DFL
political dynasty in the district could not hold for a third generation.
The GOP candidate, Jason Rarick, won by almost 1000 votes, 52% to
46%. No doubt his legislative experience and labor union ties helped,
as did the lack of experience and carpetbagging of his opponent, but
it was also a major political upset for the DFL which had only months
before swept almost every race, demoralizing the state Republican
Party and its supporters.

GOP strategist Campbell said after the results were in, “It was a
realignment of voters in outstate Minnesota. The DFL had won the
district for decades, and we were the underdogs, but we won back
a lot of working people in the distract.”

Mr. Gazelka, now the de facto leader of his party in the state, and
Senator-elect Rarick have provided local conservatives with
something to cheer about, but whether it will soon revive the state
GOP party, still reeling from 2018, is unclear as 2020 and new
elections loom.

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Copyright (c) 2019 by Barry Casselman. All rights reserved.

THE PRAIRIE EDITOR: Why Schultz Disrupts The Democrats in 2020

The news of Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz’s quite possible
presidential candidacy signals to the recently-energized radical
wing of the Democratic Party that their hitherto unchecked,
media-encouraged turn to the left, as advocated by Bernie
Sanders, Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris, Maxine Waters,
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Cory Booker and others ---at first
heralded in 2016, seconded in the 2018 mid-terms, and now
promulgated by many Democratic presidential aspirants ---
will no longer go unchallenged on the liberal side of U.S. politics.

Former Democrat Schultz’s challenge is particularly serious
because he can put himself separately on the November, 2020
ballot in all states, and give centrist Democrats and many
independents a choice between a controversial Democratic
nominee and Donald Trump. 

Radical Democrats are likely correct in assuming that a Schultz
independent candidacy, or another one with his resources, could
doom their chances to defeat President Trump next year.

Another maverick billionaire is running for president, in 2020.
Michael Bloomberg is running, as of now, for the Democratic
nomination. LikeSchultz, Bloomberg is a centrist. As such, he is
competing against the ideological tide in his newly-adopted party.
In New Hampshire a few days ago, Bloomberg spoke in sharp
contrast and critically to his radical rivals, emphasizing his issues
 of climate change and gun control, and dismissing the currently
fashionable radical issues of higher taxes, Medicare for All, and
other entitlement programs he considers unsustainable.

With so many Democratic rivals to his left, Bloomberg’s strategy
seems to be to win the mainstream and moderate Democratic
primary voters while his opponents split the party voters on the
left. But if former Vice President Joe Biden enters the race, he
might also take many centrist party voters from Bloomberg.

As the political season advances, Mr. Bloomberg might wish he
had chosen the independent route as Mr. Schulz has done.
Although both men are very successful businessmen, Bloomberg
was an outstanding mayor of New York City, and has proven
himself as an effective political executive in problematic
circumstances. But he faces a daunting challenge as a rare
centrist/moderate in political party careening to the left.

Meanwhile, Howard Schultz has indicated that he has already
carefully prepared for an independent campaign, and seems to
judge the negative response to him by Democratic leaders as a
reinforcement to his 2020 campaign strategy. He clearly poses a
potential dilemma for the more radical wing of the Democratic
Party, but it is very early in the cycle, and how the primary/caucus
component of the presidential election plays out remains to be
seen and heard.

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Copyright (c) 2019 by Barry Casselman. All rights reserved.