I started out this cycle supporting Amy, was an easy choice ‘cause she’s the most electable of our twenty odd wealth of candidates. So I waited for Amy to announce (finally) and waited for the campaign to start (barely). After a couple months of that and seeing Amy barely registering in the polls, I gave up and endorsed the viable candidate closest to my politics, Elizabeth Warren.
So a few month later Amy is showing some belated moxie, and the campaign is finally firing on a couple cylinders with a whirlwind tour of eastern Iowa. While the Warren campaign has concentrated on Iowa and is MIA around my southwest Minnesota home, Amy’s campaign suddenly has staffers out here. Even has a wrapped bus for the Iowa tours, and probably another one for New Hampshire.
So what’s Amy’s chances? The statistical experts at 538 tell us that a candidate polling where Amy is has a zero to one percent chance of winning the endorsement. Heck, Amy needs a showing of 3% or better on another poll just to make it on the stage for the November debates. So the statistical reality check is that Amy is a really, really long shot.
That reality check assumes an average candidate though, and Amy ain’t no average candidate- I was along on a bunch of south Minneapolis campaign stops with Amy on her first run for public office in 1998 a few days before the election. The tour ended at a Day of the Dead celebration around dark, and while the other candidates called it a night, Amy stayed into the night talking to the voters. Couple days later Amy won a close race for Hennepin County Attorney while DFL Governor candidate Skip Humphrey who knocked off early lost to independent political upstart Jesse Ventura. Amy went on to easily win re-election and then three victorious runs for the U.S. Senate with such massive wins that she’s Minnesota’s biggest vote getter of either party this century.
So don’t count Amy out just yet… But how does she get from maybe making the next debate to good early state showings, winning the endorsement, and the White House? Well, CNN just popped another poll with Amy at 3%, and with multiple polls out every day just statistical noise will produce another 3% or better poll for Amy and put her on the stage. That gets Amy back on the debate stage where she can differentiate herself from the better known candidates and raise some more $$$ to beef up her campaign. Comes January and Amy and half of Minnesota’s democrats barnstorm Iowa.
Amy doesn’t win Iowa, but comes out of Iowa with a bunch of delegates and does the same in New Hampshire. Now a top tier candidate, just like she does in Minnesota, Amy picks up the support of primary voters whose candidates have dropped out and other top tier candidate’s supporters who are having second thoughts about the problems of forced Medicare enrollment, free college for millionaire’s kids, etc.. In the first contested convention in years Amy comes out the nominee, then easily trounces Trump, Pence, or whoever the GOP has left while bringing in a wave of democrats all down the ballot with her coattails.
So I’d rate Amy’s odds a bit better than the stats suggestion of 100 to 1 or so, more like 10 to 1. But with the declining interest I’m seeing in the current leading candidate’s campaigns and the enthusiasm of Amy’s supporters, I’d rate her odds even better!