Riddle me this: What do Donald Trump, Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, and John F. Kennedy have in common? I think you know the answer. Before primary voting started none of them were given much (if any) chance of becoming their Party’s nominee. For that matter, Nixon (both in 1960 & 1968) had issues that greatly concerned Party elders, as did George H.W. Bush (there was justifiable concern about both the “Voodoo Economics” stuff and also what was known as “The Wimp Factor”, and George W. Bush his son – it was Jeb the family was grooming to run one day as “W” wasn’t considered by even his family to be up to the job. And they were right. Still, every one of these individuals wound up being sworn in as President of these United States.
My point is that over and over again conventional wisdom was flat-out wrong. “No chance” candidates have been winding up in the White House throughout our history, and recent history including the 2016 election which, by the time it was clear Trump was steamrolling his opposition in the GOP primaries assumed he’d get crushed in the fall. Conventional wisdom about what was certain to be has proven to be not so wise at all. To put it more bluntly, much more often than not conventional wisdom even at this point in a cycle has proven to be not worth jack you-know-what.
I mean it. One of the main themes running through the Democratic Primary process and discussion of it by voters, candidates, Democratic politicians & Party leaders, journalists & pundit and hell, even Trump and the Republicans is which Democratic candidate is best able to beat Trump this fall. don’t profess to know the answer to that question. What do know is that with each new election there is more and more speculation in print and on TV about “electability” from more and more “experts.” Btw, many of those “experts” be they on the journalism or professional politician side of the equation have made predictions, even bold “take it to the bank” predictions in the past that have proven to be flat-out wrong! They seldom have the good grace to even admit they’ve been spectacularly wrong (often multiple times) in the past, but even when they do kinda, sorta admit to an “oops” they do their Lucy with the football routine on a Charlie Brown public. THS time they assure us they really, really do know for sure based on their experience and “expertise” seasoned with a handful of interviews with regular voters including “undecideds” (most of whom are bullshitting them – they know claiming to be undecided increases their chance at getting to be on national TV) and I’ll again say these so-called experts don’t know jack.
History also tells us btw that voters don’t know going into the primaries what’s going to happen either – polls about who will get which Party’s nomination start literally years before the next Presidential year rolls around. Being the front-runner for either major Party’s nomination even into the summer before the primaries will begin is actually more of a curse than a blessing. IOW, voters themselves don’t really know who they want to represent their Party. So let’s do a quick review – before primaries get underway all that early polling turns out to not have been so accurate about who will face off in November after all. That same polling often is cited by experts when they make their pronouncements with a level of certainty indicating it’s all a waste of time & money to even bother with the elections. Ok, so some of the experts ignore or discount the polling because they are so certain they know better based on their experience, inside knowledge etc. and most of the time those experts turn out to be wrong too! Still, looking at how things have gone in the past if I were running for President the last thing I’d want is to be polling/viewed as the clear frontrunner during the year prior to IA and NH.
Also, let’s not forget this is all BEFORE we get past the nominating conventions and into the true, general election season and the bulk of Americans who with each passing Presidential cycle have less and less time (while trying to get/keep their jobs, take care of personal/family matters, and actually pay attention to details about the candidates & figure out what’s real and what’s not in the barrage of TV ads) , which so-called experts cite as though it’s gospel It’s not just about winning in November either – many a major Party nominee wasn’t given much, if any chance of becoming the nominee (in either Party) before standing at the podium at a convention and accepting that nomination. As I’ve noted, many have gone on to become President. Donald Trump wasn’t the first, and he won’t be the last.
So if you’ve read this far you’re probably wondering if I have a point and if so what the hell is the main point? It’s this. Vote for the candidate you like the best when your primary comes around. No one knows who is most “electable”, or as good as the odds seem to be at this point in time whether any of our candidates can beat Trump in November if we keep up the energy and drive up our turnout like we’ve been doing. I like our odds, but I’m not going to take anything for granted. Getting back to my point though, it’s this:
Anyone who insists they know who can best take on Trump is at best guessing. I’m not even sure anyone no matter how knowledgeable & experienced can make even a SWAG (Scientific Wild Assed Guess) so we should all just chill. More importantly since no one really knows even in normal Presidential elections what will happen (much less with someone like Trump as a candidate) or what the circumstances will be after the conventions (will we be at war, will the economy be in recession etc.) when it’s time for us to vote in the primary/caucus in our own states we should pick the candidate that we think would be the best President. That’s it in a nutshell. Evaluate the candidates based on how their proposals fit your own preferences, and how well you think they convince the country to support them (including pressuring their Congress Critters to support those policies) and go with that. I suppose it’s fair to factor in our feelings on how electable our favorite candidate is, but that should be down the list of thinks we consider & not first on the list.
And definitely not our “overriding all else” consideration.