Recent polls show Bernie Sanders climbing into a tie for first place in Iowa, a solid lead in New Hampshire, and a strong second place nationally. Joe Biden continues to lead the race overall. Other top-tier candidates, such as Warren and Buttigieg, are fading away.
If we end up with a Biden vs. Sanders race for the nomination — which seems increasingly likely — Democrats will have to choose between two very different ways to try to beat Donald Trump. Before we vote, we should consider the implications of each.
Option 1. Joe Biden. If we nominate “Regular Joe” Biden, the strategy would be to turn the election into a referendum on Trump. Biden is a well-liked and respected political figure with decades of experience, but he is not a great public speaker and he increasingly shows signs of advanced age. For a lot of people, the appeal of Biden is that he’s ordinary and comfortable — that he would bring back “normalcy” after four years of craziness and drama in the White House. This means a campaign that turns out enough Democrats, who would be fired up by the opportunity to vote against Trump, regardless of whether they like Biden or not, while attempting to woo moderate independents and “Never Trump” Republicans to provide the margin of victory. The danger would be that some liberals would not bother to come out and vote for a centrist and uninspiring candidate such as Joe Biden, but hopefully this would be outweighed by their desire to see Trump booted out of office.
Option 2. Bernie Sanders. If we nominate Bernie, the strategy would be to have the most epic election in American history, in which a fiery progressive populist goes up against the corrupt billionaire demagogue in the White House — and hopefully the American people decide to replace a fake populist with a real one. Sanders is one of the most well-liked politicians, but he carries the baggage of calling himself a “democratic socialist” and being perceived as very far left. Despite his advanced age and recent heart attack, he is full of energy and chutzpah. His campaign would need to focus on inspiring massive turnout by the Democratic base, young people, anti-establishment independents and non-voters, and working-class voters who have soured on Trump and are looking for (another) big change — without losing too many moderates who would easily vote for Biden but who might balk at voting for the much more liberal Sanders.
Which is better? I think there is a viable path to victory for both Biden and Sanders, and recent polls show both of them ahead of Trump by significant margins (see Biden vs. Trump and Sanders vs. Trump polling averages here).
The polls show that Biden vs. Trump is a lower-risk contest for Democrats. This makes sense because, as a former vice president and a mainstream politician, Biden is less of a wild card.
Sanders vs. Trump is high-risk, because Sanders relies more on unreliable groups of voters, and the hope that moderates in essential states such as Virginia won’t sit out the election. As a Virginian, I think Biden would win this state easily, but I could see Sanders at risk of losing it, because most people in Virginia tend to prefer mainstream center-left politicians rather than anti-establishment populists. Sanders might do well in Rust Belt states and win them back from Trump, but if he loses Virginia, he loses the election (see electoral college map).
Do you really want to bet everything on 2020? If we nominate Biden, the whole focus of the election would be on the vile character of Trump, and replacing him with a “Generic Democrat,” so that America can have a respite from the madness and begin to fix some of the damage of the last four years, rather than a debate about major new liberal policies. The country would survive. Progressives would live to fight another day.
If we nominate Sanders, we’re putting all our chips on the table for this year’s election. If Sanders is judged by the American people to be too liberal, and he loses, the progressive movement would forever be blamed for allowing Trump to have four more years to destroy the country — and destroy it he would. Sanders might be the last progressive ever to be nominated by the Democratic Party, which would retreat into a terrified centrism after losing a very winnable election against a corrupt and depraved president.
If we nominate Biden, and he loses, progressives will be well positioned to argue that two moderates (Clinton and Biden) lost to Trump, and therefore the Democratic Party must shift strongly to the left, and never again nominate another centrist for president.
But Biden probably won’t lose to Trump, because the large percentage of Americans who aren’t very political but just want some normal and competent president who isn’t scary or radical would come out to vote for “Regular Joe” Biden in droves, and that will provide more than enough of a margin of victory. And since Biden is old and already seems pretty tired, after four years as president, he’ll probably retire, and then the torch will be passed to a new generation — a much more progressive generation of Democrats, in 2024 and beyond.
That’s why I’m still for Joe in the primary. My political views are less conservative than Biden and less liberal than Bernie, and I wish we could have nominated a candidate who is somewhere in between. But it seems that most Democrats are determined to re-fight the old battle of 2016, with Joe replacing Hillary as the “establishment” choice. For the sake of the party and the country, I hope Sanders vs. Biden won’t be as nasty as the last primary.
I, for one, will do everything in my power to help Bernie get elected president if he’s the nominee. I like and admire him. I believe he would make a good president — certainly a very inspirational one. But in a year when the economy is humming along pretty well, I don’t think it’s the right year to nominate someone like Bernie, who argues for radical change. It’s a risky bet. If we were in a recession, I’d say go for it. But what most Americans probably want right now, conditions being as they are, is just some normal type of president who won’t rock the boat, except to throw Trump overboard.
Please think about this before you jump on the Sanders train.
Finally, I would like to ask my fellow Democrats, no matter who ends up as our nominee, please support that person wholeheartedly — whether it’s Sanders, or Biden, or somebody else. We just need to beat Trump. Full stop. And it’s up to all of us to help make that happen, or the country is lost, perhaps forever.