If party leaders stay on the sidelines . . . Bernie’s momentum, Bloomberg’s money, and the front-loaded primary calendar will overwhelm the race. . . .
The stakes are far too high to simply wait, let the process play out, and hope for the best. A disastrous outcome is not just possible, it is highly likely without some form of intervention. . . .
[T]he only way to avoid the Bernie/Bloomberg nightmare is to unite around a single candidate and urge voters to follow suit — which I believe they would. When sensible leaders lead, voters tend to follow.
Here’s a letter that I just sent to Michael Bennet, one of my U.S. Senators (the good one) and, until recently, a presidential candidate. I’m urging Bennet, who dropped his long-shot POTUS bid in New Hampshire on Tuesday, to endorse Amy Klobuchar ASAP, and to urge his colleagues to do the same. I plan to send similar letters to ex-Gov. John Hickenlooper and some local Dem leaders, and maybe also make a letter-to-the-editor version.
PLEASE NOTE: Because of its intended audience, this letter starts from the premise that Bernie Sanders winning the nomination would decrease Democrats’ chances of beating Trump. I realize that not everyone agrees with that! I’m aware of Bernie supporters’ counterarguments, and I have thoughts on them. 🙂 I will (probably) write a slightly different version of this letter, intended for a different audience, which addresses those arguments, at some point soon. But because I know Bennet already agrees with me about Bernie, I wasn’t going to waste time arguing that point in the letter to him. Anyway…
Dear Senator Bennet,
As a Colorado Democrat, a fellow centrist, and an admirer of the sensible pragmatism that you brought to the presidential race, I write with deep concern that we are now barreling toward a fateful choice between two equally disastrous options: nominating Bernie Sanders, or wresting the nomination from him — likely in favor of an ex-Republican billionaire — after he “wins” the primaries, at a contested convention that would rip the party in two. Either choice probably dooms us in November.
To avoid these dueling nightmares, sensible party leaders need to come together now — not after Nevada, and certainly not after South Carolina, but right now — and unite around a single candidate who can beat Bernie fair and square, then win in November and prevent the cataclysm of a second Trump term. That is why I am writing to you. Yours is an important voice in the party; you can help prevent this disaster. I urge you to act now, and endorse Amy Klobuchar.
As you know, Senator Klobuchar is an experienced, accomplished leader, and an effective communicator of our shared Democratic values. She has a relatable Midwestern sensibility, and projects confidence and optimism, yet is clear-eyed and pragmatic. That combination is exactly what we need to beat Trump. Her message is forward-looking and hopeful; her mantra “I know you, and I will fight for you” will resonate in the heartland. For voters who are, as she puts it, “tired of the noise and the nonsense,” she offers the reassurance of experience, common sense, and obvious competence. Yet she is not perceived as a “Washington insider.” She is the only candidate still in the field who can run on both “change” and “experience.” That is a winning combination.
Moreover, while every candidate has a theory of “electability,” Senator Klobuchar has a demonstrated track record of not just winning elections, but winning by much bigger margins than other Democrats running on the same ballot. And crucially, she substantially outperforms fellow Democrats in rural and exurban areas, which is precisely where we must be competitive to avoid a repeat of 2016. That’s not a theory; those are facts. And they show that she can beat Trump.
But I fear she won’t get the chance to face Trump, and beat him, if party leaders stay on the sidelines in the primary. Without a major shift in the next week or two, it is likely that Bernie’s momentum, Bloomberg’s money, and the frontloaded primary calendar will overwhelm the race.
Time is of the essence. I understand the temptation to wait until Vice President Biden has had the opportunity to gracefully exit the race after making a “last stand” in South Carolina. But the calendar does not allow it. For one thing, votes are already being cast by mail, in Colorado and elsewhere. Also, crucially, there are only two days inbetween the South Carolina Primary and Super Tuesday, when 34% of the total delegates will be chosen. Two days is not remotely enough time for leaders to coordinate and unite around a single candidate. But coordinating and uniting after Super Tuesday will not work. Any such effort will be overtaken by events.
The stakes are far too high to simply wait, let the process play out, and hope for the best. A disastrous outcome is not just possible, it is highly likely without some form of intervention, as the delegate math and the primary calendar will conspire to leave us with only bad options.
We Democrats must learn from the mistakes of Republican leaders in 2016. Before they disgraced themselves by becoming Trump’s thralls, they wanted him to lose the primary, and they might well have defeated him by forcefully intervening on behalf of a single alternative candidate. But instead, paralyzed by indecision and cowardice, the party’s “leaders” chose not to lead. Their elective paralysis allowed Trump to parlay a string of modest plurality wins over a divided field (Cruz, Kasich, Rubio) into a big delegate lead, which he then spun into a narrative of inevitability, persuading the party that it didn’t dare “steal” the nomination from him. The rest is history.
To be clear: I would never, ever compare Bernie Sanders to Donald Trump on substance. Like every Democrat running, Bernie is so vastly preferable to the deranged, delusional, corrupt, authoritarian-minded narcissist bigot presently debasing the Oval Office, it is an absurdity to suggest even a scintilla of moral equivalence between them. If Bernie is our nominee, I will support him whole-heartedly, as I know you will too. Against Trump, we must vote blue no matter who.
However, also like you, I believe that nominating Bernie would be a huge strategic error that would make a Trump victory much more likely. As such, it is important to recognize, and to learn from, the obvious and important tactical similarities, not between the candidates themselves, but between the state of the race in our primary and the equivalent stages of the 2016 GOP primary.
Simply put: when a candidate has a very reliable core base of passionate supporters who constitute a decent-sized plurality (but nowhere near a majority) of a party, that candidate has an inherent advantage over a majority that is hopelessly divided among a splintered field of broadly acceptable alternatives. And that advantage can rapidly shift the ground beneath a party’s feet. When party “leaders” fail to lead in such a scenario, a cascading series of events can very quickly turn a previously unimaginable outcome into a suddenly inevitable one.
It is unfortunate that we do not use a better voting system, such as Ranked Choice Voting, which would mitigate such dilemmas. I hope you will support the broad adoption of RCV in the coming years, to make primaries fairer and more representative of voters’ true preferences. But in the here and now, the only way to avoid the Bernie/Bloomberg nightmare is to unite around a single candidate and urge voters to follow suit — which I believe they would. When sensible leaders lead, voters tend to follow.
As a constituent and a like-minded Democrat, I urge you to lead. Show the courage that Republican leaders did not. Endorse Amy Klobuchar today, and urge your colleagues to do the same.
The power to change the course of this race is in your hands, and in the hands of other sensible party leaders like you, who recognize the stakes and see the big picture. I sincerely hope that you will meet this moment by helping to rally your party, and Colorado voters, around Senator Klobuchar as a standard-bearer who will earn the nomination and win big in November.
Sincerely,
[me]
P.S. I explained above why I believe Senator Klobuchar is the best centrist choice to unite around. I suppose I should also explain why I believe the other centrists in the race are not the best choice.
Mayor Bloomberg is a billionaire ex-Republican whose nomination would seem to validate every criticism, fair and unfair, that has been lobbed at the Democratic Party by Sanders supporters and other liberal critics. He will never unite, still less inspire, the party base. I would vote for Bloomberg over Trump; I would vote for a pile of moldy cheese over Trump. But to nominate him would be the ultimate test of whether the grassroots is willing to hold its nose and vote for literally anyone when the alternative is four more years of Trump. Maybe they would, but no one can know for certain, and it is a risk we cannot afford to take.
Similarly, I believe it is too risky to nominate a relatively unvetted regional politician, brand-new to the national stage, with a résumé as thin as Mayor Buttigieg’s. I like Pete; I think he may be president someday. But in this election, against this existential menace, we cannot bet the Republic’s future on the untested hope that general-election voters would embrace him, when it is equally possible that they will judge him insubstantial, inauthentic, or otherwise unacceptable. We simply do not know how he will be perceived by the broader electorate, and we must not take the risk. The comparisons to President Obama, a generational political talent who had substantially more experience and time in the national spotlight when he ran in 2008, are inevitable but inaccurate. What’s more, the stakes in 2020 are so much higher than in any other election in living memory. Mayor Pete has a promising future, but he is the wrong choice to take on Trump.
As for Joe Biden, it is apparent that when voters see him up close, and compare him to the alternatives, they conclude that he is not the man for this moment. I must reluctantly agree. I have great affection for Vice President Biden; I wish he had run in 2016. I think he would’ve won then. But in this race he has struggled to articulate his message; he lacks a compelling, forward-looking vision; and he would be far too easy to caricature and demagogue as just another “insider” and a candidate whose time has come and gone. Joe is a good man, but he is no longer the best messenger for our message. More to the point, and in stark contrast to Senator Klobuchar, his fortunes are moving in exactly the wrong direction. Joe Biden will not win this primary, and his continued presence in the race only splinters the field, helping Sanders and Bloomberg.
I recognize how distasteful it feels to write off a former vice president’s chances so quickly, based mostly on election results in just two states — especially states that are so unrepresentative. (Therein lies another flaw in the system that must be fixed in the coming years.) And if the stakes of this November’s election were a bit lower, or the primary calendar less front-loaded, I would support withholding judgment on Biden for a bit longer. But wishing for a better process does not make it so. And in this system, with this calendar, a decision has to be made now. To delay a decision is to “decide not to decide” until it is too late for the decision to be meaningful, as the Republicans did in 2016. Thus, as Vice President Biden’s poll numbers continue to decline, he should be gently encouraged to exit the race, rather than play spoiler. Ideally he would drop out before South Carolina, or at the latest immediately afterward, before Super Tuesday.
Senator Klobuchar, of course, is not without flaws herself. Notably, she needs financial and organizational resources. A string of high-profile endorsements, by leaders rallying around her as a standard-bearer, would help tremendously with that. She also clearly needs to diversify her base of support — though in fairness, she has really only just been introduced to the nation as a viable candidate in the last few days, and I believe her base will indeed broaden as the campaign now shifts to more diverse states. In any case, again, if party leaders rally around her, that will inevitably help her reach new voters and expand her appeal. Again, the answer is to lead, rather than waiting to see what the polls say and then following them.