Writing for Fox New, Tom Del Beccaro, noted what Democratic journalists seem to be glossing over: "Joe Biden has always been a better prospective candidate than an actual candidate. He will gaffe himself to the finish lines." Del Beccaro wrote that Bernie will be the Democratic nominee.
A cigarette, martini, a staircase and Bette Davis — the 2020 election in a nutshellby Thomas NeuburgerThere are two groups of candidates in the Democratic candidate field. The first group contains people like Bernie Sanders. The second group contains all other candidates whom corporate Democratic power brokers will find acceptable. That makes handicapping this field pretty easy, at least so far. Note that it's very early days still, so this is a way-too-early set of predictions.
In June of 2017, Democracy Fund put out a post election study: Political Divisions in 2016 and Beyond-- Tensions Between and Within the Two Parties. Among the key findings two standouts were:
On Saturday, while Bernie was kicking off his 2020 campaign with a speech of substance, hope and love in Brooklyn, Trump was delivering a hateful scorched-earth address to the far right radical fringe of American politics, "calling the Russia investigation 'bullshit,' adopting a southern accent to mock his former attorney general, and asserting that some members of Congress 'hate our country.'"
Wilbur Ross, Secretary of Commerce-- failureWednesday we asked candidates what issues voters wanted to talk about out in the hustings. None them mention Putin-Gate and not even Trump was topping anyone's list. They wanted to discuss bread-and-butter issues that impact them and their families.
Yesterday, Ron Brownstein, writing for The Atlantic, had his corporate, anti-Bernie slant on full display. He wrote that Bernie's "entry into the 2020 race amounts to a big stone in a lake: It will generate ripples that touch every other candidate. But his own path to the nomination remains rocky unless he can attract a broader coalition than he did in 2016.
That video is the whole 30 minute CBS This Morning interview John Dickerson did with Bernie early yesterday. He explains why you should vote for him as part of a grassroots, non-Beltway, revolution. He doesn't want to criticize his Democratic opponents but I'll reiterate that had we paid attention to the centrist, "moderate" politicians in the mid-1770s, we still might be 13 British colonies. If we had paid attention to the centrist, "moderate" politicians in the mid-1800s, slavery might still exist.
Tomorrow's my birthday-- but the present I wanted most came a day early. First on Vermont Public Radio and then on CBS This Morning, Bernie announced he's running for president. Responding to a question from John Dickerson, Bernie said "I am going to run for president, that's correct.
