Official 113th Congressional Portrait of Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) / Wikimedia Commons
A new PPP poll shows Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) with a slight edge in the 2016 GOP presidential field, while Hillary Clinton not only trounces every other Democrat, she leads every Republican candidate. Vice President Joe Biden trails Hillary by a wide margin, but interesting for Massachusetts is who comes in third:
Clinton continues to dominate the Democratic race, although her 40 point lead this month is down a bit from 50 and 46 points on our previous two polls. She’s at 52% to 12% for Biden, 6% for Elizabeth Warren, 5% for Kirsten Gillibrand, and 3% for Cory Booker with no one else above 2%.
In a Clinton-less field Biden leads with 34% to 13% for Warren, 10% for Andrew Cuomo, and 4% for Booker with no one else above 3%. And in a field without either Clinton or Biden the leader for the first time is Elizabeth Warren who gets 20% to 11% for Cuomo, 8% for Booker, and 5% for Gillibrand.
Unfortunately for Elizabeth Warren backers, the world does in fact include Hillary Clinton and Joe Biden. As a big fan of both Hillary and Elizabeth, I’d like to have it both ways – Hillary representing us in the White House and Elizabeth representing us in the Senate. But it’s a reminder that Democrats have a strong, deep bench for 2016. And a reminder to Democrats afraid of taking strong progressive stances that Democrats like Democrats who represent the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party.
And his nomination would really fracture the GOP. Of course he could continue to jettison is libertarian principles (as he has already on some issues), but the neocon Wing would likely flee to Clinton. Rubio and Cruz are overrated, Jeb stays out, and Christie is the Huntsman of the cycle (best general candidate inhibited by a radicalized base).
I could easily see Rand win IA and NH.
and that aide wrote a paper about how Abraham Lincoln was very much like Hitler. That Rand Paul.
the GOP is the PARTY OF LINCOLN. They said so themselves.
Anything that might have happened in the past century and a half (and specifically the past half-century) to turn away from that legacy just does not count. Didn’t ya know?
Racism should help him win a GOP primary sad to say, and libertarians from Rand to Rothbard to the Paul’s have an odd and twisted view of Lincoln and the Confederacy so it helps him win over old white people without alienating his flock. Too many grassroots conservatives still want to give war, any war, a chance and wouldn’t vote for him. I do think he has the potential to be the Howard Dean of the 2016 cycle, surprising early lead and then a blowout. The question then is, who’s their Kerry in that comparison?
Oh and for the record in case it wasn’t clear, I despise the man and his policies and am dismayed by how many of my fellow millenial a were enamoured with either of the Pauls. I am simply statig he is a real contender in a way his father wasn’t-which speaks well of his political talents and poorly of the GOPs extremism.
The GOP always comes around to nominating someone of reasonable electability whose turn it supposedly is. My prediction is that the nomination goes to Jeb Bush if he seeks it.
Could America be stupid enough?
This is the country that re-elected George W. Bush to a second term. For that matter, this is the country that elected a clearly-senile Ronald Reagan to a second term.
Sorry, but as far as I’m concerned, George W Bush was not elected in 2000, hence it is impossible for him to have been “re-elected.”
…but regardless of how Bush got his first term I think Tom’s point is that even after seeing Bush in action the country gave him another term.
Had the actual election results been allowed to stand in 2000, we would have had a very different history to start the 21st century. Alas a majority of Americans proved themselves all too susceptible to post-9/11 manipulations (although not as many as it appeared from the 2004 results, given the rather effective voter suppression in Ohio for example).
I appreciate and agree with the point you’re making.
Still, the fact that the 2000 election was close enough to be determined by a two-bit GOP hack in Florida itself adds a third example of the astounding stupidity of American public. Was there ever ANY indication the George W. Bush was anything different from the cluelessly inept and incompetent bozo he turned out to be, and whom we nevertheless elected to a second term?
I rest my case. đŸ™‚
He took his homesite for granted and ran as a family values moderate when he could and should’ve run as an environmentalist and economic populist. Nader would never have gotten nearly as many votes, put Floridian Bon Graham instead of Joementum or get Dick Gephardt to carry MIssouri and fire up labor in Ohio. There is no way either vote should’ve been close.
About fifty percent (I don’t remember the except count) of American voters looked at “George W. Bush” and “Albert Gore” on their ballot, and pulled the lever for Mr. Bush. I know I’m being elitist and arrogant here, but I still argue that that is a devastating observation about the quality of the American voters.
Remember, I’m responding to the perhaps rhetorical question “Could America be stupid enough [to elect another Bush]?”
My answer is “Absolutely”.
Nixon also elected and won a second term. By the time he was first elected, he was a known quantity, after being VP, his Checkers speech following his loss in the CA Gov. race, and his loss to JFK. A twisted man, he should never have been President, but the electorate thought he was good enough. We (and me, personally) were lucky to survive his time in office.
Anyway, there’s ample precedent for the voters making really bad choices. It would help if the choices they are given were better, but NH and IA filter out most of the good ones.
Objectively speaking, I can’t think of the last time one of our “turkey” Presidents (as in “a real turkey”) was a Democrat.
The worst Democratic presidents in my lifetime were Jimmy Carter and LBJ, and neither of them rose to the level utter turkosity as Presidents Nixon, Reagan, Bush I, or Bush II. Seriously, the worst offense of LBJ was his dishonesty about the Vietnam conflict — and to his credit, he acknowledged his error and stepped down. Mr. Carter may have been an ineffectual president, but there was never even a hint of dishonesty or deceit in the Carter White House.
Bill Clinton was far and away the best president of my 60 year lifetime. I am frustrated and disappointed with Barack Obama (especially his role in perpetuating US human rights abuses), but these shortcomings don’t compare to the flagrant lies and abuses that EVERY Republican president after Eisenhower has committed.
Mr. Nixon and Watergate, Mr. Reagan and Contragate, Bush I and Contragate (among others), Bush II and — well, everything.
If this were a successful private company looking at the success of recent graduates from Democratic University and Republican State, I suggest that the latter would no longer be invited for interviews — never mind hired. Sadly, of course, the executive board of that company would probably all be Republican State alumna, so the rest of us would have to keep turning down the flood of utterly incompetent incoming prospective employees.
The fact that the GOP is viewed as anything but a collection of right-wing fringe crazies is, in my view, the fault of corrupt and sold-out mass media.
Objectively speaking, of course.
What a frustrating legacy he has. How can a president who got us stuck in Vietnam ever be any good?
How can a president who pushed through the Voting Rights Act with an unrivalled reservoir of personal, single-handed determination, the man who got us to the moon, be any bad?
He’s almost as confounding as Andrew Jackson.
LBJ sees to have done so many right things for so many wrong reasons. He was segregationist when that was to his benefit, and supported civil rights when the tide turned on that issue. When I watch “House of Cards“, I always think of LBJ while enjoying the marvelously despicable character of Francis “You might think so, but I couldn’t possibly comment” Urquhart.
LBJ was, after all, shamelessly corrupt during his ascendancy in Texas. He was masterful at exploiting weaknesses in the government bureaucracy to his own (especially venal) benefit. As I recall, he built his career and his fortune by obtaining an obscure and then-powerless position in Texas government — he controlled the granting of radio station licenses in the state. The rest is history.
I agree with you that LBJ is an enigma, especially to those who want their public figures to be cardboard all-good/all-bad stereotypes.
…just for coining the word “turkosity”:)
I do think it would be reasonable for GOP primary voters to think he has a shot, however.
Far too many conservatives bought into the “Romney wasn’t conservative enough to beat Obama for me to think electability is on their mind. It would be interesting to see if Christie can bring the establishment and tea party together. He is the only candidate charismatic enough to
do it.
So does Vice President Jindal, Secretary of State Huntsman, and Defense Secretary Powell.
…with Virgil Goode running for president – we’d have the Goode and Pawlenty ticket!
does virtually nothing for me. It would be more years of a Bill Clinton-Obama “New Democrat” in the White House. I have a hard time understanding why she’s even in the same paragraph with phrases like “taking strong progressive stances” and “Democrats who represent the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party.”
Warren, yes. Hillary, not so much.
Prepare to be lambasted.
Hillary’s run for president was a turning point in history and means that everyone can now imagine a woman running for and becoming president. I will admire that forever.
That said, she was a hawk as a senator and hawks have hurt this country and its people, and other countries and their people immeasurably.
Now, in just six months, EW has shown a combination of guts and people-focus that we’re not seeing anywhere else.
When there were mentions of EW for pres right after she was elected I thought it was ridiculous. Now, sign me up and I’ll knock every door I can for as long as I can for her.
Hillary’s more liberal on domestic issues than Bill (and Obama), even if she’s no Warren. I also think she’d be more effective dealing with Congress than Obama, but maybe that’s just me.
I am still a little tepid on EW, likely for all, ALL of the reasons that you guys are all so high on her.
But one thing stands out: she has been surprisingly effective so far, and has the potential to be a forceful advocate for liberalism in the Senate.
And though I don’t necessarily agree with her issue-to-issue, having that force would be a good thing for the country overall.
Bill was on the whole not good for ordinary Americans, and I don’t see Hillary doing differently. The reason Republicans froth at the mouth at the mention of the Clinton name is because he took all their favorite positions away from them by implementing them. If all you cared about was having a D for President, that was a winner. Those of us who were hoping for a reversal of Reaganism were very disappointed, just as we’re disappointed by Obama. To get enthusiastic support from people like me, the Democrats are going to have to find somebody like Elizabeth Warren, but odds are they’ll wind up presenting us with another faux-Republican “centrist.”
I distinctly recall the longest sustained period of peace and prosperity in our history. Low inflation, high stocks, and millions of jobs – hard to argue with success and even with an Obama presidency there are times I still miss him. If Hillary is essentially a third Clinton term I say amen.
to come along at the time of a dot-com bubble. In the meantime, the 90s did nothing at all to reverse the gross disparities in wealth that started to arise under Reagan. Those were only exacerbated. Bill Clinton presided over the shredding of the safety net and the regulatory apparatus. Unless you think getting rid of Glass-Steagall was a good idea. Without even touching such atrocities as DOMA and AEDPA to coopt conservative positions, or NAFTA, WTO, and the (fortunately) defeated MIA. Or his big plan to work with Newt to privatize Social Security.
Bill Clinton’s administration pushed me out of involvement in the Democratic Party for at least 10 years.
I’m not disagreeing with anything you are saying here, but I thought it should be noted that the Clinton administration was when the Republicans started implementing their scorched-earth policy, whereby they would froth at the mouth whenever the President wasn’t one from their party, using any tool available to discredit the President and derail his programs – and to hell with the responsibility of governing. They worked hard at convincing their followers (via Limbaugh, etc.) that Clinton was evil incarnate. It has only gotten worse with Obama in the White House (or worded another way, they have doubled-down on their strategy).
I volunteered for the first Bill Clinton run. I couldn’t bring myself to do so for the second (although I did vote for him).
Nor was his plan to pay for a hundred thousand more policemen to patrol the streets. Nor was the Family and Medical Leave Act that he signed. Nor the Assault Weapons ban he signed. Nor the Minimum Wage increase.
Like just about everything in life, I can’t label Clinton’s presidency with “good” or “bad”. It was a mixed bag, and certainly several orders of magnitude preferable to what followed the next eight years.
Look at Obama’s legacy measure, the Affordable Care Act, the thing that his defenders always point to as his major accomplishment. It is another enactment of Republican proposals. Look at the NSA domestic spying. Started by Bush, actively endorsed by Obama. Look at the continuing failure to reform banking to prevent another 2008-style disaster.
The Republicans are going off the deep end because they can’t differentiate themselves from the Democrats without doing that. Again, if all you care about is a President and Congressmen with the letter D next to their name, these moves are terrifically effective – they get Democrats elected. They do not, however, further Democratic core values or enhance the lives of ordinary Americans. In 2008, the electorate handed the House to the Dems, and were rewarded with what looked like a timid majority unwilling to use the power to undo the damage of the Bush years. Two years later, they took back the gift of the House. It’s pretty clear to me that that was a vote of no confidence.
It’s often pointed out here that progressive values are actually popular nationwide. Why don’t they get turned into laws and policies? Because the putatively Liberal party is too invested in cutting the ground out from under the Republicans by stealing their Conservative measures. Getting “centrist” Democrats elected instead of far-right Republicans is a better outcome, but it doesn’t constitute progress when the resulting laws and policies are regurgitated Republican ideas.
Elizabeth Warren is showing what can be done by a committed Progressive. Why are so many in her Party not joining the effort?
One of the countless things I love about Elizabeth Warren is that she has basically instituted a very public political cost to Democrats for going against policies that benefit the average American. I. Love. That. Until now, most of the “cost” was if you went up against big money and lost those campaign donations.
Senator Warren is helping to re-frame debate in this country. It’s hardly a coincidence that suddenly President Obama is talking about the problem of income inequality in this country.
I was just thinking about how exciting a Warren run for the presidency would be; I was actually excited to campaign for her! Then I started to do some of the math.
Obama rocketed to the presidency, if Warren were to be president, it would have to look something like his trajectory. Not to say that this is impossible, but rather unlikely it would happen again. If Hillary were to be the nominee, i can’t see her running for a second term at 74 or picking Warren as her VP. Effectively closing Sen. Warren out of the presidency for 2 or 3 cycles. That would put her in her late 70’s.
I apologize if this comes off as age-ist; we have/had many effective legislators in their 70’s.
As you mention, it appears as if Warren can be the best progressive advocate by staying in the senate. Being President would require things of her that I think would limit her effectiveness. Maybe the country is best served by keeping her in the senate?
Hillary would run not planning to seek a second term. Things might come up that preclude it, but (like Reagan) I think she’d be in it for the long haul.
On the one hand she’d be incredibly experienced and could be the next LBJ ramming a truly progressive agenda through Congress, like LBJ, she will be inheriting the Obama presidency and use his poetry to enact the prose of her far more competent and able governing ability. Or it will be more Rubinomics and a soft neocon foreign policy
I think and hope a strong progressive challenger could protect Hillary from her worse centrist instincts.
Sure would be nice to have someone with both progressive values and deep knowledge of the financial system.
President Center-Right could easily ignore a cabinet Secretary, and we’d have lost a very effective Senator.