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You are here: Home / Elections / Election 2020 / Late Night 2020 Election Open Thread: Steve Bullock, Bill de Blasio, Mike Gravel, Uncle Tom Cobleigh* et al.

Late Night 2020 Election Open Thread: Steve Bullock, Bill de Blasio, Mike Gravel, Uncle Tom Cobleigh* et al.

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(*Refers to the other folkloric Uncle Tom, and one overburdened… horse.)

Also Dave Weigel, in the Washington Post:

On Wednesday, when the news broke that New York mayor Bill de Blasio was going to seek the White House, Mike Gravel asked why he’d even bother…

Gravel, who celebrated his 89th birthday last weekend, is not typically included in the count of Democratic White House hopefuls. There’s a reason: He initially said he was not really running for president. He was running to get into the party’s televised debates, like he had in 2007, when he emerged from decades of obscurity to hector the Democratic field about the risks of nuclear war. And he was doing so this time at the behest of some perspicacious, teenage left-wing activists, whose stated goal was to not to win but to shift the party to the left.

That has been enough to get Gravel halfway to the 65,000 donors needed to qualify for a slot in the debates, a stronger position than at least a half-dozen candidates who say they’re actually running. The Gravel project epitomizes what the primary has become before it can be winnowed down: a contest with a clear leader in the polls (former vice president Joe Biden), a left-wing challenger (Sen. Bernie Sanders), a few candidates with the money and staff to seriously compete, and a whole lot of candidates who are not being taken seriously…

I, of course, blame the Republicans — after their 2016 KKKlown Karnival ended with the ‘winner’ embedded in the Oval Office like a tick, why wouldn’t any halfway ambitious politician try during the next cycle? Jonathan Bernstein, at Bloomberg Opinion:

… There was always going to be a large field in this cycle, given that there was no obvious front-runner and most Democrats think President Donald Trump is beatable. Those are two standard reasons that candidates choose to run.

But I suspect that new debate criteria set by the Democratic National Committee was also a factor. Not only was the stage opened to 20 candidates, but the qualifying standards were set extremely low: Candidates had to reach either a very low polling threshold or get 65,000 unique donors, metrics that are both objective and largely out of the hands of party actors. Usually, winnowing happens early on when candidates try and fail to win encouragement from party actors. This time, however, candidates can simply focus on reaching a qualifying goal rather than assessing the reaction they got from party officials or key politicians.

In fact, the new rules actually encouraged on-the-fence candidates to stick around for a while. After all, the DNC basically gave them a list-building challenge. Marginal candidates might well have decided that that alone was worth a formal run. Anyone who met or exceeded the donor threshold and then dropped out would’ve earned themselves a valuable resource in the meantime, not to mention increased national exposure, CNN Town Halls and a shot at a debate appearance. That’s a lot of rewards for what may turn out to be very little effort by some of the candidates…

But I’d argue that it’s still premature to worry that winnowing won’t work. If the next round of debates locks out several less promising contenders, then we may lose a batch of candidates fairly quickly. Even if everyone sticks around until Iowa, all those who don’t meet the delegate thresholds will very likely drop out immediately or after similarly failing in New Hampshire…

I’m not looking forward to blogging the first debate(s), but I still think they’ll winnow down the field considerably. As with the politically proverbial Kennedy/Nixon debates, seeing the various candidates compete live on television — not to mention the thoroughly modern social-media mockery that will ensue — is gonna be a hard lesson for a lot of overambitious no-hopers. Or at least their supporters.

Reader Interactions

39Comments

  1. 1.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    Bernie is not a “left wing challenger”, he’s Bernie and that’s that. The only challenge he presents to the left is them keeping their kneecaps.

  4. 4.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    Over at the website about fake Macs(a Hackintosh), they’re trying to guess the name for the next version of MacOS(currently Mojave). My contributions(staying in the CA desert) were Kelso, ZZYZX(also a commenter at this here blog) and Reefer City. Now if they want to go wild and crazy and go outside CA, I suggested Redmond.

  7. 7.

    ?BillinGlendaleCA

    @NotMax: I was going with the California desert theme, except for Redmond(which was a response to Redwood) just for shade.

    ETA: If they decided to go with Red Rock, I’ve got some photos that they could use for wallpaper for a small percentage of the price of a new Mac.

  11. 11.

    Barb 2

    The mayor of NYC oh!!! He!! to the no!! heaven help us. No more East coast big city jerks please?

    Governor of Montana is ok but not interested in how he managed to work with GOPers – they are traitors, the enemy. Whoever voted for the Orange Putin puppet is a traitor. But then I’m in WA State and we are big and blue and Jay Inslee is one of the good guys. (For a male type person).

    I’m still donating to Senators Harris and Warren.

    Plus guys think about donating to organizations who are working to get out the Reservation votes. Seems like the states are putting up lots of road blocks for Native Americans to register and vote. The Reservation vote is heavy democratic.

    http://www.fourdirectionsvote.com

    This is where I donated in 2018. They worked hard to get out the Reservation vote and AZ does in fact have a Democratic Senator from a tight race.

    Many of us have some Native American genealogy way back and this is how we can honor our ancestors. My aunt used to donate to Native American schools – “I have this big Native American nose.” She would say. For me it is sort of like giving the finger to Trump’s racism.

  12. 12.

    Mr. Kite

    Did you see Warren lining up another formidable enemy? She has a plan to deal with defence contractor corruption. And said something about it being time the DoD budget went down for once.

    So we’re going against Silicon Valley AND the military industrial complex at once?’OK then.

    She’s not lacking courage, is she?

  13. 13.

    Brachiator

    I’m not looking forward to blogging the first debate(s), but I still think they’ll winnow down the field considerably.

    We need more presidential aspirants. Maybe one from each state, like a Miss America contest. De Blasio would nail the Swimsuit competition.

  14. 14.

    Patricia Kayden

    I’m not sure that it matters that so many Democrats are running as long as we are committed to voting for the eventual primary winner. Anyone but Trump (except Tulsi) works for me.

  15. 15.

    JPL

    @Patricia Kayden: Same. My strategy is to vote for the one I prefer in the primary, unless that vote insures a Bernie win. In that case, vote for the one who is likely to knock him out.

  17. 17.

    Viva BrisVegas

    Since this is an election thread I thought I’d describe how democracy sausages are made in Australia.

    Tomorrow Australia votes. Voting is always on a Saturday and is compulsory, in that there is a nominal fine if you don’t turn up to vote. The advantage of this is that it is impossible to suppress voters when the law requires them to turn out.

    You go down to the local electoral booth where your name is ticked off an electoral roll, no ID needed. You get handed two pieces of paper, one for the local Lower House seat (equivalent to a Congressional District), one for the Senate. Half the Senate is up for election. There are six Senate positions up for election in each of six states, plus two in each of two territories.

    Outside of each electoral booth there will be volunteers from all the political parties handing out how-to-vote cards. These cards show the preferential order of candidates which each particular party would like you to vote. You can ignore these cards or not as you prefer.

    Using a pencil at a desk, you fill in each square on the Lower House paper with your preferences from 1 down. If you fail to fill in all squares your vote counts as informal (i.e. spoiled).

    On the Senate paper you can vote either based on parties or individuals. If you vote by party, you only need to mark a minimum of six choices. If you vote by individuals you need to mark a minimum of twelve choices.

    That is our version of preferential voting, also called alternative voting (but not in Australia). In the House, if your first choice comes in last, then your vote is distributed to your second choice. This goes on until there are only two candidates left, one of whom will have more than 50%.

    The Senate system is way too complicated to describe.

    You put each paper into its own box.

    Then you leave the booth. Outside there will be a BBQ stand setup by a local charity where you can buy a sausage sandwich, also known as a democracy sausage.

    After which you head home to watch the results on TV after polls close at 6pm.

  19. 19.

    OzarkHillbilly

    I’m not looking forward to blogging the first debate(s), but I still think they’ll winnow down the field considerably.

    I’m doubting they will have much affect at all. With 20 candidates on the stage they will each have an opportunity to answer 1 question apiece, no time for rebuttals. Between the bloviating and the commercials it will be a joke.

  21. 21.

    Anne Laurie

    @geg6: Yup — IIRC, two debates on two nights, split into a bottom & top tier, as established by the polling/donations criteria. Barring special circumstances, I figure the bottom-tier candidates will pretty well vanish (even as novelties) from any media they’re not paying for. The top ten on the first night will get all the attention, for good or bad; the hope (I presume) is that one or more candidates ‘breaks out’, for better or worse. So unless Biden is struck by lightning, or Bernie gets boo’d again and decides to go ‘independent’ in a fit of pique, we’ll be watching 8 candidates try to “win” the evening… which is a large lineup for a presidential debate, but not an unreasonable one, this early in the cycle.

  22. 22.

    LC

    No tiers. Random draw. They explicitly didn’t want tiers because of how the GOP debates went down last time. And to avoid accusations that they picked the criteria to keep out an outsider candidate.

    Later debates will probably have more stringent criteria as the campaign advances

  23. 23.

    evodevo

    I, of course, blame the Republicans — after their 2016 KKKlown Karnival ended with the ‘winner’ embedded in the Oval Office like a bloated tick, why wouldn’t any halfway ambitious politician try during the next cycle?
    Fixed it for you lol
    (Sorry – have ticks on the brain – I have picked so many off me and the dogs it’s getting reediculous)

  27. 27.

    rm

    @Qui-Gon Jinn:
    “let him win”

    The last three words give it away, but before that there are more logical fallacies, empty claims, and unwarranted assumptions than a barrel of monkeys has monkeys.

    Look, if you hate Democrats just say so. Let it out. This passive-aggressive approach is wearisome.

  29. 29.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @Qui-Gon Jinn: Bernie sucks ass, get over it. Quit blaming Hillary for Bernie being a loser and costing her the election. Bernie isn’t a liberal, he isn’t progressive and he hasn’t accomplished a fucking thing while in office.

    Bernie farts and you call it a breath of fresh air.

  31. 31.

    L85NJGT

    Bored as NYC Mayor, but he is going to magically be engaged as POTUS, or even as a primary candidate?

    Why doesn’t he just get a hobby or a mistress, like everybody else?

  32. 32.

    Juice Box

    @Qui-Gon Jinn: Sanders is a socialist/social democrat which is fine, I lean social democrat myself, but he’s to the right of me on gun control, civil rights and immigration while being completely uninterested in women’s rights. He can’t explain details of any of his policies or explain how he would implement them (see NYDN interview from 2016).

    I’ve seen the damage that guns can do both in my family and among my patients. I’m not impressed by his participation in a civil rights march when he was 20. He’s just wrong about immigration. His handling of sexual harassment charges in his last campaign was terrible and his reluctance to even hire women until recently is telling.

    He’s too damn old, he can’t build coalitions and he doesn’t really have anything to offer. He certainly doesn’t deserve to have the nomination of a major party just handed to him when he won’t even join the party.

    If my loathing of gun-humpers makes me a neo-liberal shill, so be it. Of course, I have ovaries, so that makes my opinions less than worthless to you, I’m sure.

  33. 33.

    laura

    @Qui-Gon Jinn: st. Bernard did naught but shite since 2016 but take his butt hurt out for a walk. He built no coalition. His legislative record is a barren waste land. He is willfully blind to any of the issues facing women, people of color, immigrants, victims of gun violence and the LGBTQ community. He couldn’t bother to defend Vermont legislator Kiah Morris from the unrelenting racism and threats of violence to her family, such that she, the only black female, felt she had to step down from her elected office.
    Yeah, he’s a real winner, that one.

  36. 36.

    J R in WV

    @Qui-Gon Jinn:

    Russian troll, or just a shit-head? We’ll never know for sure!!!

    You know who else faced media that didn’t like him and a party base suspicious of him? Donald Trump!

    In reality, the mass media provided Trump with something like $5 billion in free media coverage, extending to showing an empty podium at a Trump rally rather than covering an actual policy speech by the Democratic candidate, Secretary of State Clinton. And the racists which compose the vast majority of the Republican party LOVED Trump’s racism better than evah!!!

    But you go be you, in St Petersburg RU or where ever your lair or nest is located. But go, somewhere, anywhere not here, junior Nazi tool!

  37. 37.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Qui-Gon Jinn: At times one pines for a recourse available to BJ somewhat more trenchant than the banhammer. Something, say, that would leave fuckheads like you ingesting sustenance via an IV & oxygen through a tube slid through your fake-left ear.

  38. 38.

    tam1MI

    I see that the Wilmerites are in full-blown panic mode as his numbers continue to crumble…

  39. 39.

    Odie Hugh Manatee

    @Qui-Gon Jinn: The best thing about Joe Biden announcing is that he sucked most of the air out of Bernie’s sails.

    Bernie pimps…lol

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