No Organized Political Party

One of Will Rogers’s most famous wisecracks was, when asked if he were a member of an organized political party, he responded “No, sir. I’m a Democrat”. Some things never change. At Atlantic Todd Purdum remarks on divisions among Democrats:

Rahm Emanuel, the former Clinton adviser and Obama chief of staff, told me he likens the current environment to the period following 1968, when Lyndon B. Johnson was succeeded by Richard Nixon, in a right-wing victory that exploited and exacerbated deep internal divisions in the Democratic Party, just as Trump’s ascendance has. Emanuel acknowledged that Johnson’s war in Vietnam makes the analogy imperfect—“unless you think the surge in Afghanistan counts as that, and I don’t”—but added, “We have seen this movie before.”

“Here’s the thing,” Emanuel told me. “Today’s progressives are more angry at Clinton and Obama than they are at Bush 43. Whether it’s Clinton’s ‘small ideas’ and welfare reform, or Obama’s Affordable Care Act without a public option—those are the things where they feel like there were missed moments for big, bold ideas. Really? And that’s what drives the energy. Yes, they’re angry at Trump. Yes, they’re angry at Bush. But a lot of the energy is directed at the fact that they don’t love those two presidents—which I’d remind everybody are the only two Democrats to get reelected since Franklin Roosevelt.”

Read the whole thing. Presently, black voters are far more supportive of Biden ‘s presidential candidacy than they are of any of the other Democratic candidates including the two black candidates running for president, Cory Booker and Kamala Harris. That he was Obama’s vice president is not the only reason for that. I suspect they believe he is the most electable of the candidates running.

2 comments… add one
  • CuriousOnlooker Link

    Looking at realclearpolitics average for the Democratic nomination.

    Comparing to February; Biden, Harris and Sanders are polling at about the same level – no gain or loss. Warren has gone up from 5 to 18; Buttigieg from 0 to 6, and Beto from 8 to 2.

    Based on that; THE question for the fall is where is Warren’s ceiling?

  • CuriousOnlooker Link

    Apologies for using the word “ceiling” with Warren. A better phrasing is Warren is THE candidate with demonstrated growth potential.

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