To give you a break from the scandal over a hostile foreign power’s attack on our democracy, let’s turn to something more diverting: the 2020 presidential campaign. We keep hearing that more and more Democrats are running; here are some reports from just the last week or two:
• Mike Allen reports that Joe Biden is the Democrat Donald Trump most fears running against; learning this will cause Biden to immediately start looking for office space for his campaign. Actually, Allen reports that Biden “pines to run and will test the waters this fall,” which surprises no one.
• In a cover profile of Elizabeth Warren in New York magazine, Rebecca Traister writes, “Warren is up for reelection in Massachusetts in November. She can’t say that she is running for president. So officially, it is accurate to say that she is not. But of course she’s running.”
• Sen. Kamala Harris says about running for president, “I’m not ruling it out.”
• “I don’t think there’s another job in America that prepares you to be president better than being a mayor of a major American city, because mayors are executing every day,” said former New Orleans mayor Mitch Landrieu, who has been making speeches and giving interviews all around the country.
• Former attorney general Eric Holder told Stephen Colbert, “I’m thinking about” running for president.
• Former Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick took a campaign-style swing through Texas, prompting lots of 2020 speculation, which he hasn’t discouraged.
• Michael Avenatti, Stormy Daniels’ lawyer, is going to Iowa to give a speech at a Democratic dinner often visited by future presidential candidates.
OK, that last one is a little silly (no offense to Mr. Avenatti’s legal skills, but maybe we can leave the politics to politicians). I haven’t even mentioned Bernie Sanders, Kirsten Gillibrand, Cory Booker, Martin O’Malley or Terry McAuliffe, all of whom will probably be running, plus the odd governor or congressman you haven’t yet thought of. And there is one announced candidate, Rep. John Delaney of Maryland. There could be 15 or more major Democratic candidates.
This might look like chaos, but it’s the best thing that could happen to Democrats. In fact, more people should run.
Why do I say that? The first reason is that the more competitive the primary is, the more likely it will be that the candidate who prevails will have shown her- or himself to have what it takes to win in November. And the truth is that despite what we’ve seen from all these people in their careers to this point, there’s no way to know who that will be. As my friend Mark Schmitt of the New America Foundation observes, the presidential campaign is so different from any other political environment — the intensity, the media attention, the variety of skills demanded, the unrelenting pace — that we can’t know beforehand how any of these people will perform. A talented senator can turn out to be a complete dud as a presidential candidate, while someone you might not have given a second thought to could light voters on fire.
There are few better examples than Joe Biden. He was a respected senator, an excellent orator, and supposedly had that common touch. Yet he ran for president twice and did miserably both times. Most of the time when a former vice president runs for president he’s the favorite, but in this case none of the other Democrats seem to be afraid of him.
Democrats need to select an individual, but they also need to decide what that individual will say about them and what they believe about the broader electorate. In 2008, for instance, Barack Obama embodied everything Democrats wanted to see in themselves: an educated, thoughtful, eloquent, cosmopolitan, multiracial, urbane city dweller with an eye on the future.
Who do they want to say they are now? It isn’t yet clear. I know Democrats who, scarred by the venomous backlash to Hillary Clinton’s candidacy, think the party should just nominate a white dude (or at least a dude) and take all that ugliness off the table. I know other Democrats who think that nothing would be worse for a party that wants to represent a changing America than to nominate yet another white man. The best way to figure out what the party as a whole prefers is to have a bunch of candidates vie for their affection and see who prevails.
It’s also about a contest of ideas. For all its weaknesses, the presidential primary is one of the best forums to hash out what the party actually wants and believes in. For instance, right now there’s a vigorous debate going on over how ambitious the party should be in its policy demands. Should it shoot for universal health coverage, free college tuition and a government job guarantee? Some of the candidates will take a more maximal position, and others will want to temper those ambitions with more practicality. A long campaign with lots of competitors will give Democratic voters time to figure out which course they prefer.
In 2016, the Republican Party asked itself who it was, in the form of a primary contest with 17 candidates. The answer was Donald Trump. The 2020 Democratic primaries are going to be a free-for-all, but that may be just what Democrats need to figure out who they are and who they want to be, at least for the near future.
Paul Waldman | The Washington Post
Paul Waldman is an opinion writer for the Plum Line blog.
