The First Hat in the Ring

On Monday Elizabeth Warren was the first serious candidate for the Democratic nomination for president. She has long rumored to have been contemplating a run, and she's the first one out of the gate. What are her chances, and is she the right person for the job of Democratic nominee?

First of all let me say that I am not one of those Democrats who holds firing squads in a circle. There is a kind of progressive who asks for a very high standard, and if a candidate has a whiff of being tied to the establishment or corporate interests, than out they go. This is a noble but self-defeating  stance to take, especially in 2020, because the primary motive in voting will be to remove Trump (or Pence) from office before the country becomes a wasteland. No Jill Steins this time.

That being said, I think any of the candidates brought up by the Great Mentioner would be fine. Of course I would like a more progressive candidate, and I think this might be the time to strike, as progressives in congress saw a significant uptick in this last election. The changing of the rules on super delegates should help in this area.

Elizabeth Warren would make a fine president, but can she win the election? First of all, I don't think she'll get the nomination. If the Democrats want to go old, they can go to Joe Biden or Bernie Sanders. But even if they don't run, I have the sense that she doesn't have the right stuff to whip the nation into a fervor. She's a very energetic person, and even though she will be 71 at election time she doesn't seem that old.

Secondly, there are lessons to be learned after Hillary Clinton. The Democrats need someone with as little baggage as possible. Would Warren, a Massachusetts liberal, inspire mid-westerners to go to the polls? Perhaps, as she hits hard on her background of a hardscrabble upbringing in Oklahoma. She has degrees not from Harvard or Yale but from the University of Houston an Rutgers-Newark law school. If she can slough off any appearance of being an East Coast elitist, she might have a chance. She is also a champion debater, but it's hard to debate Trump because he just lies.

In an era when appearance is almost everything and substance is not, this may not be the right era for Warren. She can come off schoolmarmish (when she was a girl she lined up her dolls and admonished them for not doing homework), and could be seen as an "eat your peas" candidate, which rankles many voters, including the independents who voted for Trump. Also, the Indian DNA flap ended up hurting her, as Native Americans took it the wrong way. They are not a significant voting block, but it put a stain on her. If she were the nominee, Trump/Pence would ride the Pocahontas thing through the entire campaign. It's racist, but that didn't stop Trump before.

Just for fun, I'm going to select the running mate each of these candidates should choose. Warren would need someone young, someone from the Midwest, and a male (though doubling down and choosing a woman would be a bold move). I think she would do well with Beto O'Rourke.