Friday, February 5, 2016

The Democrats Had a Bad Night in Iowa, Might Have One Again in November

I'm getting sick of it. I'm getting sick of my fellow Democrats. I'm getting sick of my fellow Democrats celebrating the defeat of Donald Trump in Iowa. For real. You're celebrating what was a terrible night, if what you want is a Democratic President. Nothing that happened in Iowa was a positive for the party's chances of winning the White House.

Look, I know you hate Donald Trump. He's run a white-nationalist, or racist, campaign for the Presidency, and riled up hillbillies and swamp people you didn't want to believe exist. I understand. He also would have been the easiest general election opponent to defeat, most likely. He has a track record of saying crazy things, shady business dealings, and bad personal morals. He would helped Democrats win over independents, and win back down-ballot races. Had he won Iowa, he would have rolled New Hampshire easily, and possibly walked to the nomination of the Republican Party in 2016. Even if he hadn't, a few more months of peak-Trump would have forced even the "establishment" Republicans to say more and more crazy, Trump-esque things. In short, him winning helps hurt the Republican Party's chances of victory in November. If you are a Democrat, you want that.

Then there's what his defeat meant within the GOP's race more directly. Ted Cruz "out-Iowa'ed" him, and may or may not have a pathway forward from there (Iowa usually gets Republican primaries wrong). The problem is that Marco Rubio finished third, and quite close to Trump at that. Republican political operatives all over DC awoke from their decade or so slumber, and realized that they had a pathway for an "establishment" candidate to take the nomination. They are now frantically trying to kill off the other "establishment" candidates like Bush, Kasich, and Christie, and leave Rubio to fight the dual-crazies of Cruz and Trump. Because Cruz won, Trump won't be able to clear him out quickly, leaving Rubio with an actual pathway to victory now. Is Marco Rubio that scary? Electorally I don't think he's stronger than Romney was in 2012, but we're not running President Obama against their nominee either. As an actual President, someone as scripted and stupid as Rubio is absolutely horrifying. He will literally do the bidding of his corporate masters who fund him.

I won't go too far into depth about the Democratic race, other than to say that nothing good happened on Monday. If nothing else, the Bernie crowd feels he was cheated. If either candidate's people walk away feeling cheated at the end of the process, it will make it that much harder to win in November. Beyond that, Bernie raised another $3 million and looks like a serious candidate now, leading to what is likely to be another drawn out, brutal battle for the nomination. I think we all know that Hillary Clinton won't be getting out of the race any time soon. We're now going to have a left-wing brawl over whether we should have more access to health insurance or Medicare for all. I'm not sure I see that as helping us.

Look, I get it- you get to call Donald Trump a "loser." Continuing to focus on Trump's follies is not helping us win an election though. If we don't win the election, who's the loser then?

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