Red Mosquito

SunKing wrote:

tragabigzanda wrote:We met Booker one night in 2016 at an event in MT, spoke with him directly for several minutes and he put off such a positive energy... I think he's the real deal and that he still has a bright future in leading our nation.

Would love to hear what path you think is available to him.

Sanders or Warren dying in office?

Yes, obviously a future run would be the vehicle. I was wondering why you think his appeal is going to suddenly spike beyond 3% nation-wide.

For instance, from my vantage point Booker has missed his opportunity to do anything more than linger around the Senate for the rest of his life, or cash out and go into lobbying a la Jeff Flake. His record in Newark will increasingly become a liability insofar as he brought in Facebook money and worked hard for things like urban core renewal which drove up property taxes on local residents. Even if you believe that the Sanders/Warren leftward push will be resolved, you'd have to account for how long that's going to take now that more progressive ideas are drifting mainstream. By that point, Booker will be old guard, so then you have to start thinking, when was the last time an old, establishment senator won the presidency? Not in a generation. His best hope is to make a push for NJ Governor or to become someone's VP, but again, I don't see either of those things happening anytime soon.

For someone to have a bright future leading the nation they generally have to hold a leadership position in the nation, which for the time being at least involves making the public like you.

If you expect me to believe that the American electorate will choose style over substance, well....I will.

tragabigzanda wrote:

SunKing wrote:If you expect me to believe that the American electorate will choose style over substance, well....I will.

he can shift positions as views evolve...He's never going to stop being a really compelling public speaker. I don't necessarily see that as style over substance, but i take your point

Don't mean to drag this out but this seems to be a pretty central point of disagreement. How well have recent Dem candidates whose positions shift radically fared, either in a primary or a general election? Kamala. Hillary. John Kerry. Obama won because he had no record. Bernie's appeal is his consistency. Lots of candidates are compelling speakers--and Booker has this in spades--but I think this only gets you so far, at least the way the country is drifting right now.

tragabigzanda wrote:

SunKing wrote:

tragabigzanda wrote:

SunKing wrote:If you expect me to believe that the American electorate will choose style over substance, well....I will.

he can shift positions as views evolve...He's never going to stop being a really compelling public speaker. I don't necessarily see that as style over substance, but i take your point

Don't mean to drag this out but this seems to be a pretty central point of disagreement. How well have recent Dem candidates whose positions shift radically fared, either in a primary or a general election? Kamala. Hillary. John Kerry. Obama won because he had no record. Bernie's appeal is his consistency. Lots of candidates are compelling speakers--and Booker has this in spades--but I think this only gets you so far, at least the way the country is drifting right now.

all the young hard lefties will have a fairly different worldview in ten years though. More moderate, more understanding of the corporate game. It's all in how you spin your evolution. Harris sucks at it, and Clinton had to do so much spinning because her record is so deep and wide. Kerry is a bad public speaker, really quite a snoozer.

I don't think this is true, or at least, the ones who do drift right will be replaced by another crop of young leftists (with the help of a similarly galvanizing economic depression). But I take your point, Booker is much more eloquent than any of those candidates so maybe he does have a path. Watching Kamala try to spin her record in the debates this year was fucking painful.

The more I think about it, he probably should go NJ governor next cycle.

Booker should not leave the Senate to be Gov for the same reasons Warren should say no to any offer for a VP spot.

Warren should say yes to Bernie's offer.

SunKing wrote:Warren should say yes to Bernie's offer.

Bernie is going to pick a woman of color. If he did happen to offer Warren the spot do you think it would be worth losing the Senate seat? I don't.

verb_to_trust wrote:

SunKing wrote:Warren should say yes to Bernie's offer.

Bernie is going to pick a woman of color. If he did happen to offer Warren the spot do you think it would be worth losing the Senate seat? I don't.

I didn't say it should happen I said it's going to happen because he'll need her primary delegates to win on second ballot at the convention. Liz should say yes to it when it happens for reasons I think are obvious.

tragabigzanda wrote:

SunKing wrote:

tragabigzanda wrote:

SunKing wrote:

tragabigzanda wrote:

SunKing wrote:If you expect me to believe that the American electorate will choose style over substance, well....I will.

he can shift positions as views evolve...He's never going to stop being a really compelling public speaker. I don't necessarily see that as style over substance, but i take your point

Don't mean to drag this out but this seems to be a pretty central point of disagreement. How well have recent Dem candidates whose positions shift radically fared, either in a primary or a general election? Kamala. Hillary. John Kerry. Obama won because he had no record. Bernie's appeal is his consistency. Lots of candidates are compelling speakers--and Booker has this in spades--but I think this only gets you so far, at least the way the country is drifting right now.

all the young hard lefties will have a fairly different worldview in ten years though. More moderate, more understanding of the corporate game. It's all in how you spin your evolution. Harris sucks at it, and Clinton had to do so much spinning because her record is so deep and wide. Kerry is a bad public speaker, really quite a snoozer.

I don't think this is true, or at least, the ones who do drift right will be replaced by another crop of young leftists (with the help of a similarly galvanizing economic depression). But I take your point, Booker is much more eloquent than any of those candidates so maybe he does have a path. Watching Kamala try to spin her record in the debates this year was fucking painful.

The more I think about it, he probably should go NJ governor next cycle.

Yep, there absolutely will be an influx of more young lefties, there always is...

Which is why I think Warren is the best candidate for our times. She'd have the best shot at actually implementing some far-left policies, so we could all see once and for all how they might play out in the US

Women can’t win Trag:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/01/13/politics ... index.html


And just to be sure:

http://news.trust.org/item/20200112223314-3co2t

Yeah, that’s gonna be a real line in the sand moment for supporters of both candidates.

"Sources say"