Handicapping Presidential Candidates
Time and debates have been enough to get a pretty good feel for the Presidential candidates. Each party has a group of candidates that are pretty similar to each other in rhetoric, notwithstanding an outlier in each (Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich).
Among the Democrats, you don't find much difference between them on the big issues of the day. They all want socialized medicine; Canada-style government-controlled healthcare. They all want to raise taxes; they say just on the rich, but if you dig a bit deeper you'll find they want to raise them for everybody. They all want out of Iraq, damn the consequences; or do they? I think I sense a bit of prevarication happening on that issue.
Hillary's been slipping a bit lately, and I sense the press is rooting for Obama. But it still looks like she's the one to beat. Obama is making his campaign about saying as little as possible, beyond the standard Democrat party line. Kucinich once again plays the role of the crazy paranoid who, unlike Hillary, is at least honest about his communistic principles. Biden is the most traditional Democrat in the race, but his bizarre looks with the strange hair plugs probably turns off the party faithful. Why Dodd is running is beyond my comprehension, maybe it's just so they have approximately as many candidates onstage at the debates as the Republicans? It's said that Richardson is running for VP, maybe so.
Clearly the Dems are choosing between Barack Hussein Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton.
The Republican side is much more interesting, at least from the standpoint of a race that remains too close to call. The early front-runners, Giuliani and Romney, have recently found themselves getting a strong challenge from the other guy from Hope, Arkansas, Mike Huckabee.
Huckabee has caught the imagination of conservatives who find his style refreshing. I also have been impressed by his performances in the debates, where he comes across as open and honest, distictly different from most of the other candidates (on both sides) by skipping the careful phrasing and double-speak so favored by those who want to play both sides of many issues.
But along the way, Huckabee has been stumbling at an increasing rate. Not in debates, but in various interviews along the way, he says stupid things. Sure, the media's famous for taking things out of context and even misquoting, but it was certainly stupid of him to make the quip to a reporter about Romney and Mormonism, (Don't they believe Jesus and Satan are brothers?)
It sounds like something one might say in jest to illustrate the stupidity of focusing on Romney's Mormonism. But I never heard Huckabee try to put the comment into context or correct the quote or even explain where he was going with it. So it sort of makes him look foolish and ignorant.
Other statements he's made make him sound naive and lacking the judgement or intelligence to be able to formulate and implement policies in areas like crime and foreign policy. But so far, his gaffes haven't hurt him too much - many of his supporters just view them as attacks by his opponents.
I think the GOP race remains wide open. The eventual nominee could be just about anyone in the top 5: Giuliani, Huckabee, Romney, McCain, Thompson. Ron Paul is loved by college students and Libertarians, and he will do better than the Democrat outlier Kucinich, but he's not mainstream enough to get a serious shot at the nomination. Duncan Hunter and Tom Tancredo haven't been able to attract enough attention to break into serious consideration, and they'll probably drop out very soon.
Let's see if I can make some good predictions on the GOP race.
Giuliani can't get the nomination. People respect what he did for NYC and his 9-11 leadership, but are getting a bit tired of hearing about it. He's also got big liabilities in his support for gay rights and abortion, not to mention the baggage of his personal skirt-chasing history.
Romney has a shot, but fair or not, there are too many people who have a problem with Mormonism. So many Christian sects view the Mormons as more of a cult, and have what might be somewhat an unfounded fear of how that would effect Romney's policies. Then of course there's the contradiction of Romney's liberal-leaning policies that got him elected governor in leftist Massachusetts and his apparent conversion to more conservative ideas now that he's running for President.
Thompson's put forth some very good ideas and solidly conservative policy statements. But people don't see passion from him, and in turn are not able to get passionate about supporting his candidacy. But he could still break through, if he can begin to get the base to see him as the true conservative in the race, with his apparent qualities of straight talk, no nonsense adult supervision.
Huckabee may remain attractive, but the GOP establishment doesn't want him as the nominee. So ultimately the only way he gets the nomination is if he holds and builds upon the grassroots support he's been able to attract. I'm going to predict he'll make one too many stupid comments along the way, and will drop out of contention sort of like Howard Dean did last time.
McCain can't be counted out yet. He lost a lot of ground with his support and sponsorship of the Comprehensive Immigration Reform bill, which to most conservatives could have been named the Illegal Alien Amnesty Bill. But the media loves him for his moderate rhetoric, and he's been pretty good in the recent debates.
If I had to predict the candidates today, I'll say Hillary vs. Romney. I'm much more confident in the Hillary prediction than the Romney prediction. But the reason I'm predicting Romney is that I think he's a competent campaigner, has the looks and bearing of a President, and is less likely to stumble in the coming months than Giuliani and Huckabee.
If I could vote in the GOP Primary today, which candidate would I pick? That's a hard question, because I really don't have a clear favorite at the moment. But if I had to pull the lever this instant, I think I'd pick Thompson.
Among the Democrats, you don't find much difference between them on the big issues of the day. They all want socialized medicine; Canada-style government-controlled healthcare. They all want to raise taxes; they say just on the rich, but if you dig a bit deeper you'll find they want to raise them for everybody. They all want out of Iraq, damn the consequences; or do they? I think I sense a bit of prevarication happening on that issue.
Hillary's been slipping a bit lately, and I sense the press is rooting for Obama. But it still looks like she's the one to beat. Obama is making his campaign about saying as little as possible, beyond the standard Democrat party line. Kucinich once again plays the role of the crazy paranoid who, unlike Hillary, is at least honest about his communistic principles. Biden is the most traditional Democrat in the race, but his bizarre looks with the strange hair plugs probably turns off the party faithful. Why Dodd is running is beyond my comprehension, maybe it's just so they have approximately as many candidates onstage at the debates as the Republicans? It's said that Richardson is running for VP, maybe so.
Clearly the Dems are choosing between Barack Hussein Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton.
The Republican side is much more interesting, at least from the standpoint of a race that remains too close to call. The early front-runners, Giuliani and Romney, have recently found themselves getting a strong challenge from the other guy from Hope, Arkansas, Mike Huckabee.
Huckabee has caught the imagination of conservatives who find his style refreshing. I also have been impressed by his performances in the debates, where he comes across as open and honest, distictly different from most of the other candidates (on both sides) by skipping the careful phrasing and double-speak so favored by those who want to play both sides of many issues.
But along the way, Huckabee has been stumbling at an increasing rate. Not in debates, but in various interviews along the way, he says stupid things. Sure, the media's famous for taking things out of context and even misquoting, but it was certainly stupid of him to make the quip to a reporter about Romney and Mormonism, (Don't they believe Jesus and Satan are brothers?)
It sounds like something one might say in jest to illustrate the stupidity of focusing on Romney's Mormonism. But I never heard Huckabee try to put the comment into context or correct the quote or even explain where he was going with it. So it sort of makes him look foolish and ignorant.
Other statements he's made make him sound naive and lacking the judgement or intelligence to be able to formulate and implement policies in areas like crime and foreign policy. But so far, his gaffes haven't hurt him too much - many of his supporters just view them as attacks by his opponents.
I think the GOP race remains wide open. The eventual nominee could be just about anyone in the top 5: Giuliani, Huckabee, Romney, McCain, Thompson. Ron Paul is loved by college students and Libertarians, and he will do better than the Democrat outlier Kucinich, but he's not mainstream enough to get a serious shot at the nomination. Duncan Hunter and Tom Tancredo haven't been able to attract enough attention to break into serious consideration, and they'll probably drop out very soon.
Let's see if I can make some good predictions on the GOP race.
Giuliani can't get the nomination. People respect what he did for NYC and his 9-11 leadership, but are getting a bit tired of hearing about it. He's also got big liabilities in his support for gay rights and abortion, not to mention the baggage of his personal skirt-chasing history.
Romney has a shot, but fair or not, there are too many people who have a problem with Mormonism. So many Christian sects view the Mormons as more of a cult, and have what might be somewhat an unfounded fear of how that would effect Romney's policies. Then of course there's the contradiction of Romney's liberal-leaning policies that got him elected governor in leftist Massachusetts and his apparent conversion to more conservative ideas now that he's running for President.
Thompson's put forth some very good ideas and solidly conservative policy statements. But people don't see passion from him, and in turn are not able to get passionate about supporting his candidacy. But he could still break through, if he can begin to get the base to see him as the true conservative in the race, with his apparent qualities of straight talk, no nonsense adult supervision.
Huckabee may remain attractive, but the GOP establishment doesn't want him as the nominee. So ultimately the only way he gets the nomination is if he holds and builds upon the grassroots support he's been able to attract. I'm going to predict he'll make one too many stupid comments along the way, and will drop out of contention sort of like Howard Dean did last time.
McCain can't be counted out yet. He lost a lot of ground with his support and sponsorship of the Comprehensive Immigration Reform bill, which to most conservatives could have been named the Illegal Alien Amnesty Bill. But the media loves him for his moderate rhetoric, and he's been pretty good in the recent debates.
If I had to predict the candidates today, I'll say Hillary vs. Romney. I'm much more confident in the Hillary prediction than the Romney prediction. But the reason I'm predicting Romney is that I think he's a competent campaigner, has the looks and bearing of a President, and is less likely to stumble in the coming months than Giuliani and Huckabee.
If I could vote in the GOP Primary today, which candidate would I pick? That's a hard question, because I really don't have a clear favorite at the moment. But if I had to pull the lever this instant, I think I'd pick Thompson.
posted by Dan S. at 6:18 AM
1 Comments:
As a Brit living in the US who has seen both sides of the coin
Socialised Medicine in the UK and the US private healthcare system , the only thing I can say is niether appear to provide a perfect solution. Not as a politician but as a human being I have seen both systems are abused in socialised medicine because it is free ( or percieved to be free ) 8% of the population monopolise 35% of the services. In the US free market system the drug companies charge more to US ( consumers / insurance companies )than they do anywhere else in the world who are the same consumers who have provided the tax breaks to develop the drugs.
steve
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