The Hillary factor: Worries about Warren's electability miss big differences

[BlueMTexpat]

https://www.ncronline.org/news/opinion/distinctly-catholic/hillary-factor-worries-about-warrens-electability-miss-big

I found this to be a very interesting article, especially given the source.

From the link:

...

Earlier this year, I called attention to some analysis by Nathaniel Rakich at FiveThirtyEight. He compared Warren's 2018 vote totals to those garnered by Clinton in 2016. With the enormous caveat that it is always tricky comparing a midterm to a presidential election, it was interesting what Rakich said about the 10 towns where Warren most outperformed Clinton: "They are all small towns in Western Massachusetts. With a few exceptions, they have incomes lower than the statewide average. Most of them have fewer college graduates than average as well. And Trump improved upon Romney's margin in all but one of them."

Conversely, the towns where Warren most underperformed Clinton were the wealthy suburbs around Boston, and suburban, moderate women Republicans and independents were the key to the Democrats' retaking the House last year. I wonder, though, how many such Republicans and moderates voted for Trump in 2016 because they told themselves he would mature into the job. Either way, it is not inconceivable that Warren could hold onto some of the Democratic gains from the midterms, while overperforming Clinton in rural areas of the country. And she could slip on a banana peel tomorrow.

Elections are not predictable events. Trump certainly looks vulnerable today and if the economy slows down, he could be subjected to a thumping by almost any Democrat. Bill Clinton look vulnerable in the summer of 1995 and Obama did in 2011. Democratic primary voters should select whom they want to carry their banner and not get into the business of electoral prognostication. If they want Warren, they should vote for Warren, and if they do, they may have selected the first nominee in this century who can actually beat an incumbent president. (emphasis mine)

[NNadir]

1. I often wonder if Joe Biden is Michael Dukakis because he's a man. And of course, Barack...

...Obama was clearly Jesse Jackson because they were both African American men who ran for President.

It also follows that Kamala Harris is Nikki Haley because they are both women of Indian extraction.

Why do we even have these conversations?

They are incredibly stupid.

Hillary Clinton and Elizabeth Warren do share one defining trait. They are extremely intelligent and competent women. Is it not possible that America has learned its lesson for utilizing a constitutional quirk in the Constitution designed to protect human slavery, the Electoral College, to put an incompetent corrupt and exceedingly violently racist unintelligent and uneducated thug in the White House rather than a media maligned woman smeared by an incompetent chief of the FBI?

I think so.

[BlueMTexpat]

2. I think that the other comparisons

you make are not really on point and are distractions. Did FiveThirtyEight run similar comparisons on any of the candidates you mention?

This article uses the FiveThirtyEight numbers as its premise.

I thought that the article was interesting in that it was more supportive of Elizabeth than not, especially from a surprising source.

Are you really attacking me for posting it? I don't really believe that you are. I was a proud Hillary supporter in 2016 and I am a proud Elizabeth supporter for 2020.

Please remember that we are both on the same side.

[NNadir]

3. No, and I apologize if it came across as an attack.

I am just frustrated with all these claims that candidate A is the same as candidate B who ran before.

The pundits are absurd, and frankly, were one to a retrospective on what pundits said and the result actually obtained, they would likely do worse than tarot card readers

Ms. Warren and Ms. Clinton are different people running under completely different circumstances.

[BlueMTexpat]

6. Thanks for your

response.

[in2herbs]

4. IMO we need a candidate who scares the Rs so that they run back into their dark abyss and I think

that Warren is the only candidate who scares the Rs.

[NNadir]

5. I feel the country will be screaming for...

...a new direction.

I'm actually somewhat surprised to find myself in the Warren camp since I consider myself more moderate than leftist, but on looking more deeply than the lazy surface impressions I had initially, I think she has the right stuff.

We will not need an "ordinary" President to recover from this awful freak in the White House.

Warren impresses me as extraordinary.

Our country and our planet need someone with the quality of Lincoln or Roosevelt, someone who can think her feet without losing sight of her love of country and humanity.

Somehow I see this in her.

[BlueMTexpat]

7. This. Exactly! eom