Hillary picked the most boring white man in Virginia for the job.

party leadership should help guide the nominee to the best decision. You think that Kennedy had a choice about Johnson?

Until McCain/Palin popped into my head.

Last edited Mon Aug 12, 2019, 05:53 PM - Edit history (1)

Now whether or not she listened or went her own way, is another question. Is there any evidence she picked Sen Kaine without any discussions from party leadership?

we will never know until some insider tells us what went on, long after the election is over.

that Hillary (and the powers that be in the Democratic Party) couldn't have done better? A person of color as the VP nominee would have pushed her over the finish line in the Electoral College, but that's just my opinion.

to beat me to the punch! I'm post #3. It's the first thing that came to mind for me as well.

I type faster when I'm sober.

There's a bottle of gin en route to your place so I have a fighting chance!

the bottle of gin on the kitchen counter is looking half empty. Yes, I'm a bit of a pessimist when it comes to alcohol.

But you make my point, only three years later, and he was quite forgettable.

of the nicest people there is.

he would be vp if not for Comey.

and the emails, yadda, yadda, yadda.

We need people of color and women to not only turn out, but be enthusiastic as hell this time around. When I lived in downstate NY, I saw the registration tables at my polling place on Election Day exploding with POC during 2008 and 2012, and no waiting lines at all in 2010, 2014, and 2016 for those precincts.

and Comey was a huge factor.

Obama's 2012 had lower turnout than 2008. it will always be more difficult to get turnout fit party in power. especially the longer they are there.

was helped considerably by the fundies getting very disillusioned with having a Mormon as US President. Having Romney pick Paul Ryan, a Catholic, didn't excite them either.

That's what happens when you let the air out of the balloon with non-strategic picks.

At this point, my guess is it's the most rational reponse you have (along with anecdotal data to support a suppositional narrative)

Marianne Williamson inspired me. And like you, I'm in support of Joe Biden, if he's still viable by the SC primary, I will vote for him.

the "Maverick" made him look stodgy to Republicons, and just plain stupid to the rest of us. I'm sure the party bosses forced that one on him pretty hard.

Square A1 is the popular variation of the "non-sequitur" ('it does not follow' for the drinking crowd) called Affirming the Consequent.

They play well on t-shirts (make sure to get the comic-san typeface-- it's a peanut butter font to the t-shirt's jelly), but not in post-enlightenment discussions.

Were most DUers excited about that? I wasn't active here at the time.

And that "bold" choice didn't quite work out for the GOP.

The emphasis, as it should be, will be on the top of the ticket. VPs have little impact on races outside of being the assigned attack dog. If we're worried about making a statement with the VP choice, our focus is entirely misplaced.

but in these times, you have to pick the right VP to get some of the base energized. Do you disagree with me that if Hillary had picked an African-American man as her running mate that it could have made a difference? Maybe a few more votes in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and even Ohio?

Because Joe Biden is considered the "safe" choice for nominee by many DUers. I notice you're endorsing Klobuchar.

But if anything, I’d say that was an overtly political pick.

Don’t get me wrong, politics matter and should be considered. But who should decide what gets considered?

The way I see it, we pick the nominee. The nominee picks the running mate. If we can’t trust the nominee to pick the best running mate (all factors consisted), should we trust them with the nomination?

Were you happy with Kaine?

whom to choose.

I do think there were better choices

their programs forward..

Clinton probably played it too cautiously with Kaine, even though he's a very decent Senator.

back when it was only white men getting nominated, now it's about making sure as many people as possible have a stake in getting out their friends, neighbors, and families to vote.

If we have to beat trump and GOPers at polls, it out to be an ass-kicking landslide.

It would be somewhat like what the orange turd did with his judge list.

This is the way it must be. As it has always been (at least as long as I can remember).

that it wasn't just an illusion, at least some of the time?

What I do care about is the VP being someone who represents the will of the primary voters.

It doesn't have to necessarily be the second-place finisher, but choosing someone who a fair number of voters have indicated is a candidate they support seems like a good way to unify the ticket and increase turnout for the general.

On the flipside, if I voted for a candidate who was polling 20%, they didn't win, and the winning candidate picked as a running mate a good buddy of theirs who wasn't even in the race, or someone who was polling 1%... I'm still voting blue... but when I remember back to 2016 and all the stories they published after the shock of election day about why people became unenthused and decided not to vote... I think it would be really smart if as many people as possible felt like their voices were being heard. My two cents.

and IMHO it would be a mistake to think you could make a pick in 2020 the same way that you could twenty years ago, as if nothing changes in the political landscape with time. Think of how important grassroots support became in 2016. I hear talk all over about what a mistake it would be not to have a woman or minority on the ticket. That wasn't happening a decade ago.

We need people super engaged and excited to get out and vote. If we have a nominee who only 32% of democrats wanted as their choice, and they pick a VP who either got 1% or wasn't running... that's 33% of people who feel highly engaged with the ticket. Of course you will have the "vote blue no matter who" people we won't lose. But I worry more about young voters and less engaged voters who may not come out and vote if they aren't excited about a candidate.

Contrast that with 32% of people getting the presidential pick, and 20% or 15% of people getting their pick as VP, and you've got a stronger ticket more people feel engaged with whether they identify with the liberal or more centrist side of the party. It also may help (assuming we're talking Biden and one of Warren, Sanders or Harris for VP) with keeping votes from being drained away by far-left 3rd party candidates if the ticket is balanced.

Clinton and Bush was a waste of space as Reagan despised him...pick who can make the ticket stronger...I am against a Harris pick as she will not add voters based on her polls...she is from California...a rust belt pick, or Sourthern (Georgia) or Texas makes more sense.

have no reason to doubt that Obama and his campaign had sole discretion regarding their selection.

Biden, being knowledgeable about the selection inner-workings, has already stated that HE will select someone that he can trust to be simpatico with him. This leads me to believe that this is how it's done -personal, pragmatic decision - he would know...

Unless you have extremely close ties to the nominee, you're not going to have any input into the choice.

I'm pretty sure what would be on the nominee's mind first and foremost is getting elected because if that doesn't happen they won't have any working relationship with their vice president. In that case they would also like to excite a major or important part of their base as well.
We can survive with a Democratic president and VP who may not have the perfect working relationship, but another 4 years of Trump will just be a disaster.

Only for their ability to get more votes in swing states - and be a good advisor like Biden was.

I think we need to cast the widest possible net in order to encourage as many people as possible to vote. Having two white men on our ticket, no matter how well they get along with each other, will not do that.

choose a qualified, competent person that has not competed in the 2020 Presidential candidate process, for his VP.

being interested in the number two slot, anyway...

as the Democratic Presidential candidate in 2020 and beyond. Joe Biden will not choose a VP candidate that is anything but Front Runner Democratic Presidential candidate grade.