Category Archives: Democrats

Ryan running, Bennet, Swalwell close

By Matt | Published April 8, 2019

Rep. Tim Ryan announced last week that is running for the 2020 Democratic nomination for President. Sen. Michael Bennet seems very close to running, in spite of, or maybe because of, his recent cancer diagnosis. And Rep. Eric Swalwell is likely to announce this week. We now have 15 announced candidates, and only 7 still to hear from.

Definitely running:

  1. Rep. John Delaney
  2. Sec. Julian Castro
  3. Gov. Jay Inslee
  4. Sen. Elizabeth Warren
  5. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard
  6. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand
  7. Mayor Pete Buttigieg
  8. Sen. Kamala Harris
  9. Sen. Cory Booker
  10. Sen. Any Klobuchar
  11. Andrew Yang
  12. Sen. Bernie Sanders
  13. Gov. John Hickenlooper
  14. Rep. Beto O’Rourke
  15. Rep. Tim Ryan

Potential candidates who have shown some interest: Continue Reading...

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O’Rourke running

By Matt | Published March 14, 2019

Beto-mania has arrived:

Beto O’Rourke, the 46-year-old former Texas congressman whose near-miss Senate run last year propelled him to Democratic stardom, announced on Thursday that he was running for president, betting that a broad message of national unity and generational change will lift him above a slate of committed progressives offering big-ticket policy ideas.

We now have 14 announced candidates, and only 8 still to hear from. Continue Reading...

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Merkley and Bloomberg out

By Matt | Published March 5, 2019

Some serious winnowing today. Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley and former NYC mayor Michael Bloomberg both announced they will not run for President. Bloomberg is the biggest drop-out so far, ranking a high as 9 in some pundit polls. We still have 13 announced candidates, but now only 10 still to hear from .

Definitely running:

  1. Rep. John Delaney
  2. Sec. Julian Castro
  3. Gov. Jay Inslee
  4. Sen. Elizabeth Warren
  5. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard
  6. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand
  7. Mayor Pete Buttigieg
  8. Sen. Kamala Harris
  9. Sen. Cory Booker
  10. Sen. Any Klobuchar
  11. Andrew Yang
  12. Sen. Bernie Sanders
  13. Gov. John Hickenlooper

Potential candidates who have shown some interest: Continue Reading...

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Inslee and Hickenklooper in; Holder out

By Matt | Published March 4, 2019

And now it’s the Governors’ turn. Washington Gov. Jay Inslee and former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper have both announced their candidacies for President. And former Atty General Eric Holder is not running. We now have 13 announced candidates, with 12 still to hear from, the first time we’ve had more candidates in the race than on the fence.

Definitely running:

  1. Rep. John Delaney
  2. Sec. Julian Castro
  3. Gov. Jay Inslee
  4. Sen. Elizabeth Warren
  5. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard
  6. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand
  7. Mayor Pete Buttigieg
  8. Sen. Kamala Harris
  9. Sen. Cory Booker
  10. Sen. Any Klobuchar
  11. Andrew Yang
  12. Sen. Bernie Sanders
  13. Gov. John Hickenlooper

Potential candidates who have shown some interest: Continue Reading...

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If Bill De Blasio is stuck in a blizzard in Iowa…

By Matt | Published February 25, 2019

Then the words “running for President” must be rattling around his brain somewhere, and that’s enough to add him to our potentials list. We now have 12 announced candidates, with 14 still to hear from.

Definitely running:

  1. Rep. John Delaney
  2. Sec. Julian Castro
  3. Gov. Jay Inslee
  4. Sen. Elizabeth Warren
  5. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard
  6. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand
  7. Mayor Pete Buttigieg
  8. Sen. Kamala Harris
  9. Sen. Cory Booker
  10. Sen. Any Klobuchar
  11. Andrew Yang
  12. Sen. Bernie Sanders

Potential candidates who have shown some interest: Continue Reading...

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Sanders joins the fun

By Matt | Published February 19, 2019

Sen. Bernie Sanders joined the race for the 2020 Democratic nomination today. We’re also adding businessman Andrew Yang to the list, as most listings of candidates are including him. And we’re removing Sen. Mark Warner, as there has been no indications of any interest from him over the last few months. We now have 12 announced candidates, with 13 still to hear from.

Definitely running:

  1. Rep. John Delaney
  2. Sec. Julian Castro
  3. Gov. Jay Inslee
  4. Sen. Elizabeth Warren
  5. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard
  6. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand
  7. Mayor Pete Buttigieg
  8. Sen. Kamala Harris
  9. Sen. Cory Booker
  10. Sen. Any Klobuchar
  11. Andrew Yang
  12. Sen. Bernie Sanders

Potential candidates who have shown some interest: Continue Reading...

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Klobuchar running; Kennedy endorses Warren

By Matt | Published February 10, 2019

Sen. Any Klobuchar became the tenth candidate to enter the race for the Democratic nomination today. Meanwhile, Rep. Joe Kennedy endorsed Sen. Elizabeth Warren today, thereby removing his name from our potential candidate list. We now have 10 announced candidates, with 15 still to hear from.

Definitely running:

  1. Rep. John Delaney
  2. Sec. Julian Castro
  3. Gov. Jay Inslee
  4. Sen. Elizabeth Warren
  5. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard
  6. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand
  7. Mayor Pete Buttigieg
  8. Sen. Kamala Harris
  9. Sen. Cory Booker
  10. Sen. Any Klobuchar

Potential candidates who have shown some interest: Continue Reading...

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Virginia and the Problem with Looking Back

By tmess2 | Published February 10, 2019

This week, with controversy swirling around the top three Democrats in Virginia, former FBI Director James Comey gave a reminder that he spent most of his career working for Republican Administrations by writing an op-ed claiming that it was clear in the 1980s that blackface was offensive.  Of course, taken to its logical conclusion, this position would mean that two of the top three Democrats should resign for having worn blackface and, since the third currently has a sexual assault scandal, the coincidental effect of Comey’s opinion that everyone knew that blackface was wrong in the 1980s would be placing the Republican Speaker of the House in the Governor’s mansion even though Democrats swept the statewide vote and the Republicans only have the majority in the House due to winning a coin toss to break a tie in one race.  My memory of growing up in the 70s and early 80s in the South is very different from the picture painted by James Comey.

When I was very young, my father’s job made him relocate from his family’s home city to a new city.  For most of the early and mid 70s, we would drive once or twice a year over the partially completed Interstate 10 to visit the grandparents and other relatives.  On the way back home, we would typically stop for breakfast at Sambo’s.  This restaurant chain was actually named after its owners.  However, the restaurant had noticed that Sambo was the main character in a British book written in the late nineteenth century called “My Little Black Sambo.”  This book was your typical British Imperialism book from that era about a Hindu boy and a tiger.  Looked at in hindsight, the book and the restaurant décor was very offensive.  But in the early 70s, Sambo’s was actually very successful and uncontroversial.  That would end by 1980, and the restaurant chain mostly disappeared in the early 80s — either changing the name to another franchise within the same company or going out of business.  It is easy to look back and ask how anybody ever thought that the association of the restaurant with the story was a good idea, but, notwithstanding the fact that I was a voracious reader as a child who was interested in politics and the civil rights movement from a young age, it was not clear to me at the time that we were frequenting this restaurant.

The same is unfortunately true about black face.  While today it is clear that black face (originating from an era when blacks were not allowed in the arts for a variety of reasons meaning that whites would put on black make-up to portray black characters — usually depicted in stereotypical fashion) was wrong for a variety of reasons, this realization came very late.  As a counter to James Comey, I offer the movie “Trading Places” — one of the top comedies of the early 80s (released in 1983).  What does “Trading Places” have to do with the current controversy?  One of the key portions of the movie has our four main character (a WASP stockbroker, the stockbroker’s butler, an African-American petty criminal, and a hooker) boarding a train having a New Year’s party to steal a crop report from a private investigator working for the two villains of the movies (the two brothers who run the brokerage firm).  To hide their identities, our heroes pretend to have different identities.  Jaime Lee Curtis (playing the hooker) dresses up as a slightly ditzy Swedish exchange student; Denholm Elliott (playing the butler) dresses up as a drunk Irish priest; Eddie Murphy (as the petty criminal) dresses up as an African exchange student in traditional tribal clothing; and — significant for this post — Dan Aykroyd playing the stockbroker dresses up in blackface as a Jamaican exchange student.  Needless to say, this scene would never be written that way today.  It is chock full of the worst stereotypes.   Back in the 1980s, however, there was no controversy about this scene, and the movie itself was critically acclaimed receiving a Golden Globe nomination as Best Comedy of the year.  Continue Reading...

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Landrieu (likely) out; Klobuchar announcing Sunday?

By Matt | Published February 6, 2019

Former New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu announced today he is probably not running for President in 2020:

I never say never, but at this point in time I don’t think I’m going to do it.”

For a 3rd tier candidate like Landrieu, that’s enough to move him into the NO column. Continue Reading...

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Booker in, Schultz goes indy

By Matt | Published February 1, 2019

NJ Senator Cory Booker becomes the 9th Democrat to announce they are running for the 2020 nomination. Meanwhile, Howard Schultz announced he will pursue an Independent route, removing him from our contender list. That leaves 9 announced candidates, with 18 still to hear from. 

Definitely running:

  1. Rep. John Delaney
  2. Sec. Julian Castro
  3. Gov. Jay Inslee
  4. Sen. Elizabeth Warren
  5. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard
  6. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand
  7. Mayor Pete Buttigieg
  8. Sen. Kamala Harris
  9. Sen. Cory Booker

Potential candidates who have shown some interest: Continue Reading...

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