So, despite hating wading into identity politics and constant drama on the left, I often feel like I'm forced to discuss these issues due to their extreme prevalence in our modern political system. However, rather than just complaining, I want to discuss how the left should focus on social issues, and what I think would be both a philosophically consistent and winning platform for the left. All in all, my views socially are more libertarian than anything, but at the same time I always thought that libertarians and liberals were not that much different on social issues anyway. I always understood, traditionally, these these ideologies were about liberty and doing what you want, rather than being forced to do what other people want you to do. However, it is quite clear this does not refer to the modern left, nor the right, consistently. That said...
How my ideas vary from other ideologies
The key principles for how the left should act socially is to stay out of each others way, unless harm comes from such an arrangement. However, my vision for this is uniquely different than most other ideologies.
Conservatives like to get involved in peoples' lives on a moral level. They support traditionalism and believe in things like religious morality, defined gender roles, and the "life script" (marriage, kids, etc.). They believe that deviation from the way things are and have always been will bring a downfall to society. This made sense in ancient society. If you didn't have everyone blindly obedient to a moral code, where they all popped out kids and behaved in certain ways, society would fall apart. The thing is, today, these morals provide little guidance in peoples' lives and we no longer need to live this way. We have technology and scientific advancement and social systems that have radically transformed our society in ways where maybe it doesn't matter if people don't have tons of kids. If anything tons of kids in modern society leads to overpopulation and climate change, which is harmful. Maybe it doesn't matter if women are empowered. Maybe it doesn't matter if gay marriage and abortion are legal. To some of these guys, such things represent weakness to society but in a modern context they just lack the rational and evidential backing to justify the heavy handedness on the issues. In modern times, we can have a society where people can do what they want, without harming others. They just seem to want everyone to live like them.
Some conservatives, although not all, also have problematic racial views in their perspective. They fear their culture being displaced by minorities coming in from other countries and believe in a form of supremacy for white anglo saxon Christians. Once again, these guys seem to have views that are irrational. In my view, people should be able to do what they want. Someone wanting to celebrate their own culture or live their own lives should be able to do so. That said, I see the conservative right as a threat to individual freedom, and any restrictions on human behavior should be justified by demonstrating harm that comes to society or others that outweigh the inherent benefits of the freedom to commit such actions.
Libertarians don't represent my views either though. They tend to understand the whole "everyone should leave me alone unless they harm others thing", but they tend to take it way too far. Libertarian freedom is the freedom of that annoying kid who sticks their finger 2 inches from your face and says "I'm not touching you". Technically they're right, but they're still doing something that is violating your personal space and making you uncomfortable. It might not be a direct violation to your freedom, but the fact that you have that freedom is disruptive to others and harmful to them.
Libertarians might be more laid back on certain issues, like drugs, prostitution, gay marriage, etc., but their views are...naive. Libertarian views don't really lead to true freedom. Because to them, they have the freedom to pollute the earth, and everyone just has to live with the consequences. They have the freedom to pay workers $1 an hour, and they better be grateful for it or they starve. They have the right to do what they want with their land despite it causing possible issues that zoning laws try to solve. They believe in a right to association that involves discriminating against racial minorities, depriving them of things they need to live. Their views of freedom are very childish and lack foresight. Clearly, we need to ensure that others are treated fairly and equally. I don't want to get too much into economics, but I believe people cannot be free unless they have enough economic security to participate in the system in truly voluntary ways. And people do have rights, ie, social constructs that guarantee them certain kinds of treatment in society. Libertarians don't understand that while an action may not cause immediate harm to people in a direct way, when approached from a big picture, systemic way, they are quite harmful and lead to structural/systemic violence against certain groups. The rights of all groups should be protected in society.
This brings me to the modern left. On many social issues, the left is kind of dead on on a lot of topics. It allows freedom of choice on many social issues. It also balances this freedom against harm caused to society and marginalized groups. However, the left is kind of going off the rails too, despite being right in principle most of the time. Modern identity politics are extreme divisive and dare I say it, authoritarian. It's not enough to be for freedom of individuals and wanting to protect marginalized groups any more. Everyone must constantly obsess over these topics and sacrifice other priorities on the altar of white liberal guilt. It's not enough to be okay with immigration, or diversity in culture, we have to actively celebrate it. People have to actively "signal" these "virtues" and express a positive reinforcement of them in an almost circlejerky way. Moreover, and this is the big issue, people who are not affected by these politics are seemingly pressured into betraying their own interests in the advancement of these politics, being told to "check their privilege" if they dare assert their own interests over them. While the issues definitely deserve some concern, the lack of attention given to other, in my opinion, more pressing issues that are more universal in scale, are what is really problematic. We have seen this a lot with Bernie in 2016 in which people who advocated for economic interests over social ones were called "Bernie bros", and more recently, we've seen this to an extent with the Andrew Yang movement, where people are expected to abandon support of Yang and UBI simply because some bad egg white supremacists are latching onto the movement. You should not be pressured into betraying core principles or concerns or speaking out about what's in your best interest simply because others have it worse. This isn't to say that there are not valid points on the left. Issues involving minority groups, privilege, etc. are structural and sociological, and should be treated as real issues that we try to solve like anything else. My problem is that the modern left goes far beyond that, devolving the issue into this circlejerky guilt fest in which we all talk about how our interests don't matter because someone else has it worse and we should just get on social media and talk about those issues in a cult like manner while pushing out everything else. This is toxic and should be stopped. If you want to know what I really think the left should be doing, look at Andrew Yang. He talked about issues white people face on Joe Rogan, which is something rare on the left these days, and as such, is winning over some Trump voters. On the flip side, on another podcast he talked about African American issues and how his policies would help them too. We need to tone down the BS rhetoric and focus on defining problems and advocating for actual solutions to them, not just circlejerking about how much we care without doing anything productively about it.
Another problem with the modern left is how some of them tend to lose respect for the rule of law and civil society. I hate to sound conservative, but this is where it fits. Many of our rules and laws exist for good reason. We have freedom of speech, for example, as we do, because we understand that if you censor unpopular speech, it will undermine that liberty, and that one day someone else might decide your views are too dangerous to hold and ban them. Yet the modern left often seems to be opposed to freedom of speech for people like, say, racists. While censorship is a way to suppress racism, it's also a way to censor any idea, and perhaps we as a society should, as I indicated, oppose censorship in principle. Racism sucks, I can't say I don't understand where the left is coming from here, but does it suck enough we're gonna chip away at our liberties to suppress it? And if we ban racism, why not other talk? What about the second amendment people and their talk about revolution against the government? What about Marxists who criticize capitalism and the state? Heck, if anything, how the left has historically been treated in this country insofar as censorship goes should be a huge red flag for why censorship is a terrible idea. The same goes with punching Nazis. Okay, who doesn't actually wanna punch a Nazi? But at the same time, if we just allow people to punch Nazis, what's to stop the Nazis from punching back? What's to stop them from retaliating and assaulting leftists for demonstrating their views? Nothing, that's what. The left does need to develop an appreciation for our civil liberties and rule of law, why they exist, and stop acting like an angry mob and advocating for things that violate just laws and legal concepts. While there is nothing wrong with disobeying unjust laws, when you disobey and advocate disobedience and repeal of just ones whose disobedience has real and dangerous real world consequences as I demonstrated, the entire fabric our society is built on begins to fall apart, for real, and that is extremely dangerous. That's how you start heading toward an actual civil war with actual violence and actual people dying, or alternatively, an actual authoritarian state.
Wrapping it up
I spent much of this article defining my values in opposition to the shortcomings of other moral systems. I felt this was necessary, because my dissatisfaction with these varying ideologies is why, in my opinion, we need a new left libertarian ideology.
My ideology is in opposition to conservatism, because conservatism is based on tradition and well, conserving things for the sake of conserving things. They fear change, and fear their culture being threatened, and on the whole I just don't value these things much. My ideas about culture is that if it's valuable, it should be preserved, but if it's not it should be abandoned, and all culture and right wing sentiment should be treated with skepticism. This skepticism, in my opinion, should provide a filter between good and bad ideas. Good ideas, like the need for civil society and freedom of speech, should be preserved, while irrational ideas like "gay people should be put to death" should be abandoned. People should be allowed to behave as they want, as long as they don't harm others, and any harm allowed by certain actions should be demonstrated in justification for any rule against ideas.
My ideology is in opposition to libertarianism because libertarians are very dogmatic and narrow minded and often ignore how their ideas do real harm. Just because someone isn't picking up a blunt object and beating someone else outright does not mean that harm is not being done. It's possible for individual actions to harm people in an indirect way. A company polluting the earth does not directly hurt someone, but it does do so indirectly, by changing the environment, which then harms people.Paying people sub par wages may not be directly hurting them, but it does lead to a systemic form of resource denial that is arguably quite unfair and coercive. Denying people services on freedom of association might not be directly harming that person, but once again, the effects of such actions do indirect harm. We need to take into account both active, direct harm, but also passive, indirect harm done to individuals, and correct these actions in the most effective but freedom loving ways possible.
My ideology is in opposition to modern liberalism, because while liberals do bring light to issues that right wing ideologies do not discuss, and this should be applauded, they often do so in a way that's toxic, that forces participation in discussing these issues in unproductive ways and undermines other issues from being discussed, and often does not respect just concepts of law. We need a form of liberalism that discusses all issues, of all people, both privileged, and nonprivileged, but does so in a way that is not particularly circlejerky or shames people for not being oppressed enough. We need to focus instead on defining problems and actually solving them in a non toxic way. And maybe liberalism has a little to learn from conservatism too. Maybe liberals need to learn that sometimes they need to better respect the rule of law, and understand that sometimes rules exist for good reason and undoing them to solve a problem in the short term is fundamentally dangerous for the long term.
That said, to sum it up, we need a form of left wing social ideology that:
1) Is skeptical toward tradition, and evaluates everything through a lens of reason and evidence.
2) Is receptive and understanding of both direct, active forms of harm, as well as big picture indirect/passive forms of harm that come from destructive individual actions or social structures.
3) Is non toxic, open to discussing issues of all people, without judging them or playing games regarding who has it worse and who has to shut up and listen to whom.
4) Is respectful of just and valid legal concepts and social structures, understanding that solving a problem short term could lead to larger long term consequences.
This does not seem to really exist in our modern spectrum. Conservatives are gung ho about tradition, the right in general tends to ignore big picture sociological analyses of society and how seemingly innocent actions do have harmful consequences, and liberals tend to see the sociological issues but tend to have heavy handed solutions and a toxic mindset toward approaching them. My views are, as you can tell, closest to the left, but also a lot more "libertarian" in nature than the left currently is, in that it supports a more laid back live and let live philosophy, rather than a more authoritarian ideology in which everyone has to participate in their toxic culture while accomplishing little. I believe my ideas take the best of all of the ideologies out there while rejecting the bad. If I had to sum up my views in a sentence, it would be very similar to that.
Sunday, March 24, 2019
Saturday, March 9, 2019
Basic income or socialism....why not both?
It seems already there is a growing rift in the Bernie Sanders camp and the burgeoning Andrew Yang camp. This kind of makes me feel frustrated and conflicted. Both candidates are excellent and have good policies that would help people, but the two groups seem to be taking jabs at one another over policy and ideology, with some of them demonizing the other to an extreme extent.
The Bernie Sanders crowd seems to be a bit more malicious over it. I know the Bernie crowd has high standards and skepticism of a lot of candidates, and with good reason, but it frustrates me to see them bash Andrew Yang and refer to him as a "trap." They act like he's some closet libertarian who wants to destroy the government and make people worse off by taking welfare away from them. Yang himself stated he's not interested in taking welfare away from people, merely giving people more options. While there are some legitimate complaints from the Sanders crowd I already covered on here including a handful of his policies, he seems to have good intentions, and is not seemingly malevolent like I would suspect other candidates of being, he's not bought out.
The big complaint seems to come, though, from the fact that Yang isn't a "socialist." He does not want to seize the means of production, and rather, provide a more humane form of capitalism, and to many of these people that's a deal breaker, for them, it has to be socialism, and they often attribute a lot of Sanders' policies as forms of socialism....when they don't appear to be.
The Yang camp seems a bit more open to the Bernie people, but at the same time I'm also detecting some hostility there on policy. Once again, the big problem seems to come from the idea that Bernie is a "socialist". I know Yang appeals to a very diverse crowd, including people ranging from "Bernie bros" like me to literal alt right 4channers and everything in between, so it's no surprise some are turned off from left wing policy other than UBI, but honestly, I feel like we're eating our own over labels. Bernie, at least on the campaign trail, isn't so much a socialist, but a social democrat, and the way I see it, if you like Bernie, you should at least somewhat like Yang, and vice versa. Yes, their visions are different, but only in the details, the two candidates both support a transformative vision of the economy and will bring about change that will help millions of people in significant ways. I'm not trying to underscore the policy and ideology differences here, but I would think most Bernie supporters should at least like Yang somewhat, and Yang supporters should at least like Bernie somewhat. We might have our preferred vision at the end of the day, but I don't see openness toward each other as a zero sum game. People seem to have this weird all or nothing mentality toward each other, and seem turned off and alienated by the other side over ideological differences. I can understand this given my pickiness in 2016. Sometimes the differences are just too big to reconcile and you have to draw the line somewhere. For me, HRC was on the other side of that line. Sanders and Yang? I'm cool with both. Sure, I like Yang better ideologically but I'm not exactly gonna say no to Bernie.
What is the source over this major disagreement? Well, it seems to be over the "S" word, dreaded "socialism." A lot of the Sanders crowd I discuss politics with seem to be socialists. Full fledged socialists. They see capitalism in and of itself as fundamentally broken and needs to be changed, and some of these guys seem to be calling for "decommodification" of basic needs and nationalization of many industries...which I personally find to be a turnoff. Then you have the capitalist Yang supporters who think that Sanders represents nationalization of industries and 20th century luddite solutions (I can't say I disagree with the second assessment to some degree) and that his views are bad. Both of these perspectives seem to miss the mark and grossly misinterpret what Sanders is about.
Bernie Sanders, despite calling himself a "democratic socialist", is basically channeling FDR, the new deal, and Nordic social democracy in his platform. Yes, he speaks fiery rhetoric about the corporations, the 1%, etc. But ultimately, medicare for all exists in Canada, free college exists in Europe, high minimum wages exist in much of the industrialized world, and the "green new deal" is just a modified version of FDR's new deal from the 1930s. Heck, this is exactly what Sanders invoked when asked what "socialism" means. He explicitly rejected the government owning the means of production, which is a smart move. This means that he supports....*gasp*, a form of what Andrew Yang would consider "human centered capitalism"! They're not much different. Both are supporting variations of social democracy! They just have different ways of getting there. Both sides need to stop acting like Sanders is gonna be inaugurated while waving red flags and singing the Soviet national anthem, both the people who want that and don't want that need to chill. Bernie isn't going to herald in an age of "socialism" for better or for worse. The dude is basically FDR.
So what do I mean by basic income or socialism? Well, there is a form of socialism I'm okay with, and that's the worker cooperative model for businesses, which Sanders also supports. Such a model would maintain the market system, but also change who owns the means of production in a decentralized manner. This maintains all of the good aspects of capitalism like competition, freedom, markets, while eliminating the fact that businesses are like mini dictatorships in which ownership of wealth becomes concentrated at the top. Yang does not explicitly support this, but Sanders does, so I guess Sanders is "socialist" in this sense, but this does not seem to be what his advocates seem to want in entirety given the rhetoric of nationalization of businesses. I don't think that this "socialism" is an end all though. As I discussed a few years back, socialism of this kind does not fix issues with the market, it does not fix work culture, it does not eliminate the need for labor laws or safety nets or even basic income. I personally believe we should have both. Basic income on the other hand, does not fix who owns property and the means to create more wealth. This will lead to inherent long term issues involving wealth being concentrated at the top, despite concerted efforts to avoid it. This is one aspect in which the "socialists" are right.
Honestly, we need both. Basic income provides a safety net that would make millions of peoples' lives better, and I prefer it over a rehash of 20th century ideas like Sanders supports. Not that I have a particular dislike of Sanders' ideas, I like that the dude wants to make peoples' lives better, even if I disagree with how. Socialism, in terms of a decentralized worker cooperative model for businesses, would likely solve the core issue with "capitalism" that socialists complain about, while maintaining virtually all benefits of capitalism itself. Honestly, it's hard to say if I'm even a capitalist or a socialist. This ideology makes me too moderate for most socialists, but also more extreme than most capitalists. Either way, can we all just agree that all of these solutions are better than the crap Clinton offered in 2016, and the republican solutions of the past 40 years? Please? I believe the two camps have way more in common than what separates them.
The Bernie Sanders crowd seems to be a bit more malicious over it. I know the Bernie crowd has high standards and skepticism of a lot of candidates, and with good reason, but it frustrates me to see them bash Andrew Yang and refer to him as a "trap." They act like he's some closet libertarian who wants to destroy the government and make people worse off by taking welfare away from them. Yang himself stated he's not interested in taking welfare away from people, merely giving people more options. While there are some legitimate complaints from the Sanders crowd I already covered on here including a handful of his policies, he seems to have good intentions, and is not seemingly malevolent like I would suspect other candidates of being, he's not bought out.
The big complaint seems to come, though, from the fact that Yang isn't a "socialist." He does not want to seize the means of production, and rather, provide a more humane form of capitalism, and to many of these people that's a deal breaker, for them, it has to be socialism, and they often attribute a lot of Sanders' policies as forms of socialism....when they don't appear to be.
The Yang camp seems a bit more open to the Bernie people, but at the same time I'm also detecting some hostility there on policy. Once again, the big problem seems to come from the idea that Bernie is a "socialist". I know Yang appeals to a very diverse crowd, including people ranging from "Bernie bros" like me to literal alt right 4channers and everything in between, so it's no surprise some are turned off from left wing policy other than UBI, but honestly, I feel like we're eating our own over labels. Bernie, at least on the campaign trail, isn't so much a socialist, but a social democrat, and the way I see it, if you like Bernie, you should at least somewhat like Yang, and vice versa. Yes, their visions are different, but only in the details, the two candidates both support a transformative vision of the economy and will bring about change that will help millions of people in significant ways. I'm not trying to underscore the policy and ideology differences here, but I would think most Bernie supporters should at least like Yang somewhat, and Yang supporters should at least like Bernie somewhat. We might have our preferred vision at the end of the day, but I don't see openness toward each other as a zero sum game. People seem to have this weird all or nothing mentality toward each other, and seem turned off and alienated by the other side over ideological differences. I can understand this given my pickiness in 2016. Sometimes the differences are just too big to reconcile and you have to draw the line somewhere. For me, HRC was on the other side of that line. Sanders and Yang? I'm cool with both. Sure, I like Yang better ideologically but I'm not exactly gonna say no to Bernie.
What is the source over this major disagreement? Well, it seems to be over the "S" word, dreaded "socialism." A lot of the Sanders crowd I discuss politics with seem to be socialists. Full fledged socialists. They see capitalism in and of itself as fundamentally broken and needs to be changed, and some of these guys seem to be calling for "decommodification" of basic needs and nationalization of many industries...which I personally find to be a turnoff. Then you have the capitalist Yang supporters who think that Sanders represents nationalization of industries and 20th century luddite solutions (I can't say I disagree with the second assessment to some degree) and that his views are bad. Both of these perspectives seem to miss the mark and grossly misinterpret what Sanders is about.
Bernie Sanders, despite calling himself a "democratic socialist", is basically channeling FDR, the new deal, and Nordic social democracy in his platform. Yes, he speaks fiery rhetoric about the corporations, the 1%, etc. But ultimately, medicare for all exists in Canada, free college exists in Europe, high minimum wages exist in much of the industrialized world, and the "green new deal" is just a modified version of FDR's new deal from the 1930s. Heck, this is exactly what Sanders invoked when asked what "socialism" means. He explicitly rejected the government owning the means of production, which is a smart move. This means that he supports....*gasp*, a form of what Andrew Yang would consider "human centered capitalism"! They're not much different. Both are supporting variations of social democracy! They just have different ways of getting there. Both sides need to stop acting like Sanders is gonna be inaugurated while waving red flags and singing the Soviet national anthem, both the people who want that and don't want that need to chill. Bernie isn't going to herald in an age of "socialism" for better or for worse. The dude is basically FDR.
So what do I mean by basic income or socialism? Well, there is a form of socialism I'm okay with, and that's the worker cooperative model for businesses, which Sanders also supports. Such a model would maintain the market system, but also change who owns the means of production in a decentralized manner. This maintains all of the good aspects of capitalism like competition, freedom, markets, while eliminating the fact that businesses are like mini dictatorships in which ownership of wealth becomes concentrated at the top. Yang does not explicitly support this, but Sanders does, so I guess Sanders is "socialist" in this sense, but this does not seem to be what his advocates seem to want in entirety given the rhetoric of nationalization of businesses. I don't think that this "socialism" is an end all though. As I discussed a few years back, socialism of this kind does not fix issues with the market, it does not fix work culture, it does not eliminate the need for labor laws or safety nets or even basic income. I personally believe we should have both. Basic income on the other hand, does not fix who owns property and the means to create more wealth. This will lead to inherent long term issues involving wealth being concentrated at the top, despite concerted efforts to avoid it. This is one aspect in which the "socialists" are right.
Honestly, we need both. Basic income provides a safety net that would make millions of peoples' lives better, and I prefer it over a rehash of 20th century ideas like Sanders supports. Not that I have a particular dislike of Sanders' ideas, I like that the dude wants to make peoples' lives better, even if I disagree with how. Socialism, in terms of a decentralized worker cooperative model for businesses, would likely solve the core issue with "capitalism" that socialists complain about, while maintaining virtually all benefits of capitalism itself. Honestly, it's hard to say if I'm even a capitalist or a socialist. This ideology makes me too moderate for most socialists, but also more extreme than most capitalists. Either way, can we all just agree that all of these solutions are better than the crap Clinton offered in 2016, and the republican solutions of the past 40 years? Please? I believe the two camps have way more in common than what separates them.
Monday, March 4, 2019
Discussing the 2020 primaries
I know it's a bit early to discuss the 2020 primaries as they're almost a year away and anything can happen, so take everything I'm about to say with a grain of salt. This discussion is going to be personal speculation, inspired by a recent discussion on the David Pakman show about Yang's 2020 chances in which it's discussed how he could, in theory win. I think it's relatively unlikely, but possible. However, I think that given the sheer number of candidates anything is possible and we will need to wait and see. That said, let's look at the field.
So far the following candidates have declared:
Cory Booker
Pete Buttigieg
Julian Castro
John Delaney
Tulsi Gabbard
Kirsten Gillibrand
Kamala Harris
John Hickenlooper
Jay Inslee
Amy Klobuchar
Bernie Sanders
Elizabeth Warren
Marianne Williamson
Andrew Yang
I would also expect Joe Biden, Sherrod Brown, and maybe Beto O'Rourke and Michael Bloomberg to declare. That gives us 18 candidates, and this might not be an exhaustive list. There are also a lot of lesser known candidates I may not be aware of.
Looking at the polls, while RCP's polls don't cover every candidate, they do give a good idea of what the race is looking so far, especially among the front runners. Their polling data indicates, in aggregate, these results:
Joe Biden - 29%
Bernie Sanders - 20%
Kamala Harris - 12%
Elizabeth Warren - 7%
Cory Booker - 6%
Beto O"Rourke - 6%
Amy Klobuchar - 3.3%
Michael Bloomberg - 3%
Sherrod Brown - 2%
Tulsi Gabbard - 1%
Julian Castro - <1%
Kirsten Gillibrand - <1%
That said, Joe Biden is the front runner, without having declared yet. Bernie is leading among the declared candidates, and I think Kamala Harris is also a formidable candidate I could consider to be in the top tier of contenders. These are the ones I think have the best shot at the presidency. Both approach politics differently and have a unique niche. Biden is the centrist candidate with a well known name and probably has a lot of the Clinton vote. Sanders is also well known at this point but is known as being a fiery progressive, the opposite of Biden ideologically. Harris is kind of the middle ground compromise between the two with a heavy focus on intersectionality. She appears to be pursuing the Obama coalition by striking a balance between centrism and progressivism, while also appealing to women and people of color.
That said:
Does Joe Biden stand a chance?
Primaries are weird. Especially with this many candidates. Some primaries are relatively boring with the frontrunner being known before hand and they just maintain their lead the entire race. Joe Biden is a familiar name, he was the vice president under Obama, and he has a good chance with some of the Hillary Clinton vote due to his centrism. He could theoretically coast to the presidency. However, it's also possible his support is primarily because of name recognition and that if he declares, he may find himself embroiled in a world of controversy. Biden is a very controversial figure. He has run for president multiple times before and always lost. And at this point it might be too late for a "new democrat" to win, especially with all of the ammo progressives have to sink his campaign with. At the start of his political career, a mere decade after Bernie Sanders was arrested for standing with civil rights protesters, Joe Biden was in the senate....turning people against integration and busing programs. This may have played well with his constituents at the time, but let's be honest, the dude was flat out on the wrong side of history. And while people often forget this about him now, it's been coming up in recent years given the possibility of him running again, and it might be brought up again by opponents. He also has a very abysmal record on the drug war that does not fit in the party today. This is likely going to be brought up again. Again, he could make an argument that it made sense at the time, and that he can pivot in different ways, but does America really want someone who flip flops? The more I look at him, but more I see a white male Hillary Clinton candidacy all over again.
Biden is also a "gaffe machine". You think Howard Dean's "BYAH!" was bad? Biden is infamous for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time and this ability could kill his campaign just like Howard Dean. He could start off as the front runner but say stuff that alienates voters, driving them to other candidates. Heck he's already alienated me from voting for him by downplaying millennial experiences with the economy and telling us to "give him a break." No, Joe, you give US a break. I mean between this and his vocal opposition to basic income, a policy I champion regularly on here, he has basically lost me before he's even declared. I'll vote third party again if he is the nominee, just saying.
Finally, Biden comes off to some as kind of "creepy." He is known to touch people in uncomfortable ways and while nothing to my knowledge flat out goes into sexual harassment territory, some have speculated that he is going to be "me tooed" out of the race.
It's possible that despite all of this baggage he maintains enough popularity to win and make it to the general, but he would be going into the general mired in controversy just like Hillary Clinton did. If I had to guess, once the spotlight is on him and all of this stuff comes out, he will likely lose a lot of support, with Sanders and Harris becoming far more likely to win.
Does Bernie Sanders stand a chance?
With Biden being the tenuous front runner who may implode upon announcing his candidacy, does Bernie Sanders stand a chance? If I had to guess, yes, yes he does. He is starting out 2020 with a strong base of support, already gathering huge crowds in his first campaign rallies in Brooklyn and Chicago. His campaign also raised $6 million from small donors within 24 hours of announcing. He has tremendous energy. He has also polished up his stump speech and has far more of a focus on intersectionality than he did in 2016, so people can't realistically say he doesn't appeal to minorities (news flash, they still do, nothing will be good enough for these people unless he was a black woman himself). He went on a town hall on CNN and nailed it, despite the fact that CNN did everything in their power to make him look bad by stacking the audience full of DNC operatives and lobbyists. I mean, he's far stronger than he was in 2016 message wise, and listening to him, and looking at his energy, if I had to guess who would win this time around, I'll say this: Bernie Sanders stands the best chance of any candidate in the running. He draws in tons of small donor money, tons of crowds, and enthuses people in a way few people do. He's strengthened his platform, he's clearly learned from 2016. He's back and means business. The haters still hate him and are still trying to do dirty tricks against him, but I don't think they will work this time because he is starting out with tons of momentum and not just one percent. To me, for anyone else to become the nominee, he is THE person to beat, along with Biden, who I see as far more beatable. While I suspect Biden will lose a lot of support if he declares and the race goes on, Sanders comes off as someone with a strong following and enthusiasm, and the only way he will lose his current support is if he gets sick given his advanced age and apparent propensity to give speeches during snowstorms (hello, William Henry Harrison), or if another progressive comes up and possibly splits the vote.
Does Kamala Harris stand a chance?
This is tricky, because it's unclear whether she does. She has been pushed as the frontrunner before and when she declared her candidacy was given all kinds of special treatment it seemed which propelled her to the third place slot. However, she has not taken off since then and much like Beto O'Rourke before her, might just be a flavor of the month. Someone pushed artificially high by the media tipping the scales, but who does not have a strong base of support when the dust settles.
However, as the Fox article points out, she has a lot going for her. People in 538 and the like seem to think she stands a good chance because she can theoretically bring in people from all over the party including minority voters, young voters, progressives, and establishment figures. She's pushed as this unifying figure who triangulates all of the different factions in the party and brings them together. Despite that though, she's only third place and does not seem to have the traction, for example, Sanders has. However, say Biden does drop out of the race. Since establishment figures like Harris, it's possible Biden's supporters could flock to her, giving her a commanding lead. However, at this time her level of support doesn't seem high enough. This could change, and I still think she's a strong candidate in the running, but I'm not sure she can seal the deal. Her level of support and enthusiasm seems relatively low at the time despite getting lots of media coverage.
Candidates I think will drop out
So, moving on, and covering the front runners, I think I want to cover candidates I don't think will make it very far. Here's the thing, when you have a race this competitive, with so many different people in the race, you end up getting an oversupply of candidates who all tend to overlap with each other. By this I mean, they have no niche, and appear too similar to a candidate who has a better chance at the presidency. Here are the people I think fit this category:
Tulsi Gabbard- Gabbard is quite frankly, too similar to Sanders. Her big claim to fame is giving up her position as DNC vice chair to point out funny business in the democratic party and back Sanders. As such, the vast majority of her support comes from people who already back Sanders. Unless Sanders gets sick, I see him as a near unstoppable freight train in this sense. People like Tulsi have no base of support. The only people I have seen who like Gabbard over Sanders are people who are openly anti Semitic, and people who think Bernie fails to meet insane purity tests and think Tulsi has more guts in standing up to the establishment like. These people are a minority and I doubt her campaign will get off the ground.
Either Sherrod Brown or Amy Klobuchar- It's unclear which of these candidates will drop out, but these two seem too similar to each other. Both of them are relatively centrist/pragmatic candidates from the midwest whose big claim to fame is being able to win the areas of the country Trump lost. Brown has a more labor oriented message while Klobuchar comes off more like your typical Clintonite. Either way both reject big solutions to problems like free college, medicare for all, and the green new deal and prefer more centrist paths to accomplishing their goals. I just don't think the race is big enough for both of these candidates, although if their voters all rallied behind one of them, they might stand a chance. It's also if Biden drops out or doesn't run that they could pick up some of his support and be a force to be reckoned with themselves. Otherwise it's possible both will be crowded out due to Joe Biden's presence in the race.
Kirsten Gillibrand, Cory Booker, and Julian Castro- These candidates all come off as too Harris-like. I think Harris has the whole "centrist pretending to be a progressive while appealing for the Obama vote" crowd locked down. Too many copycats of copycats at this point.
Pete Buttigieg- Combined with having many of Tulsi Gabbard's problems related to overlapping with Sanders, this guy is relatively unknown. His big selling point is that he's a millennial who has run a city before but nothing about his platform seems to stand out. He's another Bernie copycat.
Elizabeth Warren- I think Warren will make it further than most on this list. She's more progressive than most candidates while being not as progressive as Sanders. She has a niche and strong credentials that way. She's not explicitly copying Sanders but trying to carve out her own path with her own unique policies. But she is suffering severe likeability and image problems. While she appears to be trying to triangulate as being left of the Harris crowd and to the right of the Sanders crowd, offering a "capitalist" alternative to Bernie's democratic socialism, she just doesn't appear to be taking off. Many of her prospective voters likely already back other candidates and she is questioned as to whether she has the chops to take on Trump effectively after the whole "Pocahontas" thing. Better than most on this list, but a long shot.
John Delaney, John Hickenlooper, Michael Bloomberg- Despite being very vocal, these avowed centrists seem to have next to no support in the party at all. I think they will be crowded out of the race while Biden and maybe Klobuchar and Brown pick up the "centrist" vote.
Jay Inslee, Marianne Williamson- Who has even heard of these guys?
Don't get me wrong, one or two of these guys may take off given certain circumstances, but as a whole, I just don't see these guys as gaining enough traction to win. That said, why did I leave off Andrew Yang? Well, to get into that....
Does Andrew Yang stand a chance?
Andrew Yang is so unknown most are not aware of his existence. Most mainstream news outlets don't cover him, most pollsters don't ask about him, he's relatively unknown. However, I can't help but find parallels to his campaign, and Bernie and Trump in 2016. Yang, when he is polled, tends to get around 1% from what I see. He also seems to be getting a major boost from his appearance on Joe Rogan's podcast. I mean it sold me on him too, despite still having reservations about some of his policies. When people hear him and listen to him, he seems to get a lot of people on his side and talks sense in a way few people do. Not just liberals, but conservatives as well. People in this country do want change, and I am convinced of this. It's why Trump won in 2016 and one of the reasons I think Bernie will win 2020. But it's possible Yang's vision is more popular than Bernie's. Bernie is good at stump speeches and inspiring people, but Yang has a way of systemizing the issues and explaining them in a way that most people have never heard of before, and make perfect sense. Right now his goal seems to be to make it to the debates. If he does, he could raise his profile for awareness and possibly come out of nowhere, gaining a lot of support. People who are committed to Biden or Sanders but who think they're too old might vote for him. People who think the green new deal and Bernie Sanders' "socialism" as too far gone but want a progressive alternative might vote for him. Yang ultimately is both an idealist but also somewhat of a pragmatist. He understands we can't do everything and has a clear vision insofar as what he wants. I could see him going from 1% or less right now to hitting 3-5% in the debates, and possibly creeping up into the double digits before the Iowa caucus and New Hampshire primary. It's also possible he never takes off like so many others, but I think that if we are going to have a candidate who is not currently well known and on the radar come out of nowhere and take it, it's probably going to be Yang. He has a niche no one else does, his message is unique and makes sense. While other candidates seem like general copycats of other candidates, Yang is one candidate I think has a unique niche, and in this crowded race it's good to find something that makes you stand out that resonates. It's unclear whether basic income can be that thing, but it's possible.
At the same time there are a lot of good reasons to believe that Yang will NOT take off, or at least not win. The centrist camp of the democratic party hates progressives with big ticket programs. They hate medicare for all, they hate free college, they hate the green new deal, and they would hate basic income. One of the reasons I am so disillusioned with the centrists is their refusal to think big about these programs and think the status quo or some variation of it is "good enough." So instead of getting UBI the furthest left they will go is Kamala Harris' "lift act" or an expanded EITC.
Some democrats oppose UBI because they see it as a program designed to make people poorer and help the rich. They see a tech oriented rich person like Yang push this and they see it as a conservative plot to destroy welfare. I could see some on the left and center oppose UBI because they want to defend current programs. This happened before when Nixon supported a UBI style program to replace Johnson's "great society". Democrats get touchy when people try to one up their past accomplishments. We saw this recently with Hillary not wanting to replace Obamacare with single payer. It's also possible the idea is just too forward thinking and radical for people to get behind.
Much of the country who is progressive seems to be behind Sanders' message which is in favor of a jobs program. Many people really can't think of a world without work yet and would rather create more work to give people a paycheck than see people do "nothing." While I think Yang's aspirations are more realistic than Bernie's here (UBI would only cost a fraction of what the green new deal would), it is possible people just aren't ready for UBI and will vigorously fight against it. I personally was thinking originally UBI would not be introduced into the debate in a serious way for another decade or so, but Yang seems to be pushing it now. It's possible it's too early.
Finally, I think Yang is making too many of Sanders' 2016 mistakes. Yang reminds me a lot of 2016 Sanders: someone who wants to run an issue based campaign but who is naive and doesn't realize that he will be torn apart for it. Yang is one of the few people who published numbers for funding his ideas on his website and quite frankly, as I already covered, they don't work well and need an overhaul. If I can point this out, imagine how CNN treats them when he gains awareness in the country. They will do the same thing they did to Bernie in 2016. Yang also seems to be avoiding the pit of snakes that is identity politics, but as Bernie learned, you need to either adapt to them or get swallowed up. Yang, in running an issues oriented campaign, will be blasted for not pandering to people of every single identity group properly, and honestly, I really don't see the democrats as a party to unite behind common solutions to problems unless they get pandered to specifically based on identity. You can't just say "here's UBI, it will work and make your lives better", you need to explain to women how it will make their lives better, and then African Americans and latinos, and people in the LGBT+ community, and everything else. Otherwise you'll be written off as "too white" (despite Yang being asian) and too male and your supporters will be called "Yang bros". I've heard it said by someone I introduced Yang to that he's "too smart to be president" and sadly I think that's not far off the mark. Sadly, many people don't care about ideas, they care about being pandered to specifically, and while I find it sickening, it's the truth.
Yang's message seems to appeal primarily to the people who are needed to win the general. Sadly, these are not the same people who vote in the primary. They are not loyal democrats, they are independent swing voters. And while Yang is correct that if you don't offer good solutions from the left these people will succumb to xenophobia and move right, they also often don't come out and vote as a bloc on the democratic side in primaries, and many who do likely already back Bernie.
That said I can't rule Yang out and think he has a stronger chance than most candidates, going so far to say I think he might come in 4th or 5th. However, I can't see him winning. It's possible, but I cannot see how a coalition would come together to seal the deal unless he manages to "Trump" everyone. I see him as this cycle's Ross Perot, or Ron Paul, or Hermin Cain. Someone with very unique ideas that maybe should be listened to somewhat but who will likely only acquire a small base of support not capable of winning the party's nomination in and of itself.
Conclusion
I'm just gonna call it now, if I had to guess who will win the primary right now, it will be Bernie Sanders. I say this because he is currently second in the polls, and because I don't think Biden will make it out of the primaries unscathed. I think he has the strongest, most loyal base of support this time, and there are enough candidates out there where he could win with a strong plurality vote, likely not needing a full majority to lock down the nomination. Biden has a strong chance too though, and while I don't think he will definitely win, I could see him limping into the general like Clinton did as a vastly unpopular, damaged candidate who managed to beat the competition. I could also see Harris possibly gaining support from other candidates dropping out, giving her enough of a base to win. Other than that, I think it's hard to guess. I think most other candidates will drop out as they lack unique messages that could resonate with the voter base. I do think Yang will make waves this election, but I think it's unlikely he will win. I would like to see him gain more awareness in the country though in order to inject basic income into the debate though.
So far the following candidates have declared:
Cory Booker
Pete Buttigieg
Julian Castro
John Delaney
Tulsi Gabbard
Kirsten Gillibrand
Kamala Harris
John Hickenlooper
Jay Inslee
Amy Klobuchar
Bernie Sanders
Elizabeth Warren
Marianne Williamson
Andrew Yang
I would also expect Joe Biden, Sherrod Brown, and maybe Beto O'Rourke and Michael Bloomberg to declare. That gives us 18 candidates, and this might not be an exhaustive list. There are also a lot of lesser known candidates I may not be aware of.
Looking at the polls, while RCP's polls don't cover every candidate, they do give a good idea of what the race is looking so far, especially among the front runners. Their polling data indicates, in aggregate, these results:
Joe Biden - 29%
Bernie Sanders - 20%
Kamala Harris - 12%
Elizabeth Warren - 7%
Cory Booker - 6%
Beto O"Rourke - 6%
Amy Klobuchar - 3.3%
Michael Bloomberg - 3%
Sherrod Brown - 2%
Tulsi Gabbard - 1%
Julian Castro - <1%
Kirsten Gillibrand - <1%
That said, Joe Biden is the front runner, without having declared yet. Bernie is leading among the declared candidates, and I think Kamala Harris is also a formidable candidate I could consider to be in the top tier of contenders. These are the ones I think have the best shot at the presidency. Both approach politics differently and have a unique niche. Biden is the centrist candidate with a well known name and probably has a lot of the Clinton vote. Sanders is also well known at this point but is known as being a fiery progressive, the opposite of Biden ideologically. Harris is kind of the middle ground compromise between the two with a heavy focus on intersectionality. She appears to be pursuing the Obama coalition by striking a balance between centrism and progressivism, while also appealing to women and people of color.
That said:
Does Joe Biden stand a chance?
Primaries are weird. Especially with this many candidates. Some primaries are relatively boring with the frontrunner being known before hand and they just maintain their lead the entire race. Joe Biden is a familiar name, he was the vice president under Obama, and he has a good chance with some of the Hillary Clinton vote due to his centrism. He could theoretically coast to the presidency. However, it's also possible his support is primarily because of name recognition and that if he declares, he may find himself embroiled in a world of controversy. Biden is a very controversial figure. He has run for president multiple times before and always lost. And at this point it might be too late for a "new democrat" to win, especially with all of the ammo progressives have to sink his campaign with. At the start of his political career, a mere decade after Bernie Sanders was arrested for standing with civil rights protesters, Joe Biden was in the senate....turning people against integration and busing programs. This may have played well with his constituents at the time, but let's be honest, the dude was flat out on the wrong side of history. And while people often forget this about him now, it's been coming up in recent years given the possibility of him running again, and it might be brought up again by opponents. He also has a very abysmal record on the drug war that does not fit in the party today. This is likely going to be brought up again. Again, he could make an argument that it made sense at the time, and that he can pivot in different ways, but does America really want someone who flip flops? The more I look at him, but more I see a white male Hillary Clinton candidacy all over again.
Biden is also a "gaffe machine". You think Howard Dean's "BYAH!" was bad? Biden is infamous for saying the wrong thing at the wrong time and this ability could kill his campaign just like Howard Dean. He could start off as the front runner but say stuff that alienates voters, driving them to other candidates. Heck he's already alienated me from voting for him by downplaying millennial experiences with the economy and telling us to "give him a break." No, Joe, you give US a break. I mean between this and his vocal opposition to basic income, a policy I champion regularly on here, he has basically lost me before he's even declared. I'll vote third party again if he is the nominee, just saying.
Finally, Biden comes off to some as kind of "creepy." He is known to touch people in uncomfortable ways and while nothing to my knowledge flat out goes into sexual harassment territory, some have speculated that he is going to be "me tooed" out of the race.
It's possible that despite all of this baggage he maintains enough popularity to win and make it to the general, but he would be going into the general mired in controversy just like Hillary Clinton did. If I had to guess, once the spotlight is on him and all of this stuff comes out, he will likely lose a lot of support, with Sanders and Harris becoming far more likely to win.
Does Bernie Sanders stand a chance?
With Biden being the tenuous front runner who may implode upon announcing his candidacy, does Bernie Sanders stand a chance? If I had to guess, yes, yes he does. He is starting out 2020 with a strong base of support, already gathering huge crowds in his first campaign rallies in Brooklyn and Chicago. His campaign also raised $6 million from small donors within 24 hours of announcing. He has tremendous energy. He has also polished up his stump speech and has far more of a focus on intersectionality than he did in 2016, so people can't realistically say he doesn't appeal to minorities (news flash, they still do, nothing will be good enough for these people unless he was a black woman himself). He went on a town hall on CNN and nailed it, despite the fact that CNN did everything in their power to make him look bad by stacking the audience full of DNC operatives and lobbyists. I mean, he's far stronger than he was in 2016 message wise, and listening to him, and looking at his energy, if I had to guess who would win this time around, I'll say this: Bernie Sanders stands the best chance of any candidate in the running. He draws in tons of small donor money, tons of crowds, and enthuses people in a way few people do. He's strengthened his platform, he's clearly learned from 2016. He's back and means business. The haters still hate him and are still trying to do dirty tricks against him, but I don't think they will work this time because he is starting out with tons of momentum and not just one percent. To me, for anyone else to become the nominee, he is THE person to beat, along with Biden, who I see as far more beatable. While I suspect Biden will lose a lot of support if he declares and the race goes on, Sanders comes off as someone with a strong following and enthusiasm, and the only way he will lose his current support is if he gets sick given his advanced age and apparent propensity to give speeches during snowstorms (hello, William Henry Harrison), or if another progressive comes up and possibly splits the vote.
Does Kamala Harris stand a chance?
This is tricky, because it's unclear whether she does. She has been pushed as the frontrunner before and when she declared her candidacy was given all kinds of special treatment it seemed which propelled her to the third place slot. However, she has not taken off since then and much like Beto O'Rourke before her, might just be a flavor of the month. Someone pushed artificially high by the media tipping the scales, but who does not have a strong base of support when the dust settles.
However, as the Fox article points out, she has a lot going for her. People in 538 and the like seem to think she stands a good chance because she can theoretically bring in people from all over the party including minority voters, young voters, progressives, and establishment figures. She's pushed as this unifying figure who triangulates all of the different factions in the party and brings them together. Despite that though, she's only third place and does not seem to have the traction, for example, Sanders has. However, say Biden does drop out of the race. Since establishment figures like Harris, it's possible Biden's supporters could flock to her, giving her a commanding lead. However, at this time her level of support doesn't seem high enough. This could change, and I still think she's a strong candidate in the running, but I'm not sure she can seal the deal. Her level of support and enthusiasm seems relatively low at the time despite getting lots of media coverage.
Candidates I think will drop out
So, moving on, and covering the front runners, I think I want to cover candidates I don't think will make it very far. Here's the thing, when you have a race this competitive, with so many different people in the race, you end up getting an oversupply of candidates who all tend to overlap with each other. By this I mean, they have no niche, and appear too similar to a candidate who has a better chance at the presidency. Here are the people I think fit this category:
Tulsi Gabbard- Gabbard is quite frankly, too similar to Sanders. Her big claim to fame is giving up her position as DNC vice chair to point out funny business in the democratic party and back Sanders. As such, the vast majority of her support comes from people who already back Sanders. Unless Sanders gets sick, I see him as a near unstoppable freight train in this sense. People like Tulsi have no base of support. The only people I have seen who like Gabbard over Sanders are people who are openly anti Semitic, and people who think Bernie fails to meet insane purity tests and think Tulsi has more guts in standing up to the establishment like. These people are a minority and I doubt her campaign will get off the ground.
Either Sherrod Brown or Amy Klobuchar- It's unclear which of these candidates will drop out, but these two seem too similar to each other. Both of them are relatively centrist/pragmatic candidates from the midwest whose big claim to fame is being able to win the areas of the country Trump lost. Brown has a more labor oriented message while Klobuchar comes off more like your typical Clintonite. Either way both reject big solutions to problems like free college, medicare for all, and the green new deal and prefer more centrist paths to accomplishing their goals. I just don't think the race is big enough for both of these candidates, although if their voters all rallied behind one of them, they might stand a chance. It's also if Biden drops out or doesn't run that they could pick up some of his support and be a force to be reckoned with themselves. Otherwise it's possible both will be crowded out due to Joe Biden's presence in the race.
Kirsten Gillibrand, Cory Booker, and Julian Castro- These candidates all come off as too Harris-like. I think Harris has the whole "centrist pretending to be a progressive while appealing for the Obama vote" crowd locked down. Too many copycats of copycats at this point.
Pete Buttigieg- Combined with having many of Tulsi Gabbard's problems related to overlapping with Sanders, this guy is relatively unknown. His big selling point is that he's a millennial who has run a city before but nothing about his platform seems to stand out. He's another Bernie copycat.
Elizabeth Warren- I think Warren will make it further than most on this list. She's more progressive than most candidates while being not as progressive as Sanders. She has a niche and strong credentials that way. She's not explicitly copying Sanders but trying to carve out her own path with her own unique policies. But she is suffering severe likeability and image problems. While she appears to be trying to triangulate as being left of the Harris crowd and to the right of the Sanders crowd, offering a "capitalist" alternative to Bernie's democratic socialism, she just doesn't appear to be taking off. Many of her prospective voters likely already back other candidates and she is questioned as to whether she has the chops to take on Trump effectively after the whole "Pocahontas" thing. Better than most on this list, but a long shot.
John Delaney, John Hickenlooper, Michael Bloomberg- Despite being very vocal, these avowed centrists seem to have next to no support in the party at all. I think they will be crowded out of the race while Biden and maybe Klobuchar and Brown pick up the "centrist" vote.
Jay Inslee, Marianne Williamson- Who has even heard of these guys?
Don't get me wrong, one or two of these guys may take off given certain circumstances, but as a whole, I just don't see these guys as gaining enough traction to win. That said, why did I leave off Andrew Yang? Well, to get into that....
Does Andrew Yang stand a chance?
Andrew Yang is so unknown most are not aware of his existence. Most mainstream news outlets don't cover him, most pollsters don't ask about him, he's relatively unknown. However, I can't help but find parallels to his campaign, and Bernie and Trump in 2016. Yang, when he is polled, tends to get around 1% from what I see. He also seems to be getting a major boost from his appearance on Joe Rogan's podcast. I mean it sold me on him too, despite still having reservations about some of his policies. When people hear him and listen to him, he seems to get a lot of people on his side and talks sense in a way few people do. Not just liberals, but conservatives as well. People in this country do want change, and I am convinced of this. It's why Trump won in 2016 and one of the reasons I think Bernie will win 2020. But it's possible Yang's vision is more popular than Bernie's. Bernie is good at stump speeches and inspiring people, but Yang has a way of systemizing the issues and explaining them in a way that most people have never heard of before, and make perfect sense. Right now his goal seems to be to make it to the debates. If he does, he could raise his profile for awareness and possibly come out of nowhere, gaining a lot of support. People who are committed to Biden or Sanders but who think they're too old might vote for him. People who think the green new deal and Bernie Sanders' "socialism" as too far gone but want a progressive alternative might vote for him. Yang ultimately is both an idealist but also somewhat of a pragmatist. He understands we can't do everything and has a clear vision insofar as what he wants. I could see him going from 1% or less right now to hitting 3-5% in the debates, and possibly creeping up into the double digits before the Iowa caucus and New Hampshire primary. It's also possible he never takes off like so many others, but I think that if we are going to have a candidate who is not currently well known and on the radar come out of nowhere and take it, it's probably going to be Yang. He has a niche no one else does, his message is unique and makes sense. While other candidates seem like general copycats of other candidates, Yang is one candidate I think has a unique niche, and in this crowded race it's good to find something that makes you stand out that resonates. It's unclear whether basic income can be that thing, but it's possible.
At the same time there are a lot of good reasons to believe that Yang will NOT take off, or at least not win. The centrist camp of the democratic party hates progressives with big ticket programs. They hate medicare for all, they hate free college, they hate the green new deal, and they would hate basic income. One of the reasons I am so disillusioned with the centrists is their refusal to think big about these programs and think the status quo or some variation of it is "good enough." So instead of getting UBI the furthest left they will go is Kamala Harris' "lift act" or an expanded EITC.
Some democrats oppose UBI because they see it as a program designed to make people poorer and help the rich. They see a tech oriented rich person like Yang push this and they see it as a conservative plot to destroy welfare. I could see some on the left and center oppose UBI because they want to defend current programs. This happened before when Nixon supported a UBI style program to replace Johnson's "great society". Democrats get touchy when people try to one up their past accomplishments. We saw this recently with Hillary not wanting to replace Obamacare with single payer. It's also possible the idea is just too forward thinking and radical for people to get behind.
Much of the country who is progressive seems to be behind Sanders' message which is in favor of a jobs program. Many people really can't think of a world without work yet and would rather create more work to give people a paycheck than see people do "nothing." While I think Yang's aspirations are more realistic than Bernie's here (UBI would only cost a fraction of what the green new deal would), it is possible people just aren't ready for UBI and will vigorously fight against it. I personally was thinking originally UBI would not be introduced into the debate in a serious way for another decade or so, but Yang seems to be pushing it now. It's possible it's too early.
Finally, I think Yang is making too many of Sanders' 2016 mistakes. Yang reminds me a lot of 2016 Sanders: someone who wants to run an issue based campaign but who is naive and doesn't realize that he will be torn apart for it. Yang is one of the few people who published numbers for funding his ideas on his website and quite frankly, as I already covered, they don't work well and need an overhaul. If I can point this out, imagine how CNN treats them when he gains awareness in the country. They will do the same thing they did to Bernie in 2016. Yang also seems to be avoiding the pit of snakes that is identity politics, but as Bernie learned, you need to either adapt to them or get swallowed up. Yang, in running an issues oriented campaign, will be blasted for not pandering to people of every single identity group properly, and honestly, I really don't see the democrats as a party to unite behind common solutions to problems unless they get pandered to specifically based on identity. You can't just say "here's UBI, it will work and make your lives better", you need to explain to women how it will make their lives better, and then African Americans and latinos, and people in the LGBT+ community, and everything else. Otherwise you'll be written off as "too white" (despite Yang being asian) and too male and your supporters will be called "Yang bros". I've heard it said by someone I introduced Yang to that he's "too smart to be president" and sadly I think that's not far off the mark. Sadly, many people don't care about ideas, they care about being pandered to specifically, and while I find it sickening, it's the truth.
Yang's message seems to appeal primarily to the people who are needed to win the general. Sadly, these are not the same people who vote in the primary. They are not loyal democrats, they are independent swing voters. And while Yang is correct that if you don't offer good solutions from the left these people will succumb to xenophobia and move right, they also often don't come out and vote as a bloc on the democratic side in primaries, and many who do likely already back Bernie.
That said I can't rule Yang out and think he has a stronger chance than most candidates, going so far to say I think he might come in 4th or 5th. However, I can't see him winning. It's possible, but I cannot see how a coalition would come together to seal the deal unless he manages to "Trump" everyone. I see him as this cycle's Ross Perot, or Ron Paul, or Hermin Cain. Someone with very unique ideas that maybe should be listened to somewhat but who will likely only acquire a small base of support not capable of winning the party's nomination in and of itself.
Conclusion
I'm just gonna call it now, if I had to guess who will win the primary right now, it will be Bernie Sanders. I say this because he is currently second in the polls, and because I don't think Biden will make it out of the primaries unscathed. I think he has the strongest, most loyal base of support this time, and there are enough candidates out there where he could win with a strong plurality vote, likely not needing a full majority to lock down the nomination. Biden has a strong chance too though, and while I don't think he will definitely win, I could see him limping into the general like Clinton did as a vastly unpopular, damaged candidate who managed to beat the competition. I could also see Harris possibly gaining support from other candidates dropping out, giving her enough of a base to win. Other than that, I think it's hard to guess. I think most other candidates will drop out as they lack unique messages that could resonate with the voter base. I do think Yang will make waves this election, but I think it's unlikely he will win. I would like to see him gain more awareness in the country though in order to inject basic income into the debate though.
Saturday, March 2, 2019
Bernie Sanders or Andrew Yang? That is the question....
So, I wrote a bit ago about how I felt about the presidential candidates and the race so far. My views haven't changed much, outside of one aspect. I like Andrew Yang a lot more than I did a few weeks ago. I listened to him on Joe Rogan and other podcasts, and he hit it out of the park. I mean, this guy is almost me in terms of politics. A bit of an exaggeration, but pretty close. I mean, he speaks about the issues like I do, sees the world like I do, and advocates for solutions like I do. There are some areas of disagreement, he's slightly more pro capitalism than I am (while recognizing a need for systemic change), and I will vehemently disagree with the nuances of a handful of his policies (for example, his plan to fund UBI, which I already covered), but other than that he strongly aligns with my highest priorities. Universal basic income, universal healthcare, a need to fix our system and bring it into the 21st century, realizing jobs aren't the answer any more, etc.
However, at the same time, he's sometimes very cringey. He seemingly keeps downplaying that there's a $1 trillion hole in his UBI plan and that what he's peddling in terms of funding is basically left wing reaganomics. To be fair, people like AOC are doing the same thing with the green new deal, and that frustrates me too. It's like Yang and others want to give us these expansive programs but are too cowardly to raise taxes and make the sacrifices needed to make them work. Which is a shame, the taxes are a total paper tiger for most Americans; they seem way more intimidating than they actually are and most Americans would be better off in net even if they think they wouldn't be. I really wish Yang would be more honest with the numbers and push the details hard to explain to people how they work so they would be better off. We lefties can't come off like Santa Claus, trying to fund something for nothing and racking up the debt in the process. That's a way to destroy our credibility and hand the ideological football back to small government conservatives who scream about the debt all the time.
Yang also has other ideas I don't like. He has a policy in which he would give us a "news and information ombudsman" to crack down "fake news" and alleged Russian trolls. I'm against this because, watching the democrats for the last 2 years, the idea of them having anything remotely close to a "ministry of truth" in which they regulate the press and users on social media scares the crap out of me. It comes off as a way to suppress dissent within the democratic party (and as you can tell, I'm a VERY vocal dissenter) and I'm concerned that these powers could, quite frankly, be abused. To be fair it does seem more oriented toward 'corporate offenders", but such an idea still scares the crap out of me in theory. Maybe it won't be as bad as what I'm thinking, but I don't want to set a precedent.
He also has ideas that sound almost conservative in nature. One idea is to sunset old laws by measuring laws according to certain goals and repealing them if they don't meet those goals. The problem I have with this is, well, our system is corrupt. While I get the spirit of what he's going for here, in practice I'm afraid this policy will heavily favor laws corporations lobby for and sunset laws that said corporations claim "hurt jobs" or something like that, which would apply to virtually every labor law if a simplistic understanding of econ 101 is to be believed. I mean, hey, we just lost the whole fair labor standards act and OSHA, but at least I can carry ice cream in my back pocket again. Yay America! Again it's possible that I'm being hyperbolic and that the parameters for repealing laws would be a lot more stringent, but I don't want to risk it. He also wants to cut the size of the federal work force, which, could interfere with the productivity of important agencies, or at least put a lot more stress on federal workers than currently exists.
Now, it's possible I'm blowing many of these flaws out of proportion, but I could see some harm done with these ideas. I don't think Yang means harm; I think these policies exist because he's not a politician and doesn't necessarily understand how these ideas can be abused, but they are concerning.
On the bright side, Yang also has many many innovative ideas that would make up for these poor policies. He wants to do things like eliminate first past the post and implement ranked choice voting. He wants to eliminate corruption, get money out of politics, and give people money they can use specifically to donate to politicians in hopes that it will drown out corporate money. For every bad idea this guy has, he has three good ones. He also seems to understand the need to fundamentally change how our economy works and make it work for the people. And honestly, it's possible I misunderstand his policies or am blowing their flaws out of proportion. So he's a solid candidate.
At the same time, I still feel a draw toward Bernie Sanders. Bernie is...Bernie. And I love Bernie. He's dusting off his 2016 platform, making some adjustments, and advocating for the same things he always does. He has a more socialist bend to his politics. He sees the core problem as the rich screwing over the little guy, which isn't inaccurate, and proposes a wide array of solutions like a $15 minimum wage, green new deal, medicare for all, and free college. I closely aligned with him in 2016, and I still love and respect the guy a lot. Moreover, he seemed to fine tune his numbers for his plans. For example, in 2016 Sanders got a lot of criticism for his medicare for all funding numbers. This time around, as I recently analyzed, his numbers some to come out perfectly according to the metrics he puts forward. He is a much more pragmatic candidate, while I see Yang as having some issues with his platform due to his lack of experience. Don't get me wrong, Yang is very smart for someone who hasn't run for office before, but his naivete and inexperience on policy shows sometimes. Sanders is much more experienced and has a much better ideal of what he's doing.
Another advantage Sanders has is electability. Sanders, I believe, can win the primary this time around. As a matter of fact I would give him the highest shot right now based on this. He already has a strong loyal base of support that seems to be growing since he announced. He consistently scores second in polls with Biden leading, and honestly, I think Biden is a lot like Clinton in the sense that if he ran, between his personality and politics, he would alienate people, and his support would split among different candidates given the more crowded 2020 field. I could see his supporters splitting among Beto o Rourke, and Amy Klobuchar, and Kamala Harris, giving Bernie a win. Yang...I can't see him winning the primary. I could see him winning the general as his message is heavily geared toward the areas of the country the democrats lost in 2016, and he also seems to be making inroads with some Trump supporters for what I see, but he would need to get out of the primary first. It's gonna be tough enough for Sanders to win with the progressive base united behind him. If we just splinter off and support Yang and Tulsi Gabbard and the like, it could cost Sanders the primary, giving us a moderate like Biden or Harris.
While I would take someone who has somewhat cringey policies at times but is far more closely aligned with my views over someone who isnt really aligned with my views and pragmatic (the justification for my Stein vote over Clinton), Sanders is relatively close to my views compared to most other candidates. While Clinton arguably represented, say, a 50% match with my views weighted by priority, and Stein represented say a 70% match, Sanders represents like an 85-90% match and Yang more like a 90-95% match. It might be worth voting my heart against someone I feel like I disagree with 50% of the time but it isn't worth it over someone I might only disagree with 10% of the time. If Sanders has a better chance to win, it may not be the time to protest vote or play around with unelectable candidates. We need to focus on who can win and implement some sort of vision close to my own. That said, based on the sheer pragmatism of his ideas and the fact that I believe he can win the primary while I'm not sure Yang can, Bernie might actually be the better candidate to support. While I would greatly miss UBI as a central policy in the next democratic administration, I would not be particularly unhappy with Sanders and his ideas. He's still moving us in the right direction and we could always revisit the issue in 2028.
Honestly, at this point, I am just undecided. I guess for now I will root for both. I keep fluctuating between the two. One day I feel like an Andrew Yang guy, the next a Bernie guy. I guess I will need to wait until next year and see how the field develops to see what I should do. I do at least want to see Andrew Yang get into the democratic debates. It might influence the field and for all we know Sanders might integrate some sort of UBI into his platform if it's popular. Who knows. I will say that barring some major development or some other candidate better than them both entering the race, those two are the ones I'm keeping my eye on most and have the most support for at the moment. There are some other decent candidates out there, but right now I have to say I like these two most.
However, at the same time, he's sometimes very cringey. He seemingly keeps downplaying that there's a $1 trillion hole in his UBI plan and that what he's peddling in terms of funding is basically left wing reaganomics. To be fair, people like AOC are doing the same thing with the green new deal, and that frustrates me too. It's like Yang and others want to give us these expansive programs but are too cowardly to raise taxes and make the sacrifices needed to make them work. Which is a shame, the taxes are a total paper tiger for most Americans; they seem way more intimidating than they actually are and most Americans would be better off in net even if they think they wouldn't be. I really wish Yang would be more honest with the numbers and push the details hard to explain to people how they work so they would be better off. We lefties can't come off like Santa Claus, trying to fund something for nothing and racking up the debt in the process. That's a way to destroy our credibility and hand the ideological football back to small government conservatives who scream about the debt all the time.
Yang also has other ideas I don't like. He has a policy in which he would give us a "news and information ombudsman" to crack down "fake news" and alleged Russian trolls. I'm against this because, watching the democrats for the last 2 years, the idea of them having anything remotely close to a "ministry of truth" in which they regulate the press and users on social media scares the crap out of me. It comes off as a way to suppress dissent within the democratic party (and as you can tell, I'm a VERY vocal dissenter) and I'm concerned that these powers could, quite frankly, be abused. To be fair it does seem more oriented toward 'corporate offenders", but such an idea still scares the crap out of me in theory. Maybe it won't be as bad as what I'm thinking, but I don't want to set a precedent.
He also has ideas that sound almost conservative in nature. One idea is to sunset old laws by measuring laws according to certain goals and repealing them if they don't meet those goals. The problem I have with this is, well, our system is corrupt. While I get the spirit of what he's going for here, in practice I'm afraid this policy will heavily favor laws corporations lobby for and sunset laws that said corporations claim "hurt jobs" or something like that, which would apply to virtually every labor law if a simplistic understanding of econ 101 is to be believed. I mean, hey, we just lost the whole fair labor standards act and OSHA, but at least I can carry ice cream in my back pocket again. Yay America! Again it's possible that I'm being hyperbolic and that the parameters for repealing laws would be a lot more stringent, but I don't want to risk it. He also wants to cut the size of the federal work force, which, could interfere with the productivity of important agencies, or at least put a lot more stress on federal workers than currently exists.
Now, it's possible I'm blowing many of these flaws out of proportion, but I could see some harm done with these ideas. I don't think Yang means harm; I think these policies exist because he's not a politician and doesn't necessarily understand how these ideas can be abused, but they are concerning.
On the bright side, Yang also has many many innovative ideas that would make up for these poor policies. He wants to do things like eliminate first past the post and implement ranked choice voting. He wants to eliminate corruption, get money out of politics, and give people money they can use specifically to donate to politicians in hopes that it will drown out corporate money. For every bad idea this guy has, he has three good ones. He also seems to understand the need to fundamentally change how our economy works and make it work for the people. And honestly, it's possible I misunderstand his policies or am blowing their flaws out of proportion. So he's a solid candidate.
At the same time, I still feel a draw toward Bernie Sanders. Bernie is...Bernie. And I love Bernie. He's dusting off his 2016 platform, making some adjustments, and advocating for the same things he always does. He has a more socialist bend to his politics. He sees the core problem as the rich screwing over the little guy, which isn't inaccurate, and proposes a wide array of solutions like a $15 minimum wage, green new deal, medicare for all, and free college. I closely aligned with him in 2016, and I still love and respect the guy a lot. Moreover, he seemed to fine tune his numbers for his plans. For example, in 2016 Sanders got a lot of criticism for his medicare for all funding numbers. This time around, as I recently analyzed, his numbers some to come out perfectly according to the metrics he puts forward. He is a much more pragmatic candidate, while I see Yang as having some issues with his platform due to his lack of experience. Don't get me wrong, Yang is very smart for someone who hasn't run for office before, but his naivete and inexperience on policy shows sometimes. Sanders is much more experienced and has a much better ideal of what he's doing.
Another advantage Sanders has is electability. Sanders, I believe, can win the primary this time around. As a matter of fact I would give him the highest shot right now based on this. He already has a strong loyal base of support that seems to be growing since he announced. He consistently scores second in polls with Biden leading, and honestly, I think Biden is a lot like Clinton in the sense that if he ran, between his personality and politics, he would alienate people, and his support would split among different candidates given the more crowded 2020 field. I could see his supporters splitting among Beto o Rourke, and Amy Klobuchar, and Kamala Harris, giving Bernie a win. Yang...I can't see him winning the primary. I could see him winning the general as his message is heavily geared toward the areas of the country the democrats lost in 2016, and he also seems to be making inroads with some Trump supporters for what I see, but he would need to get out of the primary first. It's gonna be tough enough for Sanders to win with the progressive base united behind him. If we just splinter off and support Yang and Tulsi Gabbard and the like, it could cost Sanders the primary, giving us a moderate like Biden or Harris.
While I would take someone who has somewhat cringey policies at times but is far more closely aligned with my views over someone who isnt really aligned with my views and pragmatic (the justification for my Stein vote over Clinton), Sanders is relatively close to my views compared to most other candidates. While Clinton arguably represented, say, a 50% match with my views weighted by priority, and Stein represented say a 70% match, Sanders represents like an 85-90% match and Yang more like a 90-95% match. It might be worth voting my heart against someone I feel like I disagree with 50% of the time but it isn't worth it over someone I might only disagree with 10% of the time. If Sanders has a better chance to win, it may not be the time to protest vote or play around with unelectable candidates. We need to focus on who can win and implement some sort of vision close to my own. That said, based on the sheer pragmatism of his ideas and the fact that I believe he can win the primary while I'm not sure Yang can, Bernie might actually be the better candidate to support. While I would greatly miss UBI as a central policy in the next democratic administration, I would not be particularly unhappy with Sanders and his ideas. He's still moving us in the right direction and we could always revisit the issue in 2028.
Honestly, at this point, I am just undecided. I guess for now I will root for both. I keep fluctuating between the two. One day I feel like an Andrew Yang guy, the next a Bernie guy. I guess I will need to wait until next year and see how the field develops to see what I should do. I do at least want to see Andrew Yang get into the democratic debates. It might influence the field and for all we know Sanders might integrate some sort of UBI into his platform if it's popular. Who knows. I will say that barring some major development or some other candidate better than them both entering the race, those two are the ones I'm keeping my eye on most and have the most support for at the moment. There are some other decent candidates out there, but right now I have to say I like these two most.
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