November 03, 2004

Who's next? 2008 is the next chance for America to throw off the shackles of theocracy. Who do you think will be the Democratic candidate? I know who I suspect.
posted by Skrik 20 years ago
  • versus Jeb?
  • Hillary Clinton
  • I agree, Skrik. She is the most obvious choice.
  • Well, that'd be one way to assure another loss in 2008. Hillary Clinton is despised (I have no idea why) in much of the U.S.
  • Yep, Clinton..... and I would vote for her, and I'm a guy..... But, I'm holding to my belief that, by '08, the system will have been manipulated to allow George the Chimp to run again.
  • Rudy Guiliana vs Barack Obama. Condi Rice vs Hillary Clinton. Oh, the possibilities are endless!
  • I fear that with redistricting, electoral vote tweaking, and the utter powerlessness of the Democratic party, that it won't matter who they put up in 2008. I hope I'm wrong.
  • Clinton would be a horrifically bad idea. Way to enrage the Evangelicals and conservatives even more, huh? Clinton in 2008 means another loss. Personally, I'm thinking of someone along the lines of Bill Richardson, Erskine Bowles, or Russ Feingold.
  • Obama in '08. It might lose the election (I think we're in a swing towards suburbs and alienation, and will be for a while until the US reaches European density), but damn, I'd love to have him as my president and it would be a great way to get people back into politics in another four years.
  • No way will Clinton run. It'd be the death of the party. I think she'd make a damn good president, but if people really think that John Kerry's too liberal, no way will they accept Mrs. Bubba in the White House.
  • I think it'll be John Edwards. Hilary is hated by a lot of Americans, so I don't think she'd have a chance of winning.
  • Obama would be a bad candidate, too. I like the guy, but I don't think he'd stand a snowball's chance of getting elected.
  • I'll do it.
  • You're assuming that Americans will get to vote again in 2008. Given the lies and corruption of the Bush administration, that's very optimistic.
  • I'd vote for you, BBF. But expect the ABBBF crowd.
  • I don't think people were afraid of Kerry's liberalism nearly as much as they were turned off by his lack of charisma. Charm goes much farther than it should in an election.
  • Yeah, it's gotta be Edwards or possibly Dean. If 11 states voted to ban same-sex marriage, there's no way this country is ready for a female or black president. Besides, Hillary is the anti-Christ as far as conservatives are concerned. Obama may have a chance in 2012 or 2016, assuming the country is still around by then...
  • Everybody keeps saying "people hate Hillary". People hate Bush, too, and he got re-elected. I don't know whether the conventional wisdom about Hillary Clinton running holds water, but I'm not convinced the electorate could be much more divided than it was this time. Four years is a long time. I'd like to get a little closer and see who emerges from the field before I decide who I like, thanks.
  • It has to be someone who isn't going to play the same game as the Republicans. Someone who is clearly different and is clearly against the things the current administration has done. As I've said on here before, I don't have much faith that a Yale-educated rich white man that voted for the war and the patriot act is a compelling enough candidtate against a Yale-eduacted rich white man who initiated the war and the patriot act.
  • Like it's going to even matter in 4 years...
  • The bench for both teams looks pretty weak. The Dems are just plain out of anybody, and the Republicans keep sending astonishing sleazeballs to Congress. Maybe the Dems should start looking at celebrities a la The Governator or Jesse Ventura (or Reagan, for that matter). Americans will obviously vote for anybody who's famous regardless of their qualifications. How about Martin Sheen? He's at least got the experience of being a fake president.
  • (P.S. I would vote for Hillary in a heartbeat, but she won't run.)
  • McCain/Guiliani against another set of B-list Democrats. Are there any A-listers left other than Hilary? Robert Kennedy maybe, but I've never read anything to show that he's interested. Or electable.
  • They should rebuild Reagan some time in the future, and send him back to the past... But this time, he's fighting for us.
  • By 2008 Cheney will be a cyborg.
  • My prediction: Gary Locke (the departing gov of WA) as Pres. Hilary Clinton as VPres. Gary gets the business types and moderates, the west coast, the ethnic vote (he's of Chinese descent). He's executive branch, not an ex-legislator, so he won't have to explain myriad conflicting votes. Hilary rounds up the more statist-progressive faction and the female vote. Both are pretty wonky, but I think that could sell well. If not Locke, then Richardson, for sure.
  • No chance for McCain, Giuliani or any reasonable Republican in '08. And no Democrat can possibly overcome the Republican Infrastructure they have already gone a long way to build (if I had to pick a designated loser, I think Edwards would put up the best fight). In 2007, another idiot puppet of the neocons will emerge as a media-approved 'charismatic leader', run with Rumsfeld or some other high-ranking Bush House insider, and win a landslide of electronically-generated votes. DeLay is frighteningly honest when he said "The Republican Party is a permanent majority for the future of this country... We're going to be able to lead this country in the direction we've been dreaming of for years...And we're going to put God back into the public square." Our task now is to stay out of DeLay's 'public square' and build and maintain our own 'private squares'. (I suspect that communes are gonna make a big comeback).
  • Hilary would get destroyed. A woman or a black man can easily win the presidency -- that person just has to be a Republican. In fact, it will be an automatic win for the Republicans. You get the benefit of the religious and wealthy vote just by being a Republican, and you will then also get more female or black voters, depending on what you are. It does not work the same for the Democrats. The Democrats are getting low on candidates. It has to be a governor or a senator. Mike Easley was just re-elected yesterday as governor of North Carolina. Perhaps he will become a player. I don't really care who it is next time, I just hope that it is someone who will stand up and say, "Damn right I am a liberal. Here is what a liberal means... And here are some examples of causes fought for by liberals through the years." Never happen.
  • I agree with wendell. And that is another reason that the Republicans will have a tremendous advantage: they will christen their leader and nominee before the primaries just like they did in 99 with Bush. The Democrats will actually fight it out and be trailing in money and exposure right out of the box.
  • A woman or a black man can easily win the presidency -- that person just has to be a Republican which is why the GOP will run Condi Rice as POTUS for 2008.
  • Steve Jobs.
  • The following scenario is highly improbable but: the only way Condi Rice would be chosen by the GOP is if the Dems chose Hillary as their candidate. Clinton would be defeated. Rice would be the GOP's chance to show they're not woman-haters (despite the fact that Roe v. Wade would be overturned by then) or racist (despite the fact that urban issues would be ignored) or evil (despite evidence).
  • Clinton with only one term under her belt will already be much more impressive than Edwards. Not that that says much. And she's very attractive to certain segments. Can she be groomed to scare the center less? Maybe Kerry/Clinton in 2008.
  • I don't know who's going to take the helm of the Democratic party in 2008... but, frankly, it doesn't much matter right now. A LOT of shit is going to happen in the next four years, so who knows what this country will look like by then? I'm pretty sure, though, that HRC would be a horrible choice for a candidate. A certain percentage of Americans would automatically feel uneasy about her being president given that her husband already served two terms. Unfair as it may be, for many Americans the President and First Lady are a team, and such people will say Bill and Hill already had their chance. And if that's not enough to ensure her defeat, don't you think Karl Rove (or whoever else assumes his role) would find it easy to sway more than a few voters with banter about "Hey, she's married to one of only two presidents in the history of this country to be disgraced by impeachment..."? Without even having to discuss policy, HRC isn't a strong bet.
  • Harold Ford is better than Obama, I think, but the fact is, the Democrats don't have anybody electable and that isn't likely to change in a mere 4 years (especially under the circumstances).
  • Slate's Saletan argues for Edwards: Simple but effective. I say Bruce Springsteen.
  • You can't Jerry, you already said Steve Jobs.
  • OK, The Boss with Jobs as his veep. Think different, Democrats!
  • goetter! great to see you again!
  • No way it will be Hillary. Think moderate (I know she really is, but I mean *perceived* as moderate). Bubba was basically an Eisenhower Republican. We need someone similar. No idea who it could be, but a moderate Dem governor is not a bad guess. There are still a fair number of those left. Perhaps Bill Richards of New Mexico or Mike Easley out of North Carolina.
  • Bill Richards is a great guess but he's repeatedly said he doesn't want to stop being gov of NM, even turned down a sure spot as the VP candidate this election. I say we dig up Eugene V Debs, in ject him with some zombification juice, and turn him loose on capital hill, or maybe just Texas. And I don't mean "turn loose" as in run for office, but turn loose as in "theres an undead socialist chewing on my skull."
  • edwards and mccain/more probably sen. ____ hillary is smart enough to wait thru another senate term
  • I don't think there will be a Democratic party around in four years. I don't think the Republicans will be unseated in four years. The Republicans have won for this generation, perhaps for the rest of US history.
  • But, on the bright side, fuyu, the U.S. might not be around in four years... :)
  • Based on the Democrats' superb record of learning and adapting from past setbacks - just look at how well they learned from the failings of Gore in 2000! - then my prediction is this.
  • I'm counting on it!
  • The Democrats couldn't pick someone better than Kerry to run against the weakest presidential candidate since Dukakis. If they couldn't find anyone willing and able to beat George W. Bush this time, then what does it matter who they pick next time, when the opponent will undoubtedly be more formidable.
  • The Economist agrees with Skrik.
  • None of the candidates can act for shit. Oh, wait. You want someone with half a brain to play someone with no brain. (Except for Streep, I like her) Actually, I lie. There's a couple of candidates that are pretty intelligent. Too bad the smart ones are spending their time figuring how to pad their wallets, suck up to the corporations, and screw the country.