I read a Thomas Friedman column this week that really required a smackdown. So I supplied one at New York:
How much political capital should Democrats invest in a probably doomed effort to save the political career of Liz Cheney? Earlier this week, Never Trump Republican Linda Chavez penned a column urging Wyoming Democrats to take a dive this November in order to give the incumbent a chance to survive as an independent, assuming (as it safe) that Cheney will be purged in her own party’s primary. And now, in an apparent coincidence, in comes New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman suggesting a far more radical step by Democrats to align themselves with the small slice of Republicans who follow Cheney’s example in repudiating Donald Trump. He wrote:
“Is that what America needs in 2024 — a ticket of Joe Biden and Liz Cheney? Or Joe Biden and Lisa Murkowski, or Kamala Harris and Mitt Romney, or Stacey Abrams and Liz Cheney, or Amy Klobuchar and Liz Cheney? Or any other such combination.”
Friedman phrases this as a question, but clearly he thinks it’s a good idea given the “existential moment” America would face if Trump is allowed to regain the presidency in 2024. It’s a bit of a loaded question, too, since it postulates that nothing short of a previously unimaginable “sacrifice” by Democrats and Never Trump Republicans alike can stop Trump — and that it would, in fact, succeed in stopping Trump.
I certainly agree that Democrats dumping Kamala Harris to give their vice-presidential nomination to a conservative Republican who opposes legalized abortion and is a militarist by conviction and heredity would be a “sacrifice,” to put it very mildly. It would also be very, very weird. Friedman cites the recent establishment of a mind-bending coalition government in Israel to thwart Bibi Netanyahu as a development comparable to what he is suggesting. But as he acknowledges, Israel has a parliamentary system in which multiparty coalitions are the rule rather than the exception. A presidential system in which parties invariably run separate tickets for the top job is another thing altogether.
The U.S. has had exactly one example of multiparty fusionism in a presidential election. In 1864, in the midst of the Civil War, Republicans nominated Democrat Andrew Johnson of Tennessee — then serving as U.S. military governor of Tennessee — to run with Lincoln on a “Union” ticket. The experiment did not turn out well, beginning with Johnson’s drunken inaugural address in 1865 and continuing with the racist solidarity he exhibited toward ex-Confederates after Lincoln’s assassination, culminating in his impeachment and near removal from office. There are important reasons politicians sort themselves out into major parties, which should be apparent in an era of polarization over issues other than the scofflaw behavior of Donald Trump.
Is the threat of Trump’s return to the White House the equivalent of the U.S. Civil War? Not in itself, I would contend, though that horrific development could lead eventually to grave conditions comparable if not equal to a civil war. The premise that a Biden-Cheney fusion ticket would uniquely doom Trump to failure is even more dubious. There has never been much evidence of a mass following for Never Trump Republicans, and such as it is, it is mostly composed of people who would (and did in 2020) gladly vote for Biden and Harris. The baleful effect that replacing Harris with Cheney on the ticket would have on Democratic turnout could easily offset or exceed the alleged benefits of bipartisan and trans-ideological fusion.
So Democrats should say thanks, but no thanks, to Friedman for the idea of submitting their party to some sort of unwieldy and unnatural coalition of national salvation, so long as there is the slightest possibility of beating Trump the old-fashioned way. Liz Cheney deserves great respect for the courage she has shown in defying Trump at the expense of her own career, and if Biden is reelected with her support, perhaps she deserves an ambassadorship, a minor Cabinet post, or a major sub-Cabinet position. But she has no business being at the top of the line of succession to a Democratic president.
Given that the Democratic campaign has upped the early voting in its favor, then wouldn’t the exit polls show a favorable number of Bush voters on the election day itself in a number of key battleground states? Couldn’t this be used to “spin” the exit polls for the Republicans?
Did you notice the 8 point party ID registration
advantage for Democrats? That’s TWICE what it
was in 2000. Combine that with the Democracy Corps poll which showed Kerry with only 1 percent
less support among D’s than Bush has among R’s,
and with the energized left…well, I guess we’ll see.
Something that just struck me: Suppose Gallup — whose likely voter model we sneer at — were to suddenly revise its judgment on the composition of the electorate, based on Gans’ oft-repeated observations? Would its LV model then be closer to reality? My thought is, perhaps not. The Gallup voter screen would probably operate in much the same way even while opening the window a bit wider — that is to say, they’d let in more voters (getting to, say, 60%), but they’d still use the same criteria in deciding who’s more and less likely. It seems to me that young and minority voters — seemingly the basis of much of the increased turnout — would still be be at the bottom of their pyramid, and still be the ones least likely to make the cut. What if the situation this year is, the least likely voters of all join the party, and (at least potentially) seeming sure-thing voters — lifelong but disgusted Republicans — stay home? Is there any model truly apt to yield the right numbers in that situation?
Tangential observation: is it posible this situation could also create a coattail effect? Coattails are, to me, a misnamed phenomenon: they imply that a president’s numbers are so strong they drag along underdog down-ballot candidates to victory. This was certainly the case in 1964, but I’ve seen two landslide presidential re-elections since — 1972 and 1984 — where the wide margin did nothing whatever for Congressional candidates. On the other hand, I saw 1980, where Reagan got barely 50% of the national vote, but saw his party pick up 37 House seats and a slew in the Senate. It strikes that what 1964 and 1980 had in common was a disgust on the part of the losing party with its candidate, resulting in poor turnout for that party and thus an unusually tilted electorate. Is it possible we’ll get the same next Tuesday, with young and minority voters not only turning out at unexpected levels, bu representing a higher percentage of the total electorate than could otherwise be expected, because a small number of Republicans simply decide their guy’s worthless and stay home? Suddenly, every Dem candidate within range could find him/herself over the top, and the Congressional numbers could shift to a startling degree.
There’s a better way than a survey to track early voting — go to the secretaries of states themselves. You’ll find that the rates are even higher (for the states for which I can find data, double the rate of 2000 a week before election day) than the NAES suggests.
I’m glad to see Curtiz Gans quoted here. He is very reliable and a good, unbiased source for voter analysis.
All the results for higher turnout usually favor Dems. I’m glad many states have gone out of their way to make voting available on more than just one day (even if you are supposed to have a valid excuse for absentee voting in some states like VA). It only makes sense.
Gans in previous years has been a debunker of high-turnout predictions, as I recall. So it’s good to see his thoughts on this year.