One of the odder phenomena of the 2024 presidential election is a certain 2020 Democratic candidate who has strayed very far since then. I took a look at her options at New York:
A month ago, when ex-Democratic congresswoman and 2020 presidential wannabe Tulsi Gabbard showed up at a Mar-a-Lago event, I wrote about the logic that could make her a highly unconventional but not entirely implausible 2024 running mate for Donald Trump. Once a major backer of Bernie Sanders, Gabbard’s trajectory toward MAGA-land has been steady since she left the Democratic Party in the fall of 2022, a main course she served up with a side dish of jarring candidate endorsements (e.g., of J.D. Vance). Even when she was still a Democrat running for president, though, her orientation was more MAGA-adjacent than you might expect, as Geoffrey Skelley explained in 2019:
“Gabbard’s supporters … are more likely to have backed President Trump in 2016, hold conservative views or identify as Republican compared to voters backing the other candidates. …
“In fact, Gabbard has become a bit of a conservative media darling in the primary, with conservative commentators like Ann Coulter and pro-Trump social media personalities like Mike Cernovich complimenting her for her foreign policy views. In a primary in which some 2020 Democratic contenders have boycotted Fox News, Gabbard has regularly appeared on the network. Just last week, Gabbard even did an exclusive interview with Breitbart News, a far-right political outlet. She’s also made appeals outside the political mainstream by going on The Joe Rogan Experience — one of the most popular podcasts in the country and a favored outlet for members of the Intellectual Dark Web, whose purveyors don’t fit neatly into political camps but generally criticize concepts such as political correctness and identity politics.”
So her parting blast at Democrats as controlled by an “elitist cabal of warmongers driven by cowardly wokeness” didn’t come out of nowhere.
But much as Gabbard might be an outside-the-box running mate for the 45th president, it does seem there is another 2024 presidential candidate whose extreme hostility to mainstream institutions and difficult-to-categorize views might make him a better match for her: Robert F. Kennedy Jr. And sure enough, according to NBC News, the wiggy anti-vaxxer is interested in Gabbard:
“The four-term former member of Congress from Hawaii is now getting consideration for both former President Donald Trump’s and independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s tickets, two sources familiar with the candidates’ deliberations told NBC News.”
The prospect of choosing between these two politicians appears to have left Gabbard feeling she’s in the catbird seat:
“As one source said, Gabbard would be more likely to seriously consider running as Kennedy’s vice presidential nominee had she not been swept up by the possibility of serving with Trump. This person said Gabbard ‘was enticed’ by the chance of serving on Kennedy’s ticket but is now focused on the possibility that Trump will select her.
“’My understanding is that Tulsi is convinced that Trump is going to pick her,’ this person said. ‘Had that not been the case, she probably would have gone with Kennedy.’”
Since Kennedy has scheduled a running-mate reveal for March 26 in Oakland, we’ll know soon enough whether he chose Gabbard and Gabbard chose him. Others rumored to be on his short list include New York Jets quarterback Aaron Rodgers, former Minnesota governor Jesse Ventura, and California entrepreneur and major RFK Jr. donor Nicole Shanahan.
As NBC notes, it’s more than a bit unusual for people to be considered for multiple presidential tickets:
“[I]t’s exceedingly rare for a politician to attract interest from more than one presidential ticket or party. (Ahead of the 1952 election, Democrats and Republicans led dueling efforts to draft another politically ambiguous veteran, Dwight Eisenhower, the former supreme Allied commander in Europe during World War II, for the presidential race.)”
It’s hard to say what Tulsi Gabbard would think of this comparison. After all, Ike was a bit of a warmonger.
Oh great! This is exactly the attitude which will give the Congress back to the GOP in 2008.
It’s hard to be civil when dealing with this kind of material, so I’m not going to try. Instead, I want to go on record to point out that Dems who followed Mr. Cook’s strategy, Harold Ford Jr and Tammy Duckworth come to mind did much worse than those who listened to the netroots and spoke out.
So, instead of seeing “few options”, we should put forth the most aggressive aganda possible and then throw rocks at those who stop it. Our majorities will increase in 2008 that way. And Mr Cook’s approach is a guarantee that we will lose control.
I’ll stop now, before I describe in more graphic terms exactly what I think of the thinking being demonstrated in the article.
As Jon Tester said on the Senate floor yesterday that he’s traveled all around his home state of Montana, and “not a single person told me we should debate about whether or not to have a debate on Iraq.”
Don’t seek small victories, attack, attack, attack, until the GOP is shown for what it is. Then elections get easy.
I am personally disappointed in the house and senate. I had high hopes for an end to the war, accountability of the Bush administration, passage of the “Employee Free Choice” bill which would strenghten the middle class and the Dem party, real Campaing finance reform, including public financing in federal elections and lobby reform. Whith the dem candidates opting out of fed matching funds, this important issue is forgotten, and the business (DLC) free traders are gaining control of the party. Most of America will have no say in who the nominee is and it will be based on fund raising and the results in a few states. We are disenfranchised, and if the Dems nominate Clinton, Gore, or any other free trader, I will be forced to write in Nader!
I am really confused as to why a 27% increase in the favorable rating for Congress is considered poor. Sure, the overall rating is not that high, but as a being trend it is enromous!