In a contest that is growing hauntingly similar to 2016, mainstream Democrats are having trouble deciding which non-Bernie candidate to coalesce behind to keep Bernie from running away with enough Super Tuesday delegates to make him insurmountable.
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“All of this has happened before, and all of this will happen again.”
You’ll have to forgive my nerdy aside, but quotes like that come to mind as I look at where the Democratic Primary is right now. The similarities to the Republican contest in 2016 are chilling, as the Democratic Party appears poised to embrace its own populist uprising. The question is, can Bernie Sanders be knocked off his newfound frontrunner hill on Super Tuesday and, if so, who can do it?
Let us first examine what we can be relatively sure of: Warren and Klobuchar are finished at this point.
Warren’s moment has passed, and the progressive wing of the Democratic Party has clearly anointed Sanders as its champion. Judging by Warren’s performance in the most recent debate, where she mostly just provided cover for Bernie Sanders, she doesn’t even really know why she’s still running.
As for Klobuchar, she’s the donut wheel in the truck bed lying useless next to the fully treaded spares. She doesn’t have the historical weight of Biden, the moneyed ad campaign of Bloomberg, or the delegate total of Mayor Pete. Her path to the nomination just isn’t there. If she were going to burst into relevance, it would have happened by now.
But what about the remaining contenders? All three of them, Biden, Bloomberg, and Mayor Pete, have a viable argument…and that’s the problem.
The fiasco of the Iowa Caucus essentially robbed Pete Buttigieg of the momentum that Iowa should have given him. We may never know how the primary would have shaped out if the young mayor had been able to declare an immediate shocking victory on the evening of the first-in-the-nation caucus. But despite this stolen victory, Mayor Pete can claim to be the mainstream frontrunner with the highest delegate count for a candidate not named Bernie.
As for Joe Biden, the shockingly poor turnout of support he’s had in the first three states has been devastating to his campaign’s viability. Devastating…but not fatal. In recent days, Biden has surged in South Carolina polls, signaling he’s far from out of the running. He maintains a strong basis of support from Obama voters, including the African American community.
It may be that Biden has maintained his frontrunner status all along, but the results of the early contests in states whose demographics don’t match his coalition have hidden his strength. The results of Super Tuesday may leave us laughing at ourselves for not realizing it was going to be Uncle Joe all along.
But speaking of Super Tuesday, that pivotal day constitutes the bulk of Mike Bloomberg’s campaign strategy. Coming into the presidential race too late to compete in the early states, Mike Bloomberg is making the case that not only is he the mainstream Democrat most capable of thwarting Bernie Sanders’ populist rise, but is the best positioned to defeat Donald Trump.
Bloomberg has been using a very deep pocket to bring an argument to the American people that he is a moderate who can restore norms and unite a disparate and agitated nation. Further, his significantly sized war chest allows him to compete in all the states participating in Super Tuesday in a way no one else can.
So, which is it going to be? Will Democrats choose one and unite behind them? The chances seem slight that that’s how it’s going to go down.
If Biden wins in South Carolina, he undercuts Mayor Pete’s story by showing he’s far from down-and-out. But if Mayor Pete squeaks out enough delegates to stay at or near Biden, he still maintains enough of his narrative to be viable for votes on Super Tuesday. As for Bloomberg, there’s no discounting the strength of his ad campaign, but it’s weakened by his poor debate showings and his latecomer status.
I only see two scenarios that thwart a Bernie nomination.
In the first scenario, Biden’s strength in the South Carolina polls fails to play out in the results, and Sanders notches another win. Finally acceding to the weakness of his candidacy, Biden drops out. As Super Tuesday rolls in, voters decide Mayor Pete is too much of a gamble and instead give Bloomberg the decisive Super Tuesday showing he has been fighting for. Bloomberg can then ride his Super Tuesday victories to the nomination.
In the second scenario, Biden’s strength in South Carolina increases and he notches a decisive victory. Mayor Pete, realizing his failure to make gains among ethnic minorities, drops out of the race and endorses Joe Biden. Barack Obama chooses this pivotal moment as the time to offer an endorsement and gives his nod to his former VP. On Super Tuesday, voters reject Bloomberg’s overtures and hand the mainstream mantle to Biden. Bloomberg drops out and endorses Biden, creating a two-man race. With the mainstream Democratic vote united under a single candidate, it becomes only a matter of time until Bernie’s path to the nomination becomes impossible.
Have you noticed the theme of these two scenarios? Someone, either Biden or Buttigieg, must drop out before Super Tuesday. From where I’m sitting, there’s just no way mainstream votes split three ways can combine to overcome Bernie’s momentum and hardline progressive support. And that’s the trick of this whole exercise. I don’t foresee anyone, not even the remaining outliers, dropping out of the race before Super Tuesday.
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Like much of your other speculation, you were dead wrong about this. The reason Biden generated so much Joementum is the other centrist Democratic candidates were willing to put their egos aside and drop out of the race. This is in stark contrast to the 2016 Republican clown car where a number of candidates refused to concede, allowing the Republican base to coalesce behind Trump.
I know you have the view that Obama forced the Republican base to vote for Donald Trump, but that is just one more point where your ignorance of the facts is in clear view.