Question about weak candidates.

[karynnj]

61. Sanders is an extremely good retail politician, which is why he has the highest approval rating in

the Senate. He is KNOWN for having town meetings across the state. This is something he has done since he became a Congressman. I have lived in Vermont for 4 years and even now I am sometimes surprised at how much access anyone in the state has to our elected officials. The comparison to NJ or IN the states I lived in before moving here is stunning.

As to John Kerry, other than his position as Secretary of State, he earned his elected positions through retail politics. He was NOT the party or media favorite to get the Democratic nominations for either the Lt Governor position or his first Senate nomination. In both elections he took on competitors who the party favored and whose "turn" it was deemed to be.

In 2004, it was EXACTLY retail politics in both Iowa and NH that made Kerry our nominee. Before Iowa, he had almost no media support. When he was mentioned, it was more in the context of would he drop out after losing Iowa or after he lost NH. It is true that in 2002, he was among those favored by some in the party, but by fall 2003, he was getting no money from the big money men of the party. (He had never been a favorite because he investigated BCCI even when the Pakistani bank had coopted both top Democrats and Republicans. Kerry refused to stop his investigation on that until they took his subcommittee away! This paralleled his investigations on the Contras.)

I saw Kerry speak to crowds where he had us on our feet and completely behind him. This was post 2004 and in both NJ and MA. I also saw (from video) MANY town halls he did in MA - mostly after his run for President. They were interactive and he was very very good - explaining complex answers well -- and, in a very few cases, saying he would get more information to the person on obscure issues. It was not until I moved to VT that I understood my MA friends comments about how essential retail politics are in MA where their culture demands that even the highest elected official communicate directly with them. Without retail politics ability, Sanders would NEVER have even been mayor of Burlington; Kerry would never have been elected to anything. Neither had party mentors that smoothed the way for their early runs.

There is a solid case to be made that Hillary Clinton is extremely smart, extremely hard working, and very competent. She also DID (as Kerry did as well) become the head of student government in college. This showed both interest and the ability to engage in retail politics among their college peers. It is entirely possible that she made Bill Clinton's Presidency possible by her 60 minutes appearance at a point where his primary campaign could well have gone in a death spiral.

Hearing the many stories of a warn, funny likable Clinton someone saw in a chance meeting -- I was struck by the fact that the same stories were plentiful about Kerry. Walter Shapiro in a summary written during the primary noted that Kerry was much better and much more engaged when the media was not there - which he contrasted to John Edwards' million dollar smile for the media, which disappeared when the media left. I suspect that the same is true of Clinton -- for the same reason. They were - for good reason given their respective past histories - wary of the media.

What you are dealing with now is what we in the JK group dealt with since Nov 2004. There is a desire to find a "reason" the candidate was not good enough to win. People want something more than "the country was still to traumatized to move from the President they rallied around after 911 and particulary did not want someone very likely to be constrained by morallity in fighting "those who attacked us" (and anyone who looked like them.) In 2016, HRC was the wrong person for a year where change was wanted and there was anger against the (undefined) "elites". It is possible that Had she quietly left her emails with the State Department soon after she left, she might still have won.

Donald Trump was the MUSIC MAN, TOMMY or the newest evangelical preacher to the masses. He convinced people who were hurting that he could "make America great again". Note that he rarely bothered to state exactly what that would look like. I suspect because keeping it vague his fans to picture it meaning what they wanted it to mean. Not to mention -- what retail politics did he do? Unless there is a lot I missed - he was entirely a stage act - the bigger the venue the better. He is the type of demogogue that I have feared for decades. It will be a test of our democracy as to whether it is stronger than he is. What will derail him will be that people may see that he is not just not their savior, he is hurting them.

Every Democrat you named has a better personality, character and is more likely to be able to speak to average citizens than Donald Trump is.

The last thing we need to do now is to attack the personalities and abilities of anyone who could be a strong voice for our values going forward. We will have very little power that comes from having the Presidency or majority. What we need are strong, clear voices. Fortunately, many in the Obama administartion - including Obama himself, Kerry and Loretta Lynch have spoken of their own likelihood to stay involved on their issues. In addition to speaking out, Gore has already spoken to Trump. From the Senate, I assume that others will rise to join Warren and Sanders (and Schumer from a more centrist point). Obviously, Bill and Hillary Clinton will be strong senior statesmen as well.