The multi-cultural melting pot of the US Presidential Election can create more twists, turns and surprises than a Brexit negotiation. And takes almost as long. Eighteen months or more. So on this side of the Atlantic people can be forgiven for switching off from the forest of names competing for air space right now – a year out from the election itself – and saving their brain space for the two names (well one actually since, impeachment notwithstanding, we know the other – all too well) which will emerge next summer at the party conventions. After all, how far have the names Rubio, Perry, Christie, Bush (J), Cruz, Fiorina, Walker and Rand Paul enhanced anyone’s understanding of today’s US political universe? To name just half of the candidates and all the front-runners (bar one) who were pitching for the Republican nomination this time four years ago.
The wheel now turns full circle with Democrat hopefuls producing an even more crowded field for the 2020 nomination. Apart from the two near-octogenarian warhorses Biden and Sanders (the latter known for having taken on and almost defeated the Democrat establishment last time, the former for having been Obama’s VP for two terms), all the candidates have no name recognition here beyond the world of political anoraks and Economist readers. Why should they, with not a vote due to be fired in anger till next February? And precedent suggests that those initial February primaries in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina tend to upset many of the previous predictions. It will not be until Super-Tuesday on 3rd March when fifteen states (including heavyweights such as California, Texas and Minnesota) vote simultaneously that a pattern of true front runners will emerge.
So why waste time and effort now getting familiar with just two other names (besides the two warhorses who have dominated attention so far but for whom age must surely tell at some point) out of a still large field? First, because one (Elizabeth Warren) has held her own consistently with her two better known male rivals and looks so clearly and logically the appropriate choice for the radical, left-leaning wing of the Democrat Party. It can only be a matter of time before she takes over the Sanders mantle but with wider reach due to her age (a brisk, healthy, youthful 70 against Sanders’ old prophet aura and worrying heart at 78) and her grounded, sensible, statesmanlike and always measured style. Plus an impressive life history as happy wife, mother, law professor and two-term senator who has slid naturally and with little apparent ego into front line politics. She would be the perfect antidote of normal, nice human being to the narcissistic temper of Trump. Something which was so (unfairly) hard for Hilary Clinton to achieve after the mud slinging she had endured with Bill. The distinctive policy feature which could yet be Warren’s undoing with the wider electorate (the radical stance on corporate tax, regulation and – trickiest of all – social healthcare) is what will vault her to front-runner status in the Democrat primaries. She is the acceptable face of radical policies to improve the life chances of America’s poor and dispossessed.
The other even less recognised (and much harder to pronounce) name is Pete Buttigieg, the 36-year-old mayor of a modest town (Bend) in Indiana. Now at the head of the chasing pack but still several notches below Biden, Sanders and Warren, he should not realistically be a serious contender given his lack of major political experience (locally as well as nationally) and his ticking a couple of boxes which could go down really badly with middle America – an elite Harvard, Oxford and McKinsey career and being gay. So why is he the second unknown name to get familiar with? Simply because he conveys complete competence and mastery of all issues without ever seeming arrogant or putting a foot (or word) wrong in debate. He is supremely intelligent, sensitive to people and situations and skilled at avoiding slip-ups and coming across as decent, caring and reliable. Quite simply, he is damned good. A white – and gay – Obama.
The same could be said of my own personal favourite candidate, Senator Cory Booker from New Jersey, minus the white and gay bit – and he has loads more heavyweight political experience than Buttigieg, has “paid his dues” (he still lives around the New Jersey project where he was brought up) and wears his black credentials lightly but most impressively. I cannot quite understand why he has not broken out of the chasing pack in the way that Buttigieg has been steadily doing since the summer. Booker is the only one of the other chasing candidates who I would expect to be able to hold his own if he could catch a popular break. Others (Harris, O’Rourke, Castro) have been, and still are being, promoted as likely to break out but they all lack the control and gravitas that will be needed on the long haul. Harris in particular is a crowd favourite who is just too strident and flaky to survive the ordeal of being front-runner. She won the first Democrat debate back in July (prompting Simon Schama of all people to declare her the one to watch in an FT article – kiss of death) and has struggled ever since. I wish that it had been Corey Booker taking up that leading challenger space but sadly he seems to lack popular appear. So my money is on Buttigieg to take the centrist spot from Biden as the one most likely to beat Trump for the middle ground. He clearly suffers from those three negative tags – inexperienced, elitist and gay – as well as lacking the reach towards Afro-American voters which Biden enjoys from the Obama halo, but his sheer class will steadily win him support across the range of progressive voters. I wish that it was Booker but it does not look as if he has got that appeal or momentum.
Warren will take most of the headlines over the coming months as she emerges as the clear front runner (right now, she is roughly in a tie with Biden and Sanders but both old men will fade). At that point, worries will intensify about her radical policy stance – and especially on healthcare where Americans are so sensitive to any suggestion that their private health plans will be socialised – and Buttigieg may show himself to be the safer candidate to take middle America votes away from Trump. But these are the most likely two out of the “unknown” field to force themselves upon our consciousness throughout next year.
View from the Clapham Omnibus 