Warner's big selling point appears to be that he took office after a Republican state govt had ruined the state finances, and brought it back into some kind of fiscal sanity. So the hope apparently is he can repeat this experience at the national level.

This CW completely ignores the Iraq War, rising energy and resource prices, fears of terrorism, all of which will be interwoven in the 2008 issues. The Dems can't keep running away from these issues. Perhaps HRC is starting to appreciate this, though possibly too late to correct some disastrous tactical mistakes.

Warner sounds promising as a Treasury Secretary. As the 08 nominee, I have no reason to believe he would be anything more than a Southern Dukakis.

J. McCutchen "JmacSF"

San Francisco. CA

It certainly is a big bun - certainly feels more like 1984 these days than it did in 1984

Better a Southern Dukakis than a Northern Dukakis.

That is my understanding and my concern about him. I don't remember the details, just that his postion on abortion was more in line with moderate republicans.

I recall that Bush was selected as the chosen by big money very early on precisely for those reasons. He didn't even have any foreign policy knowledge nor much of an ideology beyond his interests in education and Mexico and the "uniter not divider" thing about the legislature in Texas.

I also recall early campaign coverage that sometimes suggested he was ambivalent about being president, as if it was being pushed on him....that sometimes he just wanted to go home and leave this campaign thing behind...for me, that sort of fits with his statements all the time now about things being "hard work," as if he is a kid complaining to his masters and wants credit for being a good boy and doing his homework. I recall some saying that they liked that about him, that he really didn't want to be president that bad, no passionate drive to do it for some ideological reason or drive to accomplish something. Even his main theme, "the education president," was so obviously the influence of interests of his wife. (Heck, he himself disliked college and higher learnin'.)

I also recall lots of complaints from GOP faithful that he had no passion and didn't have a good message and a bitterness that the money people had pre-selected him, partly for the name, partly for his malleability, partly for his "I'd have a beer with the guy" lack of eliteness, and, for want of a better word, moderateness. That this would cause them to lose the presidency, that the money people were betting wrongly on CW.

The point: whether you believe he was elected or selected, he ended up as president two times. The method has been shown to work.

Actually, I personally think that one of the detrimental effects of the left blogosphere anti-Bush echo chamber, where every new Bush horror is the main news over all other news, has helped to contribute to many in the left blogosphere not realizing that a large number of voting people out there think of Bush overall, on balance, as moderate, not a conservative (note: this is not so for Cheney.) Now they think of him as incompetent moderate. But I think the popular majority still does not see him as the conservative pictured if one only read lefty blogs.

I'm sick of Southern candidates and all the careful calculus that goes into them. I'm sick of Northern candidates and all the Johnny Reb crap that gets hung on them. There are other regions of the country. We need a Midwesterner or a Westerner in '08.

These days, everyone's conservative on gun control, including the whole left-blogosphere.

As for abortion, I think he's right about in the middle of the country. Yes to Roe, no to late-term abortions, yes on some restrictions, no on others, etc etc.

I hardly see how his positions on either gun control or abortion are any particular problem. I don't think the gun debate is worth having again. Its just a political loser and should be abandonded.

As far as abortion, I can't see the problem with electing a president with a fairly moderate perspective. I would have to imagine that whatever his personal views Warner would appoint judges who would be unlikely to strike down Roe V. Wade. Thats really the only thing a president is likely to actually do that effects abortion so why should I care what he says about it? I can't see the problem here.

These are exactly the kind of issues that Democrats canidates ought to be talking moderately about, because their isn't a great deal that can be done in the first place. If it helps a canidate position himself or herself as a moderate while having more liberal views in substantsive areas where a president can actually effect policy than thats a trade we ought to be willing to make. Who cares if a canidate makes moderate sounding noises about abortion and opposes gun control.

Matthew,

Mark Warner is not running for President of the punditocracy. Do you seriously believe that policy positions are what get someone elected POTUSA? I think GWB's two terms are a pretty serious repudiation of that belief, not to mention the many other past presidents that certainly didn't ride their policy positions to the White House.

The process the Dem voters went through in choosing Kerry was right (yes, electability), the IA and NH Dem caucus/primary voters just turned out to be bad judges of what other Americans would want in a presidential candidate at that time (favoring a tough-talking military hero over a charming Southern political novice, and yes, I do think that given the post-primary race Kerry ran, Edwards would have been more successful than Kerry was at the top of the ticket). How would they possibly have distinguished and chosen in '04 based on the various candidates policy stances?

What we need this time is a telegenic, congenial governor (it just works better if the candidate is a governor, perhaps b/c of the executive branch leadership experience) who's hard to pin down on tough issues, preferably a Southerner who hasn't been in the Senate, who is a fantastically prolific fundraiser, and most importantly, ISN'T AFRAID TO PLAY HARDBALL. And I'm not talking about Chris Matthews here. That's the single-most important characteristic, other than perhaps being a good fundraiser.

Fighting back is probably the only dimension that I'm interested in finding out more about Mark Warner before declaring him the best of the best. I bet Hillary won't be afraid to fight back.

It isn't military experience, it is foriegn policy experience.

Most long serving Senators have significant Foriegn Policy experience, where Governors have none. And yet voters tend to prefer the Governors. I suppose this reflects on Americans not wanted to face harsh realities. A governor can take idealistic positions, Senators (or Presidents and Vice Presidents) have had to deal with the complexity of the real world, Clinton was guilty of this when running against Bush and attacking him for not acting in Yugoslavia. This of course is on foriegn policy, you could make exactly the opposite case on domestic policy, most governors have laws forcing balanced budgets, Senators get to basically print money.

I disagree. I think he's actually very charismatic, which I agree is an extremely important dimension to use to gauge potential candidates for president.

For those who want to decide for themselves how charismatic he is, check out his PAC at www.forwardtogetherpac.org.

Matt says "issues" and the first two that come to your mind are abortion and gun control?

No wonder we're screwed. Are we really saying that what the candidate is for makes no difference at all? Are these the only two issues? What about Iraq. What about the economy and trade? What about the environment, global warming? Why, other than ambition, does the dude want to be President?

You put someone in who won't say what he's for and he might win, but we won't hava a clue what we're getting. He also might get beaten around like a pinata and lose.

I'm with Matt. Where's the beef? "Likes blogs" isn't a bad thing but it's not at the top of my list.

This is a mighty weak reason to start a bandwagon.

Governors don't face anything remotely like that. Residents of the governor's state can dredge up lots of bad stuff about him, but this doesn't affect national voters at all.

You don't think that national voters were affected by Michael Dukakis' prison furlough program? There was a famous ad that showed prisoners go in and out through a revolving door. GOP campaign strategist Lee Atwater said he wanted to make Willie Horton Dukakis' running mate.

Voters do tend to vote for governors in times of relative peace, but in times of international crisis they go for somebody who can speak authoritatively on national security issues, and that excludes most governors.

If you look at governors who became president you find that most took office when -- as is usually the case -- domestic issues were at the forefront. Most governors, quite wisely, avoid speaking about such matters white they're in office.

Reagan was a big exception, and he was the rare governor who had been outspoken on war, peace, the Cold War, Communism, even before he entered electoral politics.

2004 was clearly a year when we needed somebody who was strong on security, and the primary voters were wise to choose John Kerry. He put up a good fight, he almost won, and did better against a wartime incumbent than any other challenger in history. He completely dominated Bush in the televised debates, particular in the foreign policy debate; I doubt that somebody with less depth in that area could have done as well.

I don't know what the international scene will be like in 2008, what's going to happen in Iraq or if we'll see another terror attack. And I won't know much about Warner; he'll have to make his case just like all the other candidates.

Specifically for both Iowa and New Hampshire, the one rationale that folks kept coming back to (as was reported in the media) was electibility. Largely as in opposition to Howard Dean -- the major part of the calculus as I listened to voter after voter as interviewed after had to do the "electbility". Remember that Dems were pretty energized and motivated for ABB and the easiest way to do that was through a calculation of what others might also vote for -- rather than a buy in to principles or vision. Who was more electable was certainly an appeal that Kerry and Edwards (during the primaries) personally made.

That said, I don't beleive that voters act with perfect information (who does?). No matter how much info all of the candidates in 2004 might throw out there, the "electibility" quotient was very much at the top of the list.

A parallel with Bill Clinton here, where Republicans and conservatives thought he was a wild left-winger, which of course he was not. The GOP tried to paint him as a liberal, but it wouldn't wash with the American people. He was liberal on some issues, moderate on others, conservative on a few.

(Nobody's said it so far on this thread, so I guess I will.)

Every Democrat who's been able to get elected president since John Kennedy has been from the South: Johnson, Carter, and Clinton. It doesn't mean that the pattern will hold, but there's an advantage to coming from that region. It isn't, I think, so much that southerners will vote for one of their own as it is that a southern Democrat will know how to speak in a language that will resonate with the voters of red states.

Also, the states that were closest in the last two elections -- Florida and Ohio -- have areas within them that belong to the South. In Florida, those areas are in the geographical north of the state.

The difference of course is that Clinton didn't try to implement the left equivalent of what Bush has done from the right. It beggars the imagination what Clinton would have had to do from the left to match the Bush reality from the right--something like confiscate guns and bibles, mandate gay marriage, raise income taxes to pre-1960 levels, and completely dismantle the military.

"Every Democrat who's been able to get elected president since John Kennedy has been from the South: Johnson, Carter, and Clinton. It doesn't mean that the pattern will hold, but there's an advantage to coming from that region. It isn't, I think, so much that southerners will vote for one of their own as it is that a southern Democrat will know how to speak in a language that will resonate with the voters of red states."

It's not just Democrats.

Every person elected President since John Kennedy of both parties has been from South of the Mason-Dixon line: Johnson, Nixon, Carter, Reagan, Bush, Clinton, Bush.

In fact, even the states immediately south of the Mason-Dixon haven't elected a President in that time span. The last 11 Presidential elections have been won by candidates hailing from south of Virginia.

Or to put it another way, Bill Clinton is the northernmost candidate to win the Presidency from either party in the last 45 years.

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I'm an Edwards guy.

• I think Edwards would perform better in a general election than Warner.
• As President, I think Edwards would be a more effective evangelist in recruiting new members for the Democratic Party than Warner.
• I think Edwards would be a more reliable lefty and more effective lefty in office than Warner.

It's your own subjective set of values that's setting up that equivalence. Conservatives, armed with the same facts as you, see it differently, as do those in the middle of the road.

Bush's domestic agenda has been modest. The most radical element of it was Social Security reform, which fizzled out. No Child Left Behind broke from long-standing conservative orthodoxy, which was to remove the Federal role in education. He's moderate on social issues such as abortion (exceptions for rape and incest) and gay marriage (wishy-washy support on the amendment, but he's the first president ever to speak out in favor of gay civil unions). The faith-based initiative had popular support, at least in theory.

So he's kind of a mixed bag, radical on a few issues, conservative on others and moderate on still others, moderate-conservative on something else. Trying to portray him as an extremist is a tactic that won't work any more than attempts to do the same with Bill Clinton.

The underlying ideology of the Bush Administration isn't conservatism, but cronyism.

"Bush's domestic agenda has been modest. The most radical element of it was Social Security reform, which fizzled out. No Child Left Behind broke from long-standing conservative orthodoxy, which was to remove the Federal role in education. "

And let's not forget the largest expansion in entitlements in 40 years with the prescription drug bill.

"The underlying ideology of the Bush Administration isn't conservatism, but cronyism."

Exactly.

As a point of history, none of the presidents from the height of the Cold War (Truman to Nixon, who engineered detente with the USSR) had come up from governorships. The only one who was nominated was Adlai Stevenson, who lost badly twice.

I don't know if we're entering a comparable period or not. But if foreign policy is the dominant issue, we'll need somebody who can talk about it.

a non-ideological Democratic Party against a passionately ideological Republican Party will continue to get taken to the cleaners, if not in every election, then in most.

I beg to differ on your premise. I think it's based on lefty cant that is common but gets it pretty backwards, and is a reason the left ends up being surprised at election results all the time.

What you are saying here is nearly the direct opposite of Karl Rove theory.

I'd like to see you read this and then come back and say Republican wins since Reagan are all about coherent national ideology. He works anti-national-ideology:

The Controller: Karl Rove is working to get George Bush reelected, but he has bigger plans.
by Nicholas Lemann
"Profiles," The New Yorker Magazine
May 12, 2003

It's almost anti-single-ideology. It's all about forming a big tent from pandering to minute local interests (I would include radical Christian fundie church movements here) and gerrymandering and the like. The only unifying ideologies are stronger local government, less Federal government except for a strong defense. It was sold earlier on by Lee Atwater, with its heart in the "Reagan revolution," and anti-big-liberal Federal government on social issues.

If you don't understand the appeal of your opposition, and continue to cling to propagandistic canards about your opposition meant to rile up a small liberal base, you'll lose those elections where you need a majority.

"p.s. There's very little ideology involved here for example. And its results freaked out Clinton and his best political advisors. It's mostly about process, and any ideology beyond cutting taxes is cloaked in the stressing of the word "reform;"

Yup.

It was a conscious effort to expand their tent by inviting in the Perot voters.

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"If you don't understand the appeal of your opposition, and continue to cling to propagandistic canards about your opposition meant to rile up a small liberal base, you'll lose those elections where you need a majority."

True, of course. But it's hard for many to understand the appeal of the opposition when it's a boom time for snake oil salesmen in the Democratic Party who are less interested in winning elections than establishing control over a small tent party.

Technically true,

But I'd lump CA, AZ, and NM with the Mountain West more than the South. Things tend to change quite a bit as you leave Texas and head West, and you could probably count Texas as a region all on its own, a little distinct from the true South.