When the cameras are turned off, Democrats have to be sweating bullets. The economy is booming. The impeachment push by House Democrats has seemed to not only further unite and animate the GOP base but push those 2016 Trump supporters who might have switched votes this cycle to hurry back into the MAGA camp. Maybe this was inevitable, or perhaps not. If Democrats were laser-focused on getting better trade deals, job creation, and focus on how some aspects of the Trump White House still wallow in the swamp, maybe there could have been some peel off. Alas, Democrats hate Trump too much.
They’re pushing a hard-left agenda. Democrats want forced Medicare for All, high taxes, fewer jobs, more regulations, wealth taxes, Green New Deal nonsense, health care for illegals, and the decriminalization of border crossings. Oh, and did we mention gun confiscation? Yeah, that’s also on the docket, though that is more of a hidden item that was outed by former 2020 candidate Beto O’Rourke. There is nothing appealing to this agenda, that has some rather unpopular proposals. Medicare for All cannot work without the destruction of private health insurance. That’s 150+ million plans. Union households are included. Being against fracking in states with natural gas booms puts key states like Pennsylvania in play again. Voters will be deciding between bigger paychecks and more economic opportunities and top-down government-run slavery.
With the so-called heavyweights of the Democratic Party appearing to be milquetoast and outright weak against Trump, there’s more chatter about Hillary Clinton jumping into the fray. Joe Biden is aloof, slow, and seems incapable of breaking away. Bernie Sanders is a full-blown communist. And Elizabeth Warren’s health care plan is a killer for the American middle class and economy. She’s also the only Democrat who is guaranteed to be shellacked by Trump. When you have stories where women voters are saying she’s super unlikable, you have problems.
Hillary Clinton jumping into the mix could be interesting. She would have the people she needs to mount another national campaign. She will have the money. The media will give her airtime. And the narrative would be a revenge tour…sort of. She doesn’t have a trashed economy to use to pummel Trump as unemployment is at record lows. Small business and consumer confidence have reached their highest marks in decades. Paychecks are higher. Over three million new jobs have been created. The military has been rebuilt and unleashed against ISIS. Unless Hillary wants to campaign on killing jobs, weakening our military, increasing unemployment, and trashing consumer confidence, then this isn’t going to go well. In 2012, Mitt Romney was proven right about a lot. Russia is our biggest geopolitical foe, with them having annexed Crimea in Ukraine; the Obama people did nothing. Obamacare proved to be the premium disaster as advertised. The economic growth was not as robust. It was not the Obama economy. America got rolled a lot under Obama in his second term. That’s not the case with Trump. The things Democrats could hit Trump on, like his rhetoric, are tolerated. He’s not a politician. That’s the point.
There’s also the internal politics of this fantasy. Progressive Democrats would be irate. They want to move on from the Clintons, most of the electorate does. She would still poll miserably on character issues. She will still be seen as untrustworthy. She’s still unlikable. She’ll be viewed as the woman who simply couldn’t quit it. Some progressives may even vote for Trump; there were definitely Bernie supporters who cast their ballots for the Donald in 2016. It would create another bout of heartburn for the Democratic Party, while Trump can run an organized operation touting the economic accomplishments of the past four years. It’s not hard to figure out who will have the winning agenda and campaign message.
