Steve Chapman: Can Anyone Win This Thing? History suggests all the candidates are fatally flawed!
... Hillary Clinton can take consolation that she's neither a mayor nor, really, a New Yorker. But history holds other ill tidings for her. Every morning, 100 senators see a future president in the bathroom mirror -- and invariably it's a mirage. Americans rarely regard sitting senators as presidential timber.
The last person to go directly from the Senate to the Oval Office was Kennedy, and prior to that, Warren Harding in 1920. Kerry was nominated but lost, and dozens if not thousands of senators have foundered in Iowa or New Hampshire or some other primary state.
The good news for Clinton is that if sitting senators can't win, she can stop worrying about Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Chris Dodd and John McCain, all of whom are fated to turn into pumpkins. What about Fred Thompson? He's not a sitting senator, but the exclusion seems to apply to former ones as well (except those who become vice president). We have also never elected a comatose candidate, as Thompson appears to be.
Things are even tougher for House members, such as Ron Paul. His patron saint is James Garfield, the last congressman to jump straight to the presidency, back before the invention of the wheel.
Bill Richardson has the distinct advantage of being a governor, like four of the last five presidents. But he has the misfortune of being a former Cabinet secretary, which is the political equivalent of concrete overshoes. No former Cabinet secretary has made the ascent to the Oval Office since Herbert Hoover in 1928, and he didn't leave anyone yearning for more.
John Edwards lacks that drawback, but he has the handicap of being a former senator, and he has created another for himself: He's running a populist campaign in a country where populists are all glitter and no gold.
Every four years or so, someone emerges with a fiery pitch about helping the little guy and humbling the evil corporate interests. And every time, he's the one who gets a lesson in humility, from Fred Harris (1976) to Dick Gephardt (1988 and 2004) to Pat Buchanan (1992 and 1996) to Al Gore (2000). Perhaps the premier populist in American history, William Jennings Bryan was also the premier loser -- nominated three times for president by the Democratic Party without ever winning.
Recent history suggests that to win the presidency, you have to be a white male from the South or West, preferably with experience as a governor. That description fits only one candidate in the race -- Mike Huckabee. So by examining the portents of history, we find that he's the only person who can possibly be elected next year.
Unless 2008 is one of those years that confirm what Henry Ford insisted: History is bunk.
Read entire article at Creators Syndicate, Inc.
The last person to go directly from the Senate to the Oval Office was Kennedy, and prior to that, Warren Harding in 1920. Kerry was nominated but lost, and dozens if not thousands of senators have foundered in Iowa or New Hampshire or some other primary state.
The good news for Clinton is that if sitting senators can't win, she can stop worrying about Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Chris Dodd and John McCain, all of whom are fated to turn into pumpkins. What about Fred Thompson? He's not a sitting senator, but the exclusion seems to apply to former ones as well (except those who become vice president). We have also never elected a comatose candidate, as Thompson appears to be.
Things are even tougher for House members, such as Ron Paul. His patron saint is James Garfield, the last congressman to jump straight to the presidency, back before the invention of the wheel.
Bill Richardson has the distinct advantage of being a governor, like four of the last five presidents. But he has the misfortune of being a former Cabinet secretary, which is the political equivalent of concrete overshoes. No former Cabinet secretary has made the ascent to the Oval Office since Herbert Hoover in 1928, and he didn't leave anyone yearning for more.
John Edwards lacks that drawback, but he has the handicap of being a former senator, and he has created another for himself: He's running a populist campaign in a country where populists are all glitter and no gold.
Every four years or so, someone emerges with a fiery pitch about helping the little guy and humbling the evil corporate interests. And every time, he's the one who gets a lesson in humility, from Fred Harris (1976) to Dick Gephardt (1988 and 2004) to Pat Buchanan (1992 and 1996) to Al Gore (2000). Perhaps the premier populist in American history, William Jennings Bryan was also the premier loser -- nominated three times for president by the Democratic Party without ever winning.
Recent history suggests that to win the presidency, you have to be a white male from the South or West, preferably with experience as a governor. That description fits only one candidate in the race -- Mike Huckabee. So by examining the portents of history, we find that he's the only person who can possibly be elected next year.
Unless 2008 is one of those years that confirm what Henry Ford insisted: History is bunk.