July 21, 2024 : 72 EXTRA!

72 EXTRA!

As you will have heard by now, Joe Biden has finally decided to withdraw from the presidential race and thrown his support behind his vice president, Kamala Harris. But to reiterate (from a few weeks back):

Even if he does though, it is not clear that she should secure the candidacy as simply as that. As has been widely discussed, there are a wealth of plausible candidates to choose from. And the coming party convention in Chicago could offer the party a chance to do just that. 

The five or six most plausible of them (including Harris), as determined by some agreed-upon criteria (polling status or the like), could each be invited to address the convention for, say, twenty minutes on its first night; they would be encouraged not to take aim at each other but rather to frame their own sense of the stakes involved in the coming race and their forward-looking vision with regard to upcoming national challenges. (I for one would be looking to hear about what ought be done with regard to that rampaging rogue runaway Court.) There could follow a few days of floor-politicking—just imagine the wall-to-wall media coverage—leading finally to a single ranked-choice ballot (no need for the internecine warfare of multiple ballots). The resultant candidate—a new young, relatively rested fresh face—would barrel out of the convention with seven or eight weeks to mount a spirited campaign. The rest of the party could rise to the occasion as well, in races up and down the ballot. I’d give them all a pretty good chance.

So: fingers in a rictus of crossedness.  Party on!