Joe, Liz and Bernie's Bad Night

The 2020 New Hampshire primaries were last night and the front-runners from last Summer all had terrible nights.

First there is Joe Biden. En ended up losing a fight for 4th pace with Liz Warren. His support is in the single digits. He's trailing in fund-raising. He looks old and sounds confused. The impeachment was aimed at Trump but hit Biden, informing a lot of people about how his family got rich from their association with Joe. He's never been a good candidate. In three runs for president he's never finished above 4th place. He's counting on South Carolina to save him but Super Tuesday is less than a month away and brings Bloomberg and his billions. Joe will probably be out of the race within the next month.

Then there's Liz Warren. She managed to beat Biden for 4th place but her support is still in the single-digits. She had to cancel a half-million dollar ad buy in Nevada after her poor showing in Iowa failed to produce the expected donations bounce. Her slogan "I've got a plan for that" evaporated after she released her plan for universal health care. It was too expensive and the funding had too many rosy projections. She withdrew it promising to come up with something by 2024 if Congress doesn't deliver a plan before then. She's also been caught in too many lies. Her voice grates. She's been basing her appeal on "I was discriminated against decades ago for being a woman so I deserve to be president." That appeal coming from a rich, privileged white woman didn't work for Hillary Clinton and it's not working for Warren. Warren should have placed second in New Hampshire just from being a fellow New Englander. That she didn't shows that she has limited appeal and will soon be out of the race.

It may seem strange to include Bernie Sanders on this list. He won the New Hampshire primary but it was an ugly win. He got half the votes in 2020 as he got in 2016. In 2016 he finished 22 points ahead of Hillary Clinton. In 2020 he beat Pete Buttigieg by 1.3%. Everyone knew that Bernie would win this primary but it was far closer than anyone expected. Still, it's enough that a Stop Bernie movement has formed in the Democratic Party. Bernie is far enough ahead to alarm the party but he's not so far as to be unstoppable. Had Bernie repeated his 2016 win then the party might be coming to terms with him as front-runner. Instead his narrow victory has them looking for alternatives to support. Regardless, I expect Bernie to be in the race until the bitter end.