Wouldn't it be nice to see a Democrat run FOR something other than being anti-Trump? And not like Abigail Spanberger who ran on this magical, mystical thing called affordability that she never defined, but once in office completely abandoned for massive tax increases and electric rate hikes.
Forget about Newsom's talent as a politician. What about Gavin the Governor? CA's list of worsts is nearly endless.
Highest official and unofficial US poverty rate. When the cost of living is considered , 1/3 of Golden Staters, some 14 million people, and change live in poverty, or just slightly better. No other state in US history as ever created such a mass of human misery.
Highest energy costs, which will soon soar even more, because Gavin's Green Gladiators have purposefully limited energy supplies, in a misguided effort to increase prices to lessen consumption. In 1990, CA had twice as many refineries, for 1/2 as many people.
Then Gavin arrived on the scene, preaching Green Energy as the Stairway to Heaven. It was actually the road to ruin. The term "energy poverty" was coined in CA a few decades ago, to describe the 10% of the state that had to choose between energy and eating at the end of each month.
The problem is now so pervasive, CA no longer disconnects most residential customers for nonpayment. This has produced billions of electric bills in arrears. Most will never be paid.
All of the above, before we arrive a the homeless industrial complex, that literally spends tens of billions of dollars each year , to grow the CA homeless population. Of course, the thousands of CA NGOs devoted to the problem, provide a lot a jobs for the children of the STEM upper middle class, that lack their parent's Math skills.
The mass failure is bad enough, marry it with the omnipresent hubris and condescension for non coastal US residents, and Americans truly cannot begin to imagine the horror of a Newsom administration.
For years, Newsom legally forbade official travel by CA state employees to Red States. Gavin feared interaction with ill educated racists, xenophobes, homophobes and the like, would infect his morally and intellectually superior state employees. Newsom only pulled the plug on the law, less than 3 years ago, when he decided to run for President.
The above is just a short list of the destruction, before failing schools, crumbling infrastructure, massive government debt and fraud, and the inability to produce new, well paying jobs, on any scale.
CA is one of the prettiest places on earth, with one of the most mild climates, and plenty of wide open space for growth, yet millions of Americans have fled under Gavin's governance. Americans should ask themselves, where will they will run, after Newsom works his magic on the entire nation.
> "For years, Newsom legally forbade official travel by CA state employees to Red States. Gavin feared interaction with ill educated racists, xenophobes, homophobes and the like, would infect his morally and intellectually superior state employees."
IIRC, it was not red states but states that protected women's rights to single sex spaces--states that didn't let men into women's bathrooms, locker rooms or prisons. Other blue states followed suit, and the main goal was to use the economic power of blue states to coerce red states into getting onboard with (trans) gender ideology.
That's another thing the right will tie around his neck in the general.
I will add - the middle of the country, and perhaps the east coast as well, has a dim view of CA as a state and as a Dem Vibe. CA pols seem condescending, scolding, self righteous, tone deaf, anti-faith, prone to calamitous panics, etc. while their state is in shambles and ungovernable. I could go on. All the GOP need do is continually mention CA and Newsome over and over and make sure voters see him as THE california governor — the guy who turned it into a giant land fill.
"In 2019, he (Newsom) promised to build 3.5 million new units of housing by 2025. Three years later, he backed away from that idea, too, dismissing it as a mere “stretch goal”. “Just 13% of the 3.5 million homes he campaigned on building have been permitted, let alone built,” reported CalMatters in 2022." Source: The Guardian
> "Finally for realpolitik Democrats, who don’t align with—or even care about—any of these factions but just want to beat Trump by any means necessary, Newsom also wants to be their guy. "
Should we let the Democrats know that Trump isn't running in 2028?
I don't know what I am most angry about - is it the fact that a chameleon like this can actually end up being the Democratic nominee for president or the fact that the American electorate has sunk so far in intelligence to end up voting for someone like this? California voters of course will support him; I've lived here all my life and understand their addiction to shallowness. They love his hair, even though he has destroyed California. But is it the same throughout the country? Aren't there level headed, rational and intelligent people who can think in the mid-west or on the East Coast? I was never a fan of JFK or Bill Clinton but they were certainly more principled than Newsom.
Donald Trump has a gift for reading a crowd and knowing which buttons to press to gin it up. This is true regardless of whether the crowd is with him or not.
Examples include claiming he’s going to run for president a third time and taking Greenland. I think Dems (and others) generally have no idea that he’s baiting them into overwrought, furious reactions like NO KINGS!!!
Newsom is no exception. His tweets aren’t funny, aren’t cute, aren’t anything except crass. The only buttons he’s pushing are the ones of people who are already on board with him. Like the author here says: this is why he could never win a general national election.
Newsom is in part JFK: more than handsome enough to cause some people to swoon over him whatever his political beliefs are. Physical appearance usually helps: think JFK, Reagan, Obama, et al.
But he has major vulnerabilities. Outside the left-wing bubble, California is associated with high taxes, idiotic government decisions (train to nowhere, etc.), wokeism on steroids, middle-class people leaving in droves. When he runs for President, Newsom will have a fawning media on his side, especially if he makes it to the general election. But I don't think he can escape the California tarnish: it is too conspicuous, hard for even a compliant media to totally cover up. Both major parties will likely nominate candidates with little appeal to the independents/moderates who decide general elections for national office. 2028 will be like 2024 again: same candidates, different names.
Democrats will have a problem if they nominate someone with a track record in government of a blue state. Newsom, Harris, Pritzker, Walz- all are associated with failure in their states. The Republican commercials practically write themselves.
Legislators would not have the same problem. They have voted in lockstep for years, so are not as vulnerable to individual blame for their votes. They would only have to defend their words, not the results of their governance.
Edit to add:
Based on the above, the nominee could very well be AOC. The DSA takeover of the Democrat party would be complete.
I have watched Gavin Newsom's rise, from Mayor of San Francisco, upward. I can also quite easily remember Bill Clinton during the 1992 primaries. Bill was without a doubt, from the first debate onward, the smartest one up for the job. Not the most honest, faithful, or a few other things, that people tend to like in a Candidate, but he was engaging. Newson has none of that. He will be brought down by his own narcissism, if not by his hair.
In his interview with Vogue Magazine, linked in the above article, Newsom said, "Florida is the ‘high tax state,’ we’re not."
For fiscal year 2022, the Tax Foundation reported that California had the 2nd-highest per capita state and local tax collections among the states. Florida was 47th. That was collections, though, which a steeply progressive state income tax like California's (Florida has none) might skew due to higher average income. If you look at percentages, California's state and local tax burden is 11% of income, which is 4th highest in the nation (Wallet Hub), vs. Florida's 6.46%, 45th highest in the nation. This guy lies his hair gel off.
I agree with your basic point. (BTW, that AOC and Harris are #2 and #3 in polls is truly scary!). But while Mr. Clinton was indeed ....flexible in his messaging, according to his perception of political reality, I think you sell him short. Clinton was very interested in policy, knew a lot about it, and worked hard to maintain a positive spin in his messaging.
I hate to say it, but Newsome has a very good chance of winning the Presidency in 28. I don't think he would be any different policy wise than Biden or Harris, and I probably wouldn't vote for him, but he is more of a natural politician than anyone else I've seen.
More Reagan than Clinton, Newsome makes you feel like he is a well intentioned moderate fella that gets along with most people. Newsome is comfortable. Forget what he is saying, it's immaterial, forget his record, that was then. Watch Newsome with the sound off. Reagan raised the retirement age and the amount the working class pays in taxes, I expect Newsome would do similar.
I'd agree if he was the governor of MA or any other relatively functional blue state. CA baggage is significant between the insane wealth gap, homelessness, cost of living, energy poverty, dead last in education, wildfire mismanagement, crippling environmental regulation, etc. That said, I think the GOP realizes he is a threat because of the reasons you outline. Enter JD Vance spearheading the welfare fraud investigation.
Newsom's best response is that he's doing his best to fight against all the bad things in CA, but that's difficult in a world of coalitional politics. Literally all problems in CA can be attributed to client classes of the Democrats.
That's for sure. He's done nothing for this state and he had, what, 8 years to do SoMETHING that might alleviate the state's myriad problems. He turns out to be a handsome poser. It's a shame.
Is Newsom a chameleon? Of course he is. Will Newsom say anything to curry favor with whomever he's in front of? Of course he will. Will Newsom ever stake out actual policy positions rather than poll-tested slogans? Of course he won't. Will the press hold his feet to the fire? Of course not. Will Newsom win the Democratic nomination in 2028? Of course he will. He's the archetypal Democrat. Big on indignant rhetoric. Wafer thin on substance.
Wouldn't it be nice to see a Democrat run FOR something other than being anti-Trump? And not like Abigail Spanberger who ran on this magical, mystical thing called affordability that she never defined, but once in office completely abandoned for massive tax increases and electric rate hikes.
Forget about Newsom's talent as a politician. What about Gavin the Governor? CA's list of worsts is nearly endless.
Highest official and unofficial US poverty rate. When the cost of living is considered , 1/3 of Golden Staters, some 14 million people, and change live in poverty, or just slightly better. No other state in US history as ever created such a mass of human misery.
Highest energy costs, which will soon soar even more, because Gavin's Green Gladiators have purposefully limited energy supplies, in a misguided effort to increase prices to lessen consumption. In 1990, CA had twice as many refineries, for 1/2 as many people.
Then Gavin arrived on the scene, preaching Green Energy as the Stairway to Heaven. It was actually the road to ruin. The term "energy poverty" was coined in CA a few decades ago, to describe the 10% of the state that had to choose between energy and eating at the end of each month.
The problem is now so pervasive, CA no longer disconnects most residential customers for nonpayment. This has produced billions of electric bills in arrears. Most will never be paid.
All of the above, before we arrive a the homeless industrial complex, that literally spends tens of billions of dollars each year , to grow the CA homeless population. Of course, the thousands of CA NGOs devoted to the problem, provide a lot a jobs for the children of the STEM upper middle class, that lack their parent's Math skills.
The mass failure is bad enough, marry it with the omnipresent hubris and condescension for non coastal US residents, and Americans truly cannot begin to imagine the horror of a Newsom administration.
For years, Newsom legally forbade official travel by CA state employees to Red States. Gavin feared interaction with ill educated racists, xenophobes, homophobes and the like, would infect his morally and intellectually superior state employees. Newsom only pulled the plug on the law, less than 3 years ago, when he decided to run for President.
The above is just a short list of the destruction, before failing schools, crumbling infrastructure, massive government debt and fraud, and the inability to produce new, well paying jobs, on any scale.
CA is one of the prettiest places on earth, with one of the most mild climates, and plenty of wide open space for growth, yet millions of Americans have fled under Gavin's governance. Americans should ask themselves, where will they will run, after Newsom works his magic on the entire nation.
> "For years, Newsom legally forbade official travel by CA state employees to Red States. Gavin feared interaction with ill educated racists, xenophobes, homophobes and the like, would infect his morally and intellectually superior state employees."
IIRC, it was not red states but states that protected women's rights to single sex spaces--states that didn't let men into women's bathrooms, locker rooms or prisons. Other blue states followed suit, and the main goal was to use the economic power of blue states to coerce red states into getting onboard with (trans) gender ideology.
That's another thing the right will tie around his neck in the general.
I will add - the middle of the country, and perhaps the east coast as well, has a dim view of CA as a state and as a Dem Vibe. CA pols seem condescending, scolding, self righteous, tone deaf, anti-faith, prone to calamitous panics, etc. while their state is in shambles and ungovernable. I could go on. All the GOP need do is continually mention CA and Newsome over and over and make sure voters see him as THE california governor — the guy who turned it into a giant land fill.
"In 2019, he (Newsom) promised to build 3.5 million new units of housing by 2025. Three years later, he backed away from that idea, too, dismissing it as a mere “stretch goal”. “Just 13% of the 3.5 million homes he campaigned on building have been permitted, let alone built,” reported CalMatters in 2022." Source: The Guardian
> "Finally for realpolitik Democrats, who don’t align with—or even care about—any of these factions but just want to beat Trump by any means necessary, Newsom also wants to be their guy. "
Should we let the Democrats know that Trump isn't running in 2028?
"The Liberal Patriot @TheLibPatriot 11h
Democrats could save themselves a lot of headaches in 2028 by just agreeing not to nominate anyone from CA or NY for president."
Yup
I don't know what I am most angry about - is it the fact that a chameleon like this can actually end up being the Democratic nominee for president or the fact that the American electorate has sunk so far in intelligence to end up voting for someone like this? California voters of course will support him; I've lived here all my life and understand their addiction to shallowness. They love his hair, even though he has destroyed California. But is it the same throughout the country? Aren't there level headed, rational and intelligent people who can think in the mid-west or on the East Coast? I was never a fan of JFK or Bill Clinton but they were certainly more principled than Newsom.
Donald Trump has a gift for reading a crowd and knowing which buttons to press to gin it up. This is true regardless of whether the crowd is with him or not.
Examples include claiming he’s going to run for president a third time and taking Greenland. I think Dems (and others) generally have no idea that he’s baiting them into overwrought, furious reactions like NO KINGS!!!
Newsom is no exception. His tweets aren’t funny, aren’t cute, aren’t anything except crass. The only buttons he’s pushing are the ones of people who are already on board with him. Like the author here says: this is why he could never win a general national election.
Newsom is in part JFK: more than handsome enough to cause some people to swoon over him whatever his political beliefs are. Physical appearance usually helps: think JFK, Reagan, Obama, et al.
But he has major vulnerabilities. Outside the left-wing bubble, California is associated with high taxes, idiotic government decisions (train to nowhere, etc.), wokeism on steroids, middle-class people leaving in droves. When he runs for President, Newsom will have a fawning media on his side, especially if he makes it to the general election. But I don't think he can escape the California tarnish: it is too conspicuous, hard for even a compliant media to totally cover up. Both major parties will likely nominate candidates with little appeal to the independents/moderates who decide general elections for national office. 2028 will be like 2024 again: same candidates, different names.
Two words: "bullet train."
Democrats will have a problem if they nominate someone with a track record in government of a blue state. Newsom, Harris, Pritzker, Walz- all are associated with failure in their states. The Republican commercials practically write themselves.
Legislators would not have the same problem. They have voted in lockstep for years, so are not as vulnerable to individual blame for their votes. They would only have to defend their words, not the results of their governance.
Edit to add:
Based on the above, the nominee could very well be AOC. The DSA takeover of the Democrat party would be complete.
I have watched Gavin Newsom's rise, from Mayor of San Francisco, upward. I can also quite easily remember Bill Clinton during the 1992 primaries. Bill was without a doubt, from the first debate onward, the smartest one up for the job. Not the most honest, faithful, or a few other things, that people tend to like in a Candidate, but he was engaging. Newson has none of that. He will be brought down by his own narcissism, if not by his hair.
In his interview with Vogue Magazine, linked in the above article, Newsom said, "Florida is the ‘high tax state,’ we’re not."
For fiscal year 2022, the Tax Foundation reported that California had the 2nd-highest per capita state and local tax collections among the states. Florida was 47th. That was collections, though, which a steeply progressive state income tax like California's (Florida has none) might skew due to higher average income. If you look at percentages, California's state and local tax burden is 11% of income, which is 4th highest in the nation (Wallet Hub), vs. Florida's 6.46%, 45th highest in the nation. This guy lies his hair gel off.
I agree with your basic point. (BTW, that AOC and Harris are #2 and #3 in polls is truly scary!). But while Mr. Clinton was indeed ....flexible in his messaging, according to his perception of political reality, I think you sell him short. Clinton was very interested in policy, knew a lot about it, and worked hard to maintain a positive spin in his messaging.
I hate to say it, but Newsome has a very good chance of winning the Presidency in 28. I don't think he would be any different policy wise than Biden or Harris, and I probably wouldn't vote for him, but he is more of a natural politician than anyone else I've seen.
More Reagan than Clinton, Newsome makes you feel like he is a well intentioned moderate fella that gets along with most people. Newsome is comfortable. Forget what he is saying, it's immaterial, forget his record, that was then. Watch Newsome with the sound off. Reagan raised the retirement age and the amount the working class pays in taxes, I expect Newsome would do similar.
I'd agree if he was the governor of MA or any other relatively functional blue state. CA baggage is significant between the insane wealth gap, homelessness, cost of living, energy poverty, dead last in education, wildfire mismanagement, crippling environmental regulation, etc. That said, I think the GOP realizes he is a threat because of the reasons you outline. Enter JD Vance spearheading the welfare fraud investigation.
Newsom's best response is that he's doing his best to fight against all the bad things in CA, but that's difficult in a world of coalitional politics. Literally all problems in CA can be attributed to client classes of the Democrats.
It makes me weep.
That's for sure. He's done nothing for this state and he had, what, 8 years to do SoMETHING that might alleviate the state's myriad problems. He turns out to be a handsome poser. It's a shame.
Jan Shaw, California
Homelessness, billion dollar train to nowhere, housing affordability (ha). Looks good to me.
Is Newsom a chameleon? Of course he is. Will Newsom say anything to curry favor with whomever he's in front of? Of course he will. Will Newsom ever stake out actual policy positions rather than poll-tested slogans? Of course he won't. Will the press hold his feet to the fire? Of course not. Will Newsom win the Democratic nomination in 2028? Of course he will. He's the archetypal Democrat. Big on indignant rhetoric. Wafer thin on substance.