Hillary's Reported VP Choices Are Truly Underwhelming

Hillary Clinton is expected to announce her Vice Presidential pick sometime this weekend and the reports on her remaining potential choices seem to get worse and worse every day. I am in total agreement with Kos that the choice of either Tim Kaine or Tom Vilsack would be the ultimate buzzkill for progressive Democrats. Talk about boring – these two are a virtual snooze fest. And their DLC connections are just an anathema to every progressive in the party. Hillary may think she can get away with playing it safe but either of these two will pretty much guarantee that Sanders’ supporters will be hard to get to the polls. I have already gone on record as saying Democrats can’t afford to “waste” a sitting Senator on the VP slot, but I guess I could stomach Corey Booker, although that just give Chis Christie the chance to appoint his temporary successor. And we certainly can’t afford to lose Sherrod Brown’s seat in Ohio and Elizabeth Warren’s voice as a progressive is way too important to have her become VP, in addition to having the same problems as Booker with a Republican governor naming her temporary replacement.  I have already gone on record as supporting Tom Perez but, according to reports, he seems to fall further and further out of contention each day.

Democrats have an odds-on shot to win back the Senate and a real chance to make some inroads into the Republican majority in the House, perhaps even squeaking out control. Polls show generic Democrats with an 8 point lead over Republicans right now and that has traditionally turned into nearly as many seats as we would need to win back the House.  Educated white males are fleeing the Trump candidacy in droves. Combine them with some motivated millennials and you could possibly have a wave election. But those opportunities will be greatly reduced with the selection of either Kaine or Vilsack. This is not the 1990s and the Democratic party has moved far left of the DLC policies of that era.  Hillary better wake up to that fact for the good of the party and the good of the country.