New Hampshire results point the way ahead for Democrats

The results are now on the record books for New Hampshire and  were as expected with Bernie in the lead, followed by Pete Buttegieg, then Amy Klobuchar, and trailing behind Elizabeth Warren and Joe Biden. So, while the results were no great surprise, what many are looking at is to see if the historical precedent can make a prediction in a race where no one clear victory stands out for the Democrats nearly nine months before the election.

There is also an expected bump for the three as well as a healing from the tabulation debacle in Iowa, where the local DNC head, Troy Price resigned, resigned after a malfunctioning app failed to deliver the results, and the results had to be tallied by hand, using paper and pencil.

New Hampshire like Iowa, after the app debacle  is now seen as not being truly representative of the nation, on the whole, and there are calls for a national primary, or a move to another state that is more representative, such as Illinois which has the support of both its Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot.

“Former 2020 candidate Julián Castro . . . openly questioned why two predominantly white states get to hold such power over the presidential nominating process,” reported Vox.com..

“I actually believe we do need to change the order of the states because I don’t believe we’re the same country we were in 1972. ... our country’s changed a lot in those 50 years,” Castro said on MSNBC this fall.

“What I really appreciate about Iowans and the folks in New Hampshire is that they take this process very seriously. At the same time, demographically it’s not reflective of the United States as a whole, certainly not reflective of the Democratic Party, and I believe that other states should have their chance.”

One factor in  favor of the latter  is the use of paper ballots used to decide on the 24 delegates that have historically awarded the weakest candidate, and dethroned the ones primed and thought to win.

“ . . the US Census estimates New Hampshire is 90 percent white; in Iowa, it’s 85 percent. By contrast, the United States as a whole is just 60 percent white. The concerns of black and Latino voters, while represented in other early states Nevada and South Carolina, still don’t have as much power as the first two states, simply because of the order of the contests.”.

Naysayers point out that in 2016 New Hampshire had a high turnout of 52 percent, and for some that is still significant. But, equally worth noting is that voters there don’t make up their mind till the last minute, or as they enter the voting booth.

Looking in the rearview mirror

It is also an area, where politics is sport and conversation can quickly take a political turn, and “Historically, no major-party nominee has won the nomination without coming first or second in New Hampshire. Winning here, all else equal, increases a candidate’s expected share of the primary vote by 27 percentage points,” according to political scientist William Mayer.

History can make strange bedfellows, as well as results, notably  when both Harry Truman and Lyndon Johnson both lost,  in the 1950s and 1960s; and, with that in mind it’s time to turn  towards the present.

For New Hampshire it’s Sanders at 25.7 percent and Buttigieg at 24,4 percent and Klobuchar at 19.8 percent and Elizabeth at 9.2 and Joe at 8.4 percent, at,or near, what the polls showed.

The pundits always had Sanders winning in his neighboring state and after former mayor Pete scored well in Iowa, his second place finish was also considered a win.

Issues still matter

Then there are the issues -- if anyone remembers them outside of sound bites, “gotcha” moments, and the like

On the front burner is still health care and Medicare for All - “I wrote the damn bill” Sanders now colloquial tagline, is still reflective of progressives and the left, but has taken some hits from moderate centrists like Buttigieg, whose incremental steps are not always out of the ballpark, for many voters, and while lacking specifics  - one of his traits - is in line with what most say that have  private insurance say: they love it -- 60 percent - and throwing this away might cause more dissension among Sanders and Warren, and from a strategic point might give Pete an edge, and as the late host of “Meet the Press” always said, it’s about the numbers.

In states like Iowa and New Hampshire with all white voters, either college graduates, or rurals, the theme of incrementalism can help the former mayor.

What won’t help him is his low ratings with African Americans where he only has a 2 percent national standing --- and based on his inactions, intransigence and cavalier attitude toward black voters, such as telling a black woman, who challenged him on his record with the South Bend community, “Ma'am I don’t want your vote” is giving him, to many, the label of a racist, coupled with comments made during a children’s television show.

 "It’s an embarrassing thing to admit, but the people who wrote the Constitution did not understand that slavery was a bad thing and did not respect civil rights.”

Topping this off was this statement was another: that he was unaware that South Bend schools were segregated, despite having a husband as a teacher.

There is still the dominant issue of climate change coming to the forefront as it should be and this is more a gift from the left than the center, and with young voters, a predominant issue since it will be their world that will suffer from lack of attention.

Affordable housing is also there and Warren wants to use “federal funds to build more houses,” while Buttegeig, Klobuchar and Bloomberg want to combine federal funding and rent subsidies --- but it;’s notable that the former South Bend mayor’s position is not much different than his tear down and replace, and still lacks a more targeted funding stream for low income people of color.

Lowering prescription drug costs has almost become an  urgency and most of the candidates are in agreement on negotiating drug prices, like Canada, and other countries.

Klobuchar’s rise in the polls may have something to do with what is more of a targeted plan. Perhaps redolent of “being the adult in the room” in some debates, but she also shows more than a dose of Midwestern pragmatism.

"Lifting the ban on Medicare negotiations for prescription drugs by passing and signing into law Senator Klobuchar’s Empowering Medicare Seniors to Negotiate Drug Prices Act.", "Allowing personal importation of safe drugs from countries like Canada by passing and signing into law Senator Klobuchar’s bipartisan Safe and Affordable Drugs from Canada Act.", "Stopping pharmaceutical companies from blocking less-expensive generics by passing and signing into law Senator Klobuchar’s bipartisan Preserve Access to Affordable Generics Act and Biosimilars Act.” according to her website. 

Far from the Beltway, her voice as a moderate has been shadowed by Biden as the centrist standard bearer, yet his deflating campaign seemed to have lost more than lustre as he abandoned New Hampshire as a win, and decided to re energize for South Carolina where his firewall of older black voters is expected to push him back into the spotlight.

Bloomberg enters the fray against Biden

Now comes, the entrance of another billionaire, and another former mayor, this time from New York, Michael Bloomberg, who has recently garnered significant support from black leaders, and whose strategy after sitting out New Hampshire is to chip away at Biden’s firewall, which may be crumbling after his drop in New Hampshire.

While there has been justifiable criticisms of stop and frisk policies in New York that resulted in a modest crime reduction, and the mostly innocent young black men, simply running errands, or on their way to work and school. And, while his recent apologies Bloomberg seems to be more focused on pushing Joe Biden aside, for the black vote, and has used his billions on market saturation with ads far and wide in the American South, still home to many black voters, and especially older black voters

He also has a legacy of lawsuits for sexually harassing women, and a near totalitarian view of policing, and his odd view that  the end of redlining was responsible for the housing crisis, reported Slate.com.

A recent “Quinnipiac poll showed that Black voter support for Bloomberg, by measure of this one poll, was within 5 percentage points of former Vice President Joe Biden’s. A second poll in Florida showed Bloomberg leading in the state. A further breakdown showed Bloomberg is trailing Biden among Black voters and ahead of him in Hispanic support.”

“Michael Bloomberg is leading the pack of Democratic presidential hopefuls in Florida, according to a new survey from St. Pete Polls, a sign that the former New York City mayor has picked up traction in a crucial swing state before most of his rivals have even started to campaign there,” reported The Hill

Cash works wonders, and there is talk that some black leaders in the South have been paid, or are being paid - a practice that has long been held in U.S. politics but has also been criticized as being less than heartfelt..

“Earlier this week, South Florida progressive activist Elijah Manley said he received a call from a Bloomberg staffer who offered him $6,500 per month (plus medical benefits) if Manley would join the campaign as an adviser for "racial justice and social justice issues." Manley says he declined because he's a Bernie Sanders supporter and because he thought Bloomberg was, frankly, trying to buy black support in Florida,” reported the Miami New Times.

“The poll shows Bloomberg with 27.3 percent support in the Sunshine State, up 10 points from a similar poll released late last month. Biden, meanwhile, has seen his support in Florida plummet, falling from more than 41 percent in January to 25.9 percent this month.”

There may be some irony with him -- stop and frisk controversy aside --- and as The Nation pointed out earlier this year, and last, he left, as mayor, affordable housing completely out of the picture, “projecting a large increase in population but ignoring the near certainty that a large share of those additional New Yorkers would be unable to afford market-rate housing,” according to researcher Benjamin Dulchin, Moses Gates, and Narika Williams, noted journalist and quoted by historian Eric Alterman for The Nation.

This no doubt affected all New Yorkers, but especially a hit taken by black residents, who according to Alterman, those living in public housing suffered from a “incompetence and [a] lack of accountability,” according to a report by City Comptroller Scott Stringer, whom he also quoted.

All of which resulted in cost burdened  renters whose 42 percent spent on rent also effaced costs for such food, transportation and health care.

Black leaders take note.

Biden meanwhile, as earlier noted, after his low place in New Hampshire seems to be losing support from many including previous supporters who no longer feel that he is the one to beat Trump, and places too much on electability and the glow of the “Barack effect” as Obama’s vice-president, making a way for Sanders who lacks black support and the endeavors of the baby boomer Tom Steyer who have come to South Carolina and done retail politicking.

.“I haven’t seen a real investment of both money and people, and I haven’t seen the vice president spend much time here,” Rep. J.A. Moore said to Politico. “The narrative this election cycle is not taking African-Americans, especially African-American women, for granted. Yet the former vice president hasn’t spent money here nor had an organizational structure here. At least I haven’t seen it.”

Yet there is still fervor for Bden among many of South Carolina’s black leadership and his ardent supporters, as Politico discovered.

“The county of Sumter, South Carolina, has more African-Americans than the entire state of New Hampshire,” said state Sen. Marlon Kimpson, who endorsed Biden in January. “Yes, we would rather have done better, but there’s precedent for candidates not winning New Hampshire and Iowa but going on to win the presidency.”

.