OPINION:
Only yesterday the Democrats thought they had the House of Representatives signed and sealed, ready for the second coming of Nancy Pelosi, and the Senate was probably in play, too. But second thoughts can ruin the fun.
A malady called “midterm migraine” struck the retreat of Senate Democrats early this month at Mount Vernon in suburban Washington after a focus group was called in to describe the lay of the land to the assembled nabobs. Democrats looking for feel-good news should have called in the pundits who have confidently predicted that Republicans are not only sure to lose the House, but Chuck Schumer could probably regain control of the Senate if Democrats just rant about Donald Trump a little harsher and a lot louder.
To their astonishment what they heard from the focus group followed a consistent theme: “Republicans have the wrong agenda, and Democrats have no agenda at all.”
One Democratic Senate aide says party leaders are “acutely aware” of the problem and think the immigration issue will “fill the agenda gap.” Others warn that might not work because it would confirm Republican snark that Democrats won’t compromise on DACA relief because the issue is more important than relieving the pain of DACA immigrants.
Other Democrats feeling their midterm migraines say the party has other issues to ventilate, including pensions, dealing with opioids, child care and student loans for college. These are all worthy of attention, but they’re not issues likely to make anyone throw his hat in the air.
No wonder, then, that some Democrats with a migraine want to leave 2018 behind now and concentrate on electing a new president two years hence. And apparently not just Democrats. President Trump, ever eager to change the subject, whatever that might be, has challenged Oprah Winfrey to run against him two years hence.
Miss Winfrey has indeed been “mentioned” as a 2020 prospect, by “that mysterious source who plucks politicians from obscurity and mentions them to political journalists as contenders for higher office.” Russell Baker, a columnist for The New York Times of yesteryear, identified the source as “the Great Mentioner.”
Oprah Winfrey hardly needs plucking from obscurity, but she obviously needled the president with a much-remarked rouser in support of the #MeToo movement at the Golden Globes dinner in Hollywood. The press, ever in pursuit of the new thing, consulted with the Great Mentioner and a new political star was born. She told “60 Minutes” that she has no desire to run, and was “stunned” that someone thought she was qualified to run for the highest office in the land. “But that’s just not my spirit,” she said. “It’s not in my DNA.”
That’s not exactly a Sherman (“If nominated I will not run,” Gen. William Tecumseh Sherman told a group of politicians who tried to draft him in 1884), “and if elected I will not serve.” But it’s close. Oprah is a thoughtful, sensitive interviewer, as I can attest, having been on her program twice, so why should she want to invite misery?
Nevertheless, if the presidency is a misery, it’s “a splendid misery,” Thomas Jefferson called it. Some feminists, still dreaming of shattering the well-cracked glass ceiling, think 2020 could be another year of the woman, and this time for real.
The party has several unusual Democrats eager to be cajoled or pushed into the race. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, 35, of Hawaii is a combat veteran of the war in Iraq, and so is Rep. Tammy Duckworth, 49, of Illinois, who lost both legs when her U.S. Army helicopter was shot down over Iraq. Rep. Val Demings, 60, of Florida was the first female police chief of Orlando, and black besides, and once boasted that “I carry a 9mm gun in my Dooney & Bourke handbag that was a gift when I retired from the Police Department.”
If the party wants an unexpected practicing capitalist, there’s Sheryl Sandberg, 48, the chief operating officer of Facebook. She helped build Google, and worked in the Treasury Department with Lawrence Summers. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, 51, of New York is almost as close to the party establishment as Hillary Clinton was, and to show her current toughness on harassment, she said, in retrospect, that Bill Clinton should have resigned the presidency after the Monica Lewinsky affair. Sen. Kamala Harris, 53, of California is both black and female, a two-fer like the pistol-packing Val Demings. And there’s Pocahontas, a veteran of the Twitter wars with Donald Trump. But Elizabeth Warren, 68, probably missed her chance in 2016.
Chickens that never hatched never made Sunday dinner for anyone, and you don’t have to be a hen, or even Hollywood comic, to lay an egg. There’s miles to go before 2020, and there will be migraines enough in the midterms this year. But half the fun of politics is speculation.
• Suzanne Fields is a columnist for The Washington Times and is nationally syndicated.
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