[erimir]

It's starting to be strange how much longer Biden is waiting to declare his candidacy.

I understand it's still a bit early historically, but also historically the winner doesn't declare last or close to last.

I think he's conflicted between what the polls say (I'm winning! It'll be easy! I want it so bad!) and serious worries about how his age, women's issues (not just the #metoo one-two of Creepy Uncle Joe and Anita Hill, but also his record on abortion), racial issues, his record on financial issues, his vote for the Iraq War, etc. will play when people start paying attention. The thing where they floated the idea that Biden might pledge to serve only one term suggests they are worried about his age, and the thing where they floated (apparently without her being on board) Abrams being his running mate from the start suggests they are seriously worried about his gender/racial issues and the optics of him just being yet another old white man.

And even if he thinks that he still has a great shot and his frontrunner status won't be derailed easily, the fact is that he still isn't highly likely to be the nominee. A 30% shot would be great and make him the most likely nominee... but it still means that 70% of the time he ends his career on a loss while being scrutinized like never before, whereas if he decides not to run, he could still be cool Onion Uncle Joe who missed his chance in 2016 because his son died and isn't that sad.

As it is... My current (but still tentative) ranking, which is both on electability and how good I think they'd be at presidenting (which is policy but also temperament and how I infer they'd be on staffing*) is something like...

Warren > Harris > Gillibrand > Sanders > O'Rourke > Castro > Inslee > Booker > Buttigieg > Klobuchar > Biden > Hickenlooper

And then the dregs: Yang > Delaney > Gabbard > Gravel

Inslee's a bit lower because I don't know how "electable" he is and his campaign seems less serious. Based on what I know, I think he'd be one of the best actually in office, but this is all tentative of course. O'Rourke is there because he seems to have the charisma, but on policy he's a bit of a ?. I think his "centrism" is a bit exaggerated though, he seems left of Biden and Klobuchar from what I can tell of his record and campaigning. Certainly not on the progressive edge though.

*This is one of Sanders weakest points, IMO. He seems to hire people often on the basis of how loyal/intensely they support him more so than how good they are at their jobs. Hiring people for his campaign who supported Jill Stein in 2016 is not a way to expand your support, for example, and it suggests he's prioritizing something other than effectiveness... He is a frontrunner, he should not have a shortage of quality people to hire this time, so I view that as a deliberate choice.