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As my fellow conservatives enjoy their gloating time following last week's acquittal of President Trump, his soaring State of the Union speech, and the Democrat caucus crash in Iowa, my head is in another place altogether.
I'm thinking of the Democrat convention this summer and I have a strong hunch who it is they will ultimately nominate.
Now that Joe Biden is in total free-fall and Elizabeth Warren is pooping out, the Dems are left with four possibilities, Bernie Sanders (where the momentum is), Pete Buttigieg (youngest candidate), Amy Klobuchar (last woman standing), and Mike Bloomberg (moneybags).
Most pundits say it's too early to predict where this all goes. The DNC does not want an open socialist such as Sanders on the ticket. The thinking is, with the exception of Bernie supporters, no one is really excited about any candidates. So far this is true.
Some think that there will be an open convention and maybe a dark horse will emerge to save the day. Will Hillary return from the dead? Will Michelle be coaxed into running? Will Mitt Romney defect and turn Democrat to go against Trump? Will it be Oprah? Alec Baldwin? Joy Behar? The mind boggles.
Well, I don't know about my mind, but my gut tells me the likely candidate has to be Buttigieg. Even though he hasn't caught fire quite yet, all it will take is a couple more close calls like Iowa and New Hampshire. If he can keep biting at the heels of Sanders, soon people will start to look at him more closely. And what will they see?
They will see a clean-cut man who is articulate, young, and smiles a lot. A man who is even-tempered. A man who speaks quietly but with authority. A man who is a member of an aggrieved minority group, but isn't angry. In short they will see 2020's answer to the 2008 Democrat candidate. Another Barak Obama.
Yes, he is in every measure a progressive, big government liberal, but his rhetoric isn't quite as extreme as some of the others. Obama hid his progressive agenda under a cover of sensible sounding platitudes.
"Hope and change," remember that? No one could really tell you what KIND of hope and change he was talking about, but it sounded good to millions of voters. Buttigieg is doing the same thing; he speaks of "uplift" and "generational change." Whatever the hell that means.
Obama knew that he couldn't sell his hard left social policies to America right away. It had to be done gradually, in small increments. Bernie doesn't get that, but Buttigieg understands completely, which is why he has taken a less full-throated approach to progressive change. He knows once he gets into office he'll have the ability to implement the changes he really wants.
But before Pete Buttigieg can become the Democrat nominee for president he first must become the darling of the media, because the media are the king makers for the left. And he will. He will because he represents everything they value; progressive social policies, non-restrictive abortion, the Green New Deal environmentalism, government run healthcare, open boarders, and above all, sticking it to conservative traditional Americans.
Just as Obama broke with precedent to become the first black president, you know the media would love to see Pete Buttigieg occupy the White House as the first homosexual president. His husband would be the nation's very first "First Gentleman."
Sooner or later (providing Buttigieg continues to have strong showings in the state primaries) the Dems will realize that Buttigieg possesses many qualities that democrat and independent voters could hang their hats on; he's a military veteran, a guy who professes to be religious, he's from the Midwest, he's young and nice looking, (did I say he smiles a lot?) and he articulates a positive message. Voters like a candidate who smiles and speaks in positive terms.
Hope and change. It worked once. Will it happen again for the Democrats? I don't see anyway Buttigieg could win the election over President Trump.
But I can see the Democrats running him, thinking that he's the next Obama. The next anointed one.
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JWR contributor Greg Crosby, former creative head for Walt Disney publications, has written thousands of comics, hundreds of children's books, dozens of essays, and a letter to his congressman. He's been a JWR contributor since 1999.