Hillary Clinton 2016: can Elizabeth Warren win Democratic nomination?

By Will Stabley | April 22, 2015

Some liberal voters are upset that Hillary Clinton’s built in popularity is preventing their preferred candidate from having a shot at the democratic party nomination. So from Elizabeth Warren and Joe Biden to Bernie Sanders on down, let’s take a look at how each of the other democrats would fare in both the primary and in the 2016 general election if Hillary weren’t running:

Elizabeth Warren: she has enough support to potentially win the party nomination. But from there, because she refuses to accept corporate campaign donations, her budget for the general election would be a small fraction of her republican opponent. That means as much as ninety percent of national television ads would be for the republican candidate, and because so many low-information moderates make their decision based on what they hear on TV, there is a very real chance, even a probability, that Elizabeth Warren – perhaps the most worthy presidential candidate of our era – would lose to the worthless republican. She appears to be aware of this, which is why her remarks about a potential presidential campaign seem to suggest that she wouldn’t run even if Hillary weren’t running.

Joe Biden: as the sitting Vice President, he could also win the nomination. No one in politics has done more over the past thirty years to stand up for the rights of the working class. But most voters don’t know that, they just know him as an awkward guy who sometimes misspeaks in comical ways. The media would paint the race as Biden the Buffoon against Jeb PaulCruz the Jerk, leaving moderate voters with no idea who to vote for, again creating a very strong chance the republican would win.
Bernie Sanders: he refers to himself as a “socialist” regularly, and therefore even if he somehow won the democratic party nomination, he would lose the general election by a landslide.

Julian Castro, Cory Booker, etc: These are the young up and comers in the democratic party who lack national experience and have little national name recognition. While each of them could make a strong candidate in 2024, it’s unlikely any of them could even get past Biden in the 2016 primary.

Even though the 2016 republican roster might be the worst crop of presidential candidates ever put forth by any major party in our nation’s history (and a lot of republican voters would reluctantly agree with this), there are a number of reasons why the democrats could have a hard time winning this election, from the way the supreme court has structured campaign finance to favor corporate conservative candidates, to the fact that there’s a significant generational gap right now in the democratic party – there’s a reason why everyone on this list is either too young or too old to make for an ideal candidate. It’s the kind of perfect storm that comes along once a generation and gives the significantly worse candidate a strong chance of winning the general election.

In other words, if Hillary Clinton weren’t running, there is probably a less then fifty percent chance that the democrat would win in 2016. Whereas with Hillary in the race, the odds are overwhelming that she wins and continues to carry the democrat and liberal agenda forward. I know some liberals want to fantasize about what a wide open democratic primary would be like. But the reality is that it would probably result in a loss. As much as some liberals wish Hillary weren’t running, conservatives really wish she weren’t running.