Pete Buttigieg’s surprising, effective electability argument
Pete Buttigieg, the most inspiring candidate I’ve heard in the past decade, answers every question he’s asked. And he does it honestly. Last week, the 37 year old presidential candidate gave a slightly surprising answer to a question at the Austin, Texas Tribune Fest. A member of the audience asked why should anyone vote for him over Joe Biden. He responded with a single word: “electability.” Huh? I thought Biden was supposed to be the “safe” choice. He’s billed as the candidate who wouldn’t make waves, who would carry the mantle of the Obama presidency.
Buttigieg makes a compelling argument, though he didn’t go into the details at that moment. He points out that in every election since the 1960s, when the Democrats either ran a fresh, young candidate who was an “outsider”, or one who had only served a few years in Washington, they won. But when they ran an insider, someone with unimpeachable credentials, vast experience, and lots of years in Washington, they’ve been defeated. So let’s look at the history here. Fresh, inspiring faces: Carter, (Bill) Clinton, Obama. Experienced, long-serving candidates: Gore, Kerry, (Hillary) Clinton. Wow…seems Buttigieg is right. Here he makes a stronger point than the simple generational change argument he started with. He doesn’t cast aspersions on Biden’s age, though personally I think Biden’s sharpest days are behind him. Buttigieg fights vigorously against the notion that Biden has engaged in the misconduct that the present administration is trying to concoct. But Biden has been in Washington for decades. He has a very long, and checkered, record to defend, with very little true executive experience, while Buttigieg has a great deal of pragmatic experience…outside Washington.
Buttigieg makes a different argument when asked why people should vote for him over Elizabeth Warren. He focuses on trusting the American people with choice and honesty.“The boldness required for this moment doesn’t have to be my way or the highway. We can be just as bold and do it in a way that brings people together — instead of having it feel so much about the fight that you begin to think the fighting is the point.” He notes that his health care plan trusts Americans to choose an option that’s right for them. While few people actually like their insurance, no one likes to be forced into a policy. He further notes that Warren refuses to straightforwardly answer the question of whether taxes will rise if Medicare for America becomes law. I’ve paid attention to her answers, and she dodges this question, not trusting the American people to understand the details of the policies they choose, if indeed they choose her.
Buttigieg’s arguments about choice and honesty are winning ones. Many of Buttigieg’s supporters have been uninvolved in politics or have been lifelong Republicans. They, along with actual Republicans, point to Warren’s Medicare for All position as being a bridge too far for them. Buttigieg not only has a more moderate health care policy, but he speaks in more inclusive language and grounds his campaign in the notion that the US has a crisis of belonging, and that making room for more choice and appealing to people’s best selves will help alleviate this crisis. He also takes a longer term view than other candidates. He points to 40 or 50 years down the road when today’s young people will be living with policies put in place now. He puts himself in that category, differentiating himself from candidates who are 70 and older.
Buttigieg holds similar, and in some cases more progressive, positions to Warren and Sanders. One such policy is Buttigieg’s comprehensive Douglass Plan for African Americans, which reaches well beyond criminal justice issues to entrepreneurship, housing, health equity, education, and reparations. He notes that just as saved money compounds with interest, so too does stolen money. He acknowledges that while all of us have the capacity for both bad and good behavior, he wants to bring out the best in everyone without writing anyone off as unreachable. He appeals to the “better angels” of Americans’ nature (in his hero Lincoln’s words), and shared values, instead of playing to the anger and disaffection of a large part of the country. Appealing to the whole country, speaking of shared values such as loyalty, patriotism, faith, and community allows him to reach every corner of the country, if not every person. He knows he’s not going to sway committed Trump supporters or racists, but he might reach those who are uneasy with the country’s direction.
While Buttigieg draws consistently large crowds in the early voting states and beyond, this hasn’t reflected yet in the polls. His fundraising is top notch (he raised $19.1 in Q3, still with only 65% name recognition). And his supporter community is different than any of the others out there. It is a mutually supportive group that tries to follow his rules of the road, which emphasize kindness, respect, and inclusion. And the community, like the candidate, emphasizes belonging and joy. It is my hope that he (and we) will reach enough people, inspire them with smart, comprehensive, and pragmatic ideas and messages of belonging, and change the momentum of the race when it counts.
Ultimately, electability is undergirded by inspiration. Whoever inspires the largest number of voters (in the appropriate states), is de facto the most electable. Buttigieg’s intelligence, pragmatism, progressivism, inclusivity, and experience have profoundly inspired me. I find him honest, straightforward, thoughtful, and authentic, and I don’t find any of the other candidates remotely as inspiring. Even though he seems like a dark horse now, his electability argument is compelling, precisely because he is inspiring, and he’s betting that folks will see that in plenty of time.
In the meantime, I will do all I can to convince as many people as I can that Buttigieg’s pragmatic progressivism is inspiring and hopeful; and what the country wants and needs, that he has a better chance of winning the general election than any of the other candidates, and that he has proven over and over that he is presidential in word and deed.
