My biggest fear is that Trump will still muck everything up, just because of hubris and plain old nastiness.
If he ran as an Independent, his rabid core could divide votes enough for a Dem to win.
Gavin Newsome (shudder) was at the border recently, and I don't think it was because of his concern for the enormous amount of illegal immigrants crossing.
He says he isn't running for President, but I believe him as much as I do in the Easter bunny. How people could vote for him is beyond me, but I've seen stranger things happen.
Mayor Pete is another possibility, although he has done absolutely nothing but, in some ways that could work in his favor. He is gay, has a nice affable way of speaking, and younger voters love his whole story. Happily married to his partner, taking off months to care for their baby, blah, blah.
In my opinion, as much as the last election was won due to the educated middle age female, I think the red wave that didn't happen was due to the young Gen Z voter, and younger females.
The type that are worried about climate change, LBGTQ issues, abortion, helping the homeless, gender assignment--all the things that Newsome believes in.
Even though he has turned one of our most beautiful states in to a total dumpster fire, I can see young voters voting for him.
The Republican party lost a ton of female voters due to the abortion decision, and they may need to ease up on some of the more stringent policies.
I am pro-life, but there needs to be some leeway such as abortions for rape victims, pushing the window of time to get an abortion out a few weeks, baby is medically compromised and would live an extremely short life, mostly in a hospital.
That kind of thing. For every one of my friends, even Republican Pro-lifers, that is a one issue No Vote for Republicans.
On a personal note, my beautiful, intelligent niece was date raped her first semester in University. I was her first phone call, (her mother is a total psycho) and we talked it through and she was able to get a morning after pill. She never became pregnant, thank God, but it totally messed with her head and her grades for her first 2 years. That in turn, messed with her ability to go to a top law school.
She pulled it together her last 2 years and was accepted at Emory, but she wanted UT very badly.
She is an attorney now, married to a great guy, but the rape changed her in many subtle ways. She has lost a bit of her joy.
My point is, it forced me to examine my black and white pro-life views.
Did I want my niece to drop out of school to have a child, go through the emotions of having a baby inside of you via a traumatizing event? Give birth, put the baby up for adoption, wonder forever if she had made the right choice, then try to re-start her life?
I'm happy that she never had to make that decision, but some young women do.
And I don't know what I would have wanted if my niece had become pregnant, but I feel pretty certain I would have supported her abortion.
To be crystal clear, I in no way support abortions in most cases. But, in the rare few, I believe there needs to be some flexibility.
Bottom line, in my very humble opinion, Rs need to take another look at the hard core stance on this issue, or we may lose most women voters forever.
Evangelicals are a shrinking group, and we can't count on them forever.