Hillary Rodham Clinton—2008

The night before the New Hampshire primary in 2008, my son and I met with Hillary Clinton’s campaign strategists, Mark Penn and Ann Lewis. I slid a single sheet of paper across the table. There were no words on it, just a matrix with numbers. The matrix was nearly thirty years old and was a by-product of the Democratic National Committee’s arcane delegate selection rules.

Penn’s face turned ashen. Penn’s momentum strategy—winning California, New York, Massachusetts, and New Jersey—went up in smoke. He faced a congressional district by congressional district fight for delegates. Barack Obama’s team thought about that fight months earlier; its operatives began slating delegates and building organizational strength weeks if not months earlier.

It proved to be a head start, one not easily overcome.

What was so momentous about that one sheet of paper? It dictated the added cost of winning one more delegate in a congressional district. And with 435 congressional districts, picking up even one more delegate in each is a fundamental change.

After Hillary Clinton’s victory in New Hampshire, Penn quickly shifted gears. But it was too late. Barack Obama kept picking up most of the delegates in the smaller states. In the largest states, the cost of an additional delegate proved prohibitively expensive.

So, both campaigns settled in for an extremely competitive delegate race—very few routs and very close splits—until the last delegates were chosen in June.

There was, however, an upside to that fierce fight. By early March, over 28.3 million Democrats had voted or attended a caucus. By mid-June, when the last votes were cast, another 7.1 million Democrats had taken part in the delegate selection process. The Obama-Clinton combined tally of 35.4 million votes tripled the 1992 vote totals and doubled each of the 1976 through 2024 totals.

In the final tally, fewer than 300,000 votes and 127 delegates separated Obama and Clinton. All because of a single sheet of paper.6

So, the sixth step toward a complete strategy is: Never fear a primary challenge. Instead, use the primaries to increase voter turnout (and momentum) before heading into the general election.

Hillary Rodham Clinton—2016

In March 2015, I stopped communicating with Hillary Clinton’s as yet unannounced campaign for the presidency. At that point in time, the Union of Unemployed had over 300,000 Facebook fans and friends. Nicknamed UCubed, it planned to endorse her and run a Get Out Our Vote campaign. aimed at working-class Democrats.

But federal law prohibited any cross talk between the campaign and the virtual union. Using cutting-edge technology, UCubed polled and then modeled 386,000 working-class Democrats, those without a college degree, across the first four states in 2016.

We then used Experian to match them with individually

identifiable Facebook users. We found 12,000 in Iowa, 36,500 in New Hampshire, 21,000 in Nevada, and 20,700 in South Carolina. They became the target audience for our humorous Crying Babies campaign.7

UCubed pushed eight memes and two videos at those ninety thousand unlikely voters and caucus attendees. The memes carried messages like “My folks need a raise; these cheap-o diapers leak like a sieve” and “Today we depend on you … but tomorrow you’ll depend on us.”

One video carried this message:

Did you hear this? They’re talking about putting anchors on babies.

What? Like our student loans won’t be enough to drag us under.

What are we going to do? We’ve got to get everyone to vote.

Mom … Dad … Nana … Pops … How are we going to get them all to the polls?

Volume! (Ten seconds of babies crying at the top of their

lungs) I like it. It’s simple. No vote, no sleep. Come on, let’s go vote.

The Crying Baby memes and videos reached the Facebook accounts of working-class voters in those four states 667,000 times. By boosting those Facebook posts nationwide, UCubed’s total reach—paid and organic—grew to 3 million and engaged nearly 800,000 Facebook users.

Hillary Clinton won Iowa by 400 caucus goers. Bernie Sanders won New Hampshire by 57,000 votes. Hillary won Nevada by 638 out of 11,194 caucus goers. She won South Carolina by 175,000 votes.8

Did that innovative technology work? I guess so. Hillary Clinton won three of the four early states. Humor works on Facebook.

Notably, two months later, Donald Trump began spending $90 million on posts targeting individually identified Facebook users. With that level of investment, he reached 2.6 billion Facebook users from May through November 2016. But he did not use humor. Hate and anger were his strategies.

So, the seventh step toward a complete strategy is: Explore the newest, most innovative of technologies with the greatest reach. Target unlikely or low-intensity voters to increase turnout.

To the small-d democratic strategists who have read this far, let me say, “You are on your own.” If you are to lead America out of this abyss, craft a complete strategy, an all-encompassing strategy, to end the Trump Terror.

And if 2024 proved anything, small-d democrats need a new, complete strategy—a strategy that anticipates the opponents’ moves and quashes each with overwhelming force.

And yes, the Democratic Party needs a whole new crew of strategists. Having lived through the 2024 presidential campaign, you know how hard you fought, how confident of victory you were, and how frustrating it was to lose. But you did not see the contest from my perspective.

Frankly, I am wrong half the time. But as I look ahead two, four, or eight years, I never know which half will be right. So, a strategist must admit the uncertainty he or she faces.

To devise a complete strategy, the best strategists envision both the mostlikely and the least-likely scenarios. Even the black swans—the consequential surprises—require examination. And the best of the best think through and anticipate the counter-strategies required by studying the opponents’ strategies.

For defeating MAGA’s strategy is the key to victory. Hence, the adjective “complete.”

But winning also requires a “complete” candidate. So, in 2022 I went looking for one, one tested by time and trials, one who experienced the Great Recession as attorney general of California, one who proved to be a shrewd and intense questioner of Supreme Court nominees, and one whose first couple of years as vice president of the United States was a trial by fire. Sadly, it was the “friendly fire” that proved most problematic. 9

But Can She Win?

Starting in late March 2022, I began emailing Dan Pedrotty, then vice president Kamala Harris’s labor policy advisor. Over the next three years, we exchanged a couple dozen emails. Only two proved notable.

The first came in January 2023. It was in response to the growing criticism of his boss from the Wizards of Washington, the high and mighty ones who anonymously tear down others to build themselves up. Their off-the-record remarks made headlines, but they seldom made history. So, I counseled patience: OMG! “A dozen Democratic leaders and activists expressed misgivings about Kamala Harris …” according to the Washington Post.

Quick! Do nothing … except what the president wants done. And then do “it” efficiently and expeditiously as possible. Oh, and in the lowest profile and humblest way conceivable.

The early lineup of states, particularly those with mail-in and absentee balloting, sets the strategy for 2024 and 2028. The tactics and messaging can wait until an odd numbered year like 2025 or 2027.

Patience. Persistence. Persuasiveness. Are all that counts when you have an audience of one. Nothing else matters. Nothing.

Pedrotty replied, “Well said, Rick! Thanks & hope you’re well.”

But the Wizards of Washington kept up their criticisms, albeit sub rosa. They knew they could not profitably or directly attack President Joseph R. Biden.

So, it became open season on his vice president.

I pecked out a second, longer missive a month later.

What do South Carolina, Nevada, Georgia, and Michigan have in common besides being the DNC’s first primaries next year? In 1988, Jesse Jackson won them with 55, 26, 40, and 54 percent, respectively.

In 2008, Barack Obama won them with 56, 45, 66, and 46 percent, respectively. And because of DNC rules that year, then-senator Obama didn’t even complete in Michigan.

And yet, in the first two weeks of March in 1988 and 2008, that same pattern—the 50 to 100 percent increase of the African American primary vote—also occurred in Alabama, California, Massachusetts, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Texas, Louisiana, Missouri, Mississippi, and Ohio.

Those same patterns will reoccur in 2024 and 2028. As I suggested in an earlier email, they will set the strategy for those cycles. And they offer certain candidates a built-in advantage, one that can be expanded over time.

For example, in the 2024 cycle, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Missouri have gubernatorial races. And Nevada, Michigan, California, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Missouri, Mississippi, and Ohio have Senate races.

Those three gubernatorial campaigns will also occur in 2028. But the list of Senate races in those early states—February through the second week of March—will have changed. Iowa, South Carolina, Nevada, Georgia, Alabama, California, Colorado, Oklahoma, Vermont, Missouri, and Ohio will have Senate contests that year.

And while state-level candidates with primaries are loathed to endorse early, they will accept help during the off years. They will demand even more help in those presidential years but often at arm’s length. Either way, they can be reminded forcefully who showed up early and often for them.

Equally important, their campaign staffs, volunteers, funders, opinion leaders, and supporters will provide another built-in advantage: a core of potential CD-level and At-Large delegates in those thirteen to fifteen early voting states.

We cannot overlook the fact that those Jackson and Obama percentages drove up their delegate counts at the CD-level and At-Large. Due to the DNC’s proportional representation rules, once their percentages passed the one-third mark, they were virtually guaranteed a dead even split in CD-level delegates.

That split only grew wider as they won 56 percent or more of the vote, depending on the number of delegates at stake in each CD. When At-Large delegates were apportioned, those super majorities helped dictate who led the state’s delegation to the convention.

Very few presidential candidates in 2028 will be able to overcome those Jackson and Obama percentages UNLESS they’ve spent years helping gubernatorial and Senate nominees in those early states. AND delivering for the Black community in their home states.

Again, it is all about who shows up early and often. Being late and lax is a losing proposition. The next four years offer multiple ways to win the 2028 nomination long before the primaries begin.

Just. Thinking. Ahead.

Pedrotty’s response was slightly longer this time: “Very thoughtful, Rick. These strategic insights very much help us. Hope you’re well & appreciate your

input!”

And for the next thirteen months, our correspondence continued.

Ironically, the advice provided aimed at 2028. It is as applicable today as it was back in 2023. That lineup of primary states has not changed appreciably. In fact, the shift of Michigan to the early states makes Reverend Jesse Jackson’s and then-senator Barack Obama’s percentages even more indicative of how difficult the terrain will be for most presidential candidates in 2028 or 2032.

That’s just one reason I believe Kamala Harris will be a formidable candidate should she decide to run again. There are 75 million more reasons—the small-d democrats that trusted her with their votes in 2024.10

Author’s Note: Chapter 3, Part A will be posted on June 27th and Part B will be posted on July 1st. The dangling numbers at the end of a sentence or paragraph are End Notes. While most are simple citations, a few have explanatory text. I will add those at the end of the appropriate chapter.

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The Long and Winding Road

This is an aide-mémoire—mine, not my readers’. It summarizes my cameo roles in seven presidential campaigns. Most offer insights. Some underscore my mistakes. From each, I try to draw a lesson, a lesson that takes me down a long and winding road. And each step along that road takes me ever closer to a complete strategy.

Hubert H. Humphrey—1968

In the fall of 1968, Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey came to my hometown of Erie, Pennsylvania. He spoke in the park across from city hall.

Thousands of voters and hundreds of high school and college kids who were too young to vote cheered his civil rights record, his Food for Peace initiative, and his Medicare proposal.

But everyone was aware of the war in Vietnam. How could they not be? It came to us in full color on the nightly news. And Humphrey, the Happy Warrior, could not defend the war. Or at least he could not make a clean break with President Lyndon Johnson.

In his stump speech that day, he pointed to the seal of the vice president hanging on the podium facing the crowd. He noted that its American eagle held “but one olive branch.” Then he asked us, “What could I do with only one branch?”

The crowd reacted with stunned silence. And from across the park, I yelled, “Plant the damn thing.” My voice carried all the way to the stage. The vice president of the United States responded, “I could have, and perhaps I should have.”

So, the first step toward a complete strategy is: Never be afraid to speak truth to power.

James Earl Carter—1976

In the fall of 1976, a key strategist for Ohio governor John J. Gilligan, Jim Friedman, contacted me. He asked me to spend three weeks in Stark County, Ohio, managing the local campaign for Jimmy Carter. Friedman’s only instruction was “keep the loss under 25,000 votes.” He was not joking.

Within the first few days, the district director of the United Steel Workers and I were at loggerheads. For years, he had led the Get Out The Vote operations in Stark County. His members and other union members knocked on every door in Canton and its suburbs. Union dues dollars paid for those GOTV drives. But not in 1976.

The Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 prohibited unions from using members’ dues money to contact voters. They could communicate only with their own members. But knocking on every door—or buying radio or television ads—was not just a no-no but were violations of federal law.

And neither the Carter-Mondale campaign, the state labor federation, nor I wanted to run afoul of the new law.

Especially not when the Ohio AFL-CIO invested in a computer match of its statewide membership lists with the secretary of state’s voter file. The new president of the Ohio AFL-CIO, Warren Smith, wanted “a massive get-out-the-vote [to] turn this state’s 25 electoral votes. Ohio … is now the most closely contested large state in the country and could prove as pivotal

in the 1976 general election as it was in 1948 and 1968,” according to the New York Times. 4

That story, with the byline of R. W. Apple, was a fortuitous event. Along with a few heated telephone calls, it helped convince the local steelworker director to toss away his old game plan and use the walking lists provided by the Ohio AFL-CIO. The lists weren’t perfect, but they were legal. And they had the advantage of turning out our voters, instead of reminding their nonunion neighbors to go vote.

And THAT, penultimately, made all the difference in Stark County, Ohio. Ultimately, so did a late addition to Senator Walter F. Mondale’s travel schedule.

On the Sunday before Election Day, Fritz Mondale stopped at an ethnic church in Canton, the largest city in this very Republican county. He made the nightly news in the Cleveland media market. But he also gave the canvassers, many of them steel and rubber workers, a tremendous boost of energy.

Over the last couple of weekends, hundreds of those brothers and sisters had walked, knocked, and talked with other working families about Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale. They hit every door of an AFL-CIO member, sometimes twice or three times.

That one Ohio county—Stark—proved critical to Jimmy Carter’s 1976 victory. He did not lose Stark County by 25,000 votes. He lost it by 2,655 votes!

A 22,345 vote decline in the traditional GOP margin. Jimmy Carter won Ohio in 1976 by 11,100 votes, or by but 0.27% of the votes cast. Ohio’s 25 Electoral College Votes produced the narrowest victory imaginable. And that slim win in Ohio pushed the Carter-Mondale total from 272 to 297 ECVs! Wisconsin’s tally was the next closest. Had Carter lost both states, Gerald Ford would have remained the president.

So, the second step to a complete strategy was: Get out our vote, not the other party’s.

Walter F. Mondale—1984

Returning to Ohio in 1984, I ran against John R. Kasich, a first-term Republican congressman. It proved to be a fool’s errand.

And I was the biggest fool.

For me, Election Day 1984 began at the gates of the Columbus Casket Company. My wife, brother-in-law, and I met the graveyard shift heading home and the early daytime shift heading into the factory. No one took our red, white, and blue pieces of literature, no one shook our hands, and no one even made eye contact. It was an apt omen for what came next.

I lay buried under the same avalanche that swept across America that day, an avalanche that saw President Reagan win 525 out of 538 ECVs, carrying forty-nine states, just not Minnesota nor the District of Columbia. Reagan beat former vice president Mondale by 16.9 million votes or by 18.2 percentage points!

After my family’s tears of frustration and anger dried, I went back to the drawing board. I analyzed election statistics dating back to 1952. I read everything I could find about the five national campaigns Richard Nixon ran and the four national campaigns Ronald Reagan waged. And I came to realize that an avalanche was not a destructive freak of nature, an unlucky

string of bad luck, or even a convention gaffe about raising taxes. A complete strategy triggered it. That strategy built upon past campaign statistics, anticipated what their opponents would do, and led the eventual loser into box canyons.

But it went much deeper. The Reagan-Bush campaign pretested messaginglike “it’s morning in America” in Columbus, Ohio … in May. They planned major events nine months ahead of time. And the strategic messaging constructs fit a complete strategy to perfection. For example, President Reagan appeared at a nationally televised Daytona Firecracker 400 car race on July 4, 1984 in order to reach a key demographic.

That demographic was White, working-class Democrats across the South and Midwest. And the Regan-Bush campaign never wanted for resources; its strategy won the war long before the first debate occurred.

So, the third step toward a complete strategy is: Think ahead, think regionally, think big, or go home small.

William Jefferson Clinton—1992

Starting in 1989, I sent a monthly essay to a list of two hundred Democratic opinion leaders, national political reporters, union presidents and their political directors, and the offices of governors, senators, and members of Congress who might seek the presidency in 1992, 1996, or beyond.

Headlined as “On Democratic Strategy,” those essays made me think more deeply about who might run, what President Bush’s post-Desert Storm approval numbers meant, the plausibility of an Appalachian Trail Strategy, and the most legitimate way to overthrow the most powerful government in the world—at the ballot box.

Between 1989 and 1990, those essays profiled the “Most Impressive Candidates.” All but one thought that President Bush was unbeatable.

In alphabetical order, Lloyd Bentsen, Bill Bradley, Dick Celeste, Mario Cuomo, Mike Dukakis, Dick Gephardt, Al Gore, Jesse Jackson, Sam Nunn, Chuck Robb, Jay Rockefeller, and Pat Schroeder declined to become a sacrificial lamb.

By Independence Day, 1991, only Paul Tsongas and George McGovern were running. Not exactly the “Most Impressive Candidates” in my mind’s eye. So I mailed out a blistering essay titled “It’s Over Folks” followed by a quote from Lee Atwater in 1984—“We now have a lock on an electoral majority. In a very real sense, the election is over …” Toward the end of

an essay describing the massive financial obstacles a late start created, I underlined this paragraph:

Those candidates who would wait until after Labor Day, 1991, to start campaigning, do not want to be president. They only want to run for president. They want the jazz, not the job.

Eleven days later, on July 15, 1991, I received my one and only fan letter … from Governor Bill Clinton (D-AR). He wrote:

I appreciated your last essay. You raised several very good points in it. Time is running out. I think all the lesser known candidates are aware of that, and I think you will see a lot of activity, very quickly, over the next several weeks. I know my decision will have to be made very soon.

I appreciate your efforts in doing this. You have caused a lot of people to stop and think about what is going on. You should be commended for your efforts.

Clinton announced the formation of his exploratory committee on August 15, 1991, eighteen days before that Labor Day “deadline.”

So, the fourth step toward a complete strategy is: Never give up. Devise a complete strategy and challenge candidates to adopt it.

Albert Gore Jr.—2000

In 2000, I backed Senator Bill Bradley in the caucuses and primaries. He lost every state, territory, and jurisdiction in the Democratic delegate selection process. Bradley won 522 delegates and only 20% of all votes cast. I sidelined myself.

The closest I ever got to a presidential candidate that cycle was also on a sideline. Vice President Al Gore appeared several times on the Sidwell Friends Upper School’s campus to watch his son play

One Saturday, he exited the limousine and, as usual, his Secret Service team was already in place at a discreet distance from where he normally stood. There was a slight miscue. One of his pant legs was stuck atop his cowboy boot. Everyone saw it; no one did anything. So, I meandered over and explained his wardrobe malfunction. He bent over so fast, his protective detail must have thought I had gut punched him.

Instead, the real gut punch came on December 12, 2000. In a five to four decision, the US Supreme Court ruled the Florida recount should stop. Only 534 votes separated George Bush from Al Gore in Florida.

After recounts and court decisions, the state’s 25 Electoral College Votes landed in the Bush column and totaled 271 ECVs, one more than required.

Al Gore won the popular vote nationally by 543,897 votes. He won twenty states and the District of Columbia. He won 265 Electoral College Votes and, if the Supreme Court had not shut down the recounting of ballots statewide, Al Gore would have won Florida and garnered 290 ECVs.

The Green Party candidate, Ralph Nader, picked up 1.63% of the vote in Florida, or 97,488 votes. The other third-party or independent candidates drew 40,574, or 0.68% of the vote. The Plurality Threshold in Florida was 48.35%, and both Bush and Gore broke the threshold: Bush won 48.85%, and Gore won 48.84%, according to the Federal Election Commission Report on the 2000 Election. 5

So, the fifth step toward a complete strategy is: Run through the tape. Every vote counts, even third-party and independent candidates’ votes count.

Author’s Note: Chapter 1 is too lengthy for a Substack Post. So I have split it in thirds. This was Chapter 1, Part B. Tomorrow, June 21st, I will publish Chapter 1, Part C. Thanks for reading this far.

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First and foremost to unfreeze Iranian assets in U.S. and international banks;

To return the wealth collected by the late Shah during his reign;

To withdraw all lawsuits against Iran in the United States; and

To pledge non-intervention in Iranian affairs.

And 79 days later, after Ronald Reagan beat Jimmy Carter in a landslide and was inaugurated, the hostages were released.

What was it that Karl Marx said about history repeating itself, first as tragedy then as farce?

Well, this is the farce.

The pardon of Iran, excuse me, the MOU signed by $TRUMP contains the following:

Paragraph 2: The United States of America and the Islamic Republic of Iran undertake to respect each other’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, and to refrain from interfering in each other’s internal affairs. [See point 4 above.]

Paragraph 6: The United States of America undertakes with regional partners to develop a definitive, mutually agreed plan with at least USD $300 billion for the reconstruction and economic development of the Islamic Republic of Iran. [See point 2 above.]

Paragraph 7: The United States of America undertakes to terminate all types of sanctions against the Islamic Republic of Iran, including the United Nations Security Council resolutions, i.e., IAEA Board of Governors resolutions, and all unilateral U.S. sanctions, primary and secondary, in an agreed-upon schedule as part of the final deal… [See point 1 above.]

Paragraph 11: The United States of America undertakes to make fully available for use the frozen or restricted funds and assets of the Islamic Republic of Iran upon the implementation of this MOU. [See point 1 above.]

Paragraph 13: After signing this MOU and subject to the beginning of the implementation of Paragraphs 1, 4, 5, 10 and 11 of this MOU, and the continuing implementation of these measures, the United States of America and the Islamic Republic of Iran will start negotiations regarding the final deal exclusively on the other paragraphs. [See point 4 above.]

Paragraphs 1. termination of the war; 4. removal of naval blockade, 5. safe passage of ships through Strait of Hormuz, 10. Waivers on Iranian oil and business operations, 11. release of frozen assets.

Jimmy Carter was humiliated; so was Donald Trump. Period.

Sixty-six years later… in diplomatic language… plus ca change plus ca meme chose.

But Can She Win?

Yes, of course, she can.

This is still America. With hard work and perseverance, prescience and a powerful, motivating idea, all things are possible. But the hardest things to accomplish take time and patience. And often, we all need the patience of Job. Some of us, like me, more so than others.

But then, I am deeply biased. As you will learn, my bias began back in March 2022 when a dozen Democrats anonymously attacked Kamala Harris in the Washington Post. I thought their criticism was unfair then, as they are unfounded now. Even back then, I felt she had the potential to be an amazing presidential candidate in 2028 and 2032.

And as a small-d democratic strategist, my focus was six and ten years into the future. I never cared much for the thrust and counter-thrust of the daily news cycle.

However, I enjoyed looking over the horizon at what might be possible and what might be problematic.

In my mind’s eye, Kamala Harris had genuine possibilities. And her 75 million votes after a 107-day campaign only reinforced my deeply held bias.

An Open Letter to 75 Million Small-d Democrats

My Friends—

First, thank you for voting for Kamala Harris and Tim Walz in 2024. Your votes placed them much closer to victory when the counting ended than on election night. An additional 138,000 votes in four swing states would have made all the difference in the world—literally, not figuratively.

Yes, Kamala and Tim came up short. They took the blame as others ducked for cover. As powerful institutions cowered and high-profile individuals bent their knees, the 2024 Democratic nominees thought a lot about their losses and lost opportunities. How best could they end this Un-American Nightmare? How could they reawaken, reinvent, and reinvigorate the American Dream?

And so have you.

For the votes you cast are not the last. Our democratic traditions have not come to a screeching halt. Our Republic has not become a full-blown dictatorship, at least not yet anyway. Instead, your votes conveyed the courage, conviction, and self-confidence required to carry on. You cast your votes as citizens with rights and responsibilities, not as the subjects of an autocrat. You intended to govern yourselves, as Americans have for 250 years. And you still do.

So, please take pride in the votes you cast. You aligned yourself with those who believed in the rule of law, who swore to defend the Constitution from all enemies, foreign and domestic, who sought a more perfect union, and who fought against anarchists and autocrats alike. You voted for revitalizing the American Dream over enduring an Un-American Nightmare. And you did so at the apogee of American domestic tranquility, economic power, and global prestige, not its nadir, which our enemies hoped to see.

And in the second most-consequential presidential election since 1860, you chose “a new

birth of freedom” over the rebirth of the “isms” of the 1940s: fascism, national socialism, and militarism.

Because of your votes, Abraham Lincoln’s iconic phrase still guides us as we celebrate America’s 250th birthday. Because of your 75 million votes, the opening lines of his Gettysburg Address still ring true:

“. . . our fathers brought forth, on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”

For you gave all Americans a new lease on life. Or, as Lincoln intoned, “That government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from this earth.”

Thank you again for standing so tall.

Why Am I Thanking You?

January 30, 2026

The answer may surprise you. You give me hope for the future.

Seventy-five million votes is

a base small-d democrats can build upon if, and it is a big IF, we recognize how much we, as a people, have changed. We are older, far more diverse, and incredibly cynical. We are also tougher, more passionate, more engaged and enraged today than we were two or even four decades ago.

In recent years, we have learned not to take our freedoms and constitutional rights for granted. And we grew to distrust our leaders and deeply so.

The leading edge of the baby boom generation ran for office in the early 1970s. Its lagging edge in the 1990s. And many, far too many, still clutch power as if they and they alone had all the answerss. Once upon a time, they did. Or thought they did.

But now, the boomers seem confused by the changes they see. They’re out of fresh ideas and too cautious to take chances. Their inertia is obvious; their energy levels are low. They shy away from conflict. They believe their words carry weight, yet they don’t. It is time for them to exit stage left.

And that goes double for their aging ad makers, pollsters, and strategists. They elected baby boomers, and their top advisors are from the same age cohort. They are but a few years younger than their principal. So yes, it is time to pass the baton to a new generation of small-d democratic strategists.

Presidential campaigns are a younger woman and man’s game. The thirty- and forty-somethings who have been through three cycles or more by now ought to be thinking through what 2028 and 2032 should look like. What will be their complete strategy—a strategy designed to win regardless of what the opposition does—for winning back the White House?

I hope they give The Road Not Taken a critical read. But right now, I know just how frustrated they must be. I felt that way when the Greatest Generation dominated presidential Politics. And now, the baby boomers have hung on to power for far too long.

And in the confusion and chaos of these past few years, the Wizards of Wilmington and Washington—the elected officials, the well-heeled lobbyists, and the self-serving strategists who were born in the aftermath of World War II—seemed out of touch, feckless, and ineffectual. Far too many were.

In my mind’s eye, those “wizards” are like the ruler of Oz. Hiding behind the curtain, they used illusions and elaborate stagecraft to maintain an image of omnipotence and omniscience.

Yet, in Frank Braum’s original novel, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, his wizardry only extended to the Emerald City, and he was but a circus magician.

The Wizards of Wilmington and Washington, sadly, were not the tenth-century wizards from the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. In J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter novels, the wizards embodied bravery and chivalry, intelligence and wit, loyalty and fair play, and slyness and cunning. And we could have used those ancient traits in 2024.

And some of us, myself included, are almost that ancient. Our use-by-dates expired before we had. Our organ recitals—the lists of aches and pains, surgeries and sicknesses—only reinforced an image of tottering old fools. In our defense, we fought the good fight, for far longer than we ever expected. We waited for our sons and daughters, grandsons and granddaughters to stand tall even as we grew stooped.

As each new generation came of age, we watched them wrestle with each other for primacy and test their mettle even as our mental facilities dimmed.

So, are you tired of waiting for us to shuffle off the national stage, ride battery-powered wheelchairs into assisted living facilities, and die alone with our memories, or what’s left of them?

I am describing only my future self in that question. So let me rephrase it: Is it your time to lead America?

I sure hope so. My best days, like those of many baby boomers, were in the last century.

And this century hasn’t been exactly kind to any of us or the country we love.

And yet, and yet, it is never the age of the presidential candidate’s advisors that matters most. It is the agelessness of the eighty-one or seventy-five million small-d democrats who went out to vote in 2020 and 2024 and who will vote in 2028 and 2032. That’s the base on which a new generation of strategists can build a better future.

In reality, each one of you will determine who wins and who loses when the voting and the counting and the lawsuits end. And yes, when the Senate and House of Representatives meet in a joint session to count the 538 Electoral College Votes in 2029 or 2033, you will be the movers and shakers of the world forever.

Each of you will have played a decisive role in the drama of a democracy in action.

Before wandering off into my dotage, I would like to share some old war stories with you.

Each occurs eight years apart. Each deals with a Democratic presidential candidate or campaign. From each, I drew a lesson about creating strategy. Consider them my own unsteady steps toward a complete strategy: The Road Not Taken.

Author’s Note: Chapter 1, Part B will be posted on Saturday, June 17, 202

Perhaps, it was the weakness of the MAGA candidates. But my guess is that tens of thousands of once MAGA enthusiasts headed for the exits.

They’ve gotten screwed, and know it.

They voted for $TRUMP, three and, maybe, six times. But not again.

Why? Because $TRUMP lied to them, played on the fears, and made them feel like fools.

And they’ve got the receipts—gas, electricity, fuel oil, health insurance, food, interest rates, credit cards rates, and every other bill that comes due monthly—to prove it.

So today along comes the New York Times, to tell those ex-MAGA voters in Maine that they are not alone.

White working-class voters all across the country are also heading for the exits.

“Back in 2018, working-class white voters approved of his management of the economy by margins of 30 percentage points or even more. Now, recent polls show them disapproving by anywhere from 14 to more than 30 points.”

That’s a 44 to 60 point shift. So, it’s a stampede to get the hell out of his hellacious economy.

“Fox News found that just 25 percent approved of his handling of inflation.”

Fox News! Fox News!! Fox News!!!

Found that without a divining rod. And yet, $TRUMP “loves the inflation.”

“In the most recent NPR/PBS News/Marist Poll, 44 percent of white voters who didn’t graduate from college said they were more likely to vote for a Democratic congressional candidate this year — up from a meager 30 percent on the eve of the 2018 midterms.”

That’s one-fifth of the white working-class shifting from low into high gear to get the hell away from $TRUMP.

Democrats, please, please, pretty please, don’t stand in their way.

But of course, you will.

“The Senate map is made up of white working-class voters,” said Ms. Murphy, the Democratic pollster. “You just aren’t going to win in Iowa, Texas, Ohio and Maine without making inroads with white working-class voters.”

My friends, just get the fuck out of their way.

Don’t over think this.

White working-class voters don’t ‘do’ issues; they act on instinct. And right now, their instincts are telling ‘em get the hell of MAGA-ville.

Same as in 2022. That’s when 42 million FEWER voters went to the polls than did two years earlier.

Back then, they wanted no part of the $TRUMP insurrection.

Now, they want no part of $TRUMP’s love of the inflation.

Don’t. Stand. In. Their. Way.

Pretty please!

Well, I would urge them to go it alone. With all eight states competing for the DSCC and allied super PACs dollars, there’s not enough dollars to go around. Not when four very expensive MEGA Democratic states are part of the mix: Michigan, North Carolina, Ohio, and Texas. Those campaign might want to de-link themselves from the largess of Chuck Schumer’s albatross and his money machine. Fundraise nationwide for small dollar donors; they’ll come through for your guy or gal. And so will our voters.

The other four states—New Hampshire, Maine, Alaska, and Iowa—can de-link later this fall, but before his “promissory note” bounces because he’s reading the polls upside down. If you’re a smaller state and your polling tanks, he’ll quickly shift to backing the bigger “winners.”

And yet, and yet, each of those eight contests have plausible way to win. In fact, their odds of winning, all on their own, are 1 out of 2 or 50%. Each, individually, has one way to win and one way to lose.

And here’s why:

The delta (or net margin) for each state is a known knowable… for the 2022 midterms and the 2024 president race. So is the fall-off data for 2018 and 2022 and the four cycle average for 2026.

So before your eyes glaze over, here are each state’s key numbers:

‘24 ‘22. F-O ‘18

MI -80k, +98k, -450k

NH +23k, +68k, -175k

ME +58k, +102k, -116k

NC -180k, -162k, -1,078k

OH -646k, -161k, -1,084k

AK -44k, -826, -37k

TX -1,556k, -1,558k, -807k

IA -220k, -151k, -251k

Now your eyes can glaze over.

What those numbers show me is that six states — Michigan, New Hampshire, Maine, North Carolina, Alaska, and Texas (barely)—have stronger net margins in the 2022 midterms than in the 2024 results. Only Ohio and North Carolina (narrowly) lost ground.

The second thing I noticed was that the average fall-off in Texas and Ohio dropped precipitously and spectacularly by eight hundred thousand and a million voters, respectively. That in and of itself would make those states far more competitive than they’d be otherwise. MAGA turnout was much lower.

In the four smaller states, the fall-off was also much lower in 2018 because, well, their voting age populations were tiny compared to Texas.

But even then, their fall-off was significant. MAGA stayed home!

New Hampshire was down 23.5% from 2016; Maine was down 15.5%; Alaska was down 11.6%; and Iowa was down 16.1% in 2018.

Because $TRUMP was paying more attention to his grievances than theirs. And small-d democrats and small-i independents had an axe to grind in 2018.

And they have that same axe honed this year. And that’s the hidden advantage Democratic Senate candidates have in each of those eight states.

If MAGA voters feel $TRUMP has ignored or abandoned them; they’ll stay home as they did in ‘18.

Then and now, small-d and small-i voters are rip shit; they’re coming out with axes honed and looking for blood, metaphorically speaking.

Just look at the primary turnout in Maine last week: 213,000 Mainers asked for Democratic ballots; 125,000 asked for MAGA ballots… in the governor’s race!!

Maybe we can’t win eight in a row. But we can chop down the odds against winning by Getting Out Our Voters.

Between my first book, The Gift of Strategy (1995), and The Road Not Taken (2026), America has changed dramatically, grown in population, and drove down roads I could never have imagined three decades ago. But there is one road we haven’t driven. The road not taken is one that will lead to Democratic victories in 2028, 2032 and 2036.

Hope you enjoy this ride!

Where’s Kamala?

I’d like to hear her voice, her laughter, her legal analysis, her incisive questions,

her thoughts about our country.

In September 2024, she eviscerated Donald Trump in a ninety-minute

debate. And two months later, she won 75 million votes out of 155.2 million

cast nationwide. In California, she won 9.3 million votes out of the

15.9 million votes cast. If the race were an Olympic event, she would have

won a silver medal.

Presidential politics, however, is not an Olympic sport. It is a brutal, unforgiving

game of win bigly or go home smaller in stature. The Electoral

College’s winner-takes-all system turns tight races into blowouts and blowouts

into landslides.

Yes, Kamala got beat.

According to her opponent, he had “achieved the most incredible political

thing … the greatest political movement of all time.” He described the election

as a “historic realignment.”1

But if the truth be known, and this WAS an Olympic race, the leader board

would show her times, and but thousandths of a second separated her from

him. Contrary to MAGA’s talking points, just 138,000 votes out of 155.2

million cast were the delta in 2024! On a percentage basis, that was 0.0889

of 1 percent based on the Plurality Threshold in a multi-candidate race.

(The PT equation is the subject of Chapters 3, 6, and 14.)

If we, as small-d democrats, got out our voters—literally, only 138,000

more of them in but four states—Kamala Harris wins with 274 Electoral

College Votes.

Kamala missed the Plurality Threshold by 0.43 of a percentage point or

14,718 votes in Wisconsin. In Michigan, she missed it by 0.71 of a point or

40,215 votes. The Pennsylvania miss was by 0.85 of a point or 60,000 votes.

So, just 115,000 more votes would have won her 268 ECVs.

Then, with just 1.55 of a percentage point or 23,015 more votes in Nevada,

the state’s 6 ECVs would have ended our misery. And hers.

Yes, it was THAT close!

No landslide. No mandate. No historic realignment.

No Dictator from Day One (and still counting.) No Musk nor DOGE. No

Greenland nor Panama. No Riviera on Gaza’s shores. No $TRUMP crypto-

corruption. No Vance, no Hegseth, no Kennedy, nor Noem. No Big

Beautiful Bill. No National Guard nor Marines in Los Angeles, Washington,

Chicago, or Portland. No tanks clanking down Constitution Avenue to

empty reviewing stands.

So, yes, I want to hear Kamala’s voice again. This is the inflection point

between democracy and dictatorship. Her insights might tip the balance.

Her leadership might lead us out of this national nightmare.

The Road Not Taken is not a paean to Kamala Harris, however. I have never

met her. Nor do I ever expect to. I wrote most of this book from the edge

of Blue Hill Bay in Maine and over three thousand miles from her home in

Los Angeles, California.

From my viewpoint looking out toward Mount Desert Island, there were

180,000 voters to the north and east of me and 155 million voters from

here to the Aleutian Islands in Alaska. Had ten or fifteen million more

voters turned out, the result in 2024 would not have been even close. So,

yes, The Road Not Taken is a critique of the Biden-Harris-Walz campaign.

It is also an argument for an alternative strategy as small-d democrats look

toward 2028, 2032, and 2036.

And yes, I want to hear Kamala Harris’s voice echo across this land of ours.

A voice of joy and laughter. A voice hardened by getting knocked down

and a voice explaining how easily we can rise back up. A voice loud and

proud of our Republic’s past, present, and future. A voice that calls one

hundred million Americans to her side. A voice promising a new, more

vibrant American Dream. A voice that knows how best to prosecute corruptions.

And a voice with the grit and determination to win against all

odds and all enemies of democracy, domestic and foreign.

And yet, I expect the distance between Brooklin and Brentwood will grow.

As a small-d democratic strategist, I will take that chance. The Road Not

Taken is not an easy read, particularly if you came within 138,000 votes in

but four states of winning the White House.

For over six decades, I have spoken the unvarnished truth to powerful men

and women running for president. I cannot change my modus operandi

now. But I can change—and I have changed—their chances of winning

slightly, ever so slightly. And every once in a while, that makes all the difference

in this beloved country of ours.

One never knows how the twists and turns of life will play out. The road

taken can end in disaster. The road not taken can too. All a strategist or

presidential candidate can do is his or her very best. Analyze the options

presented. Choose the one that offers the highest probability of success.

No one is entirely prescient, but everyone can persevere. Follow their gut

instincts. Learn from their mistakes. Push on. But leave behind a trail of

crumbs so others can follow.

This book is my trail of crumbs.

Maybe in 2028 or 2032 or even 2036, former vice president Kamala Harris

will travel the road not taken in 2024. If not her, then someone else will.

For that reason alone, the strategy must be all-encompassing—progressively

but not gradually moving ever closer to the outcomes sought. In

these times of the Trump Terror, small-d democrats cannot take chances;

we cannot settle for a slim win. For us, those strategic outcomes are winning

over 395 Electoral College Votes, and winning a supermajority of all

votes cast nationwide.

And ya’ gotta do both.

— * —

On September 23, 2025, I heard Kamala Harris’s voice once again as I read

her campaign memoir, 107 Days. It took me two days to read its 305 pages

on my Kindle. And I recommend that small-d democratic leaders, particularly

opinion leaders with significant audiences, do the same.

In my Substack and Facebook posts, I urged readers not to rely on the

pre-publication hype. Don’t depend on her detractors’ takeaways or her

supporters’ cheer leading. Ignore the interviewers, the analysts, and the

op-ed writers.

Read the damn book.

Do your own homework. 107 Days is more complicated and more nuanced

than you might think.

But three passages are worth a thorough analysis. Her words came on the

book’s final few pages.

“Of all the advice and consolation I have received since the election,

Minyon Moore’s words have moved me: ‘God gave you a beautiful 107

days to reclaim who you are. You have been able to push back against the

caricatures, all the vile and ugly things, and be yourself. You gave America

your heart and soul. You gave it your all.’”

“I did. And I am not done.”

The second passage began at the end of the next paragraph:

“I wanted to make change from inside the system.”.

“Today I’m no longer sure about that. Because the system is failing us.

At every level—executive, judicial, legislative, corporate, institutional,

media—every single guardrail that is supposed to protect our democracy

is buckling. I thought those guardrails would be stronger. I was wrong.”

Two paragraphs later, Kamala Harris explained what lay ahead for her:

“I’ll no longer sit in DC in the grandeur of the ceremonial office. I will be

with the people, in towns and communities where I can listen to their ideas

on how we rebuild trust, empathy, and a government worthy of the ideals

of this country.”2

She will be one of us. A small-d democrat trying to save, secure, and then

strengthen our democracy.

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Infinitely small. There’s 1 way to win; there are 255 ways to lose.

But that’s what Chuck Schumer is trying to do. In order to win control of the Senate with a margin of 3 seats, he must win eight states—two open seats and six MAGA seats.

The odds are 1 to 255 against him. Or 0.39% chance of winning all eight.

True, Schumer could become the Majority Leader by winning six Senate seats—two open seats and four MAGA seats.

Then the odds are 1 to 31 against him. Or 1.5% chance of declaring victory by default.

As in, “da fault is all mine.”

Because winning five means a tie, 50 to 50, except in the United States Senate. There, the tie breaker is JD Vance.

So what if he wins but three races, two open seats and one MAGA seat?

His call sign is: Minority Leader.

But the odds of winning three in a row are so much better, 1 to 7 against him. Or 12.5% chance of not doing a full face plant.

Sorry Chuck, but you can’t count.

Your pick in Maine, a two term governor, captured 1 in 5 voters in the Democratic primary after “suspending her campaign” because your “promissory note” bounced.

An oyster farmer won 7 out of ten Democratic voters and the turnout was heading towards 226,000 Democrats, an increase of over 50,000 votes from your disastrous choice 2022.

What are odds, a million to one?

But does it matter who sits in those eight seats? Darn toot’n it does.

Each of those contests should be like flipping a coin, independent of what Schumer does or doesn’t do, calls or doesn’t call, lives up to his promises or doesn’t.

So maybe, just maybe, the best way to win is to de-link those eight seats?

How is that even possible?

Senator Schumer does what he did to his old friend, Joe Biden. Stab himself in the back, metaphorically, of course.

Updating Schumer’s own arguments against Biden: he’s too damn old, too crippled with heath issues, too out of touch, too ineffective, took weak of a leader in the $TRUMP Error, too much of albatross around the necks of Democratic candidates for the Senate.

Chuck Schumer, the ultimate Brutus and with tears running down his cheeks, should say that he is stepping back, turning his floor duties to another Democrat, and will not run for Minority nor Majority Leader.

Karma is a bitch. Ain’t it, Chuck?

But it is the only way to de-link those seats. Then, the odds of winning one seat at a time rises to 50%.

I like those odds. Don’t you, Chuck?

Chuck? Chuck? Are you still there, Chuck?

That was a headline in the New York Times yesterday. I thought it was an AI generated, fake news spoof.

But, no, this turns out to true.

Under the $TRUMP Administration proposed rule, “people who develop a costly disease or need unexpected emergency care would be able to turn to their health insurer for loans to cover their share of the bill. The debt, though, would have to be repaid, presumably with interest.”

So what’s the going interest rate?

The NYT doesn’t say. But AI Overview gives us five options.

First, “Primary Hospital and Provider Billing has an Interest Rate: 0% to 5%… Most major hospitals, physicians, and medical groups do not initially charge interest on unpaid balances. They generally offer interest-free payment plans for 30 to 180 days to avoid sending the patient to collections.”

Lucky the patient that can pull $100,000 out of thin air to avoid medical interest rates of 5%to 9%, the maximum states like California and Washington allow.

The second option is “Medical Credit Cards (e.g., CareCredit) where the Interest Rate rises from 0% promotional to a whopping to ~26%.”

So on a $100,000 hospital bill, the lucky guy or gal would pay another ~ $26,000. Or over a thousand bucks a month in interest plus some portion of the principle… until they die or hit the lottery.

The other three options are even worse.

Next up, Third-Party Medical Loans have an Interest Rate of 6% to 36%.

Fourth, Third-Party Debt Collectors charge Interest Rates of 5% to 12% (or State Usury Limits).

Fifth, Federal Government Overdue Health Debts have an Interest Rate of 11 3/8%.

And, of course, there’s always your local loan shark’s interest rate—200% or, if you’re late, another $100,000 hospital bill.

I’m being facetious about that sixth option. But for the decimated middle class, the working poor, and the desperate, $TRUMP’s new rule is as cruel as a loan shark’s threat to “pay up or someone you love is gonna get hurt.”

So, when the New York Times, writes, “Under the new rule, some plans that require families to pay tens of thousands of dollars in out-of-pocket costs will be allowed.”

Such a bargain, a corrupt bargain.

In 2027, the NYT reports, “more people will be eligible for bare-bones plans that offer catastrophic coverage, which pay for major illnesses but not day-to-day medical care. “

“The following year, a family will be able to buy a catastrophic plan with a deductible of more than $31,000, and should pay much lower monthly premiums than this year’s.”

A deductible of $31,000? That’s two grand shy of the poverty line for a family of four!!

No one will pay out-of-pocket that deductible. They will go without Obamacare—probably the hidden purpose behind the rule—or they will go without life saving medical care.

And then they will die in darkness.

Sadly, oh so sadly, that death spiral will impact all Americans—Blacks, Whites, Latinos, younger folks, and even MAGA voters.

For Obamacare was designed to provide health insurance for all those who had none. A laudable and attainable goal.

But in the $TRUMP Administration every public policy starts and ends with a corrupt bargain.

Who’s the “they?”

Just about every campaign facing a rank choice vote count in Maine.

Starting Friday, and watchable online, the Secretary of State’s Office will be “exhausting” votes cast for voters’ first, second and sometimes third place choices. It is a simple math exercise.

The last place finisher’s votes are redistributed upwards based on their voters 2nd Choices. Then the counters do it again for the second to last finisher; but this time they could be redistributing votes upwards from voters’ 2nd and, possibly, 3rd choices. So so it goes… until one candidate breaks the 50 percent plus one barrier.

Lots of angst, lots of simulations, lots of modeling at each step of the process, and lots of chaos.

But it all comes down to three math problems.

First, divide the final turnout in the race by two. That equals the 50% barrier, then add one vote. Let’s call it the FINSH LINE.

Second, subtract Candidate X’s total votes before rank choice begins from the FINISH LINE number. That’s X’s new WINNING NUMBER.

Even if it takes three or four rounds of redistributing votes upwards, that WINNING NUMBER never changes.

Third, for the pro’s reading this, calculate the SPLIT—60/40, 55/45 or 53.5/46.5—what your candidate needs to catch and surpass the leader, Candidate Z, the guy who finished first.

The first SPLIT is the FINISH LINE times .60 and the FINISH LINE times .40. Then, continue that dual multiplication for the 55/45, 53/47, 53.5/46.5 splits until you reach a tie.

That way, the pros and their candidate will have a LADDER TO VICTORY.

Hey, Boss, Here’s what we got in the last round. Here’s how many more votes we need for a tie, for a slim win, and for a blow out.

Or, when the SPLIT goes against you: Hey, Boss, here’s your concession speech.

For right now, all those things are possible.

In the last four months, the Consumer Price Index rose from 2.4% in February to 4.2% in May, 2026. That’s a 75% rocket booster for future inflation… and that’s just since $TRUMP went to war against Iran.

What is driving the rise in the CPI? Besides the war?

Well, in the last year, gasoline is up 40.5%. Fuel oil is up 58.9%, according to the most recent CPI report.

And just last month Bezos Post reported on the extreme economic pressures that America’s working poor face. It quoted the respected Kaiser Family Foundation (now KFF):

“With greater migration to bronze plans, the average deductible for ACA recipients rose more than $1,000 a year, to $3,786.”

“Active enrollment could fall from 22.3 million in 2025 to about 17.5 million in 2026,” KFF’s report said.

Remember that government shutdown last October? And the coming spike in health insurance premiums?

That legislation is still on the books; it kicks in AFTER the November 2026 elections are history.

But the migration to cheaper bronze plans has had an unexpected and disastrous consequences: the average deductible will rise to nearly $4,000!

Up to five million once insured American have shifted (or soon will shift) their medical risks to charitable organizations and / or state and local governments.

Sadly, for the working poor and the destitute, dropping out of Obamacare will make more sense financially than paying both higher premiums and higher average deductibles.

Thanks to the MAGA Congress, $TRUMP’s White House, and the Susan Collins of Capitol Hill.

Yes, the poor are getting poorer; the working poor are working fewer hours per week; and the middle class is saying, “We can’t make it anymore.”

So, love the inflation, grab the inflation with both hands, and squeeze the inflation, Mr. President, because everything you touch withers and dies.

Except the inflation, it’ll keep burning until hell freezes over…

As in Dante’s Inferno.

Ninth Circle.

Traitors’ quarter.

What happens to his Dictatorship of the Plutocracy?

Mundanely, JD Vance is sworn in immediately. Donald Trump will lie in state in the Capitol, a funeral will take place at the National Cathedral, followed by internment at Arlington National Cemetery.

And America will be split, unevenly, between the grieving and the gleeful. Thirty-one days later, the flags will be raised to full mast.

Realistically, the new Vance Administration will have (mostly) the same billionaire cabinet, the Congress and the media will go on a honeymoon watch, and the great issues of the day—the War against Iran, shaky economic fundamentals, crypto corruption, and Supreme Court rulings will be put aside for a six month hiatus to ‘honor’ him who has gone in gilded splendor to a golden apotheosis.

And yet, if his demise occurs within six months of the ‘26 or ‘28 general elections a halo-effect will occur. No one will speak ill of the dead or his policies. Those who dare to will become political pariahs to MAGA. And its shrewdest strategists will shift from focusing on the recently passed horror show to an imaginary, happy-ever-after future that lies just over an unreachable horizon.

Prophetically, that six month hiatus will also be an illusion. For MAGA will be in full meltdown mode. As in, they won’t know who to hate more—JD Vance or $TRUMP—for leaving them soulless, mindless, and leaderless.

For the Democratic Establishment, not surprisingly, the hiatus will be used to hide their cluelessness and gutlessness behind extremely philosophical questions. Do they checkmate Vance’s every move? Or do they declare defeat on Day One of the Vance-Theil-Musk-Bezos Dictatorship, and fly off to Andorra?

(FYI. Andorra is the only principality in Europe without an extradition treaty with the United States.)

But ominously, somewhere, someone is reading the final chapters of “It Can’t Happen Here” by Sinclair Lewis.

And somewhere, someone else is reading “Kill Box” by Lt. Col. H. Ripley Rawlings IV (USMC ret.).

Spoiler alert: Both have (relatively speaking) unhappy endings.

Realitity check: Those novel approaches to reviving the American Dream do not have to be our reality. We can, if we so choose, have a Cabinet-in-Waiting. A group of renown women and men chosen by the still titular leader of a hopefully, fully reimagined Democratic Party, Kamala Harris.

That Cabinet, like its parallel in the United Kingdom, will produce “action-this-day” policy papers. They’d be the equivalent of Winston Churchill’s demands to his peers to prepare the country for what lay just ahead, a “to do list” for a new government.

That Cabinet-in-Waiting will identify the deepest thinkers, the most pragmatic administrators, and the most radical idealists in order to erase the last decade of MAGA-inspired debacles and failures. And it will chart our way back to an America that heals its deep wounds, builds its capacities to meet new challenges, regains the trust of its allies, and reasserts its enormous power for good on the world stage.

And that Cabinet, consisting of small-d democrats, small-i independents, and small-r republicans, will represent the ever growing coalition of 100 million who demand an end to the Trump Errors. That coalition will insists upon, in Abraham Lincoln’s so prophetic words, “a rebirth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.”

And that Cabinet-in-Waiting will prepare us for the changes required for a more vibrant, more robust, more futuristic American Dream. It will lay the ground for the peaceful transfer of power in 2027 or 2029 and, perhaps, even in 2033.

For the votes of 100 million of us will prevail over the last, rotting remnants of Trump and Vance’s dictatorship of the plutocracy.

Or, as AI Overview defines it, “a society where a tiny, ultra-wealthy elite holds absolute political and economic power. It describes a system where democratic institutions exist in name only, and financial influence dictates all public policy.”

And, my friends, ending that dictatorship of the plutocracy won’t be easy. It will occur, if we put our minds to it now. Starting right now. Today.

On the off chance our nemesis croaks tomorrow, metaphorically speaking.

In May 2026, Unemployed (7.307 million) plus Part Time for Economic Reasons (4.805 million) plus Marginally Attached (1.723 million) plus Discouraged Workers (.486 million) EQUALED 14.321 million!

REAL UNEMPLOYMENT declined by 261,000 in May 2026!

But back in January 2026, the BLS slashed total civilian labor force by 799,000 workers. BLS slashed it again in February 2026 by 233,000, in March 2026 by 376,000, and April 2026 by 92,000. Now for the first time in five months, the total civilian labor force grew by 82,000!

The top line of the Civilian Labor Force, however, has cratered by 1,500,000 workers over the last five months. That number is the denominator for the various unemployment rates; the numerator is the number of unemployed (underemployed and uncounted); and, consequently, the rates of unemployment and real unemployment trend marginally lower with each decrease in the Civilian Labor Force.

After five months of shrinking the Civilian Labor Force, the BLS’s Presidential Sharpie cut their unemployment numbers and rates. They may called it a “correction.” I would call it a politically motivated “compression” to make $TRUMP look far more capable than he is.

In May 2026, the REAL UNEMPLOYMENT RATE resets to 8.42% or 4.1 percentage points higher than the BLS unemployment rate of 4.3%.

REAL UNEMPLOYMENT stands at 14,321,000!

RICK SLOAN’S COMMENTARY

Personally, I would prefer if an economist weigh in right now. I nearly flunked Econ 101 at Ohio State. So maybe a Wolverine professor will correct me when I am wrong.

So today’s BLS report bravely notes, “The unemployment rate held at 4.3 percent and has remained in a narrow range of 4.3 percent to 4.5 percent since July 2025.

That’s one indicator for the “stag” or stagnation in stagflation.

Another BLS product, the Consumer Price Index has increased to 3.8% since July 2025. It shot up from 2.4 % in February to that 3.8 percent in April— 58.3% increase since the TRUMP’s war of choice in Iran began. It’s May CPI comes out in five days.

That’s the “flation” in stagflation.

My take, and I sincerely hope I’m wrong, is: Hold on tight. The economic rollercoaster is about to take a stomach churning drop.

Right now, it’s chugging up the rails to its apex. And then…

Note 1: The late Leo Hindery Jr., CEO of Trine Acquisition Corp, produced a monthly Real Unemployment Report for over two decades. Released a few hours after the Department of Labor’s BLS Employment Situation came out each Friday morning, Leo sought to stimulate discussion about economic policy. With permission of his widow, I will be publishing a simplified version of his monthly report.

Note 2. The Real Unemployment for May 2026 is based on the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Employment Situation Summary, Table A. Household data, seasonally adjusted, issued June 5,

After three rounds of rank choice voting—redistribution of 2nd and 3rd choices of “exhausted” candidates’ voters—the BDN poll has Pingree beating Shah 52% to 48%. And more than the candidates are “exhausted.”

Because every step in the BDN poll’s processes are within the margin of error. Hells bells, they are within 2% or LESS. It is tighter than a tick on a dog’s tail.

So the contest is still truly up for grabs. BTW: Your vote can make all the difference in the world, literally and not figuratively And as I’ve said since 1992, “don’t vote, don’t bitch.”

For there are now attack ads against Shah citing his failures to act during a legionnaires disease outbreak in a state run Veterans nursing home in Quincy, Illinois. The Working Families Party is putting over $157,000 behind those ads.

And 314 Action, the pro-school choice PAC, has thrown another $250,000 into their ads supporting Shah. Of course, they’re not saying anything about their advocacy of policies designed to destroy public schools in Maine and Illinois. And neither is the NEA nor AFT. Shocking, truly shocking.

There are also attack ads running on Troy Jackson’s votes for anti-abortion legislation early in his career. Really, that’s back when Susan Collin’s Thank-You-Susan ads are now touting her single handedly rebuilding a dock in Eastport all by lonesome in 2014.

So it’s a shit show. With all sorts of shenanigans going on in the governor’s race. Plus more personal attacks pieces flying across the internet and aimed at Graham Platner and coming from pro-AIPAC news outlets. And 41 Democratic Senators hid in the cloak room hoping no one noticed their empty suits, missing backbones, and profiles in cowardice when Platner stopped by to measure curtains.

And yet, in four days, 150,000 to 180,000 Maine Voters will ask for Democratic ballots, if they haven’t already. And by the next Monday, they may know who won and who lost. Maybe.

But this is for sure, even nastier ads will start running that Monday backed by $100 to $200 MILLION, with an “M” in dark money.

So here’s an idea. Turn off your TV sets, computers, cellphones and take a long, leisurely walk in the Maine woods… for the next three months. Then re-engage in this shit show after Labor Day.

The news will still be breaking and, sadly, it will still be broken. But you’ll have had a long, lovely and luxurious nature bath.

Enjoy your summer!

It’s a more nuanced and sophisticated attack. But sophistry is no substitute for the truth.

Here’s what AI overview produced when I asked it what my old boss accomplished as a freshman Senator:

“Between 1977 and 1983, US Senator Howard Metzenbaum established himself as a fierce consumer advocate and liberal firebrand. Earning the nickname "Senator No", he used his mastery of Senate rules to aggressively block corporate tax breaks and special-interest legislation, while also fighting for early versions of worker safety protections and health care standards.”

“Key Legislative Fights and Accomplishments:

“Blocking Special-Interest Legislation: He single-handedly derailed a minimum of ~ $10 billion in corporate tax breaks and pork-barrel spending, frequently engaging in marathon amendments and one-man filibusters against bills.

“Energy and Antitrust: He took on massive oil monopolies by fighting to keep price controls on natural gas and strongly opposed corporate deregulation.

“Corporate Accountability: He initiated early investigations into food/drug corporations, such as questioning the FDA approval process for aspartame and spearheading efforts to mandate nutrition labelling on food packaging.

“Worker & Pension Protection: He laid the groundwork for major labor and pension reforms, forcing struggling businesses of the era to uphold their obligations regarding employee health benefits.

“Judicial Oversight: He notably used procedural leverage on the Senate Judiciary Committee to ensure stringent oversight on corporate monopolies and to advocate for pro-choice rights.

“For further details on his life and long-term congressional career, view the full Congress.gov Member Profile or learn more about his legacy through historical coverage from The Washington Post.”

Full disclosure: I was Sen. Metzenbaum’s Legislative Assistant and then AA or Chief of Staff for five those six years.

Metz served on five committees during those years:

“Committee on the Judiciary: His most high-profile assignment, where he used his seat to strictly monitor corporate monopolies, protect consumer antitrust rights, and vet judicial nominees.

“Committee on Health Educatin and Labor: (Now known as the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions) Where he championed worker protection standards and employee health benefits.

“Committee on Energy and Natural Resources: Where he vigorously opposed corporate deregulation and fought to maintain price controls on natural gas.”

He also served on the Budget and Indian Affairs Committees during his first full term.

Metz ran for reelection in 1982 and 1988, winning close but competitive races.

Can’t do shit? One Senator refusing a unanimous consent can stop legislation dead in the final 96 hours of a session, just by saying NO. Two freshmen Senators—Metzenbaum and Abourezk—forced the Senate to battle over ending natural gas price controls for 13 days and two all-night vote-a-thons.

The fact is, Senator, the draft ended in 1973, eleven years before Graham Platner was born.

The fact is, Senator, we’ve had an all-volunteer military for the last 53 years.

And the fact is, Senator, you just dissed the wrong Mainers.

According to AI oversight, there are less than a thousand active duty Marines in Maine. There are, however, “over 15,000 veterans from the wars after September 11, 2001” who know exactly what semper fidelis means.

I don’t often give advice to MAGA Senators but that was a rookie mistake. And, yes, you did vote to send them off to war, multiple times.

There are also 3,500 to 4,500 Marine Corps veterans from Vietnam and an estimated 600 from the Korean War and WWII living in Maine. Many of them were drafted; many volunteered. They all served honorably.

The fact is, Senator, not a single one of them got five deferments for bone spurs. Not a one!

Many of those Mainers volunteered for the same reason Graham Platner did. They loved their country and they were willing to put their lives on the line for all of us.

All told, over 20,000 to 21,000 “jarheads” live in Maine. And I am using that phrase respectfully, and am quoting a veteran who I met outside the Blue Hill office of Graham Platner’s campaign yesterday morning.

He was there on a Sunday morning to go canvassing for Graham. It was to be his first time ever going door to door. His reason for driving 20 miles from his home on Deer Isle was “he’s a jarhead.”

Terse.

The fact is, Senator, the vast majority of those 21,000 Marines and the other 74,000 men and women who have served in the Army, Navy, Air and Space Forces, and the Coast Guard who live in Maine VOLUNTEERED to serve.

For the same reason. A reason neither you nor “bone spurs” can comprehend.

They would forfeit their lives for the country they love, for the families they left back home, for the men and women they fought alongside of.

The fact is, Senator, many of the 5,000 veterans who served before 9/11 were drafted. And yet, many of them had volunteered. It was, as you so flippantly said, their “decision to serve.”

The fact is, Senator, you proved to the 95,000 veterans in Maine they cannot trust you with their lives, their sons and daughters lives, or their grandbabies’ lives.

They cannot trust you, Senator, to do what’s right as another forever war looms. They know how fast you can flip-flop on issues of war and peace. You’re now 2 votes for and 2 votes against the recent war powers resolutions on the war against Iraq.

Dare I say it?

On each vote, you “decided to serve” your own self-interests.

I can’t and won’t speak for those 95,000 Maine veterans. They’ll do that with their own votes next November.

But I doubt those 95,000 Mainers want you playing politics with the most precious lives in their universe: their kids and grandkids.

The fact is, Senator, you should start looking for a new line of work.

How tactically decisive of her?

Given the recent Emerson poll, it makes zero political sense. For four male candidates combined for 53% of its sample; two females— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Kamala Harris—split 21%. And undecided tied Pete Buttigieg for frontrunner status.

The other dozen wannabes named by the New York Times last January divided up the remaining eight points. So Governor Whitmer might have garnered a half a point, a point or two. Maybe.

Yes, it is way too early to be thinking about 2028 unless of course you are fully and unconditionally committed to actively working to win control of the House, Senate, and governors mansions in 2026!

And that means you’re traveling the country THIS summer, holding fundraisers for incumbents and challengers back home THIS summer, and lending your own strategists and field operatives to Democratic nominees to Get Out Our Vote THIS fall.

Why? Self-interest!

Because the votes for delegates to the next convention will start being cast in early January 2028, just thirteen months after the midterm results are finalized.

But there is also a reason why female Democratic candidates for president cannot sit on the sidelines THIS summer. And yes, it’s that Emerson Research poll.

Just as in late June 2018, four male candidates captured 48% of the Zogby Analytics survey’s sample. Four female candidates—Oprah Winfrey, Kamala Harris, Elizabeth Warren, and Kirsten Gillibrand unevenly split 32%. Other drew 2%. And a whopping 29% were undecided.

And those other and undecided voters were mesmerized by the spectre of 22 other wannabes—19 men and 3 women—whose names are memorable only to their own mothers and not worth listing here.

Nor are the names of the 16 once powerful politicians who declined to run—14 men and two women. Hillary Clinton and Stacy Abrams declined the horror of this massively self-defeating exercise for so many wannabes.

And yet, I am focusing on gender because those Emerson and Zogby polls underscore how hard and how high the glass ceiling actually is.

Famously and courageously, Hillary Clinton spoke about the “18 million cracks” in that glass ceiling when she conceded on June 7, 2016 to Barack Obama. She was referring to the number of votes she (and he) had received.

No, I am not making a sexist argument. I have volunteered for both of Hillary Clinton’s campaigns, contributed to Elizabeth Warren and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and have written about strategy for (and about) Kamala Harris.

But the deck is stacked against them.

That deck is not a glass ceiling; it’s made of steel. And you’ll need an acetylene torch to cut a hole in it. Or a shaped charge of C-4 to blow it up.

For when four or five male candidates start with a combined 50 plus percentage points and an indeterminate number of male also-rans are pulling a half dozen or more percentage points, they’re nearing three-fifth’s (60%) of the available votes.

Meanwhile, the female candidates are struggling for primacy within two-fifths (20%) of the available votes, if that. Because the undecideds are eating up a chunk of that last 20%. And, as they say up here in Maine, you can’t there from here.

And breaking out of the crowd in the debates, the fundraising totals, or the press coverage—well, it’s damn difficult.

So, let me suggest to you—all of you—go it alone THIS summer and NEXT summer and every day in between. Pick the states and CD’s where women dominate the exit polls. Focus on the states and CD’s with high concentrations of Asian, Black, Latino, and Younger voters.

Go where the “big boys” won’t play well. And don’t go where they’re all hanging out in the same locker rooms.

Don’t go where the DNC wants you to. Run, literally, run in the opposite direction. If the DNC hosts a dinner or a debate, decline and find or organize your own fundraising dinner and be sure to find your own debate stage.

(The networks are not the only media forums with national reach. Find your own megaphones.)

Ditto when it comes to the DNC’s data ‘banks’. Figure out an AI-centered way to talk to women, directly. Hells bells, I reached 800,000 unemployed women in non-battleground states in 2020 for next to nothing just to get out our vote.

And while the “big boys” are spending all their time winning the five states that the DNC intends to shoehorn in to February 2028, go find the 18 or 20 states that begin early voting and mail-in voting in January and February of 2028.

By mid-March 2028, one or two of you—Kamala, Alexandria, Gretchen, Amy, et. al—will be atop the leaderboard with the most delegates won and the most votes cast.

And then, you can flip off the “big boys” who will be beaten down and broke and begging to be a member of YOUR cabinet.

But in the absolutely decisive battle for “second choice,” Bellows led with 29% followed by Pingree at 23%, Shah at 20%, Jackson at 14%, and King III at 6%.

Pine Tree found that 51% of King’s second choices would go to Shah — or 3.5%. And 39% of Pingree’s second choices would go to Bellows— or 4.0%. Or 37% of Bellows second choices would go to Pingree—or 4.8%, depending on who was counted out first. But if Jackson wasn’t the runner up, then half of his voters’ second choices would go to Bellows and 23% would go to Pingree.

Dr. Shah is still below 50 percent plus one.

My take is that if Jackson can shoot up from a three-poll average of 13.6 points two weeks ago to 28 points with less than two weeks ago, this race is still in state of flux.

IT AIN’T OVER, FOLKS!

Shah dropped from 30% in the poll paid for by 314 Action to 28% in the independent Pine Tree poll. But King III collapsed from 23% to 7%—from the 314 Action to the Pine Tree polls. An astounding 15 point drop.

Bellows and Pingree lost 4% each of those polls. And Shah lost two points.

I am always leery of massive moves. But in the intervening two weeks, three things have happened.

Three polls of the governor’s race were released by the New York Times. Bernie Sanders, who had endorsed Jackson and Platner last Labor Day, returned to Maine to campaign with them. And Sheena Bellows kicked the trans-athlete proposition off the November ballot.

Just as Mainers began to focus on the governor’s contest—and the second tier candidates went silent or nearly so—Bernie’s visit boosted Jackson’s standing.

Perfect timing!

But one of those three polls, the Pan-Atlantic poll, tried to assess the strength of each candidate’s “second choice.” In rank order—in this rank choice system—the second choice were 22% and 21% for Pingree and Bellows, respectively. With Shah, King and Jackson trailing with 10%, 8% and 7%, also respectively.

The Pine Tree poll confirmed those numbers almost exactly.

But Pan-Atlantic added first and second choice together and Shah “won” with 39% and, when all the counting was done, he ended up with 58%.

I disagreed.

I thought that methodology gave short shrift to Pingree and Bellows. So, I applied a pro rata process that gave Pingree a better than 2 to I advantage over Shah in terms of likely total turnout.

I still think that multiplication is more likely than simple addition. And we’ll find out soon enough. But the Pine Tree poll confirmed my bias for multiplication over addition.

And yet, right now, the bottom line is that Democratic voters are still making up their minds.

Even with just 10 days to go, Shah is stuck at 28 to 30 points. Jackson and King III are somewhere between 7 and 28 points. And Pingree and Bellows are pulling between 12 and 15 points. All BEFORE those absolutely vital second choices come into play!

Frankly, I would not be surprised if Shah slid back into the mid to low 20’s. Or if Jackson and / or King III ended up in the low teens on election night. And then, Pingree and Bellows would be battling for primacy via second and third choices.

IT’S GAME ON!!!

.

We are creatures of habit. What worked in a candidate’s first winning campaign is often found in their last campaign. It’s not that new fangled tools and tactics weren’t employed; it’s that the finger nail files of yesteryear morphed into Instagram photos with a vote-for-me logo.

But in the last month, I came across a brand new pattern. It wasn’t one that matched up with any previous pattern in my memory bank.

Oh, there were elements that looked familiar. The ads, the polls, the endorsements, the massive super PAC investment, the slick, slightly disingenuous statements, the website, all seemed standard Big-D Democratic fare.

But the candidate’s core was off. Way off. A dual degree in law and medicine. A stint at an anti-labor law firm. Another stint as a cabinet member to a proudly MAGA governor. A major, career-ending failure that killed 13 veterans and infected dozens of others. A TV gig, not on Fox News, but relaying Covid-19 news from the CDC in Atlanta to Augusta. And now a campaign for governor based only on name recognition… and a $650,000 ad buy by a super PAC dedicated to destroying public education in favor of private schools funded by taxpayers and home owners.

Totally new, if somewhat bizarre? Or one of the oldest tricks in the politician’s ancient and deeply secret handbook. It’s the chapter on wolves in sheep’s clothing.

In this instance, if MAGA cannot win Maine straight up, then they buy a sheep’s costume and trot out a smiling wolf wearing it.

WHO besides MAGA would want a fledgling legal beagle from Sidney Austin who never made partner? Who jumped from a being an associate to being a MAGA cabinet member?

Whose med school credentials were never deeply vetted but had the patina of brilliance with a diploma in Latin verifying absolute genius? And whose answers to every probing question seemed… perfectly rehearsed and almost rote.

Whose major screw up was covered up by a MAGA governor from Illinois whose emails could be leaked any day… after June 9th.

Fifty-five years ago, I traveled to Chicago, Illinois for a midwestern conclave of Students for Ed Muskie, Maine’s U.S. Senator and Hubert Humphrey’s vice presidential running mate in 1968.

There I met the precinct captain for the Daley Machine handing out his business cards. So, anxious to learn how the “machine worked,” I called him the next day.

His first question was, “Who sent you?”

Perhaps, with twelve days to go, it’s time to ask Dr. Nariv Shah the same question.

“In Ohio, the group contributed $16,616 to former Ohio Health Director Amy Acton’s campaign for Governor.

So the Ohio MD gets $16,616 from the 314 Action Super PAC. And the Maine MD gets $650,000!

How does that even compute? Was it the medical schools they attended? Or was it their positions on school choice?

Dr. Amy Acton says, “I will restore public school funding to a constitutional level, get control of the opaque private school voucher system with runaway costs, and use those savings to invest in students, teachers and proven best practices to make Ohio a national leader in education once again.”

Dr. Nariv Shah told the Maine Education Association that “he would be open to expanding public charter schools only if they benefit public school students, which prompted the union to rank him third.”

What a nice pay day of $650,000 for 7 seconds of double speak.

Every public dollar that goes to private charter schools comes from… public schools. Throwing the word “public” in front of “charter schools” doesn’t change the flow of cash away from public school students and teachers.

But it sure changes the flow of cash into targeted gubernatorial races.

Not surprising, though.

Dr. Shah’s old boss, former Governor Bruce Rauner (IL-MAGA), was “a staunch advocate for charter schools and universal school choice, believing every family should have access to high-quality education regardless of their zip code.” AI Overview, again.

MAGA’s Rauner made good on his advocacy. “He secured EQUAL funding for charter schools alongside traditional public schools during his tenure.” Emphasis added.

So every dollar drained out of the Illinois’ public schools went to private charter schools until EQUAL funding was achieved.

THAT would destroy public education in Maine. For there are 596 public schools, 13 public charter schools, 12 town academies, and 130 private secondary schools operating in Maine.

But 314 Action doesn’t care about educational equity or equality of opportunity. They don’t care about rural, suburban, or urban schools. They just want half the state’s money for public education to go to 130 private schools.

So they just invested $650,000 in school choice, a MAGA talking point, in a Democratic primary?

Naw, that can’t be right.

Maybe, just maybe, 314 Action wants to buy the Blair House? I heard it’s having an old fashioned auction in two weeks. Plunk down $650,000 and get control of $6 BILLION in spending per year.

Now that makes more sense.

BTW. 314 Action paid for the SCR poll that had Shah at 30%, King III at 23%, Bellows at 17%, Pingree at 16%, and Jackson at 14%. Gotta wonder how zooie those numbers really are when your sample is 522 and after 4 rounds of counting Shah ends up with 58% of the vote??

Given the cost of polling these days, now the opening bid on the Blair House is over $720,000.

Going once.

Going twice.

SOLD to the Super PAC from who knows where… beholden to who knows whom… and being promised who knows what.

Dr. Shah does.