A lot happened over spring break ““ inflammatory remarks made by Barack Obama’s former pastor persisted to be an issue, Clinton rejected calls for her to drop out of the race, the economy scared people more than the idea of Dick Cheney with a shotgun and that one nominee from Arizona made a few headlines in a few local newspapers.
All sarcasm aside, one story caught my eye more than most. Specifically, I am referring to the idea proposed by U.S. Rep. Tim Mahoney, D-Fla., and then expanded on in a column by Joe Klein of Time magazine: the idea of a Gore-Obama ticket.
Yes, you read that correctly: a ticket in which Al Gore is the Democrats’ nominee for president. I see Obama as the vice president rather than Clinton because Gore and Clinton cannot stand each other, and the idea of a Gore-Clinton ticket speaks of no change whatsoever. While I still am an ardent supporter of one candidate in the race, the idea of a Gore-Obama ticket could eventually be the best option politically for Democrats.
The Gore option would roughly play out as follows: Come August when Democrats hold their convention, the Democratic race for the nomination may have gotten so ugly that party elders feel neither candidate will be able to gain enough party support to win in November. Thus, these elders would decide to instead go with a compromise candidate like Gore.
Of course, both Obama and Clinton would have to agree to this compromise based on the notion that neither candidate’s core supporters would get behind the other. There is some precedent for such a move ““ while reasons may have been different, party leaders used to choose compromise, or dark horse, candidates when needed.
Indeed, the Gore option would require that neither candidate holds a significant lead in the delegate count come June. With several contests left, Clinton could lessen Obama’s current lead if she can win Pennsylvania and perform better than expected in other states.
And then there is the issue of the superdelegates, or party leaders to whom the Democratic Party gives special voting rights at the Democratic National Convention. Currently there are 258 superdelegates who have yet to endorse, and it seems neither candidate will benefit from the bulk of the remaining delegates.
Finally, and most importantly, the Gore option would require Clinton to act as a team player and support it; to be sure, any scenario in which Clinton did not agree to strongly campaign for the ticket would be meaningless.
Of course one could argue that Gore has shown little interest in running for president. However, I believe Gore’s qualms came from the idea of beating Obama and Clinton for the nomination. This scenario would allow him to have the nomination without having to do anything for it.
Now, back to why this ticket would be so strong for the Democrats. To put it bluntly, there is virtually nothing wrong with a Gore-Obama ticket.
“If Clinton was on board, that would create a lot of problems for Republicans by way of responding to that ticket, since there are not many things wrong with such a ticket,” said political science professor Phil Gussin, who also said that despite that strength, such a ticket is highly unlikely.
Indeed, Gore is a centrist Democrat who is not far from McCain on many issues. On Gore’s key issue, global warming, McCain agrees with Gore; McCain’s campaign Web site boasts that he “has been a leader on the issue of global warming with the courage to call the nation to action on an issue we can no longer afford to ignore.”
Furthermore, Republicans would have to go into blitzkrieg mode trying to go after one candidate after spending a year’s worth of resources on two other candidates. Also, since Gore has not been very active in politics, Republicans would be hard-pressed to find many statements by Gore to use against him.
To be sure, there are several problems entailed in this idea. Foremost, with his current lead, Obama right now has little incentive to give up the nomination, and he probably shouldn’t.
However, things may change by the end of this primary process, and Democrats may need to put up a candidate who has not been muddied by this campaign. Furthermore, a Vice President Obama would almost certainly be guaranteed the presidency in 2016.
This idea is only a theory. That said, 2008 has been the year of unexpected developments in the race for the White House and a Gore-Obama ticket, despite its current implausibility, may be just another one.
E-mail Margolis at mmargolis@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.