The Hill: Bloomberg/Hagel Can Win if Hillary is the Nominee

[Leopolds Ghost]

I agree with the statement, unfortunately, but the inside
details are a Beltway moderate's wet dream, with the author
proposing a veritable cornucopia of fantasy-football figures
that would make up the Bloomberg Transition Team:

http://pundits.thehill.com/2007/12/21/mike-bloomberg-and-chuck-hagel-can-win-in-2008

The great political reality of the 2008 campaign is this: If the negative and personal onslaught of the Clinton campaign against Barack Obama repels and appalls political independents beyond a point of no return, Mike Bloomberg and Chuck Hagel might run, and could win.

There is no need to recapitulate the sludge that is polluting this presidential campaign from various sources, except to highlight this point: Americans desperately want to turn the page to a higher and nobler form of leadership and Hillary Clinton is systematically alienating the voters who will decide this election, and by doing so, doing grave damage to the Democratic Party’s chances in November.

Independent voters are asking a variation of Reagan’s question in 1980: Do you think your living rooms and your lives will be any more pleasant under Hillary Clinton than they were four years ago, under George W. Bush? Hillary’s problem is the living room problem: We are not merely choosing a politician, we are selecting a leader who will be in our living rooms, at our dinner tables and at the center of our lives for at least four years.

Americans will ask, about whomever the party nominates: Do we want to spend four years with this person at the center of our personal and national lives? The danger for Democrats is that regarding Hillary Clinton, Democrats say, approvingly or reluctantly, yes, but independents say, in large numbers and with increasing certainty, no. Upon numbers like this, the future of America will be decided, and the door for Bloomberg and Hagel could be opened.

While Hillary systematically alienates the independent voters, and the Republican candidates declare religious wars against each other and compete for supporting wars abroad, it is time to begin a serious discussion not only about the tactics of a Bloomberg-Hagel ticket, but the substance of what they might offer to determine whether such a candidacy and presidency makes sense.

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Here is my opening bid:

Bloomberg and Hagel should openly advocate a national unity government and should very aggressively challenge the best leaders in the nation to join their government, if they run and win.

Examples could be Republican Sen. Arlen Specter as secretary of Homeland Security, Democrat Kathleen Kennedy Townsend being America’s voice to the world as United Nations ambassador at a Cabinet level, and retired Marine Corps Gen. James Jones to assume a high national security position.

Bloomberg and Hagel should say they would name Al Gore, and either John McCain or Arnold Schwarzenegger, to co-chair a special presidential transition team, beginning on the day after the election, ending on inauguration day. They would develop a landmark program for climate change and alternative energy to be enacted into law within the first hundred days of their national unity presidency.

Bloomberg and Hagel should upgrade the Council of Economic Advisers and formalize regular economic advice from “wise men and women” of national stature. These could include Warren Buffett, former General Electric Chairman Jack Welch, Wall Street CEO Muriel Siebert, famed Goldman Sachs analyst Abby Joseph Cohen, Bill Gates, former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin, leading progressives such as Dennis Kucinich and Paul Krugman, and creative conservatives such as Jack Kemp, Newt Gingrich or Arthur Laffer.

Finally, if Mayor Bloomberg is truly serious about being leader of the free world, at a major moment and dangerous moment in history, I would propose that he make an enormous personal donation to homeless and disabled vets, and call on all Americans to do their part.

[Leopolds Ghost]

1. ...And Mary Lou Retton as Tiny Tim! n/t

[Red Zelda]

2. sorry, folks

any chance Bloomberg has is totally overblown.