Senators do not win Presidential Elections

http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A26390-2002Jun21¬Found=true



In all of American history, only two men -- Warren Harding and John Kennedy -- have gone straight from the Senate to the White House. Bob Dole in 1996 was the last sitting senator to win a party nomination (though he resigned his Senate seat a few months before the convention) and, like most of his predecessors, he was whomped in the election.

The statistics show that vice presidents (many of them, like Gore, former senators) and governors and former governors (such as George W. Bush and Jimmy Carter) have far greater success in winning nominations and in making it to the White House than do senators.

Between 1960 and 1996, senators were the largest group of presidential contenders, providing almost 37 percent of those who ran in at least one primary outside their home states, as compared with 23 percent who were governors. But only one out of 10 senators won nomination and only one out of 50 (Kennedy), the election. Governors did better in both regards

All these factors apply to the Bush-McCain contest, our most recent governor vs. senator test: age, size of state, Dixie base, recent tough election experience and ready-made campaign staff -- Bush had them all.

There may be a message here for the Democrats -- and all those senatorial wannabes.

http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~burden/psq2002.pdf

apparently idiots can win Selections.

but less relevant. :)

at least Kerry can beat Bush.

Combine that with Dean's charisma and his capacity to inspire and motivate the base and you have the only chance the Democratic Party has in 2004.

It's happened before and it will happen again.

Come on. If it was the Cubs or Red Sox winning the Series... but the numbers are not upto that level. Yes the argument is obviously valid. Out of work full time candidates have a campaign edge. On the job Senators have built in handicaps. Overcoming them makes them all the stronger.

Tired of hearing about trends and statistics when we only have a 200 year history of rapidly and drastically evolving socio-political changes. In this country what we did yesterday can become a "tradition" or accepted wisdom. What we still are as a country is young, brash and dangerously naive.

A candidate will have to stand or fall on his campaign abilities and willpower(often THE critical component). This is an unusually competitive field with no faction granting the other the nod. All have weaknesses too.

Let's not ever grasp at statistical straws. The books are too cooked in this nation at the present.

Come on.
Why didn't people go--hey Jack, Roman Catholics and Senators don't win?

"They" don't do it until they do. Shirley Chisolm won a term in Congress. We went to the moon. And on and on and on.

Their being Senators is a historical disadvantage, but not an insurmountable one.

Consider the state of the Democratic Party. Consider Karl Rove. Consider the candidates.

Only a unknown darkhorse can win.

:eyes:

It mayn't be any of the Senators either, but I cannot for the life of me understand the thinking that Dean is a dark horse.

And that was 60+ years ago.

New York is in the Mid-Atlantic region. Some people need to pick up a map, methinks.

but never had the chance, was Bobby Kennedy.

I'm not saying that no New Englander could win, just pointing how arbitrary this "No _____ has been elected in # years" thing is.

I find absolute joy, in finding holes in "absolutes" logic. ;-)

if that he had lived we would not be fighting about the primary because president so and so would be doing well, and also the DLC would be what my part of the party has become.

...don't count out little known Governors or other non-nationally known candidates.

Doesn't mean you can run the Home Depot.

I looked it up a while ago when someone made this exact same comparison.

Vermont is the second smallest state. In fact, is not a 'small state'. It is a mid-sized city. The city of Memphis has more people than Vermont does.

Also, Arkansas is a lot more diverse than Vermont in terms of race and other things.

Presidents who had been in the Senate:

Truman, Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon; Ford had been in the House.

Maybe it's time we get a President with some Washington experience who understands the difference between state politics and governing with a national and international perspective.

In the past sixty years only one northern Democrat has been elected president-John F. Kennedy. Every other Democratic president has been a southerner or a midwesterner. I see a pattern here.

Much less data than the 50:1 senatorial losing statistic since 1960.

Oh, wait, they do if the candidate is a Republican, never mind.

in non-presidential election years.

Well, if you listen to right-wing talking heads, it never happened.

Oh, wait. Happened under Clinton, ever since the coup of 1994, never mind.

Party.

Yay.