Anatomy of a Mud Puddle

The 2016 presidential election was the Democrat's to lose. And they did. And now they are standing around, scratching their, uh ... heads, wondering why. And, by all indications from the Democratic National Committee, they've decided that they just need to do more of the same in the future.

That's because they're thinking like the long-term,

New Democratic National
Committee Chair Tom Perez

professional politicians that they are. So they're already preparing a detailed plan to make all the same mistakes again. If it worked in 2008, it ought to work in 2020, right?
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Here's what happened in 2016:

1. The Democrats presented a candidate who had no charisma and, even worse, she tried to fake it. Meanwhile, Mr. Trump just oozed personality.
2. While Secretary Clinton, just like President Obama, carried all the credentials of a viable candidate, the electorate, in 2016, wasn't checking credentials.
3. There was a bit too much emphasis on Mrs. Clinton's gender as being a good reason to vote for her, introducing a note for which the opposition found an easy counterpoint and one that was discordant for many anti-gender-bias Democrats. If a male candidate was not more qualified by being male, then neither was a female for being female. You can't have it both ways and many were offended at the attempt.
4. Secretary Clinton was carrying a lot of political baggage, some of it for over twenty years. This load included, whether deserved or not, issues associated with the Whitewater controversy, Travelgate, Filegate, a cattle futures controversy, her response to the Lewinsky, Jones, et al scandals, her leadership of the Clinton presidency healthcare effort, as well as Benghazi, the Clinton Foundation and the email servers. Maybe she didn't earn it, but she had an unsavory reputation, nonetheless, that made her especially vulnerable to the negative spin from any opposition.
5. Just like President Obama, the Secretary was a known fellow traveler of the the corporate financial industry, not the most popular group since the 2008 economic debacle.
6. The Democratic platform was the same old thing while the Republican
candidate's platform, though changing hourly and presenting some highly problematic planks, was exciting and newsworthy. Oh, was it newsworthy!
7. The anachronism that is the Electoral College. Once upon a time, when we were much younger, we were the United States of America. However, we became the United States of America on November 19, 1863. Get over it.

Would Senator Sanders have been a more viable candidate? Probably not. He was a bit too fiscally pie-in-the-sky for an electorate still dealing with the aftereffects of the 2008 economic meltdown. Nor would he appear viable in 2020. Besides which, at his age, and as a conscientious worker, he'd likely not survive the rigors of the presidency.

Which Dems might be viable for a 2020 run? I'll limit this list to my preferences (not that I'd wish the top job on any one of them):

Elizabeth Warren, Senator from Massachusetts

 John Hickenlooper, Governor of Colorado

Kirsten Gillibrand, Senator from New York

First Lady Michelle Obama

 Vice President Joe Biden

!