It was. I agree with the “it’s culture, not policy or ideology.” Shouldn’t be that way at all. But I think that’s how Americans vote.
First off, the vast majority of people who do vote — and our turnout rates are abysmal — choose their team early in their adult lives and stay with them, through thick or thin. Team D or Team R. Then you have a much, much smaller group that can be persuaded one way or another . . . and that group is mostly impacted by culture signalling, but some do think in terms of policy.
Lastly, you have a group of no-voters who could be persuaded by great policies and an inspiring vision, but neither party risks those, typically. Instead, they keep things dumbed down and lizard-brained. The Dems, at times, will trot out a wonky candidate, without the vision thing, or any charisma, and they inevitably lose to the usual scare tactics of the GOP. I may be forgetting a candidate here or there, but I think RFK was the last Dem who hit the trifecta: policies, vision and charisma. I have no doubt that if he hadn’t been shot, he would have won the presidency.
Warren? She’s the best of the bunch after Sanders, IMO — relative to the other candidates. The DNC will do everything it can to stop Bernie, so if they hitch their wagon to Warren, it will at least be an improvement over the usual centrist. But I differ from Ball in this. I think she’ll defeat Trump, unless the Dems botch the Impeachment hearings. Counter to the conventional wisdom, impeachment didn’t hurt the GOP last time. People forget that they won the next election and held Congress for most of the next eight years.
If that was the “price” paid for impeaching Clinton, I think any party would take that.