Bush won in 2004 with 286 electoral votes, while carrying Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Missouri, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, and Virginia, none of which are "sure things" in 2016. Bush lost Wisconsin narrowly in 2004 so that is another possibility, but given the number of states which go Democrat almost every election, the Republican nominee will have to win most of the toss-up states.
POTUS winners normally go from obscurity to prominence in a relatively short time. Hillary will have been a national figure for 24 years by 2016, which bodes ill for her chances. After six years of Obama, Republicans have a deep bench of credible presidential timber. The Democrats don’t.But we cannot get casual about the 2016 ticket; the stakes are too high. John McCain as Republican standard-bearer was a joke, ditto Mitt Romney as an ObamaCare slayer. The country desperately needs us to nominate someone who can, and should credibly be expected to, win.
To me that requires a clear-eyed look at what makes a strong resume for a presidential candidate. Should he be a senator, a governor, or what?
- Famous generals make good candidates, at least in not-so-recent history - but realistically, we have no generals who are renowned on an Eisenhower scale, so that option is out.
- Although Secretary of State was a major credential for presidential timber in the founding era, none has been elected since the Civil War, and Hoover was the only one without elected office on his resume when elected POTUS. So I think we can dismiss cabinet officers out of hand. And a MD, black or white.
- We don’t have a sitting president, so that is out.
- That leaves senators and governors. Which to choose? Basically, senators elected by the people, rather than by state legislators under the 17th Amendment, only go back about 100 years.
- The first senator to win a presidential election was Warren G. Harding in the wave election of 1920. Since then we elected
- Governor Coolige,
- Sec Interior Hoover,
- Governor Roosevelt,
- sitting POTUS Truman, General Eisenhower,
- Senator Kennedy,
- sitting POTUS Johnson,
- VP Nixon,
- Governor Carter,
- Governor Reagan,
- sitting VP Bush,
- Governor Clinton,
- Governor Bush, and
- Senator Obama.
- A glance at the list above reveals that the number of senators is only half the number of governors elected to POTUS .
- Scrutiny of the list shows that Harding’s victory in 1920 is the only example in history of a senator defeating a governor.
- Kennedy defeated Nixon, a VP - but VP is not an executive position any more than senator is.
- Obama defeated McCain, another senator - one of them had to win.
- On the losing side of the equation, a governor lost to Hoover, two governors lost to FDR, one governor lost to Truman, a governor lost twice to Eisenhower, a sitting VP lost to Kennedy, a senator lost to Johnson, a sitting VP lost to Nixon, a senator lost to Nixon, a VP lost to Reagan, a governor lost to Bush41, a senator lost to Clinton, a sitting VP and a senator lost to Bush43, a senator lost to Obama, and a governor lost to Obama.
- In summary, three senators have won the presidency, and five have lost it. Six governors have won the presidency, seven have lost it. Two VPs, one sitting and one not, have won the presidency, three sitting VPs have lost it. None of the VPs had been former governors; all but Bush41 were former senators.
By starting in 1920 I biased the results in favor of senators, including that wave election of a senator in the sample but excluding the preceding example of Governor Wilson defeating Taft in 1912.
My conclusions are that
The Republican Party should act in accordance with the seriousness of the situation. Obama is strangling the country, and has tow more years to do it. He is setting precedents which we dare not risk allowing another Democrat to extend. We should be desperate enough to nominate a famous - and good - governor as our standard bearer. That is probably Scot Walker. IMHO
- VP is a good way to get the nomination for, but - unless you serve under an outstanding president - not election to, the presidency.
- A nominated senator doesn’t beat a sitting president, and is only about 50% likely to beat another senator or VP.
- A nominated governor has almost a 50-50 chance of winning election even if the opponent is a sitting president. Yet the major parties don’t tend to nominate a governor unless they are facing a sitting president. It seems the only counterexample since 1920 was - 1920, when the Democrats were in bad odor following WWI, nominated the governor of Ohio, but got drubbed anyway.