If too many cooks spoil the broth, too many schnooks definitely spoil a presidential primary race.
Yes, I’m talking to you, Mayor Bill de Blasio, the 23rd Democrat to enter the 2020 presidential race. Does anyone reading this think de Blasio is a viable candidate? Unless the mayor himself is scanning this, I highly doubt it.
Whatever you think of de Blasio, he’s not stupid. He has to know that his chance of becoming president is the same as my cat winning next year’s Kentucky Derby. So why run?
A presidential race resembles the Derby. The more entries you have, the more chance of chaos. Earlier this May, we saw a 20-horse stampede nearly turn to tragedy, with the best horse not winning. Why so many in that race? That’s partly because the owners wanted to brag they had a horse running in the Derby.
In other words, their egos trumped their better judgment. And so it goes in politics. In 2016, 17 Republican candidates hurled insults back and forth across the debate stage, with the biggest bully winning.
Now Democrats have 23 candidates in the 2020 race, already too many for one night of debates. Why the glut? Vanity. They all want to be able to say, “I ran for president of the United States,” billing themselves as former presidential candidates when they go on the lucrative speaking circuit.
What made de Blasio finally decide to take the plunge? I think it was when Pete Buttigieg, the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, a city one-eightieth the size of New York, entered the race and immediately became one of the front-runners. Are you jealous of “Mayor Pete,” Bill? Do you also want a cute nickname?
A friend of mine, noting your birth name is actually Warren Wilhelm Jr., calls you WW II. No? How does Mayor Blah grab you?
Sorry to break the news, but that’s what most people think of you. What kind of job has de Blasio done as mayor? Blah. What do you think of his personality? Blah. Face it. Own it. And drop out!
Because we already have one clueless, egotistical New Yorker embarrassing us daily on the national political stage. We don’t need two. Doesn’t the rest of the country hate us enough already?
Follow playwright Mike Vogel at @mikewrite7.
This is a guest column. Mark Chiusano will return in June.
