https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/ar...ual-harassment
Former Vice President Joe Biden invaded women’s physical space in a way that used to be uncomfortable and is now intolerable. He abandoned Anita Hill to the political wolves when she needed a friend on the Senate Judiciary Committee, and his signature criminal-justice law, once a political winner, now looks draconian to many Democrats.
Senator Kamala Harris, during her long career as a California prosecutor, was a cog in the prison-industrial complex.
Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, daughter of a lobbyist and former intern for New York Republican Senator Alfonse D’Amato, not long ago professed the kind of anti-regulation views on gun policy that most Democrats consider pure gun nuttery.
As a member of Congress, former Representative Beto O’Rourke voted more conservatively than the mean Democratic House member. His rhetorical gifts mask a suspiciously vague — some say empty — policy portfolio.
Senator Bernie Sanders is 77 years old and makes a lot of Democrats uncomfortable for a lot of reasons, not least because he himself still isn’t one.
Senator Elizabeth Warren has that Cherokee thing that started out messy and got worse when she tried to fix it.
Senator Amy Klobuchar is mean to her staff, Senator Cory Booker is too schmoozy and corporate-y to be trusted, and Pete Buttigieg is only 37 years old, the mayor of a city (South Bend, Indiana) that sounds like a town, and he’s gay in case anyone still cares about that outside the fortified precincts of Christian conservatism. Oh, and former San Antonio Mayor Julian Castro is, as one well-connected and very smart Democrat pointed out to me with dead seriousness, kinda short.
This is not a comprehensive list of people running for the Democratic nomination for president. But it’s a pretty good sampling of the range of disqualifications for the nomination. And those negative factors can serve as a banner under which people with lots of other qualms or agendas can rally.