It’s not quite official. But Lincoln Chaffee, in an announcement today from the George Mason Center for Politics and Foreign Relations in Arlington, Virginia, is expected to announce he’ll seek the Democrat Party nomination for president. Who is Lincoln Chafee, you might ask (I know I did)? Well, he’s a former governor of Rhode Island who failed to run for re-election because his approval numbers were reportedly so low. He’s also a former Republican senator who ditched the party following the 2002 Iraq war authorization. Sounds great. Let’s see…That makes three snoozer candidates for the Democrat party, and one self-described Socialist, none of whom tows the “diversity” line the Dems so like to beat the GOP with. Nope, they’re as old and tired as the policies they tout.
Former Governor Lincoln Chafee (Photo Credit: AltHistory Wiki)
Chafee, the son of Rhode Island Sen. John Chafee (R), was appointed to the U.S. Senate after his father died in 1999, leaving the seat vacant. As a liberal Republican, Chafee was reelected to a full term in 2000, before losing in 2006. He officially left the Republican Party the following year. He was elected governor as an independent in 2010 and joined the Democratic Party in 2013. His announcement Wednesday comes less than two years after he decided not to seek a second term as governor amid low approval ratings and the prospect of a bruising primary.
Central to Chafee’s presidential campaign: his 2002 Senate vote against authorizing the use of military force in Iraq in 2002, when he was the only Republican senator to oppose the measure.
Instability in Iraq has become an unexpected campaign issue in the GOP presidential race. Chafee is hoping it will once again take center stage in the Democratic contest, too.
“Don’t forget that probably the biggest reason that Senator Obama, at the time, defeated Hillary Clinton in ’08 was because of the Iraq war vote. That was the issue,” Chafee told CNN in April. “And that’s my big issue here, because we are dealing with [the] ramifications of that huge mistake that Senator Clinton made in 2002, which I did not make, and we live with it today.”
Well, he has a point about Hillary Clinton’s responsibility for helping to grow ISIS. I’ll give him that. And I welcome him unrelentingly thumping her with that hammer. But would I trust another Democrat to clean up her “huge mistake[s]?” Not a chance.
And does he think his past “allegiance” to another party will hurt him? Nope.
“I have not changed. My old liberal Republican stand on the issues does line up with the Democratic Party — women’s reproductive freedoms, support for working families. I have a 30-year record,” he said in April. “Also note that of the candidates here, [former Virginia senator] Jim Webb was a Republican and Hillary Clinton was a Goldwater Girl.”
At least he’s realized he’s indeed not a Republican, and left the party. Good move. But the fact that he voted for Obama twice is really all we need to know. You can read a few more interesting tidbits about him here.
If you missed the live announcement, you can watch it on CSPAN here.
Chafee’s about as interesting a candidate, at least to this Victory Girl, as Rick Santorum or Lindsey Graham, only with more wrinkles, though lacking Hillary’s hot flashes and colored hair. Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, Martin O’Malley, and now Lincoln Chafee. It’s a narcoleptic’s dream team!
UPDATE [2:00 pm pre-announcement]: Seems ‘ol Linc is about as tech savvy as Hillary “I Can’t Run Two Email Accounts on One Phone” Clinton: He can’t find at least one of his social media passwords. Seriously, has it been THAT long since he used them? From Twitchy:
“His campaign has lost track of the log-in credentials to the Facebook page that staffers started and managed for Chafee as governor, Rich said, and that page seems to be attracting more attention than the page he has set up for 2016, so now they’d like to merge the two.”
Well, this is going well. Like Queen Hillary, Chafee may need a roll-out do-over, too. Stay tuned…
UPDATE [2:30 pm]: It’s official: Chafee’s in.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OYWWBA6eTmU
And he’s…running an anti-Bush campaign. How very 2007.
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