Super Tuesday’s winners and losers

Regardless of which side of the political fence you sit on, there were some clear winners and losers from this past Super Tuesday’s primary elections on the national and local scene.

Winners

Democrats: They did a common-sense intervention and put Bernie’s socialist revolution on hold again for another four years. The Democrats came out in force with one objective — defeat “The Grifter” this November. Let’s see how this plays out eight months from now.

Joe Biden: Like Lazarus, Joe’s back from the dead. He’s got “Joementum” going now that his Democratic enema cleanse included Mayor Pete, Amy Klobochar and Tom Steyer, who all dropped out right before Super Tuesday and endorsed Biden, along with Beto O’Rourke. Next Mike Bloomberg dropped out and also endorsed Biden. Then Elizabeth Warren dropped. However their names were all still on the ballots. Makes you wonder how many more votes would have gone to Biden if he went head-to-head with Bernie.

Rex Bohn: The thing about Sexy Rexy is whether you like him or not, he’s always out there working hard for everyone, including you. Atta boy, Rex!

Estelle Fennell: Congrats on getting 49.40% of the vote so far. Let’s keep our fingers crossed that Estelle will get 50% +1 when all is said and done. And to think that the Berniecrats in the Humboldt County Democratic Central Committee (HCDCC) supported Sean DeVries over Estelle, blocking Estelle from getting the HCDCC endorsement. DeVries didn’t even garner 5% of the vote. What’s that say about our local Berniecrats?

Losers

Bernie Sanders: The local progressives have been bragging how Humboldt County voted almost 70% for Bernie in the 2016 primaries. I always remind them, did Bernie win the California 2016 primary? Nope, that’d be Hillary. Bernie got less than 50% of Humboldt’s vote this 2020 primary and that’s with Humboldt State University in session (unlike California’s June 2016 primary). That’s not a good trend. Bernie recently went on “60 Minutes” and he couldn’t answer Anderson Cooper’s simple question: “How are you going to pay for Medicare For All?” This past week on Showtime’s “The Circus”, Dick Harpootlian, South Carolina State Senator said, “When you hang around Bernie enough, you really dislike him. He’s an old curmudgeon who’s rude to people around him. And Jane’s not much better. But they were warm and cuddly compared to Hillary.” Ouch!

Mike Bloomberg: Blew an estimated $500 million to prove that money alone can’t buy an election. Just think if Bloomberg could have taken that money to form a PAC (Political Action Committee) to support the winning Democratic candidate through the November’s general election. Unfortunately far too many billionaires suffer from greed and egomania.

Tom Steyer: See above with only $250 million flushed down the drain.

North Coast People’s Alliance: I really like the grassroots work they do out there. However they failed on one basic principal: candidates win elections. Considering their webpage lists almost everyone they have endorsed in the past has won… until Tuesday. They fell off a Cliff endorsing Berkowitz and Michael McKaskle lost badly. Cliff lost to Rex by almost a 2-to-1 margin and McKaskle garnered just above 11% of the vote. As I say, it comes down to the candidates, not the machine behind them.

Humboldt Progressive Democrats: So much for “all the Democrats will come out and vote for Cliff.” Ya gotta be more than a Bernie shill promoting Democratic Socialists in Humboldt. Look outside your bubble and realize that Dems come in all shades of blue, not just communists and socialist. Some of us actually work in the private sector.

Measure T — Eureka City Schools Albee Stadium property tax: Still might win (see below) however a basic 101 campaign would have guaranteed passage.

Election Night winning candidates: Due to the fact you can hand-carry your mail ballot to a precinct and postmark your ballot envelope on election day (or sooner) and have it counted, we won’t know the final election results for up to 30 days. The election night winning candidates (outside of Rex) will have to wait up to a month for the final results. Estelle Fennell’s 2nd District Supervisor and the Humboldt County Democratic Central Committee races are but two examples where we won’t know the clear winners for another three to four weeks.

Thank you to all who voted in this past Tuesday’s primary election. And to those who couldn’t be bothered to vote, you can’t complain for the next four years, especially on Facebook and Twitter.

Matthew Owen resides in Eureka, and believes the First Amendment allows for free speech, even when married to a Humboldt County supervisor.