Richardson's troubles

Salon has a fairly well-written piece on Gov. Richardson and the problems he's having thus far in the campaign. I think it's pretty spot-on right here:

Of all the second-tier Democratic candidates, Richardson has been seen as the one most likely to make a move, mainly on the strength of his résumé. He's Hispanic, a Western governor, a former United Nations ambassador, a former secretary of energy, a former congressman, and a man who has personally negotiated with dictators and tyrants in Sudan, North Korea, Iraq, Afghanistan and Cuba. Plus, he is the only Democrat in the field who can pull off polished cowboy boots. But presidential campaigns are not about résumés as much as they are about performance, and Richardson has had his troubles

Granted, that's not a problem with Richardson as much as it is a failing of the American people ("Who cares about the issues? I want the slick talker!"), but it's unlikely to change within the course of this election. In fact, considering the that the two front-runners are both visible minorities in politics (not-white, not-male), I think that image is going to be the most important thing this election, rather than issues.


I really like where Richardson stands on a lot of issues. I like his stance on Iraq, I like his stance on Guantanamo, I like his stance on gays in the military. His stance on energy/oil dependency is pretty good. I definitely like that he wants to establish a minimum wage for teachers; that's an approach to education that I haven't seen taken seriously before and I think it's worth some thought. He's OK on health care - obviously, I'd love if someone had the balls to propose truly nationalized, affordable health care a la Britain or Canada, but I also do dwell in reality and know there's no chance of that happening. Overall, I think that Richardson is a fairly well-rounded candidate. And in my mind he gets extra points because if he's even a serious candidate it'll probably reduce the number of idiots who refuse to acknowledge that New Mexico is, in fact, part of the US.

But he needs to get it together, because, as the Salon piece says, no one cares about the issues. I don't know how peculiar to American politics that is, that we're so terribly fixated on how smooth a politician is rather than their stance on the important issues, but it bugs me. I personally don't give a flying crap how good of a public speaker he is, so long as he's willing to work his ass of on the important things.

Now, if only I had a brainwashing gun that could convince every other liberal in the country (ooh, and there I go using that dirty l-word...) to agree with me, we'd be pretty well set.