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Ear to the Ground

Bayh Not Running in ’08

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Posted on Dec 17, 2006
Bayh
indystar.com

Sen. Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) has announced he won’t run for president. The moderate said facing so-called political celebrities like Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama made the odds “longer than I felt I could responsibly pursue.”

Los Angeles Times:

Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana, a centrist Democrat who had prepared for years to seek the presidency, announced Saturday that he had decided not to run—underscoring how daunting it is to build support in the shadow of the celebrity candidates who dominate both parties.

Bayh had announced two weeks ago that he was establishing a committee to explore a presidential bid. But in a statement issued Saturday, he indicated that it would be hard to compete with Hillary Rodham Clinton’s huge fundraising machinery and Barack Obama’s star power if both senators decided to run.

“The odds were always going to be very long for a relatively unknown candidate like myself, a little bit like David and Goliath,” Bayh said. “And whether there were too many Goliaths or whether I’m just not the right David, the fact remains that at the end of the day, I concluded that due to circumstances beyond our control the odds were longer than I felt I could responsibly pursue.”

Bayh got a leg up this fall when former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner, another moderate Democrat, decided not to run for president. But Bayh’s struggle for traction also illustrates the challenge he would have faced running in the liberal-leaning Democratic Party as a moderate without a passion-inspiring message.

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By vet240, December 18, 2006 at 11:03 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)

Oops! After all my spell-checking too, I knew that!

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By don mclean, December 18, 2006 at 3:26 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)

bayh bayh miss american payh…

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By Hoosier Populist, December 18, 2006 at 9:46 am #
(Unregistered commenter)

Thank God! Evan’s reasons for not running demonstrate why he will not make a good candidate.

His caution and his apparent concern only for himself (because running and losing might “look bad") are two big reasons why I am not a big fan of my fellow Hoosier.

Like the previous poster, I would love to see someone like Dennis Kucinich in the Oval Office. But unlike the previous poster, I realize Dennis is currently a congressman, not a senator.

Evan Bayh, has started sounding more like an actual Democrat (rather than a corporate lobbyist as has been his history) in the past year, but he still hasn’t convinced me he’s had any kind of change of heart. He definitely needs a weather vane to know which way the wind blows.

His reasons for not running for president show that nothing has really changed with this self-serving Republicrat.

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By vet240, December 17, 2006 at 5:18 pm #
(Unregistered commenter)

Oh yes! We need another star in the White House. Let’s all be sure to vote on the basis of how pretty or how well the candidate can schmooze.
We might even fall for the single issue candidate. Gay marriage is a good one, or how about Stem cell research? Wooooh! Serious issues to be sure!

Meanwhile the world of survival (Global warming, American christian driven Imperialism and the disemination of wealth and resources are posited as minor issues. Get your heads out of your...your...well anyway Please!

God/Allah/Buddha/enter your God here, forbid we get a President who actually reads and thinks for him/herself. Senator Kucinich, with years of experience isn’t pretty, and he doesn’t know many jokes, but he gets to the guts of issues the old fashioned way, he studies! He also sounds like he understands the principle of Constituency leadership.

He’s my next hope.

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