Mario Coumo was outstanding. This speech ranks high in American social-political oratory. (Through my work on Native American burial protection and repatriation issues, I got to meet with Governor Cuomo several times. The traditional Iroquois had come to trust him when he served at other levels of state government. I was offered a position in the office of Indian affairs he created, which was quite the honor for a woodchuck like me. But I already was working with the Council of Chiefs.)

"but the dream shall never die"

Maybe even slightly better, on the delivery of it....

Certainly miss BOTH of them, on what they would be saying about Trump if they were still with us!

by two of Ted Kennedy's staff -- published in 2015 -- is one of my favorite books on the skills of the man I consider our country's greatest Senators. (I only saw him once in my life, as we sat in the same ringside row at Frazier vs Ali 2 on January 28, 1974.) As far as working in the Senate, he definitely had greater abilities that brothers John or Robert.

While I favored Kennedy's advocating for universal health care, while President Carter told him his bill had to have more room for private insurance companies, there were parts I became uncomfortable with. It's true that in the summer of '79, polls showed his numbers were twice Carter's, that didn't last as long, as he carried on to the Democratic National Convention. Still, it was a great speech.

I always like Gary Hart. He had a few personality quirks, and sometime people place more attention on those when the person is highly intelligent -- which he definitely was. It is less frequent that they are focused on with a more common politician of average smarts. They do seem to show up to the slug in office today. I think Hart had the potential to be a great president, though he engaged in some "monkey business" that knee-capped his '88 run. (Note: my brother the cynic had not shared my opinion of Hart. However, when pictures of Donna Rice were published, he told me that was the one thing he agreed with Hart on. I am glad to say he has matured into a solid Democrat today, and engages in grass roots activism.)

Jesse Jackson was always someone I had great respect for. My oldest brother also tended towards the Irish addiction to arguing every fu__ing thing, including his opion of Jesse. So I took him to see Jackson speak, and he made a 180 turn in his opinion. Now, in the 1988 primary, his show of strength -- including with red neck farmers who are prone to supporting republicans -- should have earned him a spot on the ticket. I was in the park in Boston when Jesse met with Dukakis.

Raygun would have been hard to beat for any Dem at the time. The cocaine was flowing by 1984 and the nation was on total party mood, money to be had in them thar hills, Raygun has delivered us from evil, cut taxes on rich people and unleashed untold mentally disabled people into the streets for good measure. The 70s were tough and the consumerism of the 1980s was like an opiate. Didn't last long, but the end of the 1980s we saw the sludge of Raygun policies. Mondale was a good man, but wasn't the guy to beat Raygun. Was Mario? I dunno.

Would have carried a second or maybe even a third state.

John Glenn was a legendary astronaut. Full stop.

but would have left Reagan with a few more bruises,
and won quite a few more states, in my humble opinion....

but, he wasn't the candidate of course.... "what if?"

Reagan and his handlers had a far better capacity to convince people he was the solution. Reagan was a trained actor, the Southern Strategy and the link between Republicans and evangelicals was ossifying, and the politics of other-ism was starting to emerge. Revelations from the Iran-Contra scandal - which I think was worse than Watergate - were a couple of years in the future.

I'm only glad I wasn't old enough to vote. Had that been the case, I'd have done something I would regret to my grave. (Young and ignorant and all that.)

It was a masterpiece of delivery and content.

And he preferred to keep them there. St. Ronnie was not going to be beaten in 1984. So there was no real reason to run a top candidate. It was much like 1996 when Republicans knew no one was going to beat Clinton, so Bob Doyle had to take one for the team.

What I've never understood is why we didn't have a better group of candidates in 1988. Bush was a weak candidate, a boring speaker with little to no charisma. And we nominated someone who was equally boring.

He was a good man.