White House 2012: who’s ready for a four-way race?

The billionaire Gorge Soros has now stepped forward in answer to the call I made right after the November 2 elections which were widely seen as a huge popular reproof of President Barack Obama.
 
"What do the next two years hold?" I asked here . "Already there are the omens of a steady stream of concessions by Obama to the right. At some point a champion of the left will step forward to challenge him in the primaries leading up to Obama's reelection bid in 2012. This futile charade will expire at the 2012 Democratic National Convention amid the rallying cry of 'unity.'

"The White House deserves the menace of a convincing threat now, not some desperate intra–Democratic Party challenge late next year."
 
Soros is the former currency trader and dispenser of billions to favoured causes, most recently California's failed pro-marijuana initiative. In 1992 he became known as "The Man Who Broke the Bank of England" after he hauled in $1 billion during the Black Wednesday currency crisis.

Last week the 80-year old Soros confided at a private gathering in Washington DC of progressive movers and shakers known collectively as the Democracy Alliance that  Democratic donors should direct their support somewhere other than the president. Soros told those in attendance that he is "used to fighting losing battles but doesn't like to lose without fighting".

He went on: "We have just lost this election, we need to draw a line. And if this president can't do what we need, it is time to start looking somewhere else."

The description of Soros's sensational remarks appeared on the  Huffington Post, citing unnamed sources, presumably at the private meeting. The article cited Michael Vachon, an adviser to Soros, as not disputing the story, though, "Vachon also clarified that the longtime progressive giver was not referring to a primary challenge to the president. Mr Soros fully supports the president as the leader of the Democratic Party. He was not suggesting that we seek another candidate for 2012."

So, if Soros doesn't favour a Democratic primary challenge against Obama and supports the president as head of the Democratic Party, but also says "it's time to start looking somewhere else," what exactly does he want? When he denies seeking another candidate for 2012, is he referring only to a rival Democratic candidate?

As I stressed here, any primary opponent to the President inside the Democratic Party is doomed: Obama would survive any such challenge. There has to be an independent, third-party challenge.

And as I also said, the left does have a champion in the wings, and one whom I am sure George Soros would be only too happy to support. This champion of the left with sound appeal to the populist or libertarian right was felled on November 2, and he should rise again before his reputation fades. His name is Russ Feingold, currently a Democrat and the junior senator from Wisconsin. Feingold has stayed mum about his plans, which is scarcely surprising. But Feingold is only 57 and it won't be long before a man who spent 18 years as a US senator, often in the headlines as a maverick prepared to buck his own party, hankers to be back in action.

But would a third-party presidential candidate have the slightest chance of winning against the nominees of the two major parties? The recent record is not promising. The political system is notoriously rigged against independents.

But when one considers a third party candidate's role as a spoiler, the historical record tells a different story. The Texan billionaire Ross Perot ran as the "Reform" candidate in 1992. He got 18 per cent of the vote and many Republicans believe that he cost George Bush Sr the White House in his reelection bid against Bill Clinton.

And though the claim is flimsy in the extreme, many Democrats believe that Ralph Nader's third party bid in 2000 allowed George Bush Jr to eventually prevail over Al Gore.

In other words, a challenge by Feingold would immediately force President Obama to the left, lest such vital constituencies as the labour unions tilt to Feingold, who has a solid record on such key issues as the Free Trade Agreements which have seen blue collar jobs vanish overseas.

But we're not done yet with the crystal ball. The 2012 battlefield could turn out to offer the voters a choice not of three but of four serious candidates. The last time this happened was in 1948, which saw a fierce contest between the Democrat Harry Truman and the Republican Thomas Dewey, and also, on the left, the Progressive Party's  Henry Wallace (formerly FDR's vice president) and on the right the pro-segregation Dixiecrats, led by Strom Thurmond.

The wild card for the Republicans is Sarah Palin. She has made it clear she's contemplating a run for the nomination, and not a week goes by but that the Republican high command gnashes its teeth at her enduring popularity with the party base, which is unfazed by Palin's gaffes with which the pundits and late-night comedians have such sport. The latest is her designation of North Korea as America's trusted client and ally.
 
But pundits and late-night comedians don't turn out in primaries and caucuses, and Palin's supporters do. It's to the low and middle-income populist Republicans that Palin is playing when she snaps back at former first lady Barbara Bush who told Larry King she hoped Palin would stay in Alaska. Palin promptly played the class card: "I think the majority of Americans don't want to put up with the bluebloods." She may not know much about the Koreas, but Palin can be a sharp counterpuncher.

If Palin does make a strong showing in the early primaries and the frantic Republican leadership cannot find an opponent tasked with overwhelming her and beating Obama, then we could see another independent making a challenge for the Republican/independent constituency.
 
And who would that be? The man with the money and the ambition for the role is the present mayor of New York, 68-year old Michael Bloomberg, the tenth richest man in the United States, who quit the Republican Party in 2007.

Last month, the Committee to Draft Michael Bloomberg announced it was renewing efforts to persuade Bloomberg (pictured) to wage a presidential campaign in 2012. Bloomberg's repeated denials of any intention to run are not taken as gospel.

An Obama-Feingold-Palin-Bloomberg donneybrook would make the 2011-2012 political season one to look forward to. "I don't think about Sarah Palin," Obama told Barbara Walters last week when she asked him if he felt he could beat the Alaskan, who had earlier told Walters she could beat the President in 2012.  

Mr President, you lie! Of course you think about Palin. Each night, as you and Michelle kneel at the bedside in prayer to the Disposer Supreme, you jointly implore him to ensure Palin wins the Republican nomination. Obama knows who came from behind in that 1948 four-way race: the Democrat, Harry Truman. ·