Dear Dems, if you wanna win in 2020, don't nominate a moderate.

Every Election cycle this conventional wisdom that the "moderate" candidate is more electable keeps being perpetuated by the media.  But as far as the Presidential Elections go it has consistently failed every Election in my living memory, (1992 to the Present).

In each of those Elections one of the major parties nominated an "electable" moderate and the other someone perceived as representing the Populist base of the Party.  And each time it was the Moderate who lost.

Now look, I know full well lots of Progressives insist Obama was a Moderate, and plenty of Conservatives insist Bush was not very Conservative at all.  But that's not my point, compared to the other viable options in those primaries, Bush and Obama were the Radical choices and they won.  Meanwhile the John Kerrys and John McCains lost.

As far back as 2014 I was figuring the upcoming Election would follow this pattern.  Trump however was unusual enough that I started to think maybe, maybe, this one will break it.  But no, he still won, and I still wasn't that surprised.

But I also know Sanders would have won.  The Rust Belt states which were the key to Trump's victory were filled with people voting on the Protectionism alone, I live in one of those states, Wisconsin.  The key to Trump's victory here, a state that hadn't gone to a Republican in a Presidential Election since 1984, was a lot of those one issue voters who voted for Sanders in the primary but Trump in the general.

Now, dethroning a sitting President is inherently more difficult.  But the last three Successful Reelections were indeed partly because the opposition nominated a dull moderate.

But I do think defeating Trump will probably require someone even more radical then Sanders, Sanders feels a lot less Radical now then he was in 2016 because of how much progress the Left has made online in such a short time.  We're going to need someone calling for a Basic Income.

If the Dems nominate an Elizabeth Warren, they will lose.  The Dems most recent victories have been with younger candidates, ones barely old enough to be eligible to run.  On average younger candidates are more radical.

A Candidate who can't get their own base excited, isn't going to get anyone else excited.