Chafee Campaign Stumbles Out Of The Starting Block

(This caricature of presidential candidate Lincoln Chafee is by DonkeyHotey.)

The campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination now has four candidates -- Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, Martin O'Malley, and most recently, Lincoln Chafee. Former Rhode Island governor Chafee announced his candidacy on June 3rd -- and personally, I think it was a rather strange entrance into the race.

He is basing his campaign on "internationalism" -- the idea that the United States should be a good member of the international community, instead of a bully that tries to force the world to bend to its own policies. It's not a bad idea (and I agree with the premise), but it is not an idea that most Americans are ready to accept. Most Americans are still enamored with the idea of American exceptionalism, and can't understand why all countries don't agree with the U.S. on everything. The idea that the U.S. is just one country out of many, and that we should cooperate internationally, is not a position that will get a lot of votes in this country (or even in the Democratic Party).

And neither will his prime example of the kind of change we need to make -- going to the use of the metric system like most of the rest of the world. The metric system is easier to use and makes a lot of sense, but it is an idea that has very little support in this country -- and it certainly won't get him the votes to become a viable presidential candidate.

Just look at the results of the recent Rasmussen Poll -- done on June 8th and 9th of a random national sample of 977 likely voters, with a margin of error of 3 points. It shows that only 21% of Americans favor going to the metric system, while a whopping 64% are opposed to it. To put it simply, this is not the kind of issue that can serve as a springboard for a campaign. It is the kind of issue that turns a candidate into an "also ran".

I have to say that Chafee has stumbled badly coming out of the starting gate.