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I'm so glad you asked. Can I come in?
Pete Buttigieg primary qualification as a "politician" is his Mayoral victory in South Bend Indiana, 2011, where they got elected with 10,991 in a town of almost 100,000. The next time they ran, they got all of ~8k votes in an election where less than 10% of residence voted (2015).
Somehow this warranted Buttigieg to be present on a national stage, where in 2019, they decided to run for president. They were taken extremely seriously by media outlets like NPR and other corporate media outlets, often being touted as a kind of moderate but still progressive alternative to Sanders. Candidates like Buttigieg were used to split the progressive vote during the primaries, divides which still exist today. Buttigieg then went on to strategically depart the race 3 days before Super Tuesday, a primary consisting almost entirely of states that will never vote D and yet somehow considered the litmus for who the Democratic candidate should be, and then going on to endorse Joe Biden, who up until that point, who had no primary wins before that date.
Buttigieg was principal in the rat-fucking of Sanders in 2020 and was given a token position in the cabinet as a result. They are a cypher, a schemer, and the reason why you are seeing anything about them is because they have substantial backers from their time in consulting who would benefit greatly if they were in power. This article wouldn't exist if not for the fact that Buttigieg will 100% be touted out as the "reasonable" candidate in 2028. And as much as the rat-fucking might seem like the principal critisim I have of them, its actually fine. I can respect some rat-fucking (for example, if Warren had dropped out and endorsed Bernie, I'd have her face tattooed on my right ass-cheek). What I can't respect is the national media taking this guy seriously when they've won no elections of any real substance. Buttigieg doesn't get to be considered seriously as a voice in politics until they win a federal election or a Governership. They need to show that people actually want to vote for them before they should be taken seriously.
*(Earlier, I was mistaken to call them a one-time mayor; they did get re-elected)
Between Pete, Warren, Gabbard, and Klobuchar, it's clear that the DNC would absolutely never allow Bernie to become the nominee. They had half a dozen others lined up, like Booker, Ryan, Delaney, and of course Harris, but none of them were charismatic enough to actually win some votes. Vote Centrist, No Matter Who.
Like I said, I can excuse the ratfucking. Its the name of the game. But what I can't excuse is people taking a guy who has never won an election of any material substance seriously. We can't afford to run candidates who don't have a track record of winning federal elections. The number one qualification for a candidate needs to be their ability to win the election.
I actually agree with you otherwise, but I think a candidate could come entirely from outside politics and still be a good candidate. You won’t know them until you see them, but it can happen.
I can't excuse ratfucking. The name of the game is literally democracy.
There's no predicting who can win what election anymore. There's no predictive value in knowing someone won such and such demographics on whatever type of ballot. I don't want Pete to run because I think he's paper thin on almost any meaningful issue. He'll say whatever he thinks will get him the most votes in the moment, and he'll abandon those principles the minute the winds change. He would be better than Trump, because he isn't a felonious child raping grifter, but that's not a reason to support the guy. That's a reason to find someone who is actually a leader, who will stand on their convictions, and fight for actual justice.
I 100% agree on not wanting to win, but I make the argument that the flimsiness of their political identity is their liability; and this is because I don't agree with you on your first point, because I do think that we can build up effective analyses that are fairly predictive of elections.
And that difference is critical, because what we're identifying, that Buttigeig is about as deep as a puddle in their political identity, the traditional political consultant class "wisdom" sees that as a feature, not a bug, because they can recast the candidate for whichever donors they plan on trotting them out to. To them, a lack of political depth to a candidate is a good thing. And I'm citing that specifically as a determining factor in both recent and future elections: People will not show up for people who's only reason for being in politics is the pursuit of power.
How may viable Democratic candidates exist that have a track record of winning Federal elections?
"Viable" is a loaded term, which is specifically why I default to an actually testable litmus: Have you won a Federal election? Demonstrating you can win an election is the "proof" of viability. Everything else is hand wringing.
So viable Democratic candidates: Any House or Senate Democrat, or any Democratic governor is viable. All of them are viable under my definition: Buttigieg is not.
Why are you using gender neutral pronouns for it? Is it because it removed its pronouns from its Twitter bio?
Because my criticism is broadly about "candidates", not just Buttigieg, although I have a special ire for them because of the utterly unwarranted amount of un-earned media they received in 2020.
National media sources are constantly used to elevate profiles to the national stage which are utterly unworthy, and its done entirely through pieces like the one linked to in this article, and its done by those who have undue influence over media. These are the billionaires backing Buttigieg, and stories like this one are basically a plant.
Also, in general, I try to default-write in "they"/"them" pronouns when I dont' positively know someones preferred pronouns. Its an easy and relatively modest change I can make to be more inclusive in my writing.
I looked him up to see if he used something other than he/him and found that he removed his pronouns from his bio in January, a not-so-subtle jab at trans people. Add it to your pile of why he's shitty.
They're a cypher. Pete Buttigeig doesn't "believe" anything, per se. A belief for someone like Buttigeig is something that is transacted for via a campaign donation.
Buttigeig wants power and will adopt whatever beliefs they think will get them there. And importantly, this kind of vapid, corporate candidate, panel tested politics is why the Democrats struggle as mightily as they do. A Buttigeig doesn't stand for anything, and so they come across as incredibly disingenuous because they are.