"Fasten your seatbelts, it's going to be a bumpy night." - Bette Davis as Margo Channing in "All About Eve."
The 2020 election is 16 months off and contentiousness is inevitable. Cue the presidential campaign messages.
Incumbents' seeking re-election are usually retrospective: Here's what my administration, Congress, states, voters, et al., have accomplished.
Others are prospective: Here's what we must accomplish if I am re-elected (or in the case of challengers, elected). What's needed to make America better for all? How do we strengthen America's role as a reliable ally in an increasingly dangerous world?
The candidates exude confidence. They are optimistic, however challenging that will be. They reach out to all Americans, not just their "base." They know many will vote for the other guy.
President Trump, who filed for re-election on inauguration day, began his campaign by rounding up the usual grievances: He's been "under assault" by the "fake news media" and an "illegal witch hunt" to subjugate him and his supporters. He reliably mentions Hillary Clinton, drawing oxygen from "Lock her up" chants.
But woe to America if he is defeated. That would clear the way for his critics' "un-American conduct," including Democrats who "want to destroy you and ... our country" and "tried to erase your vote."
This from the president whose party is infamous for its years-long voter suppression campaigns to disenfranchise voters-who-are-not-Republicans, notably people of color.
Meanwhile, Democrats kick off their campaign with debates on Wednesday and Thursday from 9-11 p.m. for the nearly two dozen qualified candidates.
Of the 23 who've tossed their helmets into the ring, maybe eight have a reasonable shot: Former Vice President Joe Biden, Mayor Pete Buttigieg of South Bend, Indiana, and Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand, Bernie Sanders, Amy Klobuchar, Elizabeth Warren, Kamala Harris and Cory Booker.
Some candidates can be expected to turn a seemingly innocent episode into a Major Issue. Thus the furor after Biden, speaking at a fundraiser, used deceased Sens. James Eastland of Mississippi and Herman Talmadge of Georgia, both of them segregationists, to illustrate his argument that Washington functioned more smoothly decades ago than it does today.
"We didn't agree on much of anything," Biden said. But, "even in the Senate, there was some civility. We got things done." In short, he committed truth.
Three candidates were conveniently outraged.
Booker said Biden "is wrong for using his relationships with Eastland and Talmadge as examples of how to bring our country together." New York Mayor Bill De Blasio argued Biden is "longing for the good old days typified by Eastland [who] thought my multiracial family should be illegal." Harris said Biden was "coddling" segregationists, and "doesn't understand the dark history of our country."
That reminded me of the late Sen. John McCain, whose July 2017 speech on the Senate floor can reasonably be used to refute Biden's critics, especially when he complained, "We're getting nothing done."
He went on:
"Our deliberations today are more partisan, more tribal than any other time I remember. And right now they aren't producing much for the American people. ... Incremental progress, compromises that each side criticizes but also accepts isn't glamorous or exciting.
"I hope we can again rely on humility, on our need to cooperate, on our dependence on each other to learn how to trust each other again and by so doing better serve the people who elected us. Let's trust each other [instead of] trying to find a way to win without help from across the aisle."
Michael Loftin is a former opinion page editor for The Chattanooga Times.