Stack Ranking the 2020 Presidential Candidates 2.0 The Post-NH, Pre-NV, Presidents Day Edition

President's Day is a good day to reflect on who might be our next President. During the formative years of this blog, the Dividist frequently maintained and updated candidate stack rank preferences over the course of a presidential campaign cycle (a couple of examples here and here from February, 2007 and February, 2008). Interestingly, some of the presidential hopefuls from those lists over a dozen years ago remain relevant in the campaign today, including Joe Biden, Mike Bloomberg, Rudy Giuliani, Mitt Romney, and Hillary Clinton.

As noted, the Dividist stack ranking is a preference not a prediction. The list, then and now, represent the top candidates the Dividist would like to see as President, stack ranked in order of preference, within an additional constraint of supporting a divided government outcome.

Ranking #Billionaires4President in 2020 - UPDATED 11/09/19

UPDATE: 09-November-2019

 Lyndon Johnson famously said "Whenever most Senators look in a mirror, they see a president.” The sentiment has been quoted, plagiarized and paraphrased by politicians and political pundits ever since.  Both Kennedy and Johnson were Senators before they were elected President and Vice President in 1962. While many Senators have run for president since Johnson served, none fulfilled that ambition until the election of Barack Obama in 2008.

In the wake of the election of Donald Trump, it's time to update that maxim:

"Whenever most billionaires look in a mirror, they see a president." 

And why not? After all, Donald Trump did it. How does a Mark Cuban look in the mirror and not think "If Trump did it, I can do it." Wealthy celebrities have expressed this sentiment directly. Consider Oprah Winfrey on Bloomberg:

“I never considered the question even a possibility,” Winfrey said about her pre-Trump thinking. “I though, ‘Oh gee, I don’t have the experience, I don’t know enough.’ But now I’m thinking, ‘Oh. Oh.'”

Or consider Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson at Vanity Fair:

“I wouldn't rule it out,” Johnson, 44, told Vanity Fair with a big smile ...“It would be a great opportunity to help people, so it’s possible. This past election shows that anything can happen.”

I'll say it again. Why not? It is worth noting that presidential campaign strategists don’t have a lot of imagination. They mostly fight the last war. Whatever worked in the last election becomes the template for what to do in the next election – only bigger and better. And what worked in the last election is this: A rich, blustering, boorish, but successful huckster/entertainer with absolutely no political experience and limited understanding of governing, foreign policy, or the constitutional framework of the United States was elected President of the United States. That happened. And when that happened the pool of future President wannabes got exponentially bigger.

This is not an original thought. Across social and mainstream media you can find many lists touting billionaires and celebrities who look in the mirror and see the next President of the United States. Examples include CNBC, People Magazine, INC, Observer, and Newsweek. Some will indeed run. In the brave new world of the Trump era, how do we separate the contenders from the pretenders?