Posting Tony Quinn’s column above caused me to dig into back files of Fox and Hounds to a piece I wrote following the California Chamber of Commerce’s post-election conference after the 2012 November election. That was 2012, not this last election. In the final paragraph of the post I wrote the following:
Standing around at a reception at the CalChamber event, I said to Seema Mehta of the LA Times that given the governor’s success, the fact he likely could win re-election easily as we look at the landscape now, and if, an important if, the economy comes back, Brown might consider another try for the presidency in 2016 even at age 78. Mehta tweeted the comment and the governor’s top political aide, Steve Glazer, standing with us just rolled his eyes!
Steve Glazer is rolling his eyes over other matters nowadays, as any reader of this page knows.
As to Brown and a presidential run – the credentials are there, the national network not so much, but that can be overcome. Those in the Democratic Party who pine for a challenge to Hillary Clinton on the left would not be satisfied with Brown on a number of issues but would embrace his environmental record. Brown would fill some of the same space occupied by Clinton, but as Tony suggests, may appear more electable if the road becomes bumpy for the presumptive front-runner.
The question is: Does he want to expend the energy in such an effort?
From suggestions that his wife Anne Gust Brown could be a candidate for governor to Jerry Brown as a presidential candidate, the Brown household must be getting busy either ready to issue a slew of denials or they are making a lot of phone calls.
Until we definitely know which path they choose, the Browns are good subjects for prognosticators and columnists.