"Bloomberg Takes Steps Into 2020 Race and Signals an Unconventional Campaign Strategy."

This is a comment I wrote at the New York Times:

Mr. Bloomberg already has my vote. I was planning to vote for him long before he decided he wanted the job.

If the Democrats don't nominate Mike Bloomberg, we will be stuck with Trump for another 4 years.

Bloomberg or Trump. Take your pick.

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

New York Times - Bloomberg Takes Steps Into 2020 Race and Signals an Unconventional Campaign Strategy

The former New York City mayor submitted paperwork on Friday to enter the 2020 presidential primary in Alabama, the first state with a filing deadline, indicating he would pursue a risky strategy of skipping all four traditional early-state contests.

By Alexander Burns and Katie Glueck

November 8, 2019

Michael R. Bloomberg disrupted the Democratic presidential field on Friday as he took his first steps into the 2020 race, unnerving supporters of Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. and prompting Senators Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders to accuse Mr. Bloomberg of seeking to buy the presidency.

But Mr. Bloomberg’s early moves also signaled he would be approaching the campaign in an unconventional manner: In a dramatic acknowledgment of his own late start in the race, Mr. Bloomberg and his advisers have decided that he would pursue a risky strategy of skipping all four traditional early-state contests in Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina, and focus instead on big states that hold primaries soon afterward.

Mr. Bloomberg, who flirted with running for president in 2008 and 2016 and early this year, but had never taken a formal step to do so, filed paperwork and qualified for the Alabama primary on Friday afternoon. The Deep South state has the earliest primary filing deadline in the country, effectively forcing Mr. Bloomberg to put his name into contention this week if he did not want to get shut out of the ballot.

While Mr. Bloomberg has not made a final decision to run, his allies say he intends to enter the campaign. His consideration of a 2020 bid reflects the fluidity of the race and the angst among many leading Democrats about whether Mr. Biden is strong enough to win the nomination as a centrist standard-bearer. Mr. Bloomberg is also acting on his own longstanding ambition to be president: At 77, he is unlikely to have another chance to run if he does not attempt a campaign now.

Mr. Bloomberg’s moves have already rippled through an unsettled Democratic field. While polls show that most Democratic voters are content with their current array of candidates, there are significant pockets of unease, most of all among politically moderate donors and leaders of the party establishment who are concerned about Mr. Biden’s prospects in the primary and fear that Ms. Warren and Mr. Sanders are too liberal for the general election.

But Mr. Bloomberg will have to overcome considerable doubts across the Democratic Party about his own ability to win the nomination, and prove that he is more than a niche candidate for moderate elites.

On Friday, Mr. Bloomberg’s camp began to lay out in public a theory of how he might win the nomination: Advisers said he intended to stake his candidacy on big, delegate-rich primary states like California and Texas, where Mr. Bloomberg’s immense personal fortune could be put to extensive use.

Howard Wolfson, an adviser to Mr. Bloomberg, said in a statement that Mr. Bloomberg would not contest the early states where other candidates have been competing for months, and would mount his candidacy in a different array of states from the outset.

“If we run, we are confident we can win in states voting on Super Tuesday and beyond, where we will start on an even footing,” Mr. Wolfson said. “But the late timing of our entry means that many candidates already have a big head start in the four early states, where they’ve spent months and months campaigning and spending money. We have enormous respect for the Democratic primary process and many friends in those states, but our plan is to run a broad-based, national campaign.”