There’s been much speculation surrounding what Nancy Pelosi, the 81-year-old Democrat apparatchik, and current House Majority Leader, will do next year. With her party almost certainly set to lose the congressional body she presides over, will she retire? Or will she keep going until she croaks?
We now have an answer to that — at least for now, as I’m skeptical this couldn’t change.
There’s something really pathetic and unseemly about someone in their 80s still feeling the need to desperately hold onto power like this. And to be fair, there are some Republicans that play this game as well. For her part, Pelosi is incredibly wealthy. She has numerous grandchildren. What part of her life isn’t providing the necessary fulfillment so as to push her to cling to her role in Washington?
Forget term limits for a moment. This country needs age limits to hold federal office, and somewhere around 70 seems about right to me. It’s ironic and nonsensical that the government forces the retirement of airline pilots at age 65 but we let doddering, senile geriatrics actually make life and death decisions about the country every single day.
Still, Pelosi really had no choice but to announce another run here. If she were to retire next year, it would send a signal to other Democrats that the House is good and truly lost. You never want your top leader calling it quits during an election year you are already expected to lose. For Pelosi to say now, almost a year in advance, that she’s done would be to wave the white flag.
Of course, the House is good and truly lost, at least by my reading of the tea leaves. Given that, I leave open the possibility that Pelosi either decides not to run next summer or that she runs, wins her seat (because a cup of water with a D on it could win in San Francisco), and then resigns shortly after. It’s hard for me to imagine her sticking around to be dictated to by the GOP for another two years, especially given she’ll likely be defeated by someone else to become Minority Leader.
I could be wrong about that, though. Pelosi might actually just be this pathetically addicted to power and notoriety, even if that means her having to spend her last years in office suffering in the minority. If that’s the case, then you can expect her to not leave until her health completely fails, and she doesn’t seem far from that point at times.