Another day, another official entry into the Democratic presidential primary race. Of course, this one is something of a retread because this campaign has already been mostly officially underway for a couple of months. New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand opted to forgo (or at least postpone) the official “big speech” announcement and just post a video to her YouTube channel instead. Gillibrand launched her exploratory committee earlier this year and has been in the polling mix all along. (Reuters)

U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand formally launched her presidential bid on Sunday morning, announcing she will deliver her first major speech next week in front of Trump International Hotel in New York City.

Gillibrand, who launched an exploratory committee earlier this year as a precursor, joins more than a dozen other Democrats who have already formally entered the contest to win the nomination to challenge Republican President Donald Trump in the November 2020 election.

“We need a leader who makes big, bold, brave choices. Someone who isn’t afraid of progress,” Gillibrand says in a video released Sunday morning to formalize her entry into the campaign. “That’s why I’m running for president. And it’s why I’m asking you for your support.”

Since she went to all the trouble of making the video, I suppose we’d best give it a look, eh? Don’t worry. It’s only two and a half minutes long and the frenetic pace makes it seem to go by rather quickly.

Well, that was certainly… something. Gillibrand has based her entire launch message on the last line from the Star Spangled Banner. (At least the last line of the version we typically hear. Parts of the other three verses are considered problematic.) Kirsten Gillibrand wants to know if our nation is still brave. And she wants you to know that she’s definitely brave, demonstrated by her many achievements (?) she lists in the second half of the video.

Parts of the message may be landing with a bit of a thud, however. She assures us that one week from now, on March 24th, she’s going to be giving her big speech right in front of the Trump International Hotel in New York City. Why? To show you that she’s “taking her positive, brave vision of restoring America’s moral integrity straight to President Trump’s doorstep.”

I don’t want to give any spoilers away here, but President Trump’s doorstep is currently located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington. That place in New York is just a hotel that he owns.

Gillibrand offers up the moon landing as proof that we brave Americans can do anything we set our minds to. As agenda items, she offers up “universal healthcare, paid family leave for all, end gun violence, pass a Green New Deal, get money out of politics and take back our democracy.”

So she wants to deliver single payer, that will bankrupt us virtually overnight and produce a race to the bottom in terms of quality health care. Paid family leave for all will break small startup businesses with few employees, which is why there are so many exemptions wherever it’s tried on the state level. Maybe shoot for paid family leave for some? She’s backing the Green New Deal, which even the Speaker has run away from like it has fangs. (Not to mention being another path to bankruptcy.) Oh, and she’s also going to end gun violence. Really? I can’t wait to hear how the gun confiscations will be rolled out.

Oh, yes… we’re also going to bravely put an end to money in politics. And if you’d like to help Senator Gillibrand get money out of politics, you can do so by visiting her donation page.

The Senator has a long slog ahead of her. Wherever she goes, annoying people seem to want to ask her about how she managed to flip-flop on virtually every position she ever held as recently as 8 years ago. And those questions have clearly had an effect. The RCP average of primary polling puts her at 0.5%. (No, that wasn’t a typo. She’s at half of one percent in a batch of surveys with a margin of error averaging between three and four percent.) The last big Morning Consult survey has her at one percent, and it looks like they were rounding up to be kind.

All of these numbers make me think that National Review’s Jonah Goldberg was only half joking when he responded to the announcement like this.

To the delight of literally dozens. https://t.co/yGAKd7mRnG

— Jonah Goldberg (@JonahDispatch) March 17, 2019