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Kasich not showing political hand during DePauw visit
He was the last Republican candidate left opposing Donald Trump’s 2016 nomination for president and he’s often the first mentioned in speculation that someone in the GOP might oppose the president in the 2020 primary.
But if John Kasich has designs on again running for president, he wasn’t revealing anything on his visit to DePauw University on Thursday.
During a press conference in advance of his Ubben lecture, Kasich wasn’t even directly asked about a possible 2020 bid before he shut down any talk of it.
The former Ohio governor and current CNN contributor spoke of speculation by other prognosticators that if Democrats move to the far left, and Trump remains on the far right, it could create “an ocean in the middle.”
However, asked where he fit in that ocean, Kasich had no answer.
“I don’t have any idea at this point. All my options are on the table,” Kasich said. “In terms of my political future, I really don’t know. I’m excited about what I’m doing and a number of things that I’m doing today. In terms of, ‘Is there a lane? Is there a path?’ It’s yet to be determined.”
Kasich said his current focus is more broadly on ideas than it is politics.
“I’m most interested in the development of ideas. I think that’s an exciting thing,” Kasich said. “What are the new ideas for the 21st century.”
In a visit that also included a talk with a group of students, Kasich said his DePauw visit was less about politics than it was about the “need to live a life bigger than ourselves.”
“All this tension on the people at the top is not as important as what we do where we live,” Kasich said. “The greatest impact we can have is not by posting on social media or by spending my time wringing my hands about Donald Trump or Nancy Pelosi. It’s about what I can do.
“We can wake up every day and make a contribution that changes the world in which we live.”
Inherent to that ability to change, though, is the ability to listen to a variety of ideas, which is an opportunity provided at DePauw and other universities.
“One of the keys is to open your mind and not shut your mind to new ideas,” Kasich said. “One of the problems that we have today is people want to just exist in a silo. They just want to be in a situation where if somebody is saying something I don’t agree with, I don’t want to listen to them. The way you open your mind and become a more interesting person is to entertain ideas that you might initially think are wrong.”
He added an example from a current political debate.
“Democrats are talking about a wealth tax. I may not like a wealth tax, but I am concerned about the growing gap between rich and poor,” Kasich said. “So why don’t we examine all the ideas to improve that — even ideas that I may not initially agree with, but ideas that can create a spark that can help me get on a roadmap to make things better.”
Even as our students are being exposed to new ideas, Kasich said, many politicians have shut themselves off to such opportunities.
“It’s not enough to just say I don’t like that idea on the left without having some idea about what your ideas are on the right of the spectrum,” Kasich said. “That’s where I think that the Republican Party has lost its way. They tend to be more negative than they are, ‘OK, what are your ideas?’ Without ideas, I don’t see why you’re really in politics.
“Ideas are really what generate enthusiasm and make political parties. If you’re just rejecting, I don’t think you win by rejecting. And you certainly don’t improve the public discourse if you’re negative and don’t have a better idea.”
With a proliferation of new ideas and advances in many areas —cars with auto assist driving, 5G technology, continual medical development — Kasich said we shouldn’t automatically assume politics is immune to such seismic shifts.
“There’s no reason to think that politics is somehow immune to change,” Kasich said. “What’s it going to look like in terms of, ‘Will we maintain two political parties?’ Everything is in flux and it’s interesting to sit back and pay attention to how American politics how people adhere to it is going to evolve.”