The wealth tax is a DOA idea. It would almost certainly require a constitutional amendment, or if not it the only existing provision in the constitution would require the tax to be equal from each state so an equal amount would have to come from West Virginia as from California. The California billionaires would either end up paying a pittance or the richest in West Virginia would have all their wealth wiped out the first year.
All politicians throw out pie in the sky ideas during elections. This is one of them. What she would likely do it push to restructure the tax code so the richest pay more.
Many of the Democratic candidates are making the same mistake that happened in the recent UK election. There was one front and center issue that every person voting had on their mind: Brexit. The country is deeply split over it, but the divide does not fall along party lines. A lot of white working class voters who have always voted Labour are pro-Brexit and a lot of traditionally Tory voters are Remainers.
Boris Johnson took a simple approach with his pro-Brexit message: "Get Brexit done". Jeremy Corbin, the Labour leader, had a very muddled message about Brexit and talked about everything else. Even though there were lots of conservatives willing to hold their nose and vote for Labour if he took a stand to stop Brexit, Labour lost in one of the biggest landslides in the UK since the 1930s.
In the US the #1 issue is about Donald Trump. The biggest concern among Democratic primary voters is who can beat Trump. Free college tuition, Medicare for all, and the rest are all pipe dreams at this point. If the Democrats defeat Trump and get enough control of the Legislative Branch to get anything done, the first term and possibly the second of the next president will be all about fixing the damage done. Most people don't realize the extent of damage already done. This book outlines some of the deep damage being done:
https://www.amazon.com/Even-Worse-T...'s+worse+than+you+think&qid=1576415236&sr=8-1
Biden remains strong in the polls because even though the Democratic insiders cringe whenever he opens his mouth, he has his eye on the only thing that really matters right now. We need a lot of the things the Democratic candidates are talking about in at least some measure, but plotting the course to the next destination takes a back seat when a U-boat just hit the ship with a full spread of torpedoes. #1 job at that point is saving the ship and/or the crew.
Every Democratic candidate has problems and none have the natural talents at selling themselves that Barack Obama, Bill Clinton, and some of the charismatic candidates of the past had. Those are the unicorns in politics. Between unicorns we have to make do with the best of what we've got. I can make a pros and cons list for every candidate running on the Democratic side and there are serious cons for every top tier candidate. The top tier candidate are top tier because they all have some pros too. The also-rans often don't have a lot of pros going for them (among them doing a poor job of letting the country know who they are).
All the candidates polling above about 5% would be equally up to the main task of the next president: picking up the pieces and putting things back together again. Each would do it differently, but I don't see where any of them would do a better or worse job of it. All are about equally up to the task.
It's a good thing to think about the ideal political climate, and if the Republicans end losing big in 2020 and implode leaving the right incapable of winning many elections for a while (something Rick Wilson was predicting in 2015 if the Republicans didn't stop Trump early), it may be possible to start implementing some new liberal ideas by 2022 or 2024, but we need to get our allies to trust us again first, repair the damage to the federal bureaucracy, and deal with a population who is showing signs of PTSD from Trump's mayhem.
