Suck on it Pence. Itās a not a ātraditionā, itās just how things work out with ex-Presidents usually too old to campaign or canāt stand the new guy, like the Bushes.
It doesnāt happen often, but thatās just because it requires all these conditions:
It must be a second-term president - if itās a first-term president, heās either running for re-election, or is not popular enough to be helpful.
The second-term president must be popular enough to be helpful (that mostly ruled out G.W.Bush, who ended his second term at about 25% approval)
The president must be healthy and capable enough to campaign (that ruled out Reagan, whose cognitive abilities were well on the downslide).
The president must want to do it - and prior to 1990, the ideological and policy divide between the two parties was not remotely like it is today, and an outgoing president wouldnāt feel - as Obama surely, and correctly, does - that all his accomplishments would be reversed if his party lost the next election.
Here, then, is a condensed list of what Kavanaugh considers to be political questions: whether it is possible to disagree with President Trump; whether Ruth Bader Ginsburg is an āincompetent judgeā who has āembarrassed us allā; whether attacking a judge for his Mexican heritage is acceptable; whether the presidentās character matters; whether anti-Nazi protesters share moral culpability with Nazis themselves; whether daily presidential attacks on a special counsel are acceptable; whether the president can order torture worse than waterboarding; and whether he can order the prosecution of his political enemies and command that prosecutions of his political allies be dropped.
