Thread by @SethAbramson

Seems to me Beto beating Trump by 12 points in Texas is one of the biggest pieces of 2020 news in a while. If Beto can put Texas in play to terrorize the GOP in 2020 the Dems have no choice but to find some way (POTUS, VPOTUS, assured cabinet member) to keep him near to the fold.

1/ The Beto-Trump Texas poll also propels Beto into 2020 relevance no matter where his polls sit now, because he's instantly become one of a small number of (at a minimum) top VP picks in this field. And the VP pick almost *has* to come from this giant, talented Democratic field.

2/ Realize how *small* the (*way* too early) likely POTUS/VPOTUS field is now, given that some folks presently only fit one likely role:

POTUS: Biden, Warren, Sanders, Harris, Buttigieg

VPOTUS: Warren, Harris, Buttigieg, O'Rourke (TX), Booker, Klobuchar (MN), Castro, Ryan (OH)

3/ Castro hasn't shown he can make a difference in Texas, and frankly it's not clear Ryan has done that with Ohio or that Ohio is even really in play this cycle. The Democrats can get Minnesota sans Klobuchar. So Beto's Texas polling is of paramount importance to the 2020 ticket.

4/ Remember too that not only won't Biden or Sanders be VP picks, but whichever of Warren or Harris (or both) comes close to being the candidate but misses may *not* be a viable VPOTUS candidate if the campaign was rough. So Beto is on a list of only 2-4 likely VPOTUS candidates.

5/ The one thing a viable VPOTUS candidate can't really do is drop out so early that the country gets to know lots of other VPOTUS candidates but not them. An early dropout also makes the VPOTUS candidate look like they're politically weak. So I'd think that Beto is here to stay.

6/ The question for media in covering Buttigieg is how long his polling can stay in the mid/low single digits before people are talking about him, Beto, and so on as fighting for VPOTUS relevance rather than having great hope of winning other primaries besides their home state's.

7/ That said, the Democrats don't necessarily expect to win Indiana, and it's not clear Buttigieg has sufficient profile there to win its Democratic primary or to have that win matter. By contrast, if Beto can win the Texas Democratic primary, it'd both show *and* mean something.

8/ The too-early likely pairings:

Biden/Warren or Biden/Harris
Sanders/Harris or Sanders/Klobuchar
Warren/Castro or Warren/Booker
Harris/O'Rourke or Harris/Buttigieg

We see here why, whatever their polling, Buttigieg, O'Rourke, Booker, Castro and Klobuchar remain very relevant.

9/ I could easily have swapped out two of the second-most-likely pairings:

Warren/Booker --> Warren/Harris

Harris/Buttigieg --> Harris/Brown (Sherrod Brown)

But it underscores that the number of folks very much "in" the conversation at this moment is only eight or so.