“I’d like to be president.”

Those are the words numerous national publications attribute to former Secretary of State/U.S. Senator/First Lady Hillary Clinton from an event that took place during the weekend.

There are several reasons why we believe it is time for Mrs. Clinton to step aside as the standard-bearer of the Democratic Party.

Although many will point to the fact that Mrs. Clinton won the national popular vote in 2016 against now President Donald Trump, that is virtually irrelevant under the system established by the Electoral College.

The debate about whether the Electoral College system is obsolete is for another day. This is the system that has been in place since the nation began electing presidents – and it is highly unlikely to be going away anytime soon.

The fact is Mrs. Clinton won the 2016 popular vote by about 2.9 million tallies. However, she won deep blue California by 4.3 million votes. That means without California, Trump won the national popular vote by 1.4 million votes.

Unfortunately for those in the Golden State, it doesn’t matter if the Democratic presidential candidate wins that state by 10 votes, or 10 million votes: the winner still only gets 55 Electoral College votes.

We are understanding of the strong push by Democrats to elect a female president. However, beyond the fact that Mrs. Clinton has already run and lost, there are numerous other strong female contenders who stand ready to run under the Democratic banner in 2020. A brief listing shows:

U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris of California,

U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts,

U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York,

U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, and

U.S. Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii.

In our opinion, Democrats should go forward, rather than backward, in selecting their 2020 presidential nominee. Irrespective of the fact that her husband was president for eight years, Hillary Clinton seems like old news to us.