Even when he was running for president, Lincoln Chafee did not go so far as to predict he would end up in the White House. “I’m running to give the people a choice—that’s my goal,” he said, when I asked him to make such a forecast. “Let them decide.” It was a crisp, sunny September day in New Hampshire, and Chafee, whose ruddy head is topped by a mushroomlike cap of gray-blond hair, was standing in a grove of trees, having finished his speech to a group of Democrats gathered in a local activist’s backyard.
Chafee dropped out of the race Friday, having apparently realized what was always clear to just about everyone else: that his candidacy was an exercise in pointlessness. A few weeks ago, I joined him in New Hampshire in an attempt to figure out what, exactly, he thought he was doing—but the mystery only deepened.
I had sought out Chafee because he seemed to epitomize a field of presidential candidates notable for its sheer profusion: Combining Democrats and Republicans, it stood, at its peak, at 22 major entrants. (With Chafee’s exit, there are now only—only!—18.) Most clown cars, the metaphor pundits tend to reach for to describe this crowd, couldn’t hold this many bozos. It is the largest field for 100 years. Never before have so many—with so little chance of success—sought America’s sanction to lead the country into the future.



