Be honest, do you miss seeing more of Kamala Harris these days?
Don’t laugh at the proposition, even if it’s tongue-and-cheek and intended to evoke a
visceral response bordering on outright shock – or unrestrained anger. I could be mistaken, but the cackling vice president has been mostly absent from public view recently, the Democrat campaign powers-that-be evidently preferring to keep the voters’ focus on president senile Joe Biden himself so as to salvage any chance the current political power duo has to return to the presidency early next year.
This says a lot considering significant majorities of both Republicans and Democrats think doddering senile Joe is too old to serve another four years as leader of the free world.
Nevertheless, the current veep has been busy doing something, the Democrats allegedly seeing the intellectually challenged woman as a valuable liaison to essential party voter constituencies such as abortion loving young single women and, of course, African-American women. The two groups definitely overlap, which provides a proven niche for Kamala to exploit. Gas-up Air Force Two, pick an appropriate demographic destination and launch Harris into space!
Other than that, there’s really not much for America’s next-in-line to do for the Biden effort. Constitutionally speaking, Harris has no official duties other than those specified in the 25th Amendment or breaking deadlocks in the upper chamber, or counting the electoral votes when the time comes. If ever there was a vice president waiting around for her boss to suffer a personal crisis of some kind (physical, mental, impeachment), it’s Kamala. Who knows, she might even have something on her daily calendar prodding her to check into senile Joe’s whereabouts and status.
Sending Harris out to talk to “ordinary” voters is a lose-lose situation, however. Asking her to shoulder real responsibilities such as assuming leadership over the border crisis… Well, we all know how that one turned out. Senile Joe must’ve gotten a brainstorm one day and put her in charge of monitoring the Democrat congressional majority’s “Voting Rights” efforts a couple years back, too, but it didn’t go anywhere, either.
West Virginia wishy-washy moderate Democrat senator Joe Manchin let it be known that he wouldn’t be rubber stamping the Nancy Pelosi-led House’s version, so Harris failed there as well.
With the Republicans retaking the House majority after the 2022 midterm elections, lonely Kamala hasn’t had many 50-50 senate ties to break, either. Ditto for Supreme Court nominations or news headline making legislative roadblocks. Heck, it’s arguable that Harris’s most important duty in recent times was sitting behind senile Joe and applauding during his State of the Union address last month.
As a side note, when her husband entered the room before the speech, she was seen beaming and gesturing to her hubby seated up in the gallery – “No kissing!”. Funny!
At any rate, seeing as she’s a recognized and undisputed campaign liability, Harris’s state of nothingness periodically inspires calls to replace her on the Democrat ticket this year. The thought gives some people hope (not Republicans!). It’s not going to happen. In a biting commentary titled “With or without Biden, Democrats are stuck with Kamala Harris”, former budget cruncher J.T. Young wrote at The Hill last week:
“There is even less reason to believe that her constituencies would be quiet if she were snubbed. Who would mollify them from the list of likely contenders? No one checks as many boxes on the identity-group politics bingo card as Harris. And none can claim the same executive experience at such a high level — unless Democrats are willing to admit publicly what they know privately: Harris has not been a good fit as vice president…
“[A]t 37.2 percent, Harris has a lower favorability rating than either Trump or Biden. Matching Democrats’ share of the 2020 vote, essentially only the party faithful view Harris favorably.
“The conclusion is that Democrats are stuck with Harris. If they could have removed someone from the ticket, she would have been the logical first choice. Democrats did not do it. And they did not ditch her because they had put her on the ticket for a reason, despite her devastating and highly personal attack on the nominee. That reason still prevails among Democrats. Democrats cannot afford to drop Harris because that would be bad. And Democrats cannot replace Biden with Harris, because that would be even worse. So Democrats are stuck with Harris, and therefore they are stuck with Biden.”
The thought is sobering, isn’t it? It’s safe to say that party voter bases sometimes dislike vice presidents and drop hints about desiring to replace them, but I don’t recall an instance where the rumors ever reached actual threats to the ticket’s backup player like they have with Kamala.
During Donald Trump’s term, for example, some MAGA adherents thought Mike Pence was too invisible and unsupportive of Trump when he was in crisis to justify giving him another four years as vice president. At various times, names were floated as potential Pence-replacements, typically women who would appeal to constituency x or y.I don’t recall any talk about removing senile Joe as Barack Obama’s errand boy, but that doesn’t mean there weren’t any. Biden was always known as an empty suit who wasn’t good for much other than attending state funerals or appearing in photo ops with “The One” so as to make it seem that senile Joe was intimately involved in day-to-day operations.
Judging by Obama’s tepid reaction to Biden’s 2020 candidacy, one gets the impression that the two aren’t close. Sure, even to this day, when the former power pair get together, they yuk it up for the cameras and pretend to enjoy each other for as long as required to perpetuate the buddy-buddy con. For his part, senile Joe genuinely seems to admire and respect Obama, but the feeling isn’t mutual. To the Big O, senile Joe is like a pesky little brother who won’t shut up and stay in his place.
The dynamic between senile Joe and cackling Kamala is different. They do a passable job feigning warmth at the official functions, but it’s clear that doddering dunce Biden neither likes nor trusts Harris, the festering wounds from the ambitious California senator’s stinging critique (in the 2020 Democrat presidential race) of Biden’s “racist” associations early in his senate career still fresh and painful.
Plus, it’s equally obvious that Dr. Jill Biden’s daggers are primed and ready for Kamala whenever the latter is around. Kamala’s husband (Doug Emhoff) – that’s another matter!
I’m not sure the enmity has reached the level of needing a food-taster for the president whenever the vice president is in the White House, but I’d be shocked if Biden isn’t on full alert and watching his back for Kamala lurking nearby and behind him.
But J.T. Young is correct – Democrats are stuck with Kamala Harris one way or another. Simply put, they can’t win with her, but to jettison her – or replace her – would infuriate their most loyal followers. It’s been said over and over, but senile Joe backed himself into a corner over four years ago (just before the pandemic hit) by promising to choose a woman for his running mate. The category narrowed further – much further – when the George Floyd riots and leftist activists insisted that the female nominee be a minority. They meant black.
Ever since Harris joined Biden’s effort, she’s acted like a lead ball-and-chain around his ankle. Senile Joe couldn’t send her out to campaign when he wasn’t able to because she invariably committed a gaffe that made the evening news. And again, not in a good way. Kamala’s presidential campaign flamed-out for a good reason. Beyond being a minority female, there wasn’t anything below the surface in her case.
Young also pointed out that California, Harris’s home state, supplied much of Biden’s popular vote cushion in 2020 even though the state was never in doubt for Electoral College purposes. Therefore, ditching Kamala might not make a difference in the 2024 totals, but the Golden Staters obviously enjoy having one of their own so close to power.
And now that the federal COVID “stimulus” money has run dry for big blue states, California’s fiscal problems will sink any prospects for Gov. Gavin Newsom to be a possible Biden replacement, should the president’s multitude of actuarial challenges get the best of him. That leaves Kamala Harris as arguably the west coast’s most powerful politician. Scary.
So now that Democrats are stuck with Harris, what can they do with her? One, they can ignore that there’s anything inherently wrong with the woman and consign her to making appearances before the Democrat base voters who seem to love her. This they’ve already been doing, and it’s a signal from the campaign brains that they’ve given up tasking her with something more meaningful to chase after.
Or two, they can run an all-out candidate “boot camp” with the goal of turning Kamala into the type of vice-presidential candidate who inspires confidence in people that she’s capable of assuming power at a moment’s notice. But haven’t Democrats been doing this for years already? Some people can’t be helped. Harris flopped on immigration; she’s flailed badly on “voting rights” and they can’t even send her to deliver commencement addresses in the coming weeks because her nervous laugh makes her look even dumber than she truly is.
Identity-politics obsessed Democrats love having a black woman as vice president, so it’s possible that Harris could be used solely to raise money for other Democrats, since dinner attendees couldn’t care less that she’s inane and off-putting. Or Kamala could be packed into a bus with no set stopping point and the driver instructed to find the largest gathering of Israel-hating Palestinian sympathizers or young leftist freaks who love transgender kids to rev up.
Teachers unions would be another favorable target audience for Biden’s incompetent pal. With the many school choice movements around the country, there should be plenty of government school proponents who want a visit from Kamala!
For those few Americans who regret not having a chance to see Kamala Harris, don’t fret. Democrats are indeed stuck with her and she’s not going anywhere. Further, Democrats can’t make it seem like they’re trying to hide her, either. Democrats should look to the bright side, however – Harris is probably the one national figure who makes senile Joe look like a better alternative.
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