In summer 2019 I wrote a number of articles suggesting that the Democratic Party’s best chance of beating President Donald Trump would be by nominating California Senator Kamala Harris.
That didn’t happen, but, in a roundabout way, might she still become president?
After all, how is one to understand how a feeble, almost 78- year-old man, during a pandemic and crisis around white racism, could end up being the Democratic Party’s presidential candidate this year? This is someone who first sought the nomination in 1988 -- 32 years ago.
But I think I understand why Congressman Jim Clyburn, the African American kingmaker from South Carolina, turned Joe Biden’s prospects around in that state’s Democratic primary last February, and made certain Biden would get the nomination.
Though they have tried to hide it until the election was over, Biden has been fading fast. Right until the end, he spent much of his time at home in little Delaware.
Biden did little campaigning, always in front of small audiences, took almost no questions from reporters, and refused to sit down for interviews with journalists not hand-picked by his staff.
In more normal times this would have demonstrated that he was physically simply not up to the demands of the job. Fortunately for those who will catapult him to victory, this was not much of a problem in 2020, as they could point to COVID-19.
So here was the Clyburn deal: The Democratic Black caucus in Congress would back Biden and allow him to finally become president, on condition he select as vice-president the person who not too long afterwards would take over. This was Kamala Harris, a Black woman, who might on her own have lost to Trump, perhaps due to racism.
The South Carolina state Democratic Party is predominantly African American – whites in the state are largely Republicans – so Clyburn could in effect control the process.
Hence we went from a raucous primary scramble, with both Biden and Harris polling poorly and donors deserting them, to a sudden triumph for Biden almost overnight.
Clyburn obviously told Biden that he could get the former vice-president over the hump on Super Tuesday if he agreed to choose Harris as his running mate.
The two other major contenders, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders, immediately folded their tents and endorsed Biden. This, too, must have been part of some grand bargain.
No doubt Barack Obama was in on this all along and he’ll be part of the team behind the scenes, in what amounts to a “semi third term.” After all, American Democrats revere him, and he received the most slanted media honeymoon in history.
No previous president has been so transparently partisan. Think of the animus other ex-presidents may have felt towards their successors, but none identified himself with a political “resistance” to a sitting president.
One small piece of evidence leading to the conclusion that Harris may soon take over was a piece of news that appeared in early October. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi indicated she wants to establish a commission to evaluate the fitness of a president under the terms of the 25th Amendment to the Constitution.
This wasn’t, she emphasized, just about Donald Trump. There was the need “for us to create a process for future presidents.” Was Pelosi using Trump as a stalking horse to get an early start on replacing Biden soon after he wins the election?
Mike McCormick, who worked with Biden from 2011 to 2017, in September told the Washington Free Beacon that the presidential candidate is “not the same Joe Biden. He’s lost a step and he doesn’t seem to have the same mental acuity as he did four years ago.”
McCormick noted that Biden seemed to get “lost” during interviews and no longer had the ability to smoothly go off script and connect naturally with his audience.
So maybe it was no slip of the tongue when both Biden and Harris, at separate rallies, called their campaign “Harris-Biden” while campaigning in Florida in mid-September, with Harris referring to the Democratic ticket as the “Harris administration, together with Joe Biden.”
I guess she already knew what lay ahead. Can you spell “placeholder?”
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