It appears she’s dropping out of the presidential race. This is a shame; she wasn’t my choice for a candidate, but she belonged there far more than about a dozen other contenders.
Now, could all those other people who have gotten even less traction than Harris take the hint and go away?
I agree that Harris was a great candidate. Although Warren also appears to be a great candidate and Sanders is pretty darn good himself, I think that it would have been good to continue to have Harris’ input into the important issues of the campaign. Also merely seeing her on the debate stage on equal footing with the other candidates sends a message to girls and young women of color, and I’ll be said to lose that.
That said, she wasn’t polling well, and we do need someone to defeat Trump (or Pence, or whomever if both are impeached and/or resign… crossing fingers). She’s from California which can be counted on to contribute another Dem to the Senate if she’s elevated to the cabinet, so there’s still a good opportunity to play an important and positive role in the next administration. Attorney General is the obvious, but not the only, role she might play.
That she was polling worse than Mayor Noface is a joke and a true testiment to how easily we are all manipulated by our cultural biases when someone says the right things in the right way whether they have substance or not. In this case it was the biases of white people to enjoy listening to articulate white men talk about how things are more complicated than you think. (I actually think this type of presentation package is the source of at least some Warren support too, even though she is a great candidate)
On the subject of bias, currently the six who are qualified for the next Democratic debate are… all white now. The only person who is likely to qualify still is Yang and he’s… problematic.
Crip Dyke… @ # 1: … Harris was a great candidate.
No – while she might do well as a president (or other office-holder), as a candidate she was awful: inconsistent messages and themes, chaotic campaign organization, mixed presentation skills at best.
Not to mention the unfair & illegitimate but inescapable obstacles of racism, sexism, and fund-raising handicaps.
Trump &/or Pence would’ve steamrollered her.
Not surprised based on her polling numbers. I preferred her over most of the lesser candidates. I would have loved to see her in a debate with Putin’s Puppet if he started his disrespect act. She’ll be on the national stage for a while, so another run is possible.
Thinking of other candidates dropping out, I don’t think the debates/polls being done before there’s even an actual contest next year should drive anyone out of the race. If I’m Cory Booker, who is now the last black candidate in the race, I’d not be dropping out yet now at any rate. None of the front runners are a lock as far as I’m concerned.
@Pierce:
Okay, I can completely accept that critique/clarification.
@aspleen:
I sort-of agree in the sense that I don’t think that there should be any campaigning before Jan 1st. The US system is incredibly fucked up that way. Given that the us campaign started ~8 months ago, though, I think it’s inevitable that some people are going to run out of money or find other legit reasons not to continue long before Iowa. That this seems to hit candidates of color harder than white candidates (I haven’t run the numbers, but that’s my impression) is a bad thing, and I hope that candidates of color stay longer than white candidates would given the same polling & fund raising.
So I think that I’m in line with you in the world we actually have. I just prioritize the criticism of the system the US has (which you might also, but just didn’t happen to mention it).
Damn, I’m gonna miss Kamala. Maybe she wasn’t the most polished candidate, but she didn’t take shit from anyone, and she didn’t get distracted from her message.
This makes my choice in the primaries a whole lot easier. I’m with Liz. And my choice in the General is any candidate with a D by their name.
Dope, one establishment democrat down, only like a dozen or so to go. Not going to shed any tears for a candidate that actively fought against the rights of transgender inmates dropping out.
aspleen wrote:
Honestly, this is a problem that was 10 to 20 years in the making. Democrats have been lousy at recruiting talented people to work through the system to get the experience they need to start competing at that level. In fact, a lot of the recruiting had to happen from outside bodies like Justice Democrats because orgs like the DCCC would prefer to keep going with the aging candidates they already have (I’m completely serious here: the average age of the Democratic party is significantly older than the average of the Republican party). Ideally, Warren, Sanders and Biden shouldn’t be up on that stage, but the serious lapse in recruiting and training successors has kneecapped the Democrats.
As a side note, it’s interesting how Bernie Sanders’ Jewishness gets squashed into “white” when it’s convenient.
Also, far more worrying to me is the fact that we have so many billionaires (Steyer, Bloomberg, and Schultz) and near billionaires (Delaney) buying their way into the running, and how little notice that’s getting.
@#10/11, ck, the Irate Lump
Hard to find anyone who isn’t a Boomer who’s willing to sell out the base, and finding ways to sell out the base while deflecting attention via relatively unimportant side issues is what the party leadership has focused on with laserlike accuracy for the last several decades.
That’s because they don’t have much traction at the moment. If Biden and Buttigieg both drop out, so that the party has to find another pro-1% candidate to throw its weight behind (and to stick thumbs on the scale in favor of), then one of them will be selected to be turned into the party’s endorsed Establishment Candidate. Otherwise they’re just superfluous — right now, the party’s goal is to keep Sanders or Warren from getting a majority in the first round of the convention so that the superdelegates can coronate Biden.
@ Crip Dyke
#1
If both Trump and Pence are removed, the office goes to Speaker Pelosi.
Can’t understand why anyone interested in voting for a Progressive candidate would be sad to see Kamala go as she was nothing of the kind. Some basic googling shows her terrible right-wing record as a prosecutor, she’s another center-right corporatist pretending to be Progressive, good riddance.
@Colinday:
I’m fully aware of the order of succession as determined by the PSA, but this is what I wrote:
Clearly I’m referring to the Republican candidate for office. Trump did not “defeat” Obama merely because Obama was president. He defeated Clinton. It is precisely because I was aware of the PSA and its designation of Pelosi as next in line after Pence that I used the language “or whomever”. If the next in line after Pence was a Republican, that person would almost certainly be the Republican nominee. However if Pelosi occupies the Office of the President the identity of the Republican nominee cannot be predicted.
I hope that clears things up for you and anyone else who was worried I might be referring to defeating a sitting president rather than defeating a candidate for president (who may or may not also be an incumbent).
@ck, the Irate Lump:
That doesn’t at all surprise me at all, not after the whole Tea Party takeover.
One of the things I’ve been thinking for a while is that, fundamentally, Trumpism and the modern Republican party can be explained by the fact that the Republicans, from Nixon through Reagan, have focused on mobilizing the racist and religious base by telling them lies about the world and how they were going to fix things once they got elected… and then, of course, not fixing things, partly because they’d have to break the law to do so, but also because if they actually managed to overturn Roe v. Wade what would they use to wind people up to vote for them later?
But that’s been going on for long enough that a generational shift happened, and the people who knew it was a con have lost out to the younger, more enthusiastic folks who are tired of waiting, and who don’t realize it was all a con in the first place or that what they’re trying to do will cause the breakdown of any sort of actual social bargain in the U.S. This was, of course, accelerated by Obama’s very presence, even though he wasn’t any more liberal than Nixon.
The good news is that it looks like we’re seeing a similar generational shift hitting the Democrats, with people who actually want their concerns heard rather than being pandered to as reliable votes while the actual candidates are Republican-lites. And unlike the actual Republicans, the newer Democratic party people at least acknowledge reality.
Now we just have to see if the wave can overtake the party before everything goes down in flames.
I’m really wondering what the future holds for the GOP, conservatives, and neocons, given the defections and from what I recall people not seeking reelection. I’d have to do some reading to get a better grasp, but ideologue George Will bolted and listening to a rebroadcast of Ezra Klein’s podcast where he’s going back and forth with Lilliana Mason on “mega-identity politics” I think one of them said something about Bill (son of Irving) Kristol that got the rusty gears grinding in my head. It’s like some of the movement architects have seen, with Trump, the house they built taken over by a squatter. Not sure what metaphor applies (foreclosure, eviction, eminent domain), but they are now looking (or peeping?) in through the windows at the horror show inside what used to be their place. I don’t even know where to go with this. Is it over after the Tea Party takeover, anti-Obama intransigence and Trump’s co-optive impact (or I guess very hostile takeover). Before Trump there seemed to be a RINO purge. Is there any place for moderate or centrist consensus seeking Republicans anymore in the GOP or is DC doomed to be an ungovernable schism with Republicans in office.
I guess with AOC, Warren, Sanders, and others there are hopes on our side of a parallel DINO purge and democratic socialist shift. I seriously cannot see myself voting for Biden ever. The thought sickens me.
Whatever their animosity toward Trump, I doubt Will or Kristol would be happy with a strong leftward shift in DC. But I am really curious the effect Trump will have on longer term Republican dynamics. Is there any chance of the Tea Party, birther, alt-right faction attenuating or getting ousted in an internal ideological reset?
@hemidactylus:
You’re new here, aren’t you?
I’m a bit disappointed she didn’t do better in the polling and what not. I know she’s widely criticized for not being as progressive as Warren and Sanders, but for what it’s worth, I think she was “progressive enough”
Big ships turn slowly, and if we don’t get a Democratic majority in the Senate, the President is going to be effectively hobbled. And even with a Senate majority, there are going to be limits as to what can be accomplished in a single, or even double term. It’s remarkably easy to tear things down, building something worthwhile takes a bit more time and planning and effort.
Ignoring the issues regarding sexism and racism, I think she would have done better facing our current president than people are giving her credit for. I think a lot of her strengths really come out in a more adversarial setting. She’s done pretty well on the various Senate hearings and committees, and I feel she could handle orange asshole’s childish taunting better than most candidates.
If we could only convince Biden to follow suit…
@18- Crip Dyke
I acknowledge we can go back to other time periods, like the Armey/Gingrich Contract on America, government shutdown, and Whitewater shift to Clinton’s inappropriate relations with an intern to see conservative ideology and intransigence in the mid 90s.
And the Klein podcast highlighted some the racial component of the Southern Democratic conversion to Republicanism after LBJ signed civil and voting rights legislation then the surge of religiosity later on with the Moral Majority, but it seems the Republicans have become more unhinged and intransigent than ever, but at least some recognize the rot with Trump. But neither Will nor Kristol are seeking to maintain elected office.
If the Dems purged DINOS or scared off Republican-lites and they were to scurry over to the GOP somehow, maybe they could chew at the foundations from below and cause some ideological fluidity.
@hemidactylus:
agreed.
I’m actually not so sure. maybe I’m too much of a pessimist, but I don’t think they actually get it. From what i see, they’re concerned about Trump making them look bad and hurting their reelection chances. They don’t appear to be actually freaked out about, e.g., coddling dictators, refusing to defend the election infrastructure, leaking intelligence to adversaries, etc. That might indicate that they realize that Trump is violating norms that ought to be upheld whether it costs them their job or not. Sadly, there is no such indication. They appear to be perfectly happy to let Trump burn down the White House, Capitol, and Supreme Court building so long as their cronies get the multi-billion dollar contracts to rebuild.
I get that incrementalism is a thing, but I don’t really see any reason to spare any thought to a candidate who made her career out of fighting transgender rights, locking up nonviolent drug offenders, allowing the use of prisoners for dangerous labor, and denying death row inmates potentially exculpatory DNA tests, when there are other people running who have like, not done that.
The Vicar… @ # 12: Hard to find anyone who isn’t a Boomer who’s willing to sell out the base…
Anything else missing in your life I can help you with?
I was hoping Harris might come out more firmly in support of police and justice system reform. To counter act her record as a prosecutor herself.