In this dystopian world Kamala Harris sails above the presidential bar

What is Mike Pence? When the painted smile fades and the glazed eyes begin to focus on reality, is there an honest penny in him? For the next three months, the core question of whether Pence has any core is the only real target for America’s history-making vice-presidential candidate, Kamala Harris. As much as the Trump campaign wants to scare the bejesus out of its old, white base with terrifying tales about Krazy Kamala, her own policy positions don’t really matter. Like every other veep candidate, Harris doesn’t deliver a voter bloc or state. She doesn’t displace the top of the ticket because veeps never do. All that matters is one debate night, in Salt Lake City, in early October. And even that night will be quickly overshadowed by the second presidential debate a week later. How can the summer’s biggest political story – except for the pandemic, recession and racial justice protests – be so easily dismissed? To understand that dynamic, you need look no further than Joe Biden and Pence. Back in 2008, Barack Obama’s pick of Biden as his running mate was everything Harris is today: a counterweight to everything he wasn’t. Biden offered some older, whiter balance to the first African American nominee for president. He also undercut Obama’s main claim to that nomination: opposing the war in Iraq. Biden had voted for the invasion, even as he turned into a sharp critic of the war like every other Democrat. How did Obama overcome his policy differences with Biden on the campaign trail? He didn’t need to. There was some chemistry between the Obamas and the Bidens on the day they walked out on stage in Springfield, Illinois, near the old state capitol. But more often that not, the chemistry story was overblown: Obama was a disciplined speaker where Biden was not. Obama chose not to wait his turn; Biden had spent his career waiting for his turn. Obama was the main choice, while Biden played a supporting role. Nobody voted for Barack Obama because of Joe Biden. Fast-forward eight years, and somehow the cosmos threw up Donald Trump and Mike Pence. Setting aside the strong possibility that nobody else was desperate enough to take the job, Pence represented a thin crust of establishment respectability on the molten lava of anti-immigrant, white supremacist, pro-Russian, self-enrichment they call Trump’s populism.


All data is taken from the source: https://www.theguardian.com/
Article Link: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/aug/11/kamala-harris-joe-biden-vice-president-pence-trump


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