The new Kamala Harris book: 107 Days

[SomewhereonNeptune]

Excerpts have been revealed in various sources from Kamala's new book, "107 Days". For someone who wants another bite at the apple in '28, she seems to have stepped in it. Among the more interesting revelations:

• Tim Walz was not her first choice for VP.
• She wanted Pete Buttigieg but thought the country couldn't handle a "black woman candidate, her husband being a Jew, and a gay VP" but would have chosen him if he was straight.

Nothing like throwing people under the bus to start a campaign, eh?

So here are some topical questions:

• Should she even run again? She currently places a distant third in a hypothetical primary campaign, behind Newsom and (even though she called Americans racist as an excerpt when referring to) Buttigieg. 
• Has she stepped in it and killed her chances for political notoriety due to writing the book?
• Do the identity considerations in selecting a running mate (race, gender, sexual orientation) along with her other comments portray Americans as racists, or is Harris projecting her racism upon the voters?

Some controversial questions to kick things off, but anyway...discuss.

[Pozzible]

I haven’t read any excerpts other than a brief bit about Tim and Pete.

I’m agnostic on whether she should run again. I thought, all things considered, she was excellent. In fact, after her debate I thought she was sure to win. From the convention until the VP debate things were sailing along. But all of the air went out of the campaign when Tim stepped onto the stage. He had shown such promise. Perhaps he was over-coached in debate prep. Perhaps we had all been too pumped up and expectations were too high. Pete would have definitely done better in the debate. 

Between the VP debate and Election Day all the energy was lost. I don’t personally believe the candidates were the problem. Consultants and staff seemed to drag them down.

Kamala’s comment about whether voters would accept a Black woman and a gay man was likely correct. I don’t see it as racist at all. Just a political calculation. And Buttigieg didn’t seem to connect with Black women in the primaries  And they are the heart of the party.

There are several good potential candidates. Josh Shapiro, Wes Moore, Buttigieg, Pritzker (he’s been on fire lately). Whitmer and Newsom both feel a bit packaged and polished (just a gut feeling). AOC would be a brilliant, exciting candidate. The primary debates should be terrific. (Oh, maybe Marianne Williamson, RFKjr, and Tulsi Gabbard will hop in the race, too.🙄)

But all of this assumes we will actually still have real elections in ‘28. Scares me. 

[viking8x6]

14 hours ago, SomewhereonNeptune said:

For someone who wants another bite at the apple in '28

If I were Kamala, I'd rather juggle live squid in a confessional booth than run in '28.

[hntnhole]

18 hours ago, SomewhereonNeptune said:

Should she even run again?

I'm not at all sure she wants to run again.  If she did, there would be more exposure in the media, and she's been really quiet since.  That's really uncharacteristic of a hungry pol.  

18 hours ago, SomewhereonNeptune said:

Has she stepped in it and killed her chances for political notoriety due to writing the book?

I haven't read it yet, so I can't really comment on that.  I'll get around to it at some point ... 

18 hours ago, SomewhereonNeptune said:

Do the identity considerations in selecting a running mate (race, gender, sexual orientation) along with her other comments portray Americans as racists, or is Harris projecting her racism upon the voters?

Now THAT's a really interesting question, and worth a well-thought-out response.   I'll put that in the "stew-pot' in the back of my head and set the oven on "simmer".

[SomewhereonNeptune]

18 hours ago, Pozzible said:

I don’t personally believe the candidates were the problem. Consultants and staff seemed to drag them down.

Kamala’s comment about whether voters would accept a Black woman and a gay man was likely correct. I don’t see it as racist at all. Just a political calculation. And Buttigieg didn’t seem to connect with Black women in the primaries  And they are the heart of the party.

Ok, so my thoughts, and bear in mind my own political stance. I agree with you that consultants dragged them down and I don't think they've done the reckoning on "why" they lost. They seemed to get the voters they always have, albeit less than previously, the swing states all moved right, and they banked on the same policies that didn't connect with voters. When inflation is critically high and employment is sagging -- which the adjusted numbers showed around 2 million fewer jobs created -- voters care more about kitchen table issues and less about trans-rights or far left ideology. That didn't land as they expected.

And in "the significance of the passage of time", Kamala's word salads didn't do her favors. 

I think she underestimated voters. We've had diverse cabinets under both Biden and Trump, so I'm not buying that voters cared about Buttigieg's bedroom preferences. We have a current Treasury secretary who is gay and people don't care.  Let's see how Winsome Sears does in the Virginia governor's race and then we can conjecture on how people feel about a black woman. But I think she doesn't give much credit to the American voters and the excerpt from her sounds...well, pretty bigoted.

18 hours ago, Pozzible said:

There are several good potential candidates. Josh Shapiro, Wes Moore, Buttigieg, Pritzker (he’s been on fire lately). Whitmer and Newsom both feel a bit packaged and polished (just a gut feeling). AOC would be a brilliant, exciting candidate. The primary debates should be terrific. (Oh, maybe Marianne Williamson, RFKjr, and Tulsi Gabbard will hop in the race, too.🙄)

My thoughts on your list.

• Shapiro - I honestly didn't think he wanted to run in '24 on a VP ticket and probably would wait until '28 or '32 for his turn. I suspect he saw the mess it became and decided to stay away. He'd be a great candidate. Honest. I actually like him.
• Wes Moore - no opinion.
• Buttigieg - East Palestine, Ohio and being a lackluster mayor of South Bend, IN will probably come back to haunt him, fairly or not.
• Pritzker - his record as governor of Illiniois is too assailable. Crime is a huge problem in Chicago, and he and Brandon are ignoring his citizens' own pleas for help. High taxes and dwindling population don't do him any favors. He's also another big billionaire, so it's a glass house for him to avoid throwing stones.
• Whitmer - polished, but is Michigan doing that well? Asking for a friend. 😉
• Newsom - oh boy! Make America California Again? If Pritzker was assailable, Newsom is style over substance. LA and SF both have crime and homeless crises that aren't changing despite their solutions; taxes are outrageous and causing outward flight like Illinois; the Palisades Fire was a complete mess, exacerbated by hydrants that didn't work and subsequent bureaucracy that seems to be holding residents' land from redevelopment to become potential low-income housing? If I were a swing voter, I don't think I'd be sold.
• AOC - tell me what she's actually doing other than cultivating sound bites for the 24-hour news cycle. Has she done anything for her district? Oh yeah! She chased Amazon's HQ2 away from considering NYC. 
• RFK Jr. - I don't think Dems are appreciating his efforts in HHS and are being sold on the notion of him being an anti-vaxxer and conspiracy theorist that they're not hearing the efforts to remove chemicals from our food so we're closer to Europe than DuPont or Monsanto. Plus, the Democrats locked him out of any potential primaries in '24, so no love lost for the party from his view, especially after serving in the Trump administration.
• Tulsi Gabbard - I like Tulsi. She's smart, polished, competent, and she left the Democratic Party complaining that they've left most voters behind and is now a Republican. She'd be a great candidate. But I don't think the Dems would have her.

[Pozzible]

It’s just too early for me to allow myself to get emotionally bogged down in political prognostications about ‘28. But I will remark on a couple of things.

My mention of Gabbard and Kennedy were totally tongue in cheek. I think they’re both just abominable, dangerous human beings.

And you mention how horrible the crime situations are in Chicago, LA, and SF. While we’re at let’s throw DC into the mix. Note where each off those cities rank on the list of the 25 most dangerous cities in the US:

[think before following links] https://realestate.usnews.com/places/rankings/most-dangerous-places

Cheers!

[PozBearWI]

It is interesting that the rushed axing of Jimmy Kimmel was the night he was to have had Kamala Harris as his guest.  

[hntnhole]

Of perhaps ancillary interest, Harris will be on MSNBC this coming Monday evening (Rachel Maddow's guest) at 9;00 pm, Eastern US time. 

Maddow is known for asking "no bullshit" questions, and putting up with none in answers.  If Harris has any answers to give, Maddow will pry them out of her.  

                                                              ________________________________________________________ 

To the "why she lost" question:

Much of her campaign was a bit prosaic.  Then, there's the fact that she's a woman (with a beautiful smile), and and of African American descent to boot.  And, while her choice of VP is a good and decent man, he didn't generate much in the way of coattails, which is the primary duty of any VP candidate.  There was precious little of a potential for hard-nosed negotiations with other world leaders, and that lovely smile just isn't enough when one runs for President.  There are plenty of misogynist's in the electorate, for whom that would be enough to vote for someone else.  

Then, there's the racism problem.  There are far too many Americans still infused with racism, and that hill would be a tough climb.  While Biden's physical decline was obvious, she apparently felt that stepping into her VP role a bit too forcefully might turn some voters off even more, that die has already been cast.  I still think that Jill Biden is mostly to blame for pushing Joe too far, which also means she pushed to keep Harris out of doing more.  

Put the two together (racism and misogyny) and Harris has two mountains to climb, as well as putting forth viable proposals for the American people.  

I'm no Maddow fan, but I'll be watching on Monday night.