Harris: from millstone to second coming (Chris duMond/Getty)
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Following Joe Biden’s belated withdrawal from the presidential race, the onslaught of felching flattery about his heroically sacrificial character and his administration’s astonishing, unprecedented, better-than-FDR-scale accomplishments began within minutes. From the Democratic party’s grand poohbahs and their lickspittles in the media, this fawning admiration is intended to compensate for having done nothing but insult, undermine, and leak against the President for three weeks. Now his detractors are suddenly Biden’s greatest fans. But don’t expect smarmy, unctuous if subtly guilt-ridden bootlicking from this columnist.
Pining over what might-have-been is more the stuff of poetry than of politics. Yet this is an apt juncture at which to reflect on the obvious alternative to today’s shambolic state of the Democratic party, which now, three and a half months before the election and under a month before its August convention, doesn’t actually have a candidate for president. I last wrote here about my fondness for parallel universes, so check this one out.
After forcing himself to watch the same YouTube videos that the public has been hooting over for years — of his own halting, rambling, often incoherent and ungrammatical performances from earlier in his term — a truly heroic elderly president honours his implicit 2020 promise to his colleagues and constituency. Thus, in January 2023, he announces that he has no intention of running for another term. This long lead time allows a range of candidates to throw hats into the ring — you know, all those names numbingly repeated ever since Biden’s train-wreck debate as demonstration of his party’s “deep bench”. Fingers crossed that in our parallel universe at least one of these candidates in a highly competitive primary season is not a lunatic dicks-in-women’s-sports progressive who therefore has a great chance of beating Trump.
In this fantasy, too, the Dems don’t put Biden’s idiotic diversity hire VP through a hasty rinse cycle, but instead acknowledge that even a large proportion of Democratic voters detest the woman. Oh, Kamala runs, all right, but she doesn’t do that much better than when she ran for president the first time, then proving so unpopular even in her own state of California that she bowed out before testing herself in a single primary. Never underestimate the far-Left-led party’s capacity to utterly misread the electorate and nominate some Witless Woke Weirdo — but at least this scenario allows for the possibility that a sensible centrist freakishly squeaks through. In which case, Trump is toast.
But back to reality! There’s been much talk about an “open” Democratic convention, in which a crowd of presidential aspirants duke it out — nicely, of course, never emitting a discouraging word about their lovely but perhaps ever so slightly misguided opponents — hence garnering excited media attention and rousing a disgruntled, resentful electorate out of their torpor of resignation to become riveted by the suspense over who will emerge as their saviour in November.
Yet given that the superior pols at the top of the “Democratic” party don’t really believe in democracy but more in noblesse oblige — a.k.a., “Yo, voters, don’t worry your pretty heads about who runs the country” — this “open” proposition is a longshot. It’s unlikely that folks so convinced that they always know best will leave the nomination to chance. I’m hardly sticking my neck out here, much less distinguishing myself as some sort of analytical genius, by regarding the nomination of Kamala Harris as almost inevitable — although I would love to be wrong.
Governor Andy Beshear of Tennessee could win. But he’s a white man so they won’t allow it. It will be Kamala. And she will lose.
“And she will lose.”
Will she? I’m no doubt becoming a broken record in the comments section today, but don’t underestimate her and her backers.
It’s only four months to the election. All she has to do is limit her appearances and tightly follow a script that highlights Trump’s weaknesses and avoids her more extreme policy positions. Her media (legacy and social) enablers will do the heavy lifting. Expect a four-month explosion of anti-Trump propaganda. It might well push her over the winning line.
I hope the Republicans don’t become complacent and have an effective plan for dealing with her.
You are right about the need for caution.
Firstly, the core Democrat voting blocks – blacks, “liberal” urban women, certain minority immigrant groups – don’t really care about how poor their candidate is. They don’t even care whether their policies genuinely are better for themselves than Trump’s, and of course they couldn’t care less whether their nation, it’s children, it’s institutions, are better off or not.
They really are an utterly awful group of people, who largely rely on various forms of DEI quotas, subsidies and government “jobs” while contributing nothing to the nation that they feed off.
So, just like Biden got “81 million” votes, so might Kamala, doesn’t matter that she (or Biden for that matter) is a comically inept and foul candidate.
It’s down to Republicans to make sure they go out and vote.
I wish you were wrong..!
And make sure Kamala does not debate the Donald.
Would Harris’ prospects improve if she 1) pressed a bread-and-butter issue where Trump is weakest, namely the curtailment of abortion and 2) doubled down on the DEI strategy by appointing Buttigieg as VP and stressing that she will break the glass ceiling? (First Black President, Asian President and female President; first gay VP.)
Is NO ONE the least bit intereseted in her background and history as VP? Good grief! They expect the public to ignore who she is and vote simply because they say she is capable. She.Is.Not.Capable!
Beshear is gov of KY, a dem darling but an ATROCIOUS person.
Really? Biden is a white man, and they let him run.
true but she is in pole position now and ditching her for a white man would go down very poorly.
During Trumps four (4) years in office, we had:
No wars
During Biden’s four (4) years in office, we had:
1) War between Taliban – Afghanistan (collapsed)
2) War between Russia – Ukraine (ongoing)
3) War between Hamas – Israel (ongoing)
4) War between Gangs – Haiti (now collapsed)
And there are dozens more. Just saying …..
Manchin, that’s an interesting idea. But that then presumes delegates who selflessly put the country ahead of deal-making and power grabs.
At the end of the day, whichever candidate wins the next prez election, the UniParty is the actual winner.
Some time ago…
News: “Biden has announced that he will pick a black woman as his running mate.”
Me: “Hmm… that is pretty clever. He needs someone intelligent, ruthless, and competent he can rely on. Someone who is well liked in the party and inoffensive enough to independents would work wonders for his ticket. I see now. Susan Rice is indeed a formidable choice. The identity politics move even placates the progressives in the party. Not bad Joe…”
News: “Joe Biden has picked Kamala Harris to be his running mate.”
Me: *faceplant*
The interesting bit is, Kamala was brought up by her Indian parent, while her black father was not that present. Not his fault, as he fought for custody, but gender equality seems to go missing when convenient, as in family courts, military drafts or construction jobs.
What is important and interesting, though, is that Kamala emphasised her black heritage so strongly, and underplayed her Indian roots.
Which tells you so much – about those two communities, how the race card promotes victimhood over achievement, the Democrat mindset.
But most of all it reveals very clearly what kind of person is the Democrat candidate.
Like Obama—absent black father who played no part in their life, but a useful tool to play the legions of low information voters.
The perfect match for our Sir Keir.. High achievers who actually believe there is a public to serve that’s not just money or cronies. Charming idealism
Susan Rice? Hahaha!
So you’re not averse to using race as a proxy for hiring, just who the beneficiary is. That’s quite the principle.
Race should NEVER be the basis for hiring – that has culminated in the dire situation we presently find ourselves! The best person for the job (including the C suites) should be the best qualified person regardless of color.
Who are all these “righteous men & women” who so blithely declare that “____” political figure ‘disgusts them’? Curiously, they never show how or why THEY are so righteous, truthful, and good.
What qualifies them to set themselves up as judges over their fellow men?
Surely, they must have some extraordinary qualities of character!
‘A political middle-of-the-roader such as the now-independent Senator Joe Manchin….’
A guy whose political ads consist of his taking a rifle, walking through a forest, and then firing said rifle at things he finds politically objectionable.
Can you imagine Trump ever firing a gun in a political ad?
Maintenance of the essential more-of-the-same quality in American policits means that, whenever Democrats have a majority in the senate and the will of their voters to enact, there must be just enough “independent-minded” moderates among the Democrats in the senate to prevent anything significant from happening.
Senators Manchin and Synema played that role for Biden – vastly reducing the scale of the IRA and maintaining the preposterously undemocratic filibuster. Under Obama, it was Joe Liebeman whose objection to any sort of public option in healthcare left the country with hastily rebranded Romney-care masquerading as health reform.
The idea that the Dems could refashion one of these platform-wreckers into a winning presidential candidate is as stupid as the notion that Mitt Romney could perform the same function for the Republicans because he voted to impeach Trump.
This is, by the way, entirely irrespective of your own particular politics. I am quite sure that Shriver herself likes the political positions of all four of these of these people. She’s welcome to that opinion (though I don’t share it). What makes her daft is the fact that she thinks that betraying your own team would make you popular enough with the other team to carry you to victory.
And, as if to prove I’m not making it up…
https://unherd.com/newsroom/aaron-sorkin-democrats-should-pick-mitt-romney-to-beat-trump/
How is it that a country, bigger and more diverse than ever before, comes up with mediocre and silly Presidential candidates. It used to be said the US had the best and worst of everything.
Clearly, in US senior politics only the worst will do.
Goodness knows how this is going to end. Hopefully sooner, before everything blows up.
She either knows Biden is demented and has been untruthful about it. Or even worse, didn’t realise he is demented, which really shows how incompetent she is!
See also Starmer’s effusive hyperbole after his meeting with poor old Joe a few days ago. Same applies!
Biden and Harris will be a footnote in history. Famous only for allowing Trump to rule for another four years and JD Vance for eight.
Well hello, good soldier!
Fingers crossed!
Harris has momentum as VP, ticking progressive boxes (black/female) and retaining the campaign funds assigned legally to the Biden-Harris ticket, but could the VP pick be used to obfuscate her deficiencies. One suggestion has been Barack Obama in that role, who arguably never left the white house and who has said he wd love to be president if he cd do the job from his basement. Shriver talks about a metaphoric assassination. It looks like a soft coup to me and the election game is far from played out. We have Trump’s potential imprisonment, Hilary refusing to lay down in her political grave, Trump purportedly discussing a deal to give Kennedy AG role, and some commentators speculating on the cancellation of elections on the grounds of war. And it’s only July …..
As depressing as the UK elections were for lack of choice and intellectual renewal, I am grateful that over the course of one day we saw the smooth handover of power. It looks remarkable when set against the current US travails.
In the US, whether you are Left or Right is determined by which hand you use to hold your nose…
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Has anyone in the US any idea how this all looks to the outside world? Shriver references a sense of amusement at the spectacle (tongue-in-check, no doubt) but the only emotion i suspect the vast majority – excluding Keir Starmer – might summon is pity.
Pity: for the forthright optimism that once exuded from the US, and pity for the rest of the “free world” at having such a farce played out at such a crucial juncture in all out futures.
The only amusement will be shared by Putin and Xi in their private talks. For this reason alone, i think the author is wrong to be so dismissive of Trump. Yes, he’s an arsehole (proper British spelling) but he’s an arsehole who Russia, China and the other totalitarian actors can’t just dismiss with the kind of cackle even Harris might approve of.
Not pity for me. Dismay, and a fair amount of alarm.
from me, surely?
Utterly deluded Lionel
Trump and Vance are the dream ticket, just watch the RNC from last week.
Peter Navarro?
Add Steve Bannon , J6 and ( hopefully) Trumps savage reprisals on the likes of Brennan, Schiff and Mayorkas,Garland and Nuland, Fauci, the better.
Popcorn, bible and deckchair on order.
Unless there’s another Crowd strike at the ballot box, another war of their creating or another confected virus from Democrat Central? This cackling phoney of New Age B/S nightmares is toast.
Right she of course, Willie Brown endorsed.
Lionel, you ought to know better. As a novelist ,you’re great. But your politics are Europap, Mike Pence lite with a John Kerry skipass!
Watch Tulsi Gabbard deal with Legszup in the 2020 presidential race. She’s done.
Try begging Tulsi or JFK Jnr to return , both of who COULD beat the Bad Orange Man….but am sure the GOP will find them decent jobs ,seeing as they’re both the type that JD and team will respect. Unlike you,sad to say.
And when the dust settles, I can go back to grilling up some ribs on my offset smoker.
Bonkers bingo.
Trump closed 3 peace deals in the Middle East, subdued Kim in NoKorea, initiated no wars, eliminated Soleimani, reduced regulations in the US, exited the idiotic Paris agreement, exited the idiotic Iranian agreement, produced the lowest US unemployment in 60 years, reduced the US corporate tax from 35 to 20%, and minimized illegal immigration, all while being hounded by the fake Russia investigation, hordes of media scolds, and autistic impeachments.
You mean that arsehole?
Is that the Middle East that threatens to explode in widespread conflict any time soon? Is that Kim in North Korea who’s cosying up to Putin on a daily basis? Iran along with North Korea is supplying arms to the man that Trump seems to admire most – Vladimir Putin. Did my eyes deceive me when people were filmed climbing over and around the wall? These weren’t particularly long-lasting achievements are they?
Say what? This is all on Biden. Hamas is a proxy for Iran. Biden’s policy of appeasing Iran clearly backfired.
As I recall, Obama began to appease Iran. Correct me if I am wrong
Not Obama. It started with Clinton “p***y cigar fidler”.
All current problems started with attempt to accommodate China as a country on a road to Western style democracy.
Which to anyone who vaguely understands China was impossible.
China should never had been allowed to join WTO.
All you are referring to happened on Biden’s watch.
Mr Magoo speaks again. Put your specs on, that Biden’s presidency you’re describing.
Don’t be ridiculous, obviously Trump is responsible for Biden’s Presidency.
Ah Mr Magoo, I used to love that cartoon! Is he available for the democrat nomination?
Are you kidding? The Democrats just forced Magoo off the ticket!
Koolaid addiction!
You didn’t include the felony conviction, his gross misogyny or being the greatest liar of any US president ever.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/the-jan-6-committee-says-trump-broke-these-laws-heres-a-guide
Should I open the PBS link to see what a fair and impartial media outlet has to say? I think I’ll pass. Only people with TDS think Trump was fairly convicted of – what was that again.
Jan 6th committee:
Seven democrats
Two republicans who included Liz Cheney and an Illinois representative who “after leaving office, he joined CNN as a senior political commentator.”
That’s not a committee.
That’s something straight out of an African or South American banana republic.
And of course misogyny – a charge frequently used by those very people who covered up mass scale grooming gangs in the name of “racism”, who are responsible for 8 out of 9 rapists going free in Germany (but saying bad things about them gets you into jail) or for allowing horrible men to enter girls toilets and sports.
But Trump said something rude about some woman sometime, oh dear…
Hahahaha, PBS reporting fairly on Trump, hahahaha! Thanks for the laugh.
Sit tight – Biden’s conviction are yet to come if there is a shred of honestly in the legal system.
But rapist Clinton was OK?
As if by magic. Trump concluded three peace deals where there was no lack of peace!
You mean his people did all that.
As stated, he’s someone who the author would do well not to dismiss on the grounds of being what he is, an arsehole. Some arseholes are very effective. I think you know that.
Unemployment did hit a 50 year low in 2019, but hit another all time low in 2023 under Biden. The national debt increased greatly under DJT, even before COVID (as a candidate, he promised to pay it down in 8 years; it was nearly 8 trillion when he left office). The corporate tax rate decrease may have had something to do with both the lower unemployment and the increased national debt.
BTW, Kim just texted me that he didn’t feel particularly subdued, as much as loved and admired.
You mean the US would leap to the top of the totalitarian tree?
Would they really put her up?. Also “f******g flattery” I nearly died laughing.
Agreed, I made a comment to this effect below… just wondering why UnHerd sees fit to censor a word in the comments section that we’ve all just read in the article?
Hear, hear.
‘Riposte’ is, I think what is meant rather than, ‘repost’. Surprising error from a writer.
I thought the intern had corrected Shriver’s spelling.
Spellcheck probably betrayed him.
Whether you are Left or Right in the US is determined by which hand you use to hold your nose…
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No, it’s definitely not fun to watch from afar. It feels like you are watching a befriended family’s complete breakdown. As a European, you feel like decency requires you to avert your eyes – but you can’t because our future depends on what crawls out of this hot mess in the end.
What are the Yanks going to make you digest: the Diversity Hire Disaster, or the Donald Disaster?
If you were going to liken it to entertainment at all, it would be like that truth-or-dare feature James Corden had on The Late Show where he made celebs tell a painful truth or eat something horrid. Except we don’t get the truth option here.
Feeling quite bilious already…
I’m sorry, but why Trump is the Donald Disaster? As for me, the rule of a party that for eight years, together with the media, poured streams of lies into the ears of voters – this is a real disaster. Mind you, this is the same party that brought disgusting racist thinking back into American society. Even this is enough to despise them; I don’t want to talk about other abominations committed by this party.
What’s striking about this is that, after the rhetorical question, there’s nothing about Trump — just criticism of the Democrats that Katharine Eyre had already acknowledged. Assessments of Trump can and should be formed independently of assessments of the other side.
Was Donald really a disaster? I don’t believe history remembers his term that way. There was relative peace, a stable economy (before Covid), the Abraham Accords were struck, etc.
How I wish I never looked up f******g. If you haven’t yet, don’t!
I wish you hadn’t told us not to, because of course I immediately did!
The word is in the piece (no 12) but medium censored it when I said it. Feeling even more persecuted.
I have. Wish I hadn’t.
I was surprised when I read that in the article too. Perhaps Lionel meant to start it with a B.
Oh surely the “f” was intended; just surprised it wasn’t coupled with “santorum.”
You are right. What is such a word doing in a serious report? Does UnHerd have any Editors?
I would like to ask Lionel, does it really matter who the president/ess is?
At this moment in time who is in charge and who has really been in charge for the past 4 years?
My take also, and the reason why Trump the Uncontrollable is not welcome in the circles of power.
Spot on. Surely no-one thinks that poor old Joe was running the country. He could just about parrot an autocue and that was all that was required of him. Word-salad Harris would be facade too.
“Trump is an asshole, but at least he’s genuinely an asshole.”
Pretty much sums up the state of play for me.
WYSIWYG is frequently the lesser of two evils.
Lord, I miss the days when I could vote for the better of two goods instead of the lesser of two evils.
‘Double hater’. Glad to discover such a pithy label for people like me. But it’s not all hate. I do love Lionel and everything she writes.
Gaslighting. It’s a (left-wing) way of life.
Lionel still has TDS.
I feel the author is on thin ground complaining about Harris as the President. I’m old enough to remember Dan ‘space is almost infinite’ Quayle, and Reagan almost got assassinated. The most misfit Vice Presidential choices have repeatedly been made by Presidential candidates for reasons of perverse incentives, so the US is sooner or later going to end up with a total lemon as Big Pres. And the same kind of thing could easily happen on this side of the pond (we weren’t exactly a million miles from putting Corbyn into power) so no one has any reason to feel smug over here.
But yeah, Harris will be a lemon, prettily arranged astride a cut-glass whiskey tumbler with a couple of ice cubes and a double shot of 12 year old Glenfiddich. Interesting will be her VP choice – by rights *her* version of a DEI hire should be a straight WASP male, but I’m guessing she will instead to pick someone like AOC, and offer up a bughouse dream tag-team ticket.
Why is Reagan almost getting assassinated relevant to Dan Quayle being VP? Reagan’s vice was Bush One.
It was just events around that time to illustrate that every President is vulnerable, and Quyale could have ended up President. And if he had he would have been a lemon.
Much as any self-possessed, moderate, not-Trump Republican could have wiped the floor with Biden in November, a self-possessed, moderate Democrat could still wipe the floor with Trump.
.
Really?
.
Any liar from a party that for at least 8 years has been unrestrainedly lying to the faces of Americans, without caring about the minimum credibility of their lies
Kamala will be the presidential candidate. Any attempt to put a white male in her place would have the DE&I lobby, which basically runs the Dems, screeching. Trump has the top job in the bag.
Another brilliant and eviscerating column from LS. She says what so many people are thinking, and does so in a razor sharp way.
As a Spectator convert, great move UnHerd.
This is a terrible indictment of the failings of the system supposed to find and elect the best available person to be the holder of the most powerful job on the planet.
Where on earth did you ever get the nonsensical idea that the American political system — or ANY political system, for that matter — is “supposed to find & elect the best available person”?
It’s NEVER been about that. It’s not even designed to do that.
What it’s about is ‘electability’…’popularity’…’electoral college vote counts’….’swing states’….’glad-handing’…. ‘back-scratching’….and to what degree the individual is telegenic and not prone to gaffe & goof (that much more amazing that gaffe-factory Joe made it that far).
Believing the presidential primary system is intended to find ‘best people’ is like believing that Movie Stars are made from ‘best actors’.
In that parallel universe of Lionel’s, that might be true….but not here.
Sorry, but this is a personal rant, not an argument of substance. Maybe wise to reserve judgement until she has proven or disproven herself as a candidate.
‘Reserve judgement until proven or disproven’??
Kamala is 59 years old. She’s been in politics for 34 years. She ran for President, beginning in 2019 (January) and bailed-out 11 months later — prior to any primary vote — because NO ONE found her to be qualified, or electable.
Biden named her Border Czar 3 months after taking office and the Border remained an absolute stinking crash & burn even unto today.
She is pathetic, clueless, and a rhetorical disaster; she’s failed in almost every way it’s possible to fail..
But that distinctly doesn’t mean that the powers-that-be won’t hitch the party wagon to her in a desperate attempt to defeat Trump.
I can understand not being enamoured with Trump as person. But at the level of policy how on earth can Lionel Shriver be a ‘double hater’? And with JD Vance to carry the torch – Trump actually makes a very compelling case. If you hate DEI and war, it’s kind of a no brainer
This is the entire insanity of the self-described centrist sensibles in a single sentence.
Even for the magnificently hard of thinking like Shriver, it ought to be possible to remember that this experiment has ben run over and over again. What happened when the archetype of self-possessed moderate Democrats ran against Trump in 2016? Hillary got thumped.
And go back just a little further to the republican “clown car” in which Trump dismissed a whole sheaf of Republican paper tigers – sometimes, as in the case of Jeb Bush – with a single well-placed jibe.
Flash forward to the 2019 Democratic primary and it was Bernie on a tear and none of the sensibles could stop him either. It had to be Kamala! It had to be Buttigieg! Surely, Klobuchar could do it! No? How about Warren? Nope, nope nope. It wasn’t until all of those candidates were all instructed to take a co-ordinated step back that Biden edged into a lead. And, even then, they scolded Sanders’ supporters with “blue no matter who” ( Telling isn’t it that Shriver seems incapable of applying this principle to Harris).
The sensibles are offering more of the same and the public does not want more of the same.
The public is sick of wealthy and connected companies and individuals being rewarded for failure. It is sick of endless wars (of which it has not won even one this century). It is sick of medical debt, and predatory lending and crumbling infrastructure and homeless people on the streets. It surely cannot help but notice that not a single member of the Sackler family went to jail after they caused (and profited obscenely from) the opiod crisis. It has certainly noticed that Nancy Pelosi has become fabulously rich by investing in stocks about which she has privileged information. And both sides of the spectrum are aware of the veritable firehose of untruth pouring out of the media on subjects large and small.
The American public knows all these things and many more but it loves none of them.
If there was one slogan in Trump’s first campaign that summed all of that up, it was “Drain the swamp” and, tragically, it was to be his greatest betrayal.
Shriver is right about one thing and one thing only. Harris is a terrible candidate. But it was the “sensibles” who put themselves in this position. They didn’t want Biden – that’s why all the others got their turn to beat Sanders first. But when none of them could do it and they were left with Biden, they had a problem. The only charge that seemed to be sticking against Sanders was that he was out of touch on race and gender – which was a charge that also applied to Biden. And so it was that having a black woman as VP looked more important than having a competent candidate.
They knew she was a heartbeat from the presidency of the oldest and sickest man ever to serve. And they knew she would be all but impossible to replace for reasons of both constitutionality and “optics”. But they were so determined to claim the hallowed crown of “moderation” that they did it anyway. And they did it with the blessing of idiots like Shriver.
As to her pining for Joe Manchin as her prince over the water… Jesus wept.
All true, sadly. How can Kamala Harris become a candidate of choice by the force of “democratic process”? It is a joke.
Used to be called a “suicide pact”
Trump is a powerhouse, is very funny and has some more sensibly isolationist ideas than most US presidents.
But he isn’t the electoral gold that this and other posts suggest. A fair summary of US presidential elections is that parties hold the presidency for two terms and then lose. So Trump’s win in 2016 was predictable by the pendulum of US politics, and his failure in 2020 made him a rare incumbent loser.
Another excellent post, thank you George. ps where is Chas Stanhope??
Yes, where is Chas Stanhope?
Always look forward to anything Lionel Shriver writes here, and she gets an extra ten points this time for the phrase “onslaught of f******g flattery” in the first paragraph. I’ll be using that one every chance I get.
The Democrats’ twin religions are identity politics and environmentalism. It is hard to see them nominating Manchin, who is the most reliable champion of hydrocarbons in the D party, although he would be their strongest candidate. The party oligarchs may think they can use him as a puppet the way they used Biden. Manchin is weak and his principles have been negotiable in the past, so this may be possible.
Universal suffrage is comparatively new in human politics. We are testing it to destruction. In the first phase, we had politicians who required affirmation of their policy from the electorate. In the second phase, we had politicians who sought affirmation through their personality (Clinton, Blair). In a third phase, we have something like Celebrity Big Brother, where the sole aim is to get elected and hardly anyone knows what the actual policies are. The fourth phase will be AI. Why bother with a real person, when (as Biden has proven) you can create a fictional character to act as your electoral persona.
The author is right. The VP is wholly unqualified. But we’re about to see the most extravagant and vigorous protect-and-boost effort by the legacy media since the Biden-is-fine project that damned all doubters before he publicly collapsed at the debate. Put on your hip waders.
You will see more than that. Biden will soon be forced, not only out of the election but out of his current term as well. That will upgrade Harris from a candidate running from the lame office of VP to a candidate running as the President. It will also forestall some of the criticism toward Democrats as to Biden’s cognitive unfitness. That is, if he is not up to running for re-election how can he be fit to complete his current term? The Dems are eager to help American voters forget the disturbing images of Joe Biden and do not want them kept alive by his continued occupation of the White House. They will put Kamala in ASAP and then, between now and November, will run their media spin machines to make anything she does appear Churchillian Whether for four years or four months, Kamala Harris will, unfortunately, be a President of the United States of America.
I agree with all you said except for the latter part of your last sentence. I have to keep believing that America is intelligent enough to read a grifter and not reward her with a position that puts us all in peril!
However, if you watch videos on YouTube of various Democrats proclaiming their belief that someone with IQ of table leg is suitable candidate for President, you might be disappointed in intelligence of USA public.
I can see you got two downvotes.
Probably from dementia patients who believe they should be President?
Differences of opinion in the UK press today:
The Daily Telegraph: In chasing Joe Biden out, the Democratic party has foisted an even worse candidate on voters
The Guardian: With Biden out and Harris stepping up to the plate, the Democrats may now have a candidate who is eloquent and comfortable. Trump is unpopular, unpleasant, undisciplined and unappealing. He is eminently beatable. And finally, Democrats may have a nominee who can beat him.
Sometimes I feel quite sorry for the deluded writers in the Guardian!
F–lch them!
The Guardian is a hopeless source of Democratic anti-Trump Socialism. They will beat their drum until proven otherwise. One should catalog all their effusive praise of Biden.
For the readers for the Guardian – the statement is lunacy – what ARE they trying to tell you? Harris is a grifter – entered politics as the mistress of one of the most corrupt politicians ever in California – cackled her way into Congress – accomplished nothing and the Guardian says THIS about her – BEWARE READERS!
Guardian writers might be deluded but Harris is clearly better oponent to Trump than Biden.
With most MSM lining up behind her she might win, unfortunately.
I am not enthused about the elevation of Kamala Harris to presidential candidate and partially agree with Shriver’s brutal comments about her. I do disagree with those who say that she does not stand a chance against Trump. Trump is after all, a convicted felon, a convicted corporate cheat, 6 time bankrupted and a convicted abuser of a Woman. Apart from all of this, he would be a disaster for American democracy (viz. emulating Viktor Orban and following the 2025 Heritage foundation playbook) and would enable the destruction of world order by enabling both Putin and Xie. How can anybody be rooting for the latter. Lets hope that the American electorate can be persuaded to not give Trump an opportunity to take a wrecking ball to all that we value (like he did to New York buildings in the middle of the night despite being told not to by the Landmark commission). He is a fraud and was a disastrous President point period.
Things may continue to go round and round. Friends and family Stateside have been doubly despairing, even more fed up with the Democratic impasse than Donald’s failure to get himself taken out. Amidst all the disgust and disillusion the only bits of cheer have been brought by formerly disregarded Kamala. ‘OK, could vote for her,’ they say.
It’s a bright spot rather than a new dawn. But then Trump has yet to approve he can stay the course as front runner. Has never happened before.
RFK Jr is the only viable solution to beat Donald Trump…and he could be a good President!
This is remarkably poisonous. You have a nice day too.
Boy, Lionel. Tell us what you really think.
Sounds like the UK problem. We now have a govt that 20% of the electorate voted for. Even fewer than voted for Mr Corbyn.
I’d find this a more compelling argument if it weren’t usually made by people who’d prefer a government that an even smaller percentage voted for.
” In which case, Trump is toast.”
In which case America is toast, I think you mean.
The party is now telling Dems to blindly support a woman who voters summarily rejected four years ago. This is after the party told Dems to blindly support an old man before turning on him without a second thought. But, sure; they care about democracy and the people and things.
Never appoint anyone who is rude to servants. Harris is.
Is it a chick thing? The writer is obsessed with optics and personalities instead of issues.
Who’s been running the country while Biden was incapable? If it was the VP, then she is fully implicated in all of Biden’s gross errors. If it wasn’t her, then the puppetmasters of the Democrat Party had long ago concluded she wasn’t up to the job.
Checkmate either way.
If she is awful how did she hold down her top prosecutor job in California?
She isn’t, she’s somewhere between OK and mediocre, but because a lot of people on here really hate liberals/the Left (capital letter obligatory) then she has to be awful.
Two words – Willie Brown. You’re welcome!
The adjectives say it all;
f+e+l+c+h+i+n+g, lickspittle, unctuous “What might have been”, shambolic, Progressive, idiotic diversity hire, Witless Woke Weirdo, sensible centrist, “Yo, voters, don’t worry your pretty heads about who runs the country”, bêtes noire, intellectual lightweight, artifice, “vapid, meaningless, repetitious, and asinine’, “gas-lighting”, progressive DEI schtick, competence be damned, painfully out of her depth, Peter Principle on steroids, worse-than-mediocrity
The Democrat platform = “they could run a potted plant for president and none of the sad little people who cast their ballots would ever notice”
Vile, but accurate.
Like all essays from this author, this is a collecrtion of rambling, dormitory bullsession vapid thoughts. there’s no analysis here, no predictive attempts. A waste of your time, and an excuse for this woman to draw a salary.
-M Robert Weiss, MD
The Democrats are boxed in by their crippling woke nonsense. Replacing Kamala Harris with someone much more electable would provoke endless recriminations.
man, that’s some show offy writing, calm down with all the big words and zippy humor…so you know what felch is, whooopee
I said it once and I will say it again:
Shriver kicks my a$$.
Perhaps saying so in this way is a bit juvenile and crass but nothing else captures how intense, direct, intelligent, and spot on this woman is. I can only stand in awe.
Throughout all my years of trawling through OED and Chambers in their various incarnations, I was fortunate enough not to have hitherto had the word ‘f******g’ pop up within my field of vision and impress itself in my consciousness, a fact that I recall with singular pleasure. I am no longer in a state of blissful ignorance by courtesy of Shriver and the internet. Though retching and vomitting at what has been revealed as the meaning of the world, I am consoled by the thought that I can now perfectly describe US politics with one single word.
Oh well, there’s always the option of rigging the election if the Donald piles up too many votes
Option?? Thats always been the plan.
Wow! What a brilliant indictment! Whoever wins, “let’s make America imbecile as never before”! As a Frenchman, I do sympathize.
Joe Manchin is 76!
Biden’s late withdrawal allows Kamala Harris to be nominated without her having to win a primary, something that she would find very difficult. I remain unconvinced that it wasn’t pre-planned.
So the writer, presumably a Democrat, where Dems seem to approve of woke, DEI, BLM, Antifa, riots and defunding the Police, if not approving, is unwilling to embrace the alternative. She must know in her Spectator UK role that above the line can clash with below. Current debate cannot even agree on the future Tory leader.
USA pop. 333 million, of whom 259 million are 18+ only has 150 or so million turn out. Room for another Party or two. If so why, instead of spouting forth, doesn’t she gather some like minded chums and form one?
Nobody here in UK is fully represented all of the time. In USA non woke Dems and non Trump republicans have a lot in common.
The problem I found with this piece was that it seemed to ignore the assassination attempt and how Trump responded and well….that photo. I’m not American, but I sense that the events of the last couple of weeks have had a galvanising effect.
Spectacular! The first paragraph made me want to shower (and I’ll never forgive Shriver for introducing me to “f******g”). The rest was a merciless, though fully justifiable bloodletting, so linguistically sharp and unsparingly honest that I can only say: Thank you. You speak so well for so many.
Lionel with her boring, and by now irritating as hell, TDS. Does she ever actually look at what Trump did in office, ever acknowledge it. Not that I know of. Just whining and complaining because, yes, he’s got a lot of personal flaws and a big gob. But she never gets beyond her own petty and peevish view of him. Grow up Ms Shriver and get over yourself, few really care about your personal hatred for Trump, and I’d hazard a guess and say few want to read about it any more.
Here’s a suggestion, do as I did when I couldn’t stomach Trump. Take a listen to what other people say about him who don’t hate him as you do. How about starting with his children or grandchildren. That would be a good place to begin. Or maybe talk to the many African Americans who had been punitively incarcerated and who he freed while in office, that could help, too. Or take a look at the women and minorities he helped in business while president. Ask people what they thought of the Abraham Accords he tried to bring to fruition. Please do something other than whinging.
The only saving grace in this article is Lionel nails the Progressives, Harris and the rotten to the core cheating, lying Soros backed Democratic Party.
The saving grace of this article, Jae, is its content, candour, style and world-weary brutality. Readers might have the grace to acknowledge such stern substance.
Brilliant essay. The ability of the Progressive Left to think it can pull wool over the eyes of the American public, with a gleamy-eyed press corps adding rhetoric and emotion to the ruse, is beyond most Americans’ wildest imagination. Kamala Harris is the most “mockable” political figure on the Left (there have been those on the Right as well) in the last 50 years.
Here is a thought. Vote projected policies. If you think a “moderate” democrat would rein in the “women with dicks in sports,” I think you are naive. delusional, or both. We are still going to have an open border because, hey, let’s let illegals vote. We will have mandatory gender affirmation policies like what was just signed into law by Newsome. We will have a ruinous energy policy with the corrupt Green New Deal. Foreign policy will be a disaster. DEI will run rampant. Expansion of government regulation will further advance of the power and ambition of the self-anointed expert bureaucrat. The Democrats are the real death of democracy. It is their only campaign theme and is grounded in nothing but a false narrative. They certainly can’t run on puberty retarding drugs for 11 year olds with top surgery to follow. Give me the Republican platform any day, even if it means putting up with Trump and the hysterical wailing from the MSM and the left.
I have a sceptical view of commentators who display their anti-Trump credentials before getting into what they want to say.
Maybe Harris would be able to turn a page to a better place in foreign policy. Her FP advisor, Phil Gordon, is anything but a neocon. He’s advocated constructive bilateral relations with Turkey, Russia, Iran and the EU. He’s published on the dangers of neocon attempts to mechanically introduce ‘democracy ‘ in the Middle East as we saw unravel in Iraq. And as an expert on French security and military policy since deGaulle, he’s no stranger to a multi – lateral world.
Suddenly I like Kamala a whole lot more, thank you!
We’re with you all the way. Or at least, I’m with you all the way. Enjoy your whip-like candour. To paraphrase the great conservative political commentator whatsisname: ‘No man like me ever dreams of being ravished by a woman dressed as a liberal’. Or as ad men on Madison Avenue almost used to say: ‘I like the cut of your jibe’. Are you ever in Sydney, or Perugia?
“Trump is an asshole, but at least he’s genuinely an asshole”
And that’s probably why he’s winning. Americans are sick and tired of being lied to by politicians who say they’re ‘for the people’ who then ignore the people once elected to pander to billionaires and multinational corporations. Trump is legitimate. He legitimately hates the globalist elite, the davos crowd, the Washington insiders, as much or more than most of his voters. His reasons are petty. They wouldn’t let him into their exclusive company or take him seriously. They’re taking him seriously now.
Unlike this author, I wouldn’t want a moderate Republican. It would just put us back where we were in 2015. I’d rather have a populist Republican who actually consistently acts as an advocate for middle and working class voters like Josh Hawley, a modern libertarian like Rand Paul, or at least someone hated by the donor class like Ted Cruz or Vivek Ramaswamy. Nikki Haley has been an elite stooge since the Bush administration. DeSantis is competent and sane, but he’s too comfortable with the donor class for my liking and his policy in Florida has been more style than substance. Both might beat Biden or Harris quite badly, but that wouldn’t say much because as the author points out, they’re both terrible candidates for different reasons. Further, it would ultimately would be counterproductive since it would put the globalists back in charge of both parties.
What I would have preferred is basically what the Democrats should have done also. Trump, like Biden, should have recognized his own unpopularity and chosen not to run, then endorsed a successor, who likely would have won the primaries with even greater margins thanks to being linked to Trump’s policies without actually being Donald Trump. Trump could have played kingmaker and ridden off into the sunset as his chosen candidate cleaned Biden’s broken clock and then put an end to the lawfare nonsense with a blanket pardon. Alas, Trump is every bit the egotistical asshole he appears to be. He had to satisfy his ego and his wounded pride from 2020’s bizarre COVID election, and here we are. It’s his incredible good fortune that the Democrats are so incompetent that they’ve managed to finagle themselves into a position where they’re almost forced to run an even worse candidate in Kamala Harris. They could go another direction and nominate a better candidate like the several mentioned by the author, but that would surely draw the ire of the woke monster they unleashed. Like Dr. Frankenstein, they’re finding out the hard way that the monster can turn on its master once it gets loose. Biden’s endorsement of Harris makes it all the more complicated. I wonder if that was maybe his way of saying thanks for support over the last three weeks, so let me do you a favor and anoint the person you least want at the top of your ticket. The Democrats best hope is that Michelle Obama steps out of the shadows to save them from themselves. I wouldn’t if I were her. She would be at the mercy of the same party bosses and wealthy donors that got the Democrats into this mess in the first place, the same ones who, in my opinion, ruined her husband’s presidency. She shouldn’t save them from a well deserved reckoning. The party bosses and elites need to be put in their place so we can, maybe, get better Democrats in the future.
A quite magical transformation: from millstone to milestone in an instant…
It should be remembered that the VP position has historically been a diversity hire. He (and only recently she) is hired for appeal for votes to states and/or constituencies diverse from those courted by the Pres. candidate. VPs with real abilities, like Theodore Roosevelt, George H.W. Bush, or Al Gore, were exceptions to the rule. Some VP diversity hires were disastrous, (e.g., Andrew Johnson, Spiro Agnew) but some apparent mediocrities turned out surprisingly well (e.g., Harry Truman).
Kackles Kamala is just mortifying but I see no good way out of this mess.
If they dump her they lose Black women.
If they keep her, they lose to Trump.
If they do not name a candidate until the convention then they lose a month and only have 2 months until the election to sell whatever it is they are gonna sell after the convention.
Are donors going to give to her if they are not sure she will be the nominee?
Trump and the GOP have all the time in the world and a boat load of money to do everything they need to until November.
I’m still convinced that Trump is gonna win this. I see nothing happening to convince me otherwise.
It’s sad how women can be some of the worst misogynists.
Society deserves itself.
Mark Twain said:
“If you tell the truth, you don’t have to remember anything”
Why are we currently saddled with such poor politicians?
The usually astute Ms.Shriver misses the forest for the trees. The question is not which political Apparatchik is the more personally deplorable (the one with whom she would be least likely to enjoy a cup of coffee).
[Little to choose from there…though personally I would prefer an hour spent with someone/anyone who was genuinely anything, than that same hour spent with some ‘boneless, clueless, chickenless’ fake who grins & cackles nothing but trailing, Woke-spoke non-sequitors.
But maybe that’s just me?!]
The question is….who is more likely to present & support policies which are reality-centric & truth-based? Given that, as the author surely recognizes… there is no choice.
You want to avoid, “lunatic dicks-in-women’s-sports progressives’… you detest the politics of ‘noblesse oblige’ (We know best what’s best for you!)… you despise the ideology of D-I-E (the sworn enemy of Quality, Merit, and Hard Work)… you hate the very thought of 4 more years of ‘don’t look behind the curtain’, puppet-master politics… you abhor the politicization of all the entities which should be passionately apolitical (“from the National Trust to the NHS, from Anheuser-Busch to the Chicago Art Museum”) but aren’t? Well then……how on earth can there be any doubt as to who and what you must support?
Three months ago Ms. Shriver spoke of the ‘pointless partisan posturing for progressives’ acrid flavour of the month’… there’s one good way to push back on such dreck, even if it requires holding one’s nose at the ballot box.
Of course Harris is the right choice for the Dem candidate, she’s black, well sort of, and a woman, I assume that’s what she self identifies as.
Can there be a better candidate for a progressive Democratic party where competence is not a requirement?
Who are you going to vote for then, Lionel?
Does this question not miss, entirely, the point Shriver was making: when the choice is structured between two different disasters, whence any enthusiasm?
The sole reason Ms Harris is likely to be a candidate for President in 2024, is that Mr Biden chose her as VP in 2020. Mr Biden could have selected anyone. Nobody remembers why he selected Ms Harris in 2020. Now, even Mr Biden is unlikely to remember. So Ms Harris’ sudden elevation now is a mystery to us all. But I guess it’s good, in that Mr Biden’s 2020 decision has relieved Dems from the chore of intelligently choosing a 2024 candidate.
“The evil that men do, lives after them”
He chose her because she ticked the right diversity boxes.
Lionel, I love learning new words. I truly do. “f******g” is not one I needed, though. Please don’t do that again.
Gross. No Englishman would ever do that.
I had to look up ‘f******g’ and couldn’t bring myself to read the rest of it
I remember when I used to revile Trump, back before 2020. It’s called TDS (Trump Derangement Syndrome).
Obviously, Harris is unworthy of the office. It should be painfully clear to anyone with two eyes and a brain that the current Democrat party—formerly my lifelong leaning—cares not a fig about their electeds’ mental acuity.
The BBC news anchors and journalists are wetting themselves with excitement and happiness at Harris’s replacement of Biden. She is ‘Black’ [✔️], a Woman [✔️], South Asian [✔️], anti-misogyny [✔️ and a Trump-hater [✔️✔️✔️]. She is about as perfect a candidate for the US presidency as the BBC might have wished.
Shriver spot on, as usual.
For years every time Kamala spoke she told about being a little girl who got bussed to school. But so what? Lots of kids got bussed to school. It doesn’t make her special, but apparently it was all she had. And now she warbles on repeatedly about imagining what can be, unburdened by what has been.
What has NOT been is a Harris trip to the southern border. After claiming adamantly that she had been there, and being immediately confronted about the lie, she made the remark about not having been to Europe, either. An unapologetic, bald-faced liar.
Lionel Shriver reminds me of the Capt Miller character in Saving Private Ryan: someone who really KNOWS how to gripe. Spot on.
Some good points. As a Brit, I feel relieved not to have to vote in this election.
BUT, might we consider the effect of some of the language?
A metaphorical assassination? Making Biden’s rejection the equivalent to an actual attempt in someone’s life brings language of violence back into political discourse. Haven’t we had some time to reflect on this recently?
Diversity hire. While you intended this against one person, the subtle implication is that the very act of recruiting a black person is “woke”.
Hey, I’m a big fan of humour and irony, and lots of this was funny to read. But words can cause damage.
And yet the media may succeed in rinsing her flaws and propelling her into the Oval Office
Kamala stands a chance, that’s my instinct now.
But the election will pit the liberal female graduate cross-generationally against the conservative male (and Christian ladies and/or Terf types).
If I were Vance, I would even push for this strategy as where Kamala will speak endlessly on abortion rights, woke as a whole is weakened culturally.
I admire the way Mr. Shriver can use words – it is, indeed, a talent. I am sorry that he is so ingrained in “double hate” at this particular time when voters need to ferret out the best candidate of their and offer support. He seems to want to be sure he is not branded a pro-Trumper – that’s very well as I had already realized how much he dislikes him. I would suppose he could vote for Harris as perhaps the lowest intellect ever to run for the highest office in the land!
I like Shriver writing but she was the one who tried to persuade Spectator readers that Biden was sensible choice 4 years ago.
Her hate of Trump is quite astonishing.
What exactly is her beef with him?
Saying that “any moderate Republican blah, blah” would defeat Democratic candidate easily is just nonsense.
Half of USA wants Trump and not some moderate nobody.
Hey, UnHerd! I’m frickin’ sick of clicking on motorcycles!
If Lionel Shriver didn’t exist we would have to invent her- what a ‘gal’
Whirls of Whizzdom
And all these jewels on just 1 meal a day