https://www.vox.com/policy-and-poli...-13-year-old-lawsuit-katie-johnson-allegation I'm calling it now: Biden steps down, Harris steps up within the next 3-4 weeks, maybe as soon as this weekend. All these back room meetings with donors and governors is to get them on board, and start auditioning for her VP slot, without it being leaked. Most likely after RNC/DNC, or as soon as Trump says who his VP will be. They'll also start coordinating with down-ticket races, to see what needs to be adjusted. Biden's team is counting on three things: a defense vote, where anyone is fine, they are voting AGAINST Trump. That's your California, New York, etc. Biden can't reliably win the swing states, but a black woman would stand a better chance of winning Georgia, Arizona and Michigan, and would have a decent chance of flipping a Southern state with a large African-American population. Dobbs has made female voters reliably anti-GOP, and the project 2025 rhetoric will continue that. So, Harris will perform better nationwide than Biden was and again, Biden polls terribly his entire life and was pretty even. (Also media bias on polls, if it's a landslide for Biden, it doesn't exactly made headlines). Lastly, Harris doesn't own the quagmire of Israel/Gaza, immigration, etc. and can leverage new messaging. Harris really hasn't been part of the media bllitz, so her first few engagements will now be nationwide news. Let's just imagine for a second a prosecutor in a debate with Trump in September, especially an angry black female one. Trump's bully schtick looks terrible against this kind of opponent, and he hasn't had 4+ years to craft messaging about "sleepy Kamala". The Biden campaign has been slow-walking their spending, so they can hit a blitz in September, getting Kamala's face everywhere, and I'd bet good money her team has been crafting speeches, messaging and even meme formats for months now. Swaths of Millennials and GenZ only come out to vote for this kind of candidate, even if they don't actually like her or know her policies. She pulls in young voters, African Americans that Biden was slipping on, some of the moderates and Liz Cheney republicans, women by and large, and avoids the further fragmentation of the left. Also, after we've seen the way Obama was treated, the AA vote literally has a score to settle, and a mad Black woman is the perfect embodiment of that rage. She's not popular, and she doesn't have the acumen/history, but we literally won't care. This has been the plan going back to 2019, and it's been executed to perfection.
If this was the plan back in 2019…why didn’t they set her up in 2019? Or was it all based on her primary performance back then, which was over before voting? In short, why wasn’t Young America feeling that way about her back then?
Are you serious? She was literally put in charge of the border and did JACK. FUCKING. SHIT. Kamala might as well be black Hillary. And how is the mess in Gaza Biden's fault? That is something I seriously don't understand.
Let's nominate someone who's less popular than Hillary when our democracy is literally at stake. Because they're all in on identity politics.
Okay…. Let’s throw on the recording of her laughing the thought of throwing the parents of truant school children in jail, since we keep forgetting how shitty of a person this is. “You know I get DOWN at the cookout!” Fuck you, bitch. Another Howard Dean Yell to use against Democratic hopefuls.
I think Biden owns the tepid response to the hard left on the Gaza issue. I honestly don’t see Kamala doing much better quelling the situation but seems to be winding down naturally. The border is another super duper deception from the left I won’t be forgetting anytime soon. It remains to be seen if voters punish them for 20 years of gaslighting only to flip flop totally in an election year because of some bad poll numbers. I once thought she and Cory Booker were the biggest rising stars of the party based on their well spoken fiery rhetoric. She used to be the can’t wait to see how she eviscerates the opposition in Senate committee hearings Senator. As a lot of people with prosecutorial backgrounds do. I tend to favor well spoken pointed speeches like this. Apparently once she is out of that arena she has some major personality traits that had her flung aside in the primaries pretty quickly. Not to mention her prosecutorial past locking up the same people they desperately want not to anymore. Still, probably a better shot than running Biden. That said you’d hope they try and field a better candidate than her.
I keep saying that Gavin is going to run but I'm rethinking that. I don't think he's sure he can beat Trump and if he loses, there goes his chance at the presidency. Better for him to sit this one out and wait for 2028 Putting Harris in is a disaster. I agree with Dixie, she was given one job and didn't even bother going to the border for years.
Hard to move past her supporting legalizing weed possession after she spent years throwing people in jail for it.
Newsom is one of the best surrogates in the party (no one can go into an interview or a debate and slap a Republican in the face like he can), but he needs to put in a lot of work to be likable enough at the top of the ticket, and he just can't do that on a restricted timeline like the one being proposed. His best shot is 2028 if the Democrats lose 2024 (and we still have elections) or 2032 if they win. But we'll see if his ambition allows him to accept that delay and uncertainty.
The Democrats put themselves in such an odd position. They pushed identity politics for a decade in order to put minorities in positions of power, but have ironically narrowed their Overton window of acceptable candidates in general. They would have a real hard time selling someone like Gavin Newsom as the replacement nominee over Kamala Harris.
Plus, it would fuel all the white man over a black woman discussions which would instantly dominate the news cycle.
Here’s the best (funniest) take on all of it. Imagine if the Republicans got a black woman as POTUS— It would be scorched earth on identity politics. Third-wavers would have no choice but to tolerate it while their heads explode with rage:
I'm not sure he fully understands how many people on both sides of the aisle are discussing his need to step aside. But the point that all the people who voted for him in primaries should be counted is valid.
Eh, party primaries wherein the sitting president has to compete to keep his party's nomination, are a joke. Nobody in their right mind runs against a president from their own party. That said, 13% of people voted against Biden in the primary, a larger percentage, as far as I can tell, than has been typical for any primary as long I've been of age to vote.
If that was supposed to reassure anyone I just don’t know. Same glazed stare, same sputtering preloaded answers. To his credit Stephenopolis pushed him on the single most important question. Will you take an independent cognitive test? Tactically Biden has to refuse. If he fails one the legislative branch would have to assert the 25th amendment if he further refuses to leave. Kill his presidency and campaign in their tracks.
I think the real problem here is that Biden's campaign has adopted a strategy that would work if they were up 10 points, but in reality they're down 5. Turtling and weathering the storm is fine if you have a strong lead and can afford to shed a few points, as long as you can stem the bleeding. It doesn't work when you need to aggressively make up ground over the next few months.
But then what? Even if he wins, which seems impossible at this point, we're left with a drooling vegetable. The only responsible move is convincing or forcing him aside.
He wins, then they replace him. I want to go on record saying that I predicted this during the primaries, only I thought it would happen about a year into the term. I can't help but think that there would be a lot less anxiety over this if the Dems had, you know, picked someone qualified and likeable as a VP, instead of a diversity hire who isn't even liked by her own race. Also, I'm going to say this: Kamala should really make scarves part of her wardrobe. Whenever I see her, I don't know if she's going to start talking or gobbling.