It’s a mystery
Jul. 6th, 2024 11:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
I keep hearing that it’s politically impossible for the Democrats to replace Joe Biden with anyone except the current Vice President, cackling Kamala Harris (except maybe for someone like Michelle Obama), because the optics of ignoring a black woman — and current officeholder — are just too prohibitive. I figure the people who say this know more than I do about the intricacies of Democrat infighting and the behavior of Democrat voters, so I won’t say they’re wrong.
I just can’t see it myself, though. And for two different reasons.
First of all, Kamala isn’t black. She has black ancestry, yes, but to know she’s black, you have to be told she’s black, because that ancestry has been diluted so many times it isn’t definitively visible. It’s not-
Second … how many black women — much less black people in general — genuinely identify with Kamala Harris? She’s part Indian (Asian Indian), part black Jamaican, part white, and been privileged all her life, she has less in common with most black people in America than I do. The idea of a semi-black woman being that close to the Presidency may be potent, but the fact of Kamala herself has to be inspiring to precisely nobody.
She’s roughly as dumb as Joe Biden — not AS dumb, but close — but he gets dumber by the moment, while she’s holding pretty steady. With every passing day, then, she’ll look better by comparison. Which is still not saying a hell of a lot.
I don’t actually care, let ’em work it out among themselves. I’m just waiting for the electoral massacre.