Lotus for Potus – An Assessment

No matter how much hate and bile Trump spews, my bet is that Americans are not ready to destroy the economic and political miracle that has made America what it is. We shall wait and see if America looks to the future or suffers a self-inflicted wound

By Anil Madan

As I have previously written, President Biden’s days as the Democratic Party’s presumptive nominee for POTUS (President of the United States) were numbered after his abysmal performance at the so-called “debate” with Donald Trump, the Republican Party’s strutting peacock.

Kamala Harris and Joe Biden. Pic – WSJ

It was not unreasonable that Democrats, seeing their leader’s clay feet crumbling before their eyes, would rapidly move into salvage mode and do what they could to urge Biden to assume lame-duck status. Trump’s fortunate escape of a would-be assassin’s bullet unsurprisingly led to an illusory surge of love for the Republicans’ own wounded duck, but this was not new love, it came in the form of declarations from those who had already professed their adoration.

What was surprising was the celerity with which the Democrats embraced and adopted Kamala Harris as their presumptive nominee. As I write, it has been widely reported that Harris has secured commitments from enough delegates to ensure that she will be the Democratic nominee.

A number of friends have asked me how the presidential election is going to turn out. My response, depending on the day the question was posed, has been that the story of Biden’s bowing out is only a day or two or three old. We just don’t have enough information to know how things will play out as the presidential race resets, and as voters have a chance to reassess the situation. In short, predicting the outcome is most likely going to be nothing more than pure speculation or wishful thinking.

Compelling trends and forces across the American electorate

There are, however, some compelling trends and influences across the American electorate that allow us to project reasonably likely alternative scenarios. Not every scenario favours either Trump or Harris, but we can postulate, based on intriguing insights, how the two candidates could each succeed or fail.

Let me pause to say that Kamala is a Sanskrit word meaning lotus. Hence the caption of this piece. Kamala is also associated with the Hindu goddess Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth. Presidential campaigns in the U.S. are cash intensive. Biden’s campaign was well ahead of Trump’s when it came to fund raising until the assassination attempt. Then Trump’s campaign saw a massive influx of money and his campaign’s coffers swelled well beyond Biden’s.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the forum. Right after Biden’s withdrawal, and even before Harris had secured enough delegates to lock up the nomination, money poured in. On the first day, Harris’ campaign raised over $80 million, by the next day, over $100 million, and within 40 hours of Biden’s announcement, the Democrats and Harris combined, reported raising a record $250 million.

In the hours following Biden’s announced withdrawal from the presidential race, there were murmurings from would-be contenders for the Democratic nomination, but these were quickly quelled when it became clear that the party’s leaders were supported by a groundswell, so much so that Harris’ ascension seemed more a coronation than a striving effort to conquer an elusive summit.

Presidential material

So, what is going on here? Surely, it is fair to say that as of January 2021 when Biden and Harris took the oath of office as President and Vice President, the prevailing perception of Harris was of a lightweight, a deer caught in the headlights, incapable, and ineffective, certainly not presidential material. This perception was enhanced by her performance when Biden assigned her the impossible task of dealing with the chaos at America’s southern border. Whereas it was grossly unfair to even suggest that a Vice President, without Congressional funding and authority to enforce immigration laws could do anything meaningful about the border, the Biden administration in its zeal to appear engaged on a problem in desperate need of solving, left her hanging.

Following what seemed a catastrophic failure, Harris receded into the background and has seldom surfaced.

What is hidden from public view is neatly summed up in an endorsement by 350 national security leaders including most notably General Michael Hayden who served as director of the Central Intelligence Agency and Director of National intelligence, and held appointed posts under Presidents Clinton, G.W. Bush, and Obama. Former Secretaries of Defense Chuck Hagel and Leon Panetta were also signatories. These security leaders wrote that Harris would, if elected, enter the office of President “with more significant national security experience than the four Presidents prior to President Biden.” They also noted that she has met with more than 150 world leaders and travelled to 21 countries. They also wrote that in contrast to Harris, Trump is a threat to national security.

That is some endorsement for a candidate the Republicans have tried to portray as incompetent. And keep in mind that most of the same security leaders consider Trump to be a threat to this country’s security and woefully ill-equipped to deal with the geopolitical theater.

The major issue here is the contrast that Harris offers to Trump. Let us also not underestimate the time that Harris has spent at Biden’s side over the past three and one-half years as the world has lurched from crisis to crisis.

I have made another point to my friends who ask if Harris can beat Trump. That, I say, is the wrong question. The correct question and the only one that matters is whether the American electorate will beat Trump. Will the people of the United States who so overwhelmingly rejected Trump and his craziness in 2020, somehow excuse what he did after that election, on January 6, and thereafter, and countenance his lies and threats to American Democracy, to world security, to the environment, and to decency itself?

The Republican Convention is not two weeks old. It offered a pageant of cognitive dissonance when Republican after Republican who had called Trump unfit for office, unhinged, and worse—his own VP pick J.D. Vance had called Trump an American Hitler and himself a “never Trumper”—bent to kiss the Trumpian ring. It was a sorry spectacle of hypocrisy, self-demeaning and infantile worship of a lesser human being. To be sure, Trump basks in the rapt obeisance of his MAGA followers and can use his influence to “primary” (lose a primary election and hence a shot at re-election) his detractors. This commands the sucking-up and self-debasement we have seen.

But will the American people stand for it? Dishonesty from politicians gets a free pass all too often. But when the security of the nation and our national security is at stake, most Americans will not give THAT a free ride.

Issues of race and gender

Then, there are the issues of race and gender. The MAGA (“Make America Great Again”)  Republicans have attacked Harris on both these fronts. There is grave danger in such attacks. In my view, the fact that Harris is a woman is likely to be far more significant than is her race.

The race question is likely to generate a big yawn from most of the American electorate. The only Americans who are motivated by racial prejudice are the bigots to whom Trump appeals. They include white supremacists and those with varyingly low levels of intelligence. The country came together when Barack Obama was running for President and demonstrated an elemental truth that we have known for a long time: the vast majority of Americans are decent, fair-minded people, who accept other Americans and do not brook invidious discrimination. We see this in American life day in and day out. The fact that so many Indians are CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, is just one example. Consider also that Kamala Harris is a combination of African American and Indian ancestry and J.D. Vance’s wife is of Indian origin.

The sad part of this story is that many in the Trump camp have been attacking Usha Vance, asking how a “brown” was let into our midst and how a VP married to an Indian can fight for “white” Americans or Christians. Sad as this may be, I predict that such hatred and vile talk will spur a massive backlash in America.

Now let us talk about gender. For far too long, Trump and his Republican faithful have abused women at the ballot box, in wage equality, in equal work conditions, in safety from sexual predators, in abortion access and in health care. The Supreme Court’s decision that overruled federal protection for abortion, the passage of restrictive abortion laws in some 26 states, and the embrace by Trump, Vance and their MAGA cohorts of abortion restrictions that demean and devalue women, are going to come back to hurt. In every state where the question has been left to voters, abortion access wins.

The Republicans are fighting a losing battle. Winning the Presidency, the House and the Senate, will become national rallying cries.

So, the answer is that all things being equal, the American electorate will defeat Trump. Republicans are about 27% of registered voters, Democrats 29%. Winning the presidency requires the votes of a sizable chunk of Independents. It is too much to expect that Independent means tolerance for indecency.

The other side of the coin

To put an exclamation point on this, consider this from an opinion piece by Jill Filipovic in The Daily Beast: “There is, of course, some worried handwringing. Most of the worries boil down to ‘the last time we ran a woman, she lost.’ This is true—but it also treats one woman as a stand-in for all women and derives a sweeping lesson from a single race.

“It seems worth mentioning that a white man has lost in every single other election in American history, including two times to a Black man. Trump lost the popular vote to Clinton in 2016, and again to Joe Biden in 2020. We have not extrapolated out from that long history of losses that white men can’t win. We shouldn’t do the same based on the one election in which a woman was a major party’s nominee.”

So, what is the other side of the coin? Is it possible that Harris will stumble and the nation will be less forgiving of a woman than it has been of Trump? Sure, it is.

Is it possible that the Democrats will simply fail to rally and that we are seeing early euphoria that will soon fade? Sure, it is. But remember that the frustration of the American people has been building for years. But just as Trump capitalized on the frustration of the American people in 2016, he failed to deliver on his promises other than to cut taxes, appoint right-wing Supreme Court justices, and gut environmental regulations. Are the American people so stupid as to buy false promises for the second time? I don’t think so.

Project 2025 and white supremacy

Finally, there is Project 2025. Expect the Democrats to hammer home the dire threat that Trump poses to the very system of governance that this nation has built. That initiative incorporates the destruction of the federal government with white supremacy, Christian nationalism, suppression of human rights, abuse of immigrants and a national insularity that is repugnant to Americans when they learn what is planned.

No matter how much hate and bile Trump spews, my bet is that Americans are not ready to destroy the economic and political miracle that has made America what it is.

Yes, America can put Kamala Harris in the White House. And it can also return Trump to the presidency.

We shall wait and see if America looks to the future or suffers a self-inflicted wound on a journey back to the 14th Century.

Cheerz…
Bwana

Mauritius Times ePaper Friday 26 July 2024