Racism and Sexism Unnecessary

Jen Psaki, perhaps a living embodiment of the Peter Principle, once was a very good press secretary for President Joe Biden and now is a very, very bad host on MSNBC. Here she is commenting on the effective round of interviews Vice President Kamala Harris had following the President's atrocious debate performance.

Jen Psaki blames sexism and racism for why people don’t like Kamala Harris

No Jen, people just think she’s retarded

And btw, you’re ugly

pic.twitter.com/8ied9jwYfD

— Drew Hernandez (@DrewHLive) July 11, 2024

Psaki states that Harris "is like, in my view, and undervalued talent. Um, she's a very fierce communicator. She's very strong, especially on one of the core issues that the election may be won or lost on, which is abortion rights." She noted that she had watched the debate "on the set" with other MSNBC personalities and  

after the debate, I was like "that was great." I said "yeah." That's what she's doing out in the country and nobody's tracking it.  It's almost like public opinion has not caught up with what she's doing out there. And also, we live in a country that's sexist and racist.

This country has a problem with sexual and racial bias. However, there are other reasons- or should be- that Kamala Harris is unpopular.  A week before Harris was announced as Joe Biden's running mate in August, 2020, The Crime Report summarized an article published a few days earlier by the American Prospect, which noted that the V.P. hopeful had

openly defied U.S. Supreme Court orders to reduce overcrowding in California prisons while serving as the state’s attorney general, reports the American Prospect. Working with Gov. Jerry Brown, Harris and her legal team filed motions that were condemned by judges and legal experts as obstructionist, bad-faith, and nonsensical, at one point suggesting that the Supreme Court lacked the jurisdiction to order a reduction in California’s prison population. Judges seriously considered holding the state in contempt of court. Observers worried that Harris’s office had undermined the ability of federal judges to enforce their legal orders at the state level. The resistance to a Supreme Court ruling was aimed at preventing the release of some 5,000 nonviolent offenders, whom courts had cleared as presenting next to no risk of recidivism or threat to public safety.

Despite a straightforward directive from the Supreme Court to identify prisoners for release over a two-year period, the state spent most of that time seesawing between dubious legal filings and flagrant disregard. By early 2013, it became clear that the state had no intention to comply. Harris refused to comment to the Prospect, which reviewed in detail the events leading up the 2011 Supreme Court ruling that required a reduction in the California prisoner count. In the 5-4 decision, conservative Justice Anthony Kennedy joined the court’s liberals, condemning the state for facilitating “needless suffering and death.” Under Attorney General Harris, the state delayed compliance, and by 2012, a report surfaced that proved the state actually intended to increase its prison population.

The American Prospect reported that the Supreme Court a 2013 ruling on the case included

“defendants have repeatedly found new and unexpected ways to frustrate this Court’s orders,” the three-judge panel decried, and “used this Court’s patience and good-faith attempts to achieve a resolution as an excuse for protracting these legal proceedings to a time that could hardly have been imagined.” Harris’s work on that case alone would likely disqualify her from a shot at a federal bench or Supreme Court appointment, Cohen opined.

Harris’s use of the anti-desegregation playbook to prevent the release of low-level offenders ultimately failed. Finally, in 2014, the state acceded, and the prison population was reduced.

This was probably the most egregious- but not the only- behavior of the Attorney General's office under Kamala Harris designed to bolster her political viability in the pre-George Floyd era. If Harris were nominated for President, the GOP, contemptuous of the courts and other institutions, might not exploit the actions of a state attorney general dedicated to improving her image as a "law and order" advocate. 

Fortunately, she did not later reverse her approach and embark on a path to condoning lawlessness, which Republicans would be more anxious to use to their benefit. Or perhaps she did, as six or so years later, as she was being considered by Joe Biden as a running mate, she knew how to ride the wave of revulsion at the murder of George Floyd.

If you’re able to, chip in now to the @MNFreedomFund to help post bail for those protesting on the ground in Minnesota. https://t.co/t8LXowKIbw

— Kamala Harris (@KamalaHarris) June 1, 2020

The 2018 tax filing of the Minnesota Freedom Foundation, an organization committed to paying the bail of accused offenders

shows it raised only about $100,000 that year. Just weeks after Floyd’s death, it raised an astonishing $35 million, in part because of tweets such as the one by Harris, who is now the Democratic vice-presidential nominee. That influx has put a strain on an organization that at the time had only one full-time staff member.

According to an accounting by the American Bail Coalition, verified by The Fact Checker with a review of Hennepin County jail records, all but three of the 170 people arrested during the protests between May 26 and June 2 were released from jail within a week. Of the 167 released, only 10 had to put up a monetary bond to be released; in most cases, the amounts were nominal, such as $78 or $100. In fact, 92 percent of those arrested had to pay no bail — and 29 percent of those arrested did not face charges. (The American Bail Coalition is a trade group of insurance companies who profit from underwriting bail bonds.)

Probably few of the individuals who sent money to the MFF realized that most of it would not be used to secure the release of black lives matter protestors. However, few of the donors had been the chief law enforcement officer of a state and only one would be promoted by (MSNBC host) Nicole Wallace and others as someone who could prosecute the case against presidential nominee Donald Trump because of her legal background. Fortunately, there is no one case the GOP could blow out of proportion- oh no, say it ain't so:

A Minnesota bail fund championed by Vice President Kamala Harris helped free a repeat felon now charged with murder.

The Minnesota Freedom Fund on Thursday acknowledged it helped secure the release of Shawn Michael Tillman, who in May shot and killed a passenger on a rail platform in St. Paul. Harris promoted the Freedom Fund on Twitter during the George Floyd riots in 2020, helping the group raise $35 million in a matter of weeks, according to the Washington Post.

Freedom Fund executive directors Mirella Ceja-Orozco and Elizer Darris defended the group's decision to post Tillman's bail in a statement Thursday, saying, "It is neither just nor effective to respond to violence by denying bail and preemptively punishing people who are disproportionately poor, Black, brown, and Indigenous."

Tillman's criminal record includes multiple counts of indecent exposure, as well as assault and unlawful possession of a firearm, court records show. He is now in custody with bail set at $2 million.

Tillman was convicted of first degree murder, second degree murder, and illegal firearm possession and sentenced four months ago to 60 months for the illegal possession and to life without parole for first-degree murder. 

Kamala Harris wasn't responsible for SM Tillman, any more than Massachusetts governor Michael Dukakis was responsible to the rape committed by Willie Horton. Yet, the Willie Horton issue, exploited relentlessly by conservatives, was probably more responsible than anything for the victory of George HW Bush over Dukakis in the 1988 presidential election.

Nonetheless, Kamala Harris' checkered record on criminal justice is ripe to be exploited by the GOP, were the vice-president to be nominated for the highest office in the nation. It illustrates also that if Jen Psaki and others from the race and gender left attempt to impugn criticism of Harris as misogynist or racist, they are- generously speaking- acting from a position of ignorance.

Share |

Beyond Vulnerable

Wait... what?

President Biden and I have cancelled $167 billion in student loan debt for nearly 5 million people — and we're not stopping there.

We will continue our work to build an economy that works for every American. Learn more at https://t.co/TOL6mQV0lq. pic.twitter.com/ikYiaOwQdy

— Vice President Kamala Harris (@VP) July 6, 2024

Of course, Ms. Harris had nothing to do with cancellation of student debt, other than possibly encouraging Mr. Biden to do it. The Vice President is the presiding officer of the Senate and casts the deciding vote there in csse of a tie. The Vice President always will do that as desired by the President.

Nonetheless, if Kamala Harris were to replace Joe Biden at the top of the Democratic ticket (as appears increasingly unlikely) and wished to run as representing the Biden-Harris Administration, the GOP would be more than happy to accommodate her.  Republicans and conservative media- and most  media less friendly to the Democratic Party than is MSNBC- would remind voters constantly, as did this piece in February, that

President Biden, facing a political crisis at the U.S.-Mexico border in the early days of his administration, tapped Vice President Kamala Harris to lead a high-profile response that would bet heavily on improving conditions in three Central American countries.

It was known as the “root causes” strategy. The border, administration officials argued, was only a symptom. If the United States could improve economic, security and political conditions in Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala, fewer people would risk the perilous journey and much of the problem could be solved, they reasoned.

Three years later, the border crisis has only deepened, with record numbers of migrants from all over the hemisphere overwhelming the border, and a president on the defense as Republicans make immigration a key issue in his reelection campaign.

Specialists in migration say the administration miscalculated, choosing a narrow and time-consuming strategy that failed to anticipate the shifting nature of migration.

“It was focused on a long-term scenario and it was focused on countries that are no longer the primary sending countries,” said Ariel Ruiz Soto, a senior policy analyst with the Migration Policy Institute, a nonpartisan research group.

Today the record number of migrants at the border has been fueled by people fleeing Venezuela, Nicaragua, Cuba and Haiti, who together accounted for 583,000 border arrests in the 2023 budget year.

The Biden Administration's record on the border is dismal and the visuals would be epic.  On OANN, Newsmax, and on local stations throughout the country (video below), viewers would be subject to video of individuals streaming across our southern border. And they typically would not be men, women, and children but rather men, unaccompanied by women, thus intensifying the fear fear the videos are to engender.

 

A valid representation of the problem of illegal immigration? No. A problem for which Vice President Harris is responsible? No. Effective? You bet.

If she were to replace Joe Biden, Kamala Harris surely would claim credit for the many accomplishments of the present Administration. However, that door swings both ways- and with the current cranky mood of the American public, the door would likely hit her where she wouldn't like it.

Share |

Another Barrier to Re-Election

What is Jennifer Rubin thinking?

She is excellent. Why does a name make any difference??

— Jen "I dissent " Rubin (@JRubinBlogger) July 8, 2024

This Parkinson's controversy appears to be a tempest in a teapot or for those born after circa 1960, a lot of nothing.  Emily Baumgaertner and Peter Baker of The New York Times note that Dr. Kevin Cannard

a neurologist who specializes in movement disorders and recently published a paper on Parkinson’s. The logs, released by the White House, document visits from July 2023 through March of this year. More recent visits, if there have been any, would not be released until later under the White House’s voluntary disclosure policy.

It was unclear whether Dr. Cannard was at the White House to consult specifically about the president or was there for unrelated meetings. Dr. Cannard’s LinkedIn page describes him as “supporting the White House Medical Unit” for more than 12 years. His biography on Doximity, a website for health professionals, lists him as a “neurology consultant to the White House Medical Unit and the physician to the president” from 2012 to 2022, which would include the administrations of Presidents Barack Obama and Donald J. Trump.

Records from the Obama administration, when Mr. Biden was vice president, show that Dr. Cannard made at least 10 visits in 2012 plus a family tour; four in 2013; one in 2014; four in 2015; and eight in 2016. Mr. Trump rescinded Mr. Obama’s voluntary White House visitors disclosure policy, so records are not available for his four years in office.

In all the Parkinson's hoopla, no one from the media seems curious about no records being available for the Trump White House since the time that then-President Trump decided to shut the media out of information. Aside from the Times article, there is little attention paid to the statement of White House spokesperson Andrew Bates that in his annual physical, President Biden "has been seen by a neurologist once a year" and that "examination has found no sign of Parkinson's and he is not being treated for it."

That's not to suggest all is well with President Biden's health. However, less well is the individual representing the President to the press, hence to the voting public:

Later in the briefing, Karine Jean-Pierre says she "takes offense to what Ed alluded to," when she dodges on the Parkinson's specialist, adding that it is "really unfair" that she is "holding information" from the White House press corps. pic.twitter.com/YACDBlIblM

— Justin Baragona (@justinbaragona) July 8, 2024

If the press secretary is to serve the President effectively, she should not get into such an extended argument with a reporter. Nor should she say "for security reasons, we cannot share names" when 

At her regular briefing later in the day, Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, refused to answer questions about Dr. Cannard’s visits, saying she would not discuss specialists who come to the White House out of concern for their “privacy” and “security,” even though Dr. Cannard lists his affiliation with the White House on a public website.

Ed O'Keefe, the CBS News correspondent Jean-Pierre quarreled with, had earlier in the exchange identified Dr. Cannard by name. And yet, the press secretary claimed "for security reasons, we cannot share names".... a name which already had been "shared" on a public website.

This is not simply a matter of transparency. The name was out there. The problem is with a press secretary who has been simply awful from the beginning of her tenure. Admittedly, on a list of the President's problems, this is probably only #41 or so. Similar to Biden's cognitive issue, it is one more matter which the White House has ignored. Jean=Pierre has improved somewhat, yet her presence remains one more obstacle to Joe Biden's re-election, one which should long ago have been removed.

Share |

Heading Down a Ruinous Road

Credit to black-oriented Philadelphia radio station HURD. After an interview (the second by a black-oriented station) with President Biden recorded July 3 was aired on July 4, CNN's Victor Blackwell asked Andrea Lawful-Sanders

about your interviews, and something – I listened to both of them. And there’s something that’s similar here. You each were, you asked for questions, and maybe that’s what you were allowed to ask by, the campaign or the White House. But they were essentially the same questions, both interviews about accomplishments, progress in your respective state, what’s at stake in the election, what do you has to say about this debate performance, and what he would say to voters who think their vote doesn’t matter or might sit this election out. Were those questions given to you by the White House, or did you have or the campaign, or did you have to submit questions ahead of this interview?

The friendly chat with the President turned out to be a bad political move because

Lawful-Sanders arranged the interview, including the prewritten questions, without the knowledge of WURD management, which “violates our practice of remaining an independent media outlet accountable to our listeners,” wrote Sara M. Lomax, the president and CEO of WURD Radio. Lawful-Sanders’ separation from the station is effective immediately.

“This is something we take very seriously,” Lomax added in the statement. “Agreeing to a predetermined set of questions jeopardizes that trust and is not a practice that WURD Radio engages in or endorses as a matter of practice or official policy.”

The exchange with Lawful-Sanders was not a good political move also by the President, who stated

By the way I’m proud to be, as I said the first vice president, the first Black woman served with a Black president, proud of the first Black woman, the Supreme Court. There’s just so much that we can do because together we, there’s nothing. Look, this is the United States of America.

Identifying himself as a black woman was apiece with Biden's theme during the interview as

Biden likely jumbled the sentence because he'd earlier spoken about being the first vice president to serve under a Black president.

Earlier in the interview, he also spoke about how he was the first president to have a Black woman as vice president and had appointed Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson, the first Black woman to serve on the Supreme Court.

This is governance by quota.  The President had ruled out males, as well as whites, Latinas, Asian-American, or members of American Indian tribes. But, O.K.: results matter, and Mrs. Jackson was an excellent choice.

However, there should be no more pride in serving under a black President than under a white President, especially because Biden would not have been selected if he had not been white.

That's all in the past, of course. But Kamala Harris was tapped by former Vice President Biden because she is a black woman, one about whom Jill Biden, following a presidential debate in June of 2019, maintained

I think that they were looking at the past. I mean, the one thing you cannot say about Joe is that he’s a racist. I mean, he got into politics because of his commitment to civil rights. And then to be elected with Barack Obama, and then someone is saying, you know, you’re a racist?

According to New York Times reporters Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns in their book published in May, 2022, Dr. Biden complained "There are millions of people in the United States. Why... do we have to choose the one who attacked Joe?"

That was a question she should have (and probably did) addressed to her husband.  A bad Attorney General, unremarkable United States Senator, and terrible candidate, Harris nonetheless was selected as a running mate by a 77-year-old white male because, well, he was a 77-year-old white male.

He is now an 81-year-old male in serious decline and facing irresistible pressure to leave the race. There is little indication that the Democratic Party has chosen to be democratic and open the process to candidates other than the sitting Vice President because.... (See above.)

If President Biden had heeded the advice of Bill Maher andJames Carville late last year, he would have chosen to sit this one out. There would have been a season of primaries and campaigning and a good chance that a strong Democratic nominee would have emerged. However, f the very unpopular Joe Biden drops his re-election bid, the very unpopular Kamala Harris now is the most likely nominee, an occurrence which would be applauded as "historic" by a Party which considers that a higher priority than defeating Donald J. Trump.

 

 

Share |

Private first class Kamala Harris

Enjoy. There will be very few moments you will see them together. Unless, of course, you will in Republican campaign ads if Kamala Harris becomes the Democratic presidential nominee.

It’s always nice to see them together!@POTUS, @FLOTUS, @VP Harris and @SecondGentleman at the Fourth of July Celebration at the White House. 🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/gcO0Sb5L1Y

— best of kamala harris (@archivekamala) July 5, 2024

Amid strains of Bruce Springsteen's "Born in the USA" (Springsteen getting the name of the country, United States of America, right), Vice President Kamala Harris screams

And today we celebrate freedom. As we celebrate the promise of America- we also celebrate and express our gratitude to our service members, to our veterans, to our military families.

So far, so good. But then the Vice President adds "and we give thanks to our commander-in-chief, the President of the United States, the extraordinary President of the United States, Joe Biden!!!!"

We now have learned something new, and important, about Kamala Harris. She is an extraordinary individual currently serving not only as Vice President but in combat for the nation. We know that because Article II, Section 2, Clause 1 of the Constitution of the United States of America states

The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual service of the United States; he may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments, upon any Subject relating to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.

(The founding fathers loved capital letters.)

Readers of this blog may wonder why I never have anything positive to say about Kamala Harris. But here I unqualifiedly thank her for her service, as many people do for other members of our Armed Services. 

Share |

Privilege vs. Electability

As of 8:30 a.m. on Wednesday, there are three camps in the Democratic Party. There are those who will soon disappear, doggedly defending President Biden; individuals, such as Jim Clyburn, who believe that the presidential nomination should be handed on a silver platter to Vice President Kamala Harris; and individuals who believe there should be open competition for the top spot once Joe Biden bows out.

In the latter category are who could be characterized as democratic Democrats. Most clearly representative of this group is longtime U.S. Representative Lloyd Doggett of Texas. He has it exactly right:

Doggett notes that Joe Biden has been an effective President and that "our overriding consideration must be who has the best hope of saving our democracy from an authoritarian takeover by a criminal and his gang." Having emphasized "too much is at stake to risk a Trump victory," the congressman proceeds logically to "he has the opportunity to encourage a new generation of leaders from whom a nominee can be chosen to unite our country thorough an open, democratic process."

This is, after all, the Democratic Party, which makes ironic to hear voice(s) which believes it should be transformed into the Undemocratic Party:

 

Listening to white folks desperately try to justify not going with the Black woman who has all the campaign money is something else.

Just, real ass showing all around.

— Elie Mystal (@ElieNYC) July 3, 2024

Leave aside (for now) the race-mongering. In the midst of an occasional insight, it is just something you have to put with in Elie Mystal. More importantly, though a lawyer, he is not a campaign finance attorney nor possessing of any particular credentials in campaign finance law. And despite the highly misleading title of this article, it is not at all clear that Kamala Harris would inherit Biden campaign funds.  Reportedly, the money could be refunded to donors, "who could in turn donate to a new candidate. Further, two experts in the field

noted that if Biden steps aside, the funds could be transferred to a charity or a super PAC, which would not be able to coordinate with the campaign. The funds could also be transferred to the national party.

Campaign finance law is (in)famously complex and arcane. However (or therefore) the bottom line is that no one knows for sure what would become of the funds already collected for the campaign. Practically, that means that the Party could do whatever it wishes. In the worst case scenario, it does what is later deemed illegal and is eventually fined. And no one, aside from perhaps the then-chairperson of the FEC remembers the time in 1993 that

Senator Bob Dole's 1988 campaign for President has agreed to pay more than $120,000 in civil penalties for election law violations, the largest settlement for any Presidential campaign organization, the Federal Election Commission said today.

In the settlement, Dole campaign officials admitted that they had committed several serious violations in raising and spending money for the 1988 presidential primaries.

In an extensive article following Dole's death in December, 2021, The New York Times made no mention of the campaign violation.. Neither did The Washington Post. Few if any people paid attention at the time of the infraction; ditto when the fine was levied, and at the time of his passing, no one noticed, let alone cared about it. 

If privilege is to reign supreme, the Party vey likely could transfer the campaign funds to Kamala Harris. Mystal may be only the first, or close to the first, of well-known individuals to imply that race must be his party's primary concern in choosing someone to replace Joe Biden, and that to overlook her would be racist. (My "leave aside for now" meant only for the moment.) 

Political pundits have understood for many months that the election would turn on whether it is viewed by voters as a choice or a referendum, the latter obviously a welcome scenario for Donald Trump. If Kamala Harris is nominated for President, Mr. Trump would delight in excoriating what would become known as the Biden-Harris administration, an albatross no candidate other than Harris or Biden would have to bear.

In response, the Party should do as Lloyd Doggett suggests and recognize that keeping Donald Trump from returning to the White House is the greatest priority. The shattering of glass ceilings is far less critical, especially now that the US Supreme Court has decided in TRUMP v. United States that the President of the United States of America may assume the powers of a king.

 

Share |

Lies and the Lying Liar Who Tells Them

On Friday, Bill Maher quipped "in case you missed (the Biden-Trump debated), so did one of the contestants."

“I think Democrats are being held to a different standard here.” @MollyJongFast says there’s too much focus on Biden’s debate performance and not on Trump’s egregious lies. pic.twitter.com/IqyxugddMX

— The Weekend on MSNBC (@TheWeekendMSNBC) June 30, 2024

CNN's great Daniel Dale did note that while Biden made at least nine false claims, Trump made more than thirty, including 

his assertions that some Democratic-led states allow babies to be executed after birth, that every legal scholar and everybody in general wanted Roe v. Wade overturned, that there were no terror attacks during his presidency, that Iran didn’t fund terror groups during his presidency, that the US has provided more aid to Ukraine than Europe has, that Biden for years referred to Black people as “super predators,” that Biden is planning to quadruple people’s taxes, that then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi turned down 10,000 National Guard troops for the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, that Americans don’t pay the cost of his tariffs on China and other countries, that Europe accepts no American cars, that he is the president who got the Veterans Choice program through Congress, and that fraud marred the results of the 2020 election."best practice."

Yet it's difficult to focus on lies or other falsehoods because there is no video. Video drives cable news and television news in general because it's, well, visual, viewers like to see it, and interviews and discussions can be packaged around it. If a tree falls in a forest and no one is around to see it, it still makes a sound. But there is no one to talk about it, and talk about it, and talk about it, and.....

It would make for bad television and a trivial number of social media clicks. By contrast, if someone is videotaped slurring words, unable to complete a thought, speaking incoherently, or looking as if he is barely aware of where he is, people want to see it. Additionally, there is a sort of dog bites man to Trump lying whenever his lips move- it's what he has done for years and it's just another day in the life.

Donald Trump, as usual, rarely made an accurate claim. However, as Maher put it, "Trump told lie after lie after lie. He never would have gotten away with that if Joe Biden was there."

Share |