Her challenge would be translating that into a public persona, which is — and let’s be blunt about this — a hard thing to do when you’ve grown up in a world that has always been quick to find your faults. A world that is afraid of women being angry, of Black people being angry. A world where, for most of your life, it was demanded of you that you be cautious and careful and measured and never make a mistake. And then you get on the public stage and people say, oh, you’re too cautious and too careful and too measured. It’s a very, very, very hard bind to get out of. But maybe she can do it.
Still, it is the party’s job to organize victory. If Harris cannot convince delegates that she has the best shot at victory, she should not and probably would not be chosen. And I don’t think that would rip the party apart. There is a ton of talent in the Democratic Party right now: Gretchen Whitmer, Wes Moore, Jared Polis, Gavin Newsom, Raphael Warnock, Josh Shapiro, Cory Booker, Ro Khanna, Pete Buttigieg, Gina Raimondo, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Chris Murphy, Andy Beshear, J.B. Pritzker — the list goes on.
Some of them would make a run at the nomination. They would give speeches at the convention, and people would actually pay attention. The whole country would be watching the Democratic convention, and probably quite a bit happening in the run-up to it, and seeing what this murderer’s row of political talent could actually do. And then some ticket would be chosen based on how those people did.
Could it go badly? Sure. But that doesn’t mean it will go badly. It could make the Democrats into the most exciting political show on earth. And over there on the other side will be Trump getting nominated and a who’s who of MAGA types slavering over his leadership. The best of the Democratic Party against the worst of the Republican Party. A party that actually listened to the voters against a party that denies the outcome of the elections. A party that did something different over a party that has again nominated a threat to democracy who has never — not once — won the popular vote in a general election.
That seems like an OK contrast to me.
Yes, the Democratic Party has been winning elections recently. But it is winning those elections in part because it takes candidate recruitment seriously. That was true in 2020. Biden wasn’t the candidate that set the base’s heart aflutter, but he seemed like the candidate with the best shot at winning. So Democrats did the strategic thing and picked him. And they won. In 2022, Democrats carefully chose candidates who fit their districts, who fit their states while Republicans chose MAGA-soaked extremists. And that is why those Democrats won.
