Of course the intersectionality Queen would be high on the list of the diversity-is-our-strength party; she is black and she is female.
Will she deliver the goods? Overall, I think she is a transparently nasty piece of work. In other words she is extremely unlikable. So the question now becomes can this transparently unlikable female of color bring in the female vote, the female vote of women of color, the male vote of males of color? And will she bring in the substantial oh-so-earnest minority of the population that feels good about voting for a candidate of color?
Notice I have not said that her history will prove her Achilles' heel. I think the voters she could potentially bring in don't care in the first instance about her history rather they will vote for a candidate who touches them emotionally, a candidate who completes the image that will make them as voters feel good. In that context, Kamala Harris' biography is damaging in that it reinforces her transparent bitchiness.
First the men and women of America must come to make their decision on her likability, do they like her or do they dislike her. If the latter, they will invoke her biography to justify their view.
Harris can undertake years of acting lessons but the camera has a way of revealing the truth.
I agree with everything you wrote, and you phrased it better than I would have.
Harris is not a likeable person. She has baggage that will harm her with voters:
- First, the obvious:
- She's not "African-American," she's Jamaican-Indian. If Obama was criticized by some for not being "authentically black," Harris has it much worse.
- She's an anchor baby. Setting the natural born citizenship question aside, she can still be attacked in the court of public opinion for being the child of two college graduates who were here on student visas shortly before she was born.
- Next, the political:
- As District Attorney in Oakland/San Francisco and Attorney General in California, Harris was soft on crime. She refused to pursue the death penalty for cop killers.
- She adds nothing to the ticket. California will vote for the Democrat regardless of who is on the ticket.
- While mentioning her affair with Mayor Willie Brown is dangerous territory, it is a classic case of a hostile work environment.
- It wasn't hostile for Harris because she benefited from the affair with the boss, but it was hostile for other women who got the message that the only way to advance in their careers is to sleep with the boss.
- That's the indirect damage of what Harris' affair caused. Like Warren taking a job from a qualified minority by faking her ethnicity, Harris possibly took away a job from a more tenured worker by jumping ahead of the pack and benefitting from favoritism.
- Finally, the personal:
- She's shrill and mean-spirited. Just run clips of her from her various confirmation committee hearings she sat on.
- She said on the radio that she took drugs and she liked music that wasn't even written at the time. She will say and do anything that she thinks is expedient for the moment.
-PJ