Replies

then he really sorta has to go with Harris, no? She's black so she brings the low information voters, but she was also a real law-and-order establishment type so she pleases the establishment. She'll tick off the Wokesters but she's still solidly two out of three.

It's a tough call. Biden's in a tough spot, methinks.

Biden isn't so much of in a tough spot as the result of a Democratic party in a tough spot. They desperately wanted to have a woman, or a minority, or something not "old white guy", but they stifled their activist base for so long they were going to nominate a socialist, so they had to go with Biden as a fallback. Biden is nobody's first pick, he has been running for president since 1988 and until James Clyburn pulled some strings for him, he had never won a single primary. He doesn't have people pulling for him, he doesn't have a power base.

As a longtime senator with nobody pulling for him, adding Harris isn't a strong choice. She is also a senator without anyone pulling for her.

She's a woman and a minority, but there's tons of tape on her rising to the Senate by bragging about her "tough on crime" by locking up and aggressively prosecuting the same low level minority criminals that the BLM and activist wings of the party want to see freed and not prosecuted.

Biden's VP negotiator is Chris Dodd, ever a party insider if you've ever seen one. He's not looking to just check identity blocks, he's bargaining with various party power brokers to see who is offering what. They leak names to the press and feed trial balloon stories to the press to see how other people in the media and donor bases react, including what the hot take opposition smeara look like. It's a form of polling. The candidates do the same, hoping something will catch fire.

I personally think team Biden is stuck with picking someone agreeable to the Congressional Black Caucus since James Clyburn saved his campaign.

There's also a publicity angle, since the VP candidate is going to have to handle an even heavier share of the media load than in other campaigns on account of Biden's creeping senility. Harris is not great on media and currently looks like Caesar Romero in blackface and even before the facelift, she came across as fake to people unsympathetic to her (I think people inclined to support her don't see the fakeness, but the VP candidate has to expand the base)

Susan Rice has a terrible media presence and has a reputation for lying to the public, and she never had to hone the public office candidate skills others have. There's also the whole fabricated Russia story bit that she could very well be implicated in legally on account of her actually being a central part of it.

I wouldn't be surprised if some black male candidates start getting floated around in the press if Karen Bass falls flat because they are running out of black women to vet.