President Joe Biden, joined by Vice President Kamala Harris, after delivering remarks on the CDC’s updated guidance on mask wearing for vaccinated individuals Thursday, May 13, 2021, in the Rose Garden of the White House. (Official White House photo by Adam Schultz)
It’s just not fair that Kamala Harris, the vice president, is being given tough problems to address, like President Biden’s immigration crisis at the southern border and the responsibility to push the Democrats’ elections agenda through Congress.
That’s because she might fail, and that wouldn’t look good for her if she runs for president in 2024 or 2028.
That’s all according to not only a column at the New York Times but an endorsing social media statement from the Grey Lady’s Ezra Klein.
The commentary was from guest writer Christina Greer of Fordham University, who warned Harris, “It’s a trap!” and explained, “Biden and his team aren’t giving her chances to get some wins and more experience on her ledger. Rather, it’s the hardest of the hard stuff.
“If she is somehow miraculously able to detangle the complex ‘immigration crisis,’ she will be heralded by some, but not all, as a success and worthy of the Democratic presidential nomination in 2024. If she becomes only the latest leader (in either party) who cannot solve the problem, she specifically will be viewed as a failure.”
Klein seconded her motion, saying, “This seems right.”
This seems right. Kamala Harris will probably be the Democratic nominee in 24 or 28. Biden's team should be giving her portfolios that make it likelier she'll win. Instead they're giving her impossible problems that will likely become liabilities. https://t.co/Bd8ATdv6kL
— Ezra Klein (@ezraklein) June 29, 2021
But the PostMillennial openly wondered, “Is Kamala Harris’ job too hard? Should the Biden administration, or as they like to call it, the Biden Harris administration, be giving Harris’ easier tasks to manage?”
It continued, “It’s hard to see this op-ed as anything other than a softly bigoted rant about how Harris can’t handle the tough jobs if the Dems want her to take the presidency in 2024. As a black woman who may intend to run for president in just a few years, who will be up against men as well as voter bias against her gender and race, Harris’, Klein believes, should be given easier problems to tackle.”
The commentary said, “Klein’s argument is literally that Harris should be given lesser challenges so that she won’t look like a failure when she attempts to attain the presidency during the next election. If she doesn’t fail, that must be a success, right?”
Klein, the PostMillennial explained, is saying, “if the Democrats want Kamala Harris to have a shot at the presidency, they need to lower their expectations of her abilities. It’s not fair, says Klein, to give her all the tough jobs while Biden deals with the rest of the nation’s ills on a cross-country PR tour to get their policy proposals in front of the public. Give her something easy to do, and then we’ll see how she can really shine, Klein implores.”
The actual work Harris faces, assigned by Biden, includes not only the border issue, where a win for the American people would mean a return to President Trump’s policies, and the voting issue, which is in filibuster limbo, but also opposition to COVID-19 vaccine mandates and police reform.
“The Biden administration consistently tells us that we are facing tough challenges that are dividing the nation and that their team is the best one to handle it. Now The New York Times and Ezra Klein tell us that they are not quite the best team, but they will be, if we give them just a little more time, and nothing too hard to handle, m’kay?” the commentary said.
Fox News also pointed out the oddity of the messaging: that Harris can’t handle America’s real problems and she should be given something easier so that she can be president later.
The report explained, “New York Times columnist Ezra Klein feels President Biden is making life too difficult for Vice President Kamala Harris and feels she should be given simpler tasks to enhance her reputation.”
Joe Concha, a Fox News contributor, pointed out: “Tackling difficult portfolios is what solid leaders do. As stated before, Harris’s abysmal (and noticeably apathetic) performance on the border crisis will play a huge role on how she’s judged as a candidate. And she doesn’t have the personal attributes/likability to fall back on.”
Greer actually noted that after Harris’ trip to the southern border last weekend, the White House said it was a “success,” but at least “there were no defensive moments like during the NBC News interview in Guatemala in which she called a border visit a ‘grand gesture’ and noted that she hadn’t visited Europe as vice president, either.”
Greer said, “Harris, at this point, can’t seem to win for trying. She is a historic yet inexperienced vice president who is taking on work that can easily backfire as so many people sit in judgment, with critics sniping (especially right-wing commentators) and allies spinning (like with official statements about ‘success’).”
Meanwhile, the clock is ticking as Biden will be 81 for the next presidential election, and in picking Harris, he had to realize he was “making her his heir apparent,” Greer said.
“But based on how things look now, her work as his No. 2 could end up being baggage more than a boon. Mr. Biden and his team aren’t giving her chances to get some wins and more experience on her ledger. Rather, it’s the hardest of the hard stuff.”
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So let me see if I understand the situation. We have an elderly president with questionable mental facilities and we have a VP, the person who is only one heartbeat or one mental breakdown from sitting in the oval office who is apparently incapable of handling a challenging interview by a sympathetic interviewer and is incapable of announcing some kind of policy formulated, I hope, by a meeting of the minds (there are some capable of reasoned thought I really hope) presently on staff at the white shack but not to worry, some more years handling softball issues like what color the seats should be in the VP’s plane and what color drapes should hang in the VP’s office should prepare her to handle negotiations with Putin and friends, the fat boy in NK and Xi Jinping. Yeah, right. Lotsa luck with that theory.
And some thought Trump was a disaster waiting to happen? Compared to the present group theoretically running the show he was the political genius of the last 100 years. Don’t get me wrong. I thought he was a crass boor. But that’s not the first time we have had crass boors in the White House. Can you say Lydon Baines Johnson? Can you say alcoholic Richard M. Nixon? Can you say William Jefferson Clinton who apparently couldn’t resist chasing any skirt that walked down the hallway. Even the saintly John Fitzgerald Kennedy was a lech of the first order. At least Trump wasn’t taking calls while he was sitting on the white throne a la LBJ.
I don’t know about other readers but I find the situation in DC truly scary.
We have an incompetent president and an arrogant vice president. What could go wrong with that combination?
She really has no reason to be VP. Sleepy Joe’s advisors wanted her because of the melanin and the sex. That’s it. Because of the cackling she would make the worlds worst gambler. It’s a tell, you following here?
Easier like what? Cleaning up after Willie Brown???
Her “cackling” is a defensive action/reaction when she’s faced with a question she either doesn’t know the answer to or afraid of what a truthful answer would cost her. She isn’t fooling anyone but those her put her into office.