{"id":4283,"date":"2019-07-03T09:20:27","date_gmt":"2019-07-03T16:20:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blackcap.name\/blog\/new\/?p=4283"},"modified":"2019-07-03T09:20:27","modified_gmt":"2019-07-03T16:20:27","slug":"odds-are-turning-in-harris-favor","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blackcap.name\/blog\/new\/?p=4283","title":{"rendered":"Odds are Turning in Harris\u2019 Favor"},"content":{"rendered":"

So, while I thought Biden didn\u2019t do too badly, it seems that Harris ate his lunch<\/a> to the point where she has gone up quite a bit in the polls at Biden\u2019s expense. Sanders is looking more and more like an also-ran with each passing day. It all gives me decidedly mixed feelings.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m just as happy to see Biden\u2019s fortunes fall, since I believe he would be a disastrous candidate against Trump. The Democrats already tried running one triangulating centrist against Trump; why repeat that failed strategy?<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not so happy to see it happen at the hands of Harris. She\u2019s very much an authoritarian in the mold of Trump, just for different ends. If you don\u2019t believe me, check out her position on gun control. She vows to unilaterally take executive action<\/a> if Congress doesn\u2019t act according to her will.<\/p>\n

That, frankly, is the last<\/em> thing we need. It it flies \u2014 and, thanks to precedents already set by Trump and his predecessors, it just might \u2014 it will successfully establish an even firmer<\/em> precedent in favor of an even more<\/em> imperial presidency.<\/p>\n

A precedent which, no doubt, would be used sooner than anyone thinks by a fascist president whose ruthlessness makes Trump look like a harmless fuzzball, much like Trump makes Dubya look by comparison today.<\/p>\n

Sadly, Harris is probably the Democrat with the best chance of winning. Biden\u2019s always been weak when campaigning on the national stage, and this pattern is starting to exhibit itself yet again. Warren is smart and experienced, but just doesn\u2019t impress me as having a winning personality (like it or not, personality matters). Sanders is weak with African-Americans (something that\u2019s undeserved, but life is unfair) and the Democratic establishment (something that\u2019s totally understandable, given how he is not one of them). Buttigieg is simply too young and inexperienced (if he ran for Senate and served for four years, he could be a formidable candidate in 2024). And that leaves the Senator from California.<\/p>\n

And she has a good chance of winning against Trump. Apparently, she unnerves The Donald so much that he has been incapable of thinking of a cute, derogatory nickname for her<\/a>. She\u2019s already shown her skill at eviscerating her opponent against Biden, and doubtless could turn that same skill against Trump.<\/p>\n

This beats the pants off Trump serving for four more years, but it also means we\u2019re not going to get out of this authoritarian mess quickly or easily. It will probably be necessary to support the right\u2019s efforts to undermine presidential authority if she wins; do this right, and presidential authority could be semi-permanently scaled back. (As much as I would like it to be permanent, the same processes that created the imperial presidency would inexorably tend to re-create it.)<\/p>\n

The silver lining to this dark cloud is that it probably will be easy to do the above if Harris wins: Trump has appointed dozens upon dozens of right-leaning judges, who will find the temptation to use their power to undermine a Democrat irresistible (the courts are<\/em> political and always have been). And once court precedents start getting set, they are difficult to undo. While the damage to the imperial presidency won\u2019t be permanent<\/em> it should at least prove somewhat lasting<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

So, while I thought Biden didn\u2019t do too badly, it seems that Harris ate his lunch to the point where she has gone up quite a bit in the polls at Biden\u2019s expense. Sanders is looking more and more like an also-ran with each passing day. It all gives me decidedly mixed feelings. I\u2019m just […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4283","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackcap.name\/blog\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackcap.name\/blog\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackcap.name\/blog\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackcap.name\/blog\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackcap.name\/blog\/new\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4283"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blackcap.name\/blog\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4283\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blackcap.name\/blog\/new\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackcap.name\/blog\/new\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blackcap.name\/blog\/new\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}