Harris has only himself to blame for weakening the vice-presidency

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According to Vice President Kamala Harris, all of her problems can be summed up in two words: race and gender. In her story, the only reason for the widespread perception that she went from being a historic model to a much ridiculed failure in less than a year is that she’s the only veep who wasn’t a white male.

But deploying this excuse to answer questions about her insignificance in the administration and the idea that she is a deeply insecure figure will not be enough.

First off, Dan Quayle – who was both white and masculine – was just as roughed up during his bumpy run as President George HW Bush’s veep 30 years ago (not to mention the fact that Charles Curtis, the Vice President of Herbert Hoover, was Native American, meaning she is not the first person of color in this post as defined today).

But even when playing the traditional veep role of partisan executor, Harris embarrasses herself, as with her weekend claim on “Face the Nation” that the country’s “biggest national security problem” is the effort to defend “our democracy” – by which she meant the efforts of certain state legislatures to pass laws ensuring that safeguards around the integrity of voters abandoned in the pandemic-plagued 2020 election are restored. That she invoked the passing of popular voter ID laws ahead of liberal climate change talking points and rather than genuine threats like China speaks volumes about her incompetence and folly.

Much of the damage done to him in the media also comes from Democrats – the party whose leadership, despite its poor poll numbers, could still inherit once President Joe Biden is done.

Harris continued to blunder during an appearance on “Face the Nation” where she claimed democracy was “the biggest national security issue.”

White House sources told the New York Times that Biden asked Harris to cut back during unsuccessful negotiations with Sen. Joe Manchin to pass the multibillion-dollar Build Back Better boondoggle, lest she ‘aggravates an already bad situation with his toxic personality. And it was former Harris loyalists who got off the ship and told the Washington Post that she was not just a mean boss who intimidated staff members, but also a stupid one who refused to read position papers. prepared for her, then got angry with her underlings when she appeared. not prepared in public.

Nor were it his detractors who orchestrated his alleged surveillance of the border crisis by making him avoid visits or by forcing him to answer questions about the problem with the same nervous laughter that escapes his lips every time. that it is taken without a coherent answer to a question.

Harris did this on her own – and, in fact, revived the 19th-century vice presidential version, when it was seen as the most insignificant job in Washington.

Over the past few decades, Vice Presidents like Walter Mondale, George Bush, Al Gore, Dick Cheney and even Joe Biden and Mike Pence have been given real responsibilities and, for the most part, been viewed by their House bosses. Blanche as reliable advisers. and serious political actors. Even Quayle, whom the media has always called an idiot, surrounded himself with what even critics understood to be strong staff who helped him set up booths – like his ‘Murphy Brown’ speech on raised children. without two parents – who sidelined him on the edge of important debates. There’s not even much Harris can do.

Unlike most vice-presidents, Harris came to her post with no political expertise or experience. She is a seasoned hacker who has repeatedly altered her ideology to accommodate changing political moods, and her sense of entitlement, inauthenticity, and energetic willingness to invoke her status as a woman of color are her hallmarks. decisive.

Despite still only having a heartbeat after serving as Commander-in-Chief, Harris in just a few months restored the office to its post status which, in the words of John Nance Garner, vice-president of Franklin Roosevelt , not ‘worth a bucket of hot spit. But unlike the fallacious narrative of racism and misogyny, it is no one else’s fault but his own.

Jonathan S. Tobin is editor-in-chief of JNS.org.

Twitter: @jonathan_tobin

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