How Kamala Harris Took Command of the Democratic Party in 48 Hours
How Kamala Harris Took Command of the Democratic Party in 48 Hours
She worked the phones. Her team worked the delegates. When it was over, she had quickly locked down the nomination in a “well-orchestrated cascade,” as one party leader put it.
For context, it's the elite media types who are pushing for some sort of contested convention — not the bulk of the Democratic voters.
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Nothing says fair, open, and transparent democracy like party insiders choosing the next candidate in a well organized cascade lasting 48 hours...
Edit you know im just gonna edit to say it here.
None of you feel powerless here? You dont feel lied to because the DNC forced Biden on us in 2020 with the rationale he's the only one who can beat trump. They rushed through a lame duck primary giving no other candidates play because he's the only one who can beat trump.
Four years theyve been saying he's sharp as a tack you just dont know him like we do. Now it turns out he cant beat trump so they just shove californias top cop in his place transfer his delegates and force kamala on us.
Am I the only one which things the emperor has no clothes or what
Bro what are you even on?
I know everyone is rushing show unity and thats understandable but I'm having a reasonable " but I didnt vote for you" moment.
I guess im bummed that the US is a full fledged oligarchy and nobody gives a shit.
She was literally elected Vice President by millions of people. If you voted for Biden, you already elected her to be one heartbeat away from the presidency.
There have been only 49 Vice Presidents in US history. She is closer to the presidency than any other eligible Democrat.
I get how it is easy to justify and I understand people are so obsessed with beating trump that they will cast aside all other doubts but the truth is that a vote for a Biden Harris ticket is not a vote for a Harris/??? Ticket. The threat of fascism is also not going to stop with trump. The moves made here will be treated like am exception but will become the norm.
Regardless of how I personally voted, I see this move as another example that the illusion of American democracy has been dead a long time. Maybe even since Bush v Gore. Primaries suffered a death blow in 2016 and finally kicked the bucket in 2024.
Biden was old in 2020. He could have easily passed away in his first term. Trump got COVID and almost went on a ventilator.
You definitely did vote for Harris/??? even if you don't realize it.
I can see how the blue no matter who crowd justifies reallocating peoples votes, but I dont see how it is acceptable to do in a so called democracy.
If y'all's voting system wasn't so fucked up maybe you'd have more than two viable political parties, and maybe then the primary process wouldn't be so important.
Here where I live the candidate list is generally selected completely by party insiders, but it doesn't matter so much because I have a choice of 15+ viable parties in parliament to choose from.
I'm with you.
Thanks. It seems crazy nobody is willing to acknowledge it.
I've been saying it too, met with about the same enthusiasm as your post. The Democrats have been riding the "end of democracy" train for 8 years now, and it'd be nice to have a normal election where we vote for a candidate that we actually want, rather than just voting for whoever they shove in front of us because they're not trump. Well, I did vote for Sanders in the primaries in 2016, and 2020, but you saw what the DNC did to him. They'd rather have trump than a progressive like Sanders.
Boo fucking hoo. "Oh, it'd be so nice to live in a world that's not a dystopic hellscape". YEAH WE ALL FUCKING AGREE! But you know what? That's not the world we live in. America is divided in a 3-way split between people who want to bring back a monarchy, people who don't want that, and people who couldn't give a shit. Do I wish that wasn't the case? Of fucking course I do. But, as Jayne Cobb said in "Firefly": "If wishes were horses, we'd all be eating steak." You can't WISH your way into a better world. In the actual, physical world we occupy, you have extremely limited options available to you. Your options are: vote for someone you don't particularly like, or don't do that and therefore make it more likely that you never get to vote again.
Sorry. That's the choice. I don't make the rules. That's just the way things are. Bitching about it on the internet will give you nothing.
No shit. Obviously we all understand what's at stake. But it's been at stake for too fucking long. Throw the bastard in prison. Fucking do something to him rather than keeping him around so there's always a crisis situation. Fix the broken system that allowed this. There's always an imminent threat as tyrants seize power and democracy dies, because tyrants make sure of it.
Again, I agree. I'd love for things to be fixed. But they aren't. Because of voter apathy in 2016, Trump was elected president, and then he proceeded to appoint hundreds of federal judges, and 3 supreme court justices who have all been working overtime covering for his ass. So that's the stakes. You can either vote for the people who are ineffectually trying to fix the mess, or get that dude back into power so he can make it worse.
Edit: And it's not like Democrats are totally to blame for being ineffectual. In a lot of circumstances, their hands are tied by our system of checks and balances. The president, up until 2 weeks ago, was not above the law. Also, Democrats barely have a majority in the Senate (which is far below the threshold of filibuster-proof), and are a minority in the House. So their ability to "fix the broken system that allowed this" has been severely hampered.
I guess it's not clear that I'd vote for a literal pile of garbage over trump, but I do not like what I'm seeing. Not at all. And I'll leave it at that, since anything more is veering further into conjecture.
What are you talking about???? Trump literally tried to coup the government with false slate of electors!! Are you even for real here jerking yourself off about being able to pick the candidate? Are you serious???
Now????
You should probably settle down a little. Yes I know who trump is, which is why I'm willing to vote for whomever they shove in front of us. I'd vote for a literal pile of garbage, or an open can of tuna before voting for trump. I would never vote for trump. Maybe read what I wrote again.
Yes I'm serious, selecting candidates through a primary is how elections have been held in this country for decades, whenever the incumbent isn't running. You think that a candidate selected by the voters is going to be less likely to get those voter's votes in the general election? Do you understand what a primary is?
Edit: since you're all worked up about "now????" Take a minute and think about it. It's always going to be the same threat from the GOP moving forward, until the actual problem is fixed. If not trump, it'll be DeSantis, or Hannity, or any of the other unelectable people they have in their pool of horrible candidates to choose from.
It's not about voters selecting the candidate. It's about the logistics of setting up a campaign in FOUR MONTHS. These are things that take years to set up) 1(staff, volunteers, offices, funds). Harris has everything ready to roll. What the he'll do you want???
So, did Biden's intellect just suddenly collapse on stage, leading to his withdrawal, or was the DNC lying to us about his mental competency during all these years it took to set up his campaign? Did they always have this planned, or were they hoping to push a candidate through who they felt wasn't actually capable of performing his duties? On that note, if he's unfit to continue his campaign, then he's probably unfit to continue his presidency too, and should just hand the reigns to Harris now. The whole thing stinks. Yes, vote trump into oblivion, but that doesn't mean we need to like what happened.
Most people didn't vote for Biden, they voted against Trump. Hell, there weren't even really any other candidates that were still running in the primary in my state.
I don't like the situation we're in any more than the next person... but that didn't start recently. The presidential election is a staying action, not a political shift. That's going to take a hell of a lot more than one person, no matter how many times they're called "the most powerful person in the world".
Were you born yesterday? This is the whole game. If you get frustrated and don't vote you get fucked harder. The only winning strategy is to keep voting against fascism and then after the election you go protest and raise hell so we can have a more fair primary, or God forbid we can get rid of first past the post voting.
Not sure what you think the DNC was expected to do. Biden didn't want to step down. What, is the party supposed to run in opposition to the sitting president? Not going to fucking happen. As long as he wanted to stay in the race, he was going to get the nomination, even with his polling numbers looking increasingly bad.
So now, he finally gets convinced to step down, and it's only like a week and a half before the convention vote. What, you expect them to run a whole new primary?
I get that you're frustrated, but the DNC isn't the bad guy here. Let me reiterate that: as someone who caucused for Bernie Sanders in 2016, and was incredibly angry about what the DNC did to him, I am saying that the DNC isn't the bad guy here.
If the DNC had gone against Biden, "Turmoil Within The Democratic Party" would be the headline on every single news organization's chyrons for weeks. They figured that going with the weak candidate would be better than blowing everything up by picking a fight before the election. They were not wrong. As long as Biden decided to remain in the race, the best thing for them to do was to support him.
so they just shove californias top cop in his place transfer his delegates and force kamala on us
Biden endorsed Harris, you dummy. She wasn't some random nobody that the DNC just foisted onto the country. She's the fucking VP. With the fact that it was late in the election cycle (way too late for a primary), added to the fact that she's able to take credit for all of Biden's accomplishments (because she is the VP), added to the fact that all of the funds raised for the Biden / Harris campaign can now be used by Harris, WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU EXPECT THE DNC TO DO???
Seriously, I don't understand why your ass is chapped in the first place, nor do I understand why you think it's somehow the DNC's fault.
Find a Democratic solution maybe? Run an actual primary with debates in the first place? An open convention? Allow challengers on the ballet consistently? Not work behind the scenes to push Biden on everyone in 2020 and beyond.
If you dont understand why someone is disillusioned with the "choices" in this upcoming election you have bigger problems than all that impotent rage on display in your reply.
Tired of shills and sycophants crying about optics and putting these power hungry parties above values and real issues. Average Americans have to choose between paying rent and eating. Cant afford a doctor. Have to work 3 jobs constantly worrying about the future of the planet.
If dems want to win they have to win on issues. Blue no matter who may be popular with you, but it doesn't resonate with the general public, leftists, people who cant make ends meet. Dont let your fear let you lose sight of the issues.
What the fuck are you even talking about, man? Did the DNC "run an actual primary with debates" in 2012, when Obama was the incumbent? Did they run "an open convention"? Did they "allow challengers on the ballot consistently", whatever the fuck that means?
Or did they accept that he was the fucking incumbent, and rally behind him? If you're unsure, let me clear it up for you: they rallied behind him because he was the fucking incumbent.
The same exact thing happened with Joe Biden. That's not party corruption. That's just the way it fucking works.
If you dont understand why someone is disillusioned with the “choices” in this upcoming election you have bigger problems than all that impotent rage on display in your reply.
I really don't understand why you are disillusioned. I'm guessing it's because you are completely blind to historical realities, and woefully uninformed about how elections work. Maybe it's because you're a complete god damned moron. I'm honestly not sure. I would be going out on a limb speculating, so I'm not going to do that here.
Literally everything else you said
Blah blah blah. Let me recap for you: you're whining because an incredibly weak candidate stepped aside for probably the single best candidate the DNC can field to take over. If you're actually a Democrat voter, what the fuck are you whining about, man? Biden stepping aside just won you the election.
Oh damn nobody has ever condescended to me quite like that before. You must be a political genius and you changed my mind by being a needles prick on the internet. If you're sure the election is won then copmala doesn't need my vote after all and you can calm down.
Well, I'm incredibly flattered that I'm the only one in your life that has ever managed to point reality out to you. Or, at the very least, I'm the only one who has gotten you to acknowledge reality.
Biden's been facing a funding shortage for 2 months now. He blamed the shortage on it being summer. Seriously.
Harris got the nod 2 days ago, and has already gotten like $120 million in funding, and an additional $150 million in pledges to her PAC. Additionally, more than 40,000 people have registered to vote in the past 48 hours.
So, seriously, what the actual fuck are you whining about? You traded in a broken-down old cart horse for a fucking stallion. And your bitch ass is whining about it.
There's that holier than thou lib hubris that wins the hearts and minds of Americans. Just ask Hillary. Keep fighting the fight once every four years, I guess.
Like, I don't give a fuck anymore. I don't know what you're trying to prove. Your assertions that the DNC is doing something wrong are completely unfounded in reality, and your whining about Biden stepping down means that you either really wanted the Democrats to lose, or you have zero idea about what his actual chances are. So you're either a shill, or a complete fucking moron. Either way, I have zero interest in continuing talking to you.
Finally some common ground.
The DNC ratfucked the primary. AGAIN! For the third fucking time. Yes they did that. It needs to be acknowledged.
And yes, they lied to you about Biden. They've been lying to you about Biden.
But at this point, those delegates are Biden/ Harris delegates. There is no changing that. We can caucus with Dems for one more cycle and beat Trump, and then wash our hands of them. But this time we need to extract real party level reforms. No more anointing. No more ratfucking. If they would open up the party, we could make it so that no republican ever gets elected to the Presidency. Ever. They are massively unpopular. But the problem is that the Democrats are also unpopular because they run their party like a fiefdom, and the voters they need don't like that shit.
I'm plugging my nose and dialing from the coconut tree this go around, but unless the Democratic party actually commits to the project of democracy within their party, this might be the last time I caucus and do their job for them.
We can caucus with Dems for one more cycle and beat Trump, and then wash our hands of them.
Except in 4 years it'll be trump again if he's still alive, or Desantis, or trump jr, or whatever the fuck his daughter's name is. This seems to be our new reality.
Nah. Trump loses to any one but Biden.
I mean, trump lost to Biden. Trump beat Hillary. So, that statement is objectively false.
This kind of naivete is what was setting Trump up for a second term. Thank god the worlds not all like this.
It's naive to quote objective reality? I didn't say that Biden could win again, I said that Biden beat him, and Hillary lost to him. You said that anyone other than Biden wins against Trump, and that is objectively false, since Hillary already lost to him in a previous election. It's naive to think that anyone could beat him, that's what led to his first victory.
Yes, I agree with you.
I feel the exact same way. I'm not just sad about it, I'm absolutely livid. These militant ass-lickers beating you up for it are the worst kinds of people. They ruin politics by shutting down discourse and bullying others to think their way. Don't listen to them.
You came to your conclusion honestly and it also happens to be correct. The DNC screwed us out of having a choice by closing the shutters and locking Biden away from us, letting him sweep each state in the primaries. If they instead allowed debates and let us see Joe as he is today up front we would have demanded new choices. Joe broke his promise of being a transitional president, and along with his enablers screwed us out of the chance to make the choice ourselves.
I won't even hide it, I dislike Harris as much as I dislike Clinton. The only thing that could possibly sway me is an epic VP pick. Otherwise I'm going back to third party voting like I've done before Trump. I'm a registered Democrat but after all this BS I'm going independent. The DNC can rot for their crimes.