Senator Kamala Harris had to do the same thing that Barack Obama had to do in the primary. Nobody has won the Democratic primary without winning the African American vote since 1992. She had to show that she could take Donald Trump down. She had to make the electorate, especially the African American Democrats electorate, believe that she could beat Donald Trump. Joe Biden served as a stand in for Donald Trump for the purposes of Senator Harris. She showed how she would attack and treat Donald Trump by the way that she prosecuted Joe Biden on that stage. Senator Warren was tremendous the previous night, but she was not on the stage with people that would have enabled her to come across like Senator Harris. She is ahead in the polls of every candidate with whom she shared the stage. Punching down does no good. She was not given the same opportunity as Senator Harris. Senator Warren did do well in presenting her plans and building support for her candidacy, but she was not with an older, privileged white male who is leading in polling. Senator Harris was and she made the most of it! Once Barack Obama showed that he could win the white vote and that he could own the stage, then he won over the African American Democratic electorate. This is a pragmatic electorate and they have to visualize that a candidate can and likely will win and beat the opposition. Senator Harris took down Joe Biden who was the white, privileged male leading in the polls. Again, Biden served as a stand in for Trump.
The major pundits : Chris Matthews just said that it looked like a mortal blow. Joy Reid and Nicolle Wallace saw it as reshaping the race and that she won by a wide margin. When she was a little girl, she was bused and it led to a better education and that education gave her the opportunity to become the person she is: a front runner for the nomination. If the federal government did not intervene in many places there would be no busing and that meant limited opportunity for African Americans. An argument for states rights and city councils to be able to oppose busing is an argument that the South tried to make for slavery. Their argument was to let it be a states rights issue or a local issue. That would have inhibited the progress of the country and of people of color. And Joe Biden still in 2019 thinks that he was right to do that. It is bad enough that he took full credit for the bill that Senator Feinstein wrote to ban assault weapons under President Bill Clinton when he was only one of fifty two votes, but this is worse. He often rambled and seemed confused and trying to come up with answers to questions he should have anticipated while speaking on stage. That was bad enough. However, this response of states rights instead of the federal government fighting for equality and racial justice and equal opportunity is fundamentally republican like his segregationist friends. Right now a huge reason that Biden is ahead is that he has 46% of the African American vote in the Democratic primary now. However, Senator Harris did two things: (1) she appealed to the heart of African Americans who may remember the fights over busing for equal opportunity which put them at cross-purposes with Joe Biden and (2) she gave African Americans and the Democratic electorate generally a picture of how she could take down Donald Trump in a debate and in the election.
His performance was almost universally panned. Senator Harris was universally regarded as the winner of the debate. This will help her to move up in the polls. This is the beginning of the descent of Joe Biden. His answer will only require more litigation and each time that it is litigated, he will look worse.
Hickenlooper’s comments require a response as well. Hickenlooper stated that he wanted to bring everybody together including the business community in regard to climate change. He also talked about methane as a greater cause of climate change than carbon dioxide. First, the business community that he referred to is Big Oil mainly because he did not eliminate them. Why would we invite Big Oil to our group planning on fighting climate change ? How is Exxon Mobil suddenly going to help fight climate change when they hid their own scientists’ writings that stated that carbon dioxide causes global warming ? Further, while methane does trap heat, it does not stay in the atmosphere even close to as long as carbon dioxide does. Does he propose to get rid of cows to reduce methane emissions ? This sounds like his primary plan to combat climate change .
My first choice among all candidates is Senator Harris. My second choice is Senator Elizabeth Warren. Then I have Governor Jay Inslee, Senator Kirsten Gillibrandt, and Mayor Pete Buttigieg. After that I have Secretary Julian Castro, Senator Cory Booker, Senator Bernie Sanders and Senator Amy Klobuchar. After that, I lose a lot of interest, but I will support whoever wins our nomination.
Friday, Jun 28, 2019 · 2:14:59 PM +00:00 · Dem
Senator Biden's comments on race:
“I do not buy the concept, popular in the ’60s, which said, ‘We have suppressed the black man for 300 years and the white man is now far ahead in the race for everything our society offers. In order to even the score, we must now give the black man a head start, or even hold the white man back, to even the race,’ ” Biden told a Delaware-based weekly newspaper in 1975. “I don’t buy that.”
Friday, Jun 28, 2019 · 2:25:42 PM +00:00 · Dem
After reading that, unless Biden comes out and repudiates what he said, he needs to quit the race now. That may sound dramatic, but those are the words of a bigot. To deny that the white man has privilege and that there is a disparity between white people and people of color is unbelievable and a person who believes that cannot be the leader of this party nor can that person be the nominee of the party.