Now that the coronation of Kamala Harris as the 2024 Democratic standard bearer seems a fait accompli, party aficionados are feverishly scrambling to repackage their shining new defender of American democracy against the encroaching shadow of Trumpian totalitarianism. Democrats caught red handed in the act of undemocratically sabotaging Joe Biden’s reelection effort must now insulate Harris and her lack of achievement and success as a national political candidate through the tried and tested method of attacking criticism of the candidate as, you guessed it, racist. The only problem with this strategy is a person named Barack Obama. White racist Americans elected Obama to the presidency twice; however, the mainstream media, Democratic party officials, and political pundits are already frothing at the mouth for the chance to once again insert the threadbare and lame accusation of race animus into the mainstream of American presidential politics. It’s a highly insulting strategy, one that does a grave disservice to the American electorate, and no doubt won’t fall for again.

Kamala Harris is tough and smart. Nobody who makes it as a prosecutor or into the closed club of the United States Senate and ultimately onto the platform as the stand-in for the president of the United States does so by being a fool. However, being president of the United States is a different dimension, and one where voters are going to look at candidate Harris with an intensity that far surpasses her skin tone. Firstly, Harris is a poor speaker, and has consistently demonstrated an inability to communicate just how exactly she would make the lives of Americans better. During her failed presidential bid in 2020, she seemed incapable of articulating her own positions, especially with respect to Medicare. Coming from California, a state hyper-dominated by Democrats, Harris comfortably speaks in the language of Liberalism, but has never been forced to communicate in the language of swing state voters, the ones who ultimately decide presidential elections. Her popularity among potential Democratic nominees was so low in 2020 she was forced to end her presidential campaign before the Iowa Caucuses were even held. On foreign policy, her record is less than impressive. She was handed the job of “border tsar” early in Biden’s term, and the results to date would hardly justify confidence in Kamala Harris’s managing a world crisis. Worst of all, Harris inherits, shares, and now will ultimately be forced to defend the record of her boss, a record of failure in terms of the economy, the disaster at the Southern border, and increased volatility and instability on the international scene. These are the factors Kamala Harris will be judged on, not that she is the first female vice-president of color. Democrats know that’s a steep uphill climb, so the only thing they have left to defend a Harris candidacy with is to whip out the race card.

Kamala Harris may or may not be the next president of the United States. If she is, it is not going to be because American voters looked at her and said here is a candidate that is unacceptable because of her race, or how she laughs, or how she tells stories to children about outer space. No, it will be because voters yearning for a person who provides vision, clearly articulates that vision, and is perceived to be tough enough in challenging situations to promote that vision to the country and the world sees that in a particular candidate. If Kamala Harris is that person, then she deserves support; if she isn’t, she should not be elected. Political leaders, and the persons who analyze and present current affairs to the American people need to end the insulting habit of viewing candidates solely through the prism of race, gender, sexual orientation, and adherence to radical ideology. It is retrogressive, stupid, and ultimately deprives the candidate of their own human dignity and detracts from voters’ ability to truly evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of those who seek to lead us.