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The stories that matter on money and politics in the race for the White House
In 2016, one of Hillary Clinton’s handicaps against Donald Trump was the sense that she had been protected from meaningful competition. While he was fighting Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio for the Republican nomination, she faced Bernie Sanders, who did well, but as an impudent long shot often does well. Against Trump, Clinton had a double impairment, then: a (perceived) lack of legitimacy and a (real) lack of practice. Coronation had been a mistake.
Worse, the Democrats had recent warning that it might be. In 2000, Al Gore faced just one rival for the presidential nomination, an ex-New York Knick who won zero primaries or caucuses. Even George W Bush, a fortunate son if America has ever bore one, was expected to do some hard rounds against John McCain to head the Republican ticket. And so the Democrats were twice-compromised when November came round. On what basis did their man win the nomination? “It’s his turn.” What’s with his stiff campaigning? “Well, he never had to learn.” Legitimacy and practice.
Confronted with these world-changing misjudgments, the Democrats are doing the characteristic thing: giving it a third go. The coronation of Kamala Harris is on. It shouldn’t be.
The Democrats have to get it out of their heads that “chaos” is the worst thing that can befall a party. Their defeats in winnable elections stem from too much order, not too much internal strife: from an excess of deference to established candidates, not from dissent. Yes, the contested convention of 1968 in Chicago — which hosts the Democrats again next month — was a violent farce. Yes, Norman Mailer’s account remains bracing: the smell of pig’s blood from the local stockyards still sings as an olfactory metaphor. But now isn’t then. Americans aren’t dying by the tens of thousands in an Asian war. A state governor or two could have challenged the presumed nominee from the podium without risk.
If Harris is of election-winning fibre, she would have trounced the field regardless, given her endorsements. If she isn’t, now is the time to know. It’s possible to go further and suggest that a politician of vision would demand a contest, knowing that unopposed triumph would be a drag on them. (In the UK, it should have been clear that Gordon Brown was a mere tactician when he didn’t make sure there was at least a token rival to succeed Tony Blair.)
Here’s a thought. The Republicans, that one-man cult, can claim to have subjected their nominee to more of a stress test than the Democrats did. He at least had to brush off Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley.
Can Harris win in November? There is enough to suggest so, but not enough to suggest that she should have been waved through.
Take those in turn. Republicans tend to exaggerate her flaws as a speaker. In a polarised nation, whoever is the nominee of one of the two great parties will be competitive. Above all, the age question has flipped. Which party’s nominee now looks likelier to serve four robust years?
Against this, it should be said more often that Harris was the first candidate of note to withdraw from the Democratic primaries last time. Among those who outlasted her was the mayor of Indiana’s fourth-largest city. Those of us who gave even tentative written expression to these doubts in the weird summer of 2020, when Biden chose her as running mate, weren’t thanked for it in liberal company. Swing voters won’t handle her with such delicacy.
But the Democrats have chosen. In all likelihood, the course was set when Joe Biden made his endorsement after quitting the race.
His reputation hinges on that judgment. Biden has that oversensitive streak, linked to education, that Brits call “chippiness”. Much of it is understandable. No one whose name has adorned three winning presidential tickets is so patronised. Had forces — private grief, Clintonian entitlement — not kept him from the 2016 race, the Trump era might never have happened. Biden was right about Afghanistan as far back as 2009. But thanks to the (unavoidably, I think) botched exit, the words “Afghanistan” and “failure” now cling more to him than to the presidents who launched and managed that two-decade mess.
“History will remember him well” is the unfalsifiable platitude that I am supposed to write here. If Harris beats Trump, it will. If she doesn’t, “history”, whoever that is, might wonder what could have been had Biden not rushed to endorse her. Democrats had time to ensure that candidate Harris was at least legitimate and practised. Nothing they have done this century suggested they were ever going to use it.