Andrew L. Urban
“Who could imagine that Kamala has any support. Are Americans asleep?” came the text message from a friend in response to the latest polls showing Kamala Harris and Donald Trump pretty well equal favourites in the final days of the campaign for the US Presidency. I replied, ‘Harris voters are not voting for Harris but generically for the Democrat – and against Trump.’
Harris is the last resort Democrat candidate and they have no-one else to vote for against Trump. She is the bonnet badge of a Democrat vehicle driven by others, carrying fellow travellers such as those from central casting in Hollywood, the hard new guard in the Democrat party and the left leaning independents. Oh, and the handful of actual Harris supporters who breezily ignore the fact that she has never won a single vote in a Presidential race.
But irrespective of what drives voters to tick Harris on the ballot, it would still be a valid vote. The big question, of course, is how much of such polling will translate into votes. Answering a pollster is one thing, ticking a box for either Harris or Trump is quite another. The latter has consequences. My friend’s text question goes to the heart of the choice.
Some of us might be saying to American voters who are inclined to vote for Harris, to remember the adage: ‘fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me’. In Biden’s wake, buyer’s remorse by the ton will follow a Harris victory, say Republicans, and they do have a case. After all, Biden is lucky he was persuaded to withdraw from the race on grounds that were not driven by a negative assessment of his policies, both domestic and foreign. He has avoided having been dismissed as a lousy President by the modesty cloth of being a mentally declining old man.
Harris has on various occasions said she can’t think of anything she would do differently, but also that her administration would not be a continuation of the Biden policies. Such discrepancies splatter her campaign – but this isn’t about her campaign. Your scribe (to borrow from a couple of my seniors) is here talking about the polls v the votes.
And jumping on my hobby horse that I ride through the battlefield of US elections, I point to the ghost of 2020 which refuses to be buried. I often quote the circumstantial evidence that voter fraud spoilt the 2020 election which makes predicting the result of 2024 impossible. How much of your hard earned would you bet on Harris getting more votes than Obama in several electorates to beat Trump? Biden supposedly did (eg in Georgia, Nevada, Arizona). That’s why he is the ill-fitting square in the round oval office. Trump, the Republican candidate, lost, yet in the same election, Republicans won over a dozen House seats and lost none.
Will this election Make America Cheat Again?