Dereliction of Duty

By ChimE @Adobe Stock

Keeping America in the Dark

When will the US media demand answers? In every healthy democracy, the media makes sure the voters understand policy issues and which way candidates lean.

Not this time. This time the media is hoping you won’t notice how it didn’t cover Joe Biden’s accelerated aging problems. The media now is covering for VP Kamala Harris by not reporting on her record on real issues – the economy, inflation, energy, immigration, education, crime, taxes, to name a few. What would policy issues be under a Harris administration?

Voters want to know what they are buying into. The media, lacking any remorse for keeping Joe Biden’s aging problems under wraps, is at it again. Apparently, the media is looking to Kamala to save the Democrat narrative.

Jim Geraghty in NRO and Roger Kimball in Spectator US have tough questions for Kamala, who has avoided the press and inexplicably flip-flopped on many issues. When will Harris unveil her policy platforms?

The Economy

Focusing on the economy, since it seems to be voters’ #1 concern, Ms. Harris, you promise to bring down costs. This is a bit puzzling in that you were the #2 executive in the Biden administration, which adamantly claimed Biden-omics was working. You seem almost unapologetic about changing many of your past positions. Here’s are some ideas you supported during the 2020 presidential nomination:

• Banning fracking
• Abolishing Immigration and Customs Enforcement
• Defunding the police
• Instituting mandatory buybacks of assault weapons
• Eliminating private health insurance
• Guaranteeing federal jobs

Attacking Fracking

Your campaign staff maintains that you no longer hold the positions you espoused when seeking the presidential nomination. For example, in 2020 at a CNN townhall, you clearly stated that you would ban fracking. As Joe Biden’s VEEP for four years, why did you never express concern over Biden’s repeated attacks on domestic energy producers. Why not?

Keeping on the Lights

Speaking of energy, it’s no secret that the US electric grid is aging/has aged. Couple that with extreme weather leading to greater energy demand, what policies would you enact as president, Madam VP, to help keep America, warm, cool, dry and safe? In other words, how would your administration keep the lights on?

The Biden-Harris Border Policy

You’ve spent an inordinate amount of time defending your position on undocumented immigration. Now, according to your staff, your position is: “Unauthorized border crossings are illegal.” 

What changed your thinking? Are you now convinced that your old positions were wrong, unfeasible, or ill-informed? Don’t voters need to know how your administration would position itself on immigration?

Supreme Court Reform

Then there is the size of the Supreme Court, Ms. Harris. Your campaign spokesperson claims you no longer hold that position of “reforming” the Supreme Court.

What guarantee do voters have that your new positions won’t be as quickly and quietly abandoned as the old ones once you’re elected?

Harris as Border Czar

There also is the question of your being a “border czar.” Your campaign now insists that you were not a “border czar.” Doesn’t that compromise Biden’s claim you would “lead our efforts with Mexico and the Northern Triangle and the countries that help — are going to need help in stemming the movement of so many folks, stemming the migration to our southern border.” Your allies prefer the term “migration czar.” Where were all those migrants headed? Wasn’t it to the U.S./Mexico border?

How can anyone affirm that you could be the administration’s point person for “migration” without having any role in, or especially responsibility for policies and the enforcement of them at the border? What exactly is your position, Madam VEEP?

How about new fences or a border wall? Are you still opposed to any new construction?

After Joe Biden constructed 20 miles of new wall in October 12013, he said:

“There is presently an acute and immediate need to construct physical barriers and roads in the vicinity of the border of the United States in order to prevent unlawful entries into the United States.”

What was your reaction as VP to Biden’s waiving more than 20 federal laws and regulations to allow for the construction of the barriers?

And if, as you claimed, fences don’t work, why did you allow additional construction with taxpayers’ money on something you staunchly opposed?

Harris as Migration Czar

Unfortunately, there is a chart to help keep readers up on the immigration mess. Charts on southwest border encounters from January 2021 to June 2024 show that just about every month was substantially higher than that month in preceding years.

Please point to the part that you feel indicates you did a good job as the administration’s “migration” czar.

BLM, Mostly Peaceful Protests

Then there is the matter of the 2020 “mostly peaceful” Black Lives Matter riots. At the time, Ms. Harris, you enthusiastically supported the riots:

Scores were injured and $2 billion in property damage was exacted from communities across the country during those “mostly peaceful protests.”

Efforts to memory-hole that upsurge of violent anomie are underway, too. Harris has repeatedly called for defunding the police and has multiple ties to radical left-wing groups not only in the United States but in the Chinese Communist Party.

Don’t Americans need to hear your take on “mostly peaceful protests”?

Harris vs Biden and Israel 

Although activists tend to view Harris more favorably on the Israel/Gaza issue, it won’t stop activists, who are planning protests at the DNC convention in Chicago next week.

Harris, Able to Meet the Challenges? 

There is not much time left, and Americans need to feel comfortable that candidates for president are up to the challenges. Public perception of the economy is a weak spot for Democrats. A recent poll shows Trump is still obliterating Harris on the economy by a 2-to-1 margin, with Americans saying they would be financially better off under Trump. According to Politico, however, Harris is gaining ground on Trump on this issue.

The partisan divide is striking — 79% of Republicans hold this belief in a new CNBC poll this week.

The race isn’t over, even if it seems balanced on a knife’s edge. Nationally, writes William Galston in the WSJ, “Ms. Harris leads by less than 1 point in the head-to-head and multicandidate averages. Pennsylvania, the state most likely to put her over the top, is a dead heat.”

But Ms. Harris, there is good news. You have an opening here: On the economy, only 48 % of Democrats believe they will be better off if Harris wins.

Never Give Up

For sure, there is a Harris “bubble,” which has not yet developed into voters believing in her leadership.

Harris’s job-approval rating in her actual day job as VEEP, albeit 5 points better than Mr. Biden’s, is still only 44%.