With Kamala Harris, Dems hope to repeat Hillary's 2016 defeat

By rallying around Kamala Harris, Democrats are setting themselves up for a repeat of Hillary Clinton's 2016 defeat, and that's OK.

As humiliating as Clinton's loss to Trump was, it didn't drag down congressional Democrats, who picked up six seats in the House and two in the Senate that year.

Former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi was determined put an end to President Biden's re-election bid because he knew the damage it would do to down-vote Democrats.

What he saw in the internal party poll was reason for a coup d'état.

Biden did not turn aside selflessly: Their choice was between burning themselves out while their fellow Democrats also blamed them for their losses, or walking away and letting someone else take responsibility for whatever happened.

Either way, he didn't return to the White House, so Biden opted to cut his losses and preserve whatever political capital he and his family can retain within the party.

The most vulnerable House and Senate Democrats had, with good reason, been among the first and loudest to call for his impeachment.

Now that their dream of a second term is over, are Democrats ready for “what might be, unburdened by what has been”?

Not exactly, because Vice President Harris is charged by everything that was Biden except age.

And with Biden still in the Oval Office, Democrats can hardly say that Trump, younger and more convincing than the sitting president, is too old for the job.

Harris also can't escape the administration record he shares with Biden:

She owns all the inflation, illegal immigration, misfortune in Afghanistan and inadequacy in the face of crises in Yemen and Ukraine that characterize the last three years of Democratic rule.

What's new?

She's a woman, of course, even though the last Supreme Court justice the Biden-Harris administration appointed, Ketanji Brown Jackson, couldn't say what a woman is.

In the less ignorant days of 2016, Hillary Clinton campaigned in hopes of being the first woman elected to the White House.

Clinton knew she might have trouble winning over rural and working-class white men, so she chose a running mate, Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine, with proven appeal to them.

It didn't work: Clinton lost Rust Belt voters who had kept their states blue for more than 20 years.

If Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania didn't take Clinton, what are the chances they'll find Kamala Harris more palatable?

Clinton was formidable in the Democratic primaries, besting Bernie Sanders in 2016 and putting up strong resistance against Barack Obama in 2008.

Harris didn't fare so well against Sanders, or anyone else, when he sought the nomination in 2020.

Polling in the single digits, he dropped out of the race before the first contest.

Now Harris is racing toward the nomination without ever having contested, let alone won, a single Democratic presidential primary.

The poll may be good enough in the short term, driven by friendly media, and the Democratic ticket will benefit from a new running mate option.

However, none of Harris' potential VP picks are very different from Kaine, who failed to rescue Clinton in the industrial heartland eight years ago.

Perhaps Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro would tip his state into the Democratic column.

That alone isn't enough: Trump only needs to win one of the big three Rust Belt battlegrounds, as long as his leads in Arizona, Georgia and North Carolina hold.

Harris' other potential running mates, including Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper and Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, are variations on the same theme, men meant to balance the appeal of the ticket, and all as little known outside their states as Kaine was when he became Clinton's running mate.

Electing Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer would give to the democrats the first two-woman ticket in presidential history, but aside from her gender, Whitmer fits the same pattern as the others.

Trump is by almost any measure stronger than when he beat Clinton and Kaine: He has gained presidential experience and survived two impeachments and an assassination attempt.

Trump is a political giant slayer, the vanquisher of top-tier opponents from Hillary Clinton to Ron DeSantis.

The only enemy to beat him, Joe Biden, imploded the second time he tried.

Harris and his running mate could improve on the Clinton-Kaine formula, and in a country as divided as America, winning is a game of inches.

But Biden's dropout hasn't changed the fundamental calculus of the presidential election, however much it may have helped bring down the candidates.

Harris is running with Biden's record and Hillary Clinton's profile, not a winning combination, but one that party bosses have chosen to embrace.

Daniel McCarthy is the editor of Modern Age: A Conservative Review and managing editor of The American Conservative.