There’s no democracy in Democrats’ anointing Harris as its next nominee

President Joe Biden’s decision to mercifully abandon his reelection plans came two years too late and has put his Democratic Party in a self-induced crisis.

On July 14, 2022, I wrote that it was hard to believe Biden could be a winning nominee for reelection. He proved me right.

Policy decisions aside, it was clear his staff was deep into its “Weekend at Bernie’s” sham of shielding Biden’s declining acuity from the public.

Outside of Ronald Reagan (who suffered from his own cognitive decline from advanced age) and Richard Nixon (who had something to hide), no president since the 1920s has had fewer press conferences than Biden, according to the American Presidency Project.

Biden’s professional campaign team and top Democrats ignored all the warning signs: the president tripping up the steps of Air Force One multiple times, falling off a stopped bicycle, struggling to answer reporter questions when he did make himself available.

Instead of convincing Biden then that he should be the “bridge” president that he pledged to be in 2020, self-preservation took over, as I wrote about last week.

The result is this: the Democrats rolling over democracy a second time in 2024 to anoint a presidential nominee.

Is Vice President Kamala Harris a better presidential candidate than Biden? Does she give the Democrats a better chance to beat Donald Trump in November?

Yes, and yes.

But is she the best candidate?

Honestly, we’ll never really know.

Harris has never won a single state’s primary election. Harris has never won a caucus. Shoot, she ended her 2020 presidential campaign before the Iowa caucuses. Her electoral history in California isn’t exactly impressive. She defeated her Republican opponent in 2010, 46.1% to 45.3%. In blue-state California.

I know 2010 was a Republican year, but every other California Democrat running for statewide office that year got at least 50%, including the Dem’s lieutenant governor. His name was Gavin Newsom, and he unseated an incumbent in that election.

Biden’s bullheadedness deprived Democrats of having a primary election season when Harris could have been vetted against some other candidates.

Maybe she would have rolled over her competition like Trump rolled over Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley and friends. Maybe it would have been a landslide like her 2016 U.S. Senate primary and general election victories.

SOMEONE would have run against her. Maybe not Newsom or U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg or even Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, but she would have had to win Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Nevada, Michigan or some Super Tuesday states against SOMEBODY.

Now, we can’t even wish for a competitive Democratic convention.

The Democrats’ grand poohbahs are now confessing that they set their convention date (Aug. 19-22) too late to make some states’ ballots. They just presumed long ago Biden would be the nominee and the convention would be another staged hype machine.

Now they want a virtual roll call by Aug. 7 to anoint Harris and fix the mistake they made, according to The Washington Post.

What would have been wrong with a competitive convention? Four days of speeches bashing Trump that would get more eyeballs? A result in question? That would have been some compelling TV.

Somehow, American political parties used the convention system to pick nominees for well over 100 years without needing to turn it into a pre-ordained production.

Don’t tell me this emergency anointment is needed for campaign fundraising, either.

If Harris raised more than $80 million in one day on July 22, she could raise at least that or more on Aug. 22. The Democrats already have an enormous money advantage and have reserved ad time in most media markets anyway.

Ironically, the Democratic Party has become the antithesis of democracy. They go to great lengths to discourage competitive primaries or conventions in favor of anointed candidates.

They believe this will win elections against the Republicans. But when you’re starting as behind as they are, wouldn’t you think they’d want a candidate that at least delegates can say they had a hand in picking?

(Email Kyle Melinn of the Capitol news service MIRS at melinnky@gmail.com.)