I don’t want to just focus on Kamala Harris, when Joe Biden (the man who selected her as his VP) is so deeply flawed.
‘Joe Biden once called state-mandated school integration “the most racist concept you can come up with,” and Barack Obama “the first sort of mainstream African American who is articulate and bright and clean.”
He was a staunch opponent of “forced busing” in the 1970s, and leading crusader for mass incarceration throughout the ‘80s and ‘90s. He has described African-American felons as “predators” too sociopathic to rehabilitate — and white supremacist senators as his friends.’
Biden has been trying to cut social security for 40 years and doesn’t mince his words about opposing Medicare for All, at a time when the country is reeling from deeply entrenched inequities, police violence and a pandemic that is further unraveling people’s lives.
Biden is a racist segregationist, an assaulter of women who doesn’t know where he is half the time and loses his s— publicly quite often.
Out of the millions of things she could have done as San Francisco DA, to make life better for the people of her city, top cop Kamala Harris decided to get tough on school truancy. One of her regular shticks at speaking events was to tell the story of ‘how she’d brought charges against a single homeless mother of 3 who was working 2 jobs because her children were truant…and this was a success story.’
Obviously such ‘crackdowns unfairly target poor parents and children without actually helping students.’
‘Harris doesn’t say it clearly, but her career indicates a belief in Broken Windows-style retributive justice. Outside her involvement in a national foreclosure settlement, her office mostly targeted low level offenses—truancy, minor drug sales, graffiti, vandalism, auto burglary.’
In a 2013 talk, she makes fun of criminal justice reformers, mimicking them on stage. In another talk she guffaws at the fear she instilled in poor mothers with truant children, based on her letterhead (with an artistic rendering of her badge). It’s painful to watch – her flippancy, arrogance and cluelessness.
Both Biden and Harris are shills for empire. They support Israel (not Palestinian human rights) and will continue a genocidal ‘War on Terror’ foreign policy.
It is also of note that ‘Harris, who was born to an Indian mother, is the top recipient of donations from Indian-Americans in the current election cycle, receiving more funds than even Tulsi Gabbard, a Hindu American senator who closely coordinates with advocacy groups in Washington tied to Hindu nationalist groups in India.’ A major portion of the Indian diaspora here in the US has funded Modi’s re-election, so the affair with Modi (and fascism in India) will probably accelerate.
In the end, it is clear that change cannot be found in the corridors of power in Washington DC. We will have to organize change together. We must focus on/develop ideas such as ‘mutual aid’. Those are the networks and relationships we can rely on.
As for Harris being a woman and a WOC, I will end with
Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor’s words:
‘Symbolic firsts are no substitute for substantive gains. We have been celebrating firsts for fifty years but the gains for the few almost never translate into a better life for the many. These celebrations are old and our people are dying. Enough.’