For everyone working for progressive transformation, in America, the Biden/Harris ticket is at minimum evidence of movement in that direction.
I’m old enough to remember when Joe Lieberman was the Democratic candidate for vice president, painful as that is to recall. If the running mates in between (John Edwards, Joe Biden and Tim Kaine) represented slight improvement, Kamala Harris represents very welcome further progress.
Besides more diverse representation, which matters, Harris co-sponsored the Sanders Medicare for All resolution; her record on climate action is excellent, and she was one of the most aggressive attorneys general in the country in holding big banks accountable for fraud after the last financial crisis. If anyone on Wall Street is supposedly celebrating the selection of Harris with relief, that seems mostly a sign that the range of what’s possible in a Democratic presidency has been shifted well to the left.
Both Harris and Joe Biden are making a pitch which is significantly progressive compared with just returning to the status quo. I take this seriously, given that Biden demonstrated many times during the primary that he’s entirely capable of scoffing at progressive idealism, when he feels like it. Whether he has been shaken by the rottenness of the system, exposed by the pandemic, or by something else I don’t know. But his move toward an agenda of change, since the primary, deserves consideration.
The selection of Harris as running mate doesn’t change that. Realistically, even a cynic ought to realize that both of them are plainly to the left of whoever will be the median vote in the U.S. Senate in 2021. (Senate primaries are mostly over, but if you want to help Ed Markey fend off a corporate challenger, by all means hurry to edmarkey.com today.)
In the big picture, America has incredible problems. Compared with what Democrats have offered up in response over the past few decades, Biden/Harris is appreciable progress toward solving some of them.
– Matt Kuhns, CCPC Member
