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The politics of not knowing what to do

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This week, we have to change the music a bit. Though the covid-19 theme is blaring incessantly in our head and memory, it’s time to acknowledge other issues needing to be addressed.

One such issue is which of the available female candidates should Joe Biden choose as his running mate for the 2020 presidential campaign? Of course, such a candidate would be in a prime position, assuming Mr. Biden is successfully elected, to become the nation’s first female POTUS in a future election.

Clearly, this discussion could just focus on emotion and passion for a particular candidate, as most of the current writing has done. Or, as I tend to prefer, we could simply be logical.

In a particularly revealing recent poll ( citing likely voters in Wisconsin, with 10 electoral votes, and Michigan, with 16), Stacey Abrams and Elizabeth Warren came out as the best qualified to help the Democrat Party win the White House this year. It has to be remembered that it was the combined 77,000 vote margin of Trump victory in these three states (less than 1 percent of the vote totals in those states) that brought Mr. Trump the electoral college victory despite losing the overall popular vote by over 3 million. The vice presidential nominee on the Democratic Party ticket, Tim Kaine, though helping Hillary Clinton in his home state of Virginia, was no help at all in those three states where it really counted.

Yes, there will be a massive attempt to cheat again through voter suppression, etc., that worked in 2016. But the chosen vice presidential candidate has to be able to bring votes to the table in battleground states, besides being able to wow the major party organizers in the South. This latest poll indicates that both Abrams (right now the least known of all the potential vp candidates being looked at, but with sterling credentials to quickly change that dynamic) and Elizabeth Warren, are the best ones to reverse that trend.

The vice presidential candidate must be able to help unify the party, given the distaste that some Bernie Sanders voters still feel at their candidate’s loss of the chance to be the presidential nominee. The vice presidential candidate must also be able to inspire the large Black voter contingency in the party. Without those votes in the South Carolina primary, Mr. Biden would not even be in the conversation anymore to be the party’s nominee for POTUS. The choice of a vp nominee cannot alienate that voting base without insuring a GOP victory again in November.

Both Abrams and Warren, seen through the lens of a possible run for POTUS later, have their negatives to overcome: Warren is still hated by the plutocrats, and Abrams will need a massive infusion of common decency in the American voting public to overcome appearance issues. But both have overwhelming positives otherwise.

Of course, there are other potential vp choices to consider, each with their own strengths. These include Amy Klobuchar, Kamala Harris, Val Demings, and Gretchen Whitmer (governor of Michigan). The thing is, with all of their individual strengths, neither of these others excite the African-American base of the party and will not generate the buzz necessary for a great turnout at the polls. The Democrat Party is banking on a huge anti-Trump turnout in November, and cannot stomach any choice party leaders will make to threaten that probability.

The two front-runners for Joe Biden’s vice president, therefore, are most likely Abrams and Warren. Either would be a helluva choice.

I like Abrams better, but I pick Warren.

Professor David L. Horne is founder and executive director of PAPPEI, the Pan African Public Policy and Ethical Institute, which is a new 501(c)(3) pending community-based organization or non-governmental organization (NGO). It is the stepparent organization for the California Black Think Tank which still operates and which meets every fourth Friday.

DISCLAIMER: The beliefs and viewpoints expressed in opinion pieces, letters to the editor, by columnists and/or contributing writers are not necessarily those of OurWeekly.

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