Yet security is certainly a worry given the Capitol Hill insurrection and out-of-control gun crime. As divided America’s crucial 2024 election looms, her reselection effectively pins a target on her back for Trump – the most likely GOP candidate – plus Maga extremists, rabid Republicans, preachifying evangelicals, lying TV hosts and assorted wackos, racists and bigots to aim at. Why? The fact she is the first woman vice-president, has Black and Asian American roots, and is a liberal from California provides a clue. Yet even by past standards, Harris has had an unusually rough ride. And perhaps her sometimes less-than-stellar performance partly warrants it. As vice-president, Harris has been patronised by friends, ridiculed by pundits and traduced by enemies.Įvidently, some of this pain goes with the job. Veep hunting recommenced in earnest last week after Biden confirmed he will seek a second term with Kamala Harris again at his side. ![]() Expectations are set impossibly high, then the victim is pilloried and pelted with mud pies for failing to match them. It’s like having your head in the stocks. One Veep spluttered the job was “not worth a bucket of warm piss”. Foreshadowing Prince Harry’s “Spare”, Benjamin Franklin suggested re-titling the incumbent “Your Superfluous Excellency”. Veep hunting: it’s a favourite Washington bloodsport. Donald Trump thundered that his reluctant fall guy Mike Pence, 2017-21, deserved lynching. Snarling Dick Cheney, 2001-9, departed widely loathed. Gaffe-prone Dan Quayle, 1989-93, the “deer caught in headlights”, was terminally mauled. Yet mostly, ex-vice-presidents slip unlamented into obscurity, diminished and finished. That happened to Lyndon Johnson, after JFK’s assassination, and, in less tragic circumstances, to Gerald Ford. Of course, there’s always a chance the ‘phone will ring – and everything changes in a proverbial heartbeat. Joe Biden, Barack Obama’s loyal No 2 for eight long years, was passed over in favour of Hillary Clinton. George HW Bush, Ronald Reagan’s deputy, moved directly into the top job in 1989. ![]() ![]() To think of the post as a stepping stone is misleading.
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