April 8, 2019

"In Washington, she hasn’t done much—let’s be honest, who in the Senate has in recent years?"

"She introduced a few bills: one, with Kentucky Republican Rand Paul, to study reforming the cash-bail system; another, with 13 Democratic colleagues, to begin addressing the high mortality rates black women face in childbirth. She also introduced, with fellow Democratic presidential candidate Cory Booker and Republican Tim Scott, a bill to make lynching a hate crime. This last one was classic Harris: tough on crime, seemingly progressive, entirely risk-free. It passed the Senate unanimously."

From "Can Kamala Harris Win?/No other matchup would be as riveting—or as revealing—as Harris versus Trump. But first she has to get through the primaries" by Elizabeth Weil (The Atlantic). I extracted the most substantive paragraph and it's notable for its lack of support for the proposition that her matchup with Trump would be riveting and revealing (or the way it only supports that proposition from an angle The Atlantic doesn't intend).

So what's riveting and revealing? The article is a long slog, but I'll fish this out:
The very fact of her campaign, Harris standing out there every day before crowds of thousands, presenting herself to the American people—some of whom will merely dissect her record; others of whom will see her female body and her brown skin, and want her dead—is bold and brave. 
That is such a lame and insulting assertion.

Let's try again... what would be riveting and revealing about Kamala Harris as the Democratic Party nominee? We're getting close to the end of the article.
It’s hard not to be ambivalent about a cautious person, particularly a person who has been working for you but holding back, saving for the future. In truth, it’s hard not to feel ambivalent about all the candidates. There are so many contenders, more of them popping up like white-haired crocuses every day. One is too old. (Well, two are too old.) One’s too mean to her staff. One said she was Native American and she’s not. One Instagrammed his trip to the dentist. So many Americans have conflicting desires for this election. They want a transformative leader who will push this country forward. They want a rescue, a captain to steady our faltering ship of state and restore the rule of law. Most of all, they want a winner—whoever that is, just tell them, they’ll vote that way. They want a sure thing. They need a sure thing. And then they feel scared and frustrated by all the options, because that’s not how the system works.
And then the article piddles out, with scenes of Harris reading cookie recipes and shopping for clothes.

ADDED: Try to diagram that sentence, the one I called "lame and insulting." It's challenging, because you have to find the subject and the predicate to get started:
The very fact of her campaign, Harris standing out there every day before crowds of thousands, presenting herself to the American people—some of whom will merely dissect her record; others of whom will see her female body and her brown skin, and want her dead—is bold and brave.
Did you find them? Let me help: fact | is

84 comments:

Achilles said...

Kamala Harris bragged about smoking pot.

And made a career throwing mostly black people in jail for smoking pot.

AllenS said...

She ain't goin' nowhere.

Achilles said...

Now her staggering hypocrisy is not her primary accomplishment as a public servant.

Her prime accomplishments were performed on Moonbeam's casting couch.

Her answer to "What have you done in office?" will be even better than Hillary's.

Bay Area Guy said...

"Can Kamala Harris Win?/No other matchup would be as riveting—or as revealing—as Harris versus Trump."

Untrue. Willie Brown found the matchup both riveting and revealing.

jameswhy said...

So they want a "transformative leader," a "captain" to restore the rule of law, a "winner..." Ummm, don't tell them, but it sounds like they want Donald Trump!

Lucid-Ideas said...

The Vagina Monologues accurately describes and serves as a metaphor for so many of these female candidate's campaigns.

It's women talking to other women about themselves. Totally one-sided and mono-toned.

Francisco D said...

Ms. Weil wants a "transformative leader who will push this country forward ..."

Three questions:

1. Wasn't Obama the transformative leader who would push the country to racial conciliation?

2. Where does Ms. Weil want the country pushed towards?

3. What talent does Kampala Harris have that will create this push?

I am getting tired of this empty headed crap coming from liberal "intellectuals."

Dave Begley said...

"They want a rescue, a captain to steady our faltering ship of state and restore the rule of law."

That means Trump wins in 2020. The Dems are lawless.

I see where Kamala's only April appearance is in Iowa City. She won't even venture out to meet voters outside the college town bubble.

Dave Begley said...

Francisco makes a great point. I saw Beto last week. Booker a few weeks before. And Bernie before that. They all complained about how terrible American is. How can that be? Obama was President for eight long years.

gilbar said...

When a student in Sioux City hoisted a sign asking him to go to prom with her, O’Rourke responded,
“First of all, as someone who did not go to prom because no one asked me, I’m really touched.


So,
Beta wants us to think that He thought that a guy couldn't go to prom, because "no one asked" him?
Beta thinks that we think that He thinks that gals ask guys to prom?
How stupid does Beta think we are? I guess this answers that

Dave Begley said...

Harris also attending a private house party in Des Moines.

Dave Begley said...

I asked Beto what he would say to Iowa Angel Mom Michelle Root.

"Deeply sorry."

What a fraud. This woman's daughter is dead. More dead Americans will be the natural result from this invasion.

Jim at said...

others of whom will see her female body and her brown skin, and want her dead

Once again, if we were half as violent as the left accuses us of being, there would be a LOT of dead bodies. Yet, Democrats can attend a baseball practice, mow their lawns - or wear a red hat in public - without a care in the world.

michaele said...

The article was fairly skimmable but this sentence caught my attention.... "Harris’s record in that office is marked more by what she didn’t do than what she did." Not a real inspiring resume' builder.

Ken B said...

Funny about the rule of law.

Amadeus 48 said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Ken B said...

Achilles,
Not what, whom.

Mike Sylwester said...

The main idea of the anti-lynching bill is that the Federal Government takes over jurisdiction in any case where two or more people are accused of attacking someone because of racist or anti-homosexual motives.

Another idea of the bill is that Kamala Harris and Corey Booker intend to campaign for President with the argument that Republican opposition to such federalization is racist and anti-homosexual.

That's why Jussie Smollett did his hoax and that also is why he was exonerated and why the police investigation files were sealed.

Mattman26 said...

"others of whom will see her female body and her brown skin, and want her dead"

Pretty sure all zero of those people will vote for someone else.

Mike Sylwester said...

I'll give Kamala Harris credit for directing the public's attention to the Kasowitz Benson Torres law firm.

Without Harris, nobody ever would have wondered whether Brett Kavanaugh ever has talked with someone at that law firm.

Ken B said...

“Lame and insulting” is the Atlantic's brand. Has been for years. THE PUBLIC HAS A RIGHT TO KNOW ABOUT TRIG PALIN!!

Amadeus 48 said...

So Elizabeth Weil thinks that Kamala Harris would be the riveting and revealing match-up with Trump for reasons that she can't quite grasp and certainly can't articulate.

That is riveting and revealing about Elizabeth Weil.

The English humor magazine Private Eye has a recurring cast of hacks that they have trotted out for more than 30 years. One is Glenda Slagg, who routinely writes gee-whiz gossip items that contradict each other in consecutive paragraphs.

Elizabeth Weil = Glenda Slagg.

Anonymous said...

Longtime Sacramento Bee political reporter, Dan Walters, wrote and article a couple of years ago about Harris. He said, in essence, she's made a career out of never taking a strong stand on anything. It's like she took a page out of Obama's pre-presidential playbook. Vote present, never put anything controversial in writing, talk in vague generalities that sound good to the people in the middle. No wonder the Atlantic writer couldn't find anything exciting about Harris.

chuck said...

I'm sure glad I'm not a Democrat, what a horrible world they inhabit. Just for the record, I think Kamala is kinda cute, why would I want to kill her?

Limited blogger said...

Good to see the Kamala train back on the track moving at a high rate of speed!

Quaestor said...

...American people—some of whom will merely dissect her record; others of whom will see her female body and her brown skin, and want her dead...

This arises naturally from Elizabeth Weil seeing Tump's male body and his orange skin and wanting him dead.

Michael Fitzgerald said...

We have a captain righting the ship of state, and restoring the rule of law. That's why Democrat party members have waged a traitorous insurrection against him.

TheDopeFromHope said...

We need an honest discussion of whether Kamala "Kama Sutra" Harris traded sexual favors for political advancement. And also an honest discussion of why she was appointed by Willy Brown to two state boards for which she apparently had no qualifications, did no work, and yet earned 400K of taxpayers' money.

My suggested campaign theme song: "She Works Hard for the Money" by Donna Summer.

She works hard for the money
So hard for it, honey
She works hard for the money
So you better treat her right

Limited blogger said...

Trump will not waste nick names on these losers.

Quaestor said...

They want a rescue, a captain to steady our faltering ship of state and restore the rule of law.

To Weil and others on the left "the rule of law" does not apply to immigration.

Harold said...

You'd think that the people who write these articles would eventually catch on to the fact that a candidate needs to have a message they believe in and a discernible personality to click with the voters. Bernie may be remind people of their crazy uncle but you don't get the idea he's running down a campaign consultant's checklist every time he makes an appearance. Agree or disagree with his ideas, the man owns them in a way that most of the other currently announced Democrats can't convincingly simulate in their own campaigns.

The Godfather said...

What the Democrats SHOULD want, more than anything else, is a candidate who can beat Trump. I don't think there's any reason to think that would be Harris. Or -- so far anyway -- any of the other mentioned candidates.

Fen said...

others of whom will see her female body and her brown skin, and want her dead

Ha. I've had lots of sex. Only 3 of which were black women. But all 3 are in my top 10.

Racism. You're doing it wrong.

Ladies, you know the (mostly true) joke that White Men have no rhythm compared to their black counterparts? That aphorism applies to White Women too, but in other ways. Black women bring a level of seductiveness and sexy moves in the bedroom that make the hottest white girl look plain vanilla and missionary. Unbelievable.

And really, does the writer honestly think the Condi Rice Fan Club wants to kill Harris because of her skin color?

Amadeus 48 said...

Glenda Slagg obviously doesn't know many Republicans. Nobody wants Kamala Harris dead. I'm with chuck. She's kinda cute.

Sebastian said...

"The very fact of her campaign, Harris standing out there every day before crowds of thousands, presenting herself to the American people—some of whom will merely dissect her record; others of whom will see her female body and her brown skin, and want her dead—is bold and brave."

I appreciate the fact that Althouse calls this lame and insulting: it shows she's not a prog. Cuz progs eat this up. Of course the fact is bold and brave, and who are you to question it? Of course some will merely dissect her record (what record, you might ask, but you'd be asking wrong, you dissecter). Of course "others of whom" will want to see the brown woman dead--as is to be expected in a racist country.

Maillard Reactionary said...

You're right, that assertion (in the article) is lame. But I am not insulted by anything these lefty dweebles say. I know who I am, how I have lived (with all the mistakes), how I treat others, and how my political decision-making works.

This is a symptom of being deplorable.

FIDO said...

She is brave because she ONLY has all the Media, Academia, Progressives, Democrats and Identitarians behind her.

Other people might...you know...do hateful things like ask her meaningful questions about her stances, policy positions and improving the nation with a skeptical gimlet stare, instead of merely basking in the dusky hue of her skin, feeling virtuous.

Maillard Reactionary said...

Fen said: "Ha. I've had lots of sex. Only 3 of which were black women. But all 3 are in my top 10."

Yeah, but were any of them dead at the time?

If they just identify as dead, that doesn't count, you know.

FIDO said...

So...the Oxbow Incident. White men were lynched.

Does this law making lynching a WHITE man a hate crime or no? If not, why not? If so, what about hanging a white man is hateful besides, you know, wanting him dead?

How is wanting a white man dead different than wanting a black man dead? How much further is the animosity than 'dead'?

She is a Damask Drum.

chickelit said...

She introduced a few bills: one, with Kentucky Republican Rand Paul, to study reforming the cash-bail system; another, with 13 Democratic colleagues, to begin addressing the high mortality rates black women face in childbirth. She also introduced, with fellow Democratic presidential candidate Cory Booker and Republican Tim Scott, a bill to make lynching a hate crime. This last one was classic Harris: tough on crime, seemingly progressive, entirely risk-free. It passed the Senate unanimously.

Those accomplishments seem inordinately focused on helping black people. Yet she was elected to represent all of California.

If elected, would she do anything for white people or latino people? Just how beholdered is she to BLM?

RobinGoodfellow said...


Blogger Achilles said...
Now her staggering hypocrisy is not her primary accomplishment as a public servant.

Her prime accomplishments were performed on Moonbeam's casting couch.


I thought her prime accomplishments were with Brown’s Willie?

Henry said...

In truth, it’s hard not to feel ambivalent about all the candidates. There are so many contenders, more of them popping up like white-haired crocuses every day. One is too old. (Well, two are too old.) One’s too mean to her staff. One said she was Native American and she’s not. One Instagrammed his trip to the dentist.

Guess who's missing.

Jupiter said...

Yeah, that's what I think when I see Kamala Harris. Brown skin? Check! Female? Check! Faster, Pussy-cat! Kill! Kill!

Like, how does Elizabeth Weil get that much dumb into her tiny little skull?

readering said...

I thought the predicate in the sentence was
is bold and brave

stever said...

"others of whom will see her female body and her brown skin, and want her dead—is bold and brave."

what a lack of imagination

Yancey Ward said...

She has a hooha. She is qualified.

Yancey Ward said...

Harris will eventually figure out how to fake sincerity and authenticity.

Francisco D said...

IMHO, there are only four candidates with a chance of getting the Democrat nomination: Harris, Warren, Biden and Sanders. The rest are running for VP or local recognition.

My money (and apparently the NYT) is on Harris. She will pick a White male Midwesterner (Buttigieg?) or Southerner (O'Rourke?) as her running mate.

Basically, she is the easiest for the Dem powerbrokers to package and sell, with help from their propaganda experts in the MSM.

Now she needs to do the scut work while the rest of the clowns make themselves look foolish. When it gets down to the convention, it will be Harris vs. Sanders. The passion is with Bernie, but the money is with Kamala.

Maillard Reactionary said...

Francisco D @5:56 PM:

The selection of the sacrificial victim is ongoing as we speak. The High Priests (and, Priestesses) know that a martyr for the cause is required. And one will be found. Battle-hardened, older but wiser, he/she/whatever will emerge again in 2024 and... get shellacked.

Alas!

Naturally, this scenario precludes Bernie and Slow Joe from participating. Well before then, it is clear, their blood plasma won't be in any condition to keep even Hillary still staggering about in the woods, mumbling about conspiracies.

Thank you for your service, Bernie and Slow Joe. Now step aside, thank you, right over here, that's it, keep on moving, thank you very much.

It's time to say it again: Sad!

rhhardin said...

The subject is Harris standing out there every day before crowds of thousands, presenting herself to the American people—some of whom will merely dissect her record; others of whom will see her female body and her brown skin, and want her dead—

It's an apposition.

What did you do with "very"?

Traditional diagramming most often misses the actual structure of sentences.

robother said...

She is running. She is black. She is South Asian. She is a she. What more could a voter possibly ask? Who do these voters think they are, WIllie Brown?

Marty said...

Even most Californians are unaware of the incredible venality of the Dem machine here in the state. Until very recently it was controlled by Willie Brown ally John Burton, who gave us not only Nancy Pelosi and Kamala Harris, but our current governor as well. All shoved down the throats of the incurious voters in Dem primaries.

Of course, the gutless and feckless GOP made it easy for them, but here we are in a monopoly blue state, controlled by a shadowy nomenklatura much in the same way as the late unlamented USSR and probably doomed to a similar fate.

So the question should be: for whom does Sen. Harris front?

narciso said...


https://legalinsurrection.com/2019/04/democrat-congresswoman-offended-by-this-whole-conversation-about-socialism/#comments

narciso said...

a degree of competence and good judgements,

Charlie Currie said...

"others of whom will see her female body and her brown skin, and vote for her because that's their one and only criteria. "

Anonymous said...

Harris campaigns as an African American, but she is the offspring of two foreigners, neither of whom was African or American. Her father was a Ph.D. Econ prof from Jamaica, and her mother a cancer research Ph.D. from India. She was raised in Berkeley and Montreal, neither of which is American, by parents who were not American. She wasn't exposed to AA culture till she went at 18 to Howard in DC

Michael K said...

Harris is a tanned Hillary without the charm.

All Trump would have to do is make some ads of her questions at Senate hearings. She is a nasty piece of work, on the order of Hillary and "Willing Suspention of Disbelief."

tcrosse said...

Meanwhile, NBC News is beating the drum hard for Buttygig.

wildswan said...

I'm running for President and I will be on all the ballots - as "Other".

My position is that it should be against the law to mention a candidate's race, religion, age or sex during the Presidential campaign. We should just be known as Other 1, Other 2 and so on. And the Olympics and all other forms of athletics should be unisex.

And that if socialism can be a world-wide creed then a religion can also be a world-wide creed and so, have at it, missionaries.

And that the Chinese who have our manufacturing should be contributing to the realization of American social goals as the American manufacturers would have been expected to do if they had not sold out to China. You see, open borders means that the Chinese are responsible for all social conditions worldwide, not just those within their own "borders", for there are no borders. And this China policy is how I will pay for things I promise to give away for free.

And I will solve the Social Security crisis by pointing out that if everyone has one more child than the statistical projections for their group then - no crisis. And if you don't want to do that then you'll be poor when you are older but you chose that. So, problem solved whatever happens.

And I have Other ideas and policies which I may discuss at anOther time.

William said...

Remember all the times Carli Fiorina, Elizabeth Warren, and Hillary Clinton devastated--utterly devastated--Trump with their crushing rejoinders. I look forward to more of the same with Kamala. You can count on the journalists of our nation to accurately report on their antipathy to Trump. So far as I can recall, Trump never won a single debate. He was completely destroyed in all of them.......By Hollywood standards, Kamala is too old to play the DA. She's about the right age for Senator. I think Hollywood usually casts somewhat older women for female Presidents, but there are exceptions.......Too early to say, but it seems Hollywood and the media get more satisfaction out of grooming and licking Buttigieg than Kamala.

Static Ping said...

Yes, I did manage to find subject and predicate. I was not expecting a semicolon separating two hyphens though. It reads like a parody of a sentence from a pretentious magazine, its parent article found opposite an advertisement for a $30,000 bottle of wine, the potent potable perfectly modeled by a woman who can track her entire family tree to the Mayflower except for a great-great-great grandmother who was a minor member of the Russian royal family, that touch of the exotic to complete the flavor profile.

bagoh20 said...

"Harris standing out there every day before crowds of thousands, presenting herself to the American people—some of whom will merely dissect her record; others of whom will see her female body and her brown skin, and want her dead—is bold and brave. "

So her campaigning will include strip tease? What's amazing is that it's not the craziest thing I've heard from the Dems this year.

Maillard Reactionary said...

That sentence is not complex, just verbose.

Too much art, trying to make up for very little matter.

rightguy said...

Ms. Harris is such a total non-entity, a generic PC rote SJW with lousy instincts, that its hard to imagine how dreadful a president she would be. But I guess she feels like its her turn. And, of course, the dems would vote for her in droves.

tcrosse said...

Perhaps Buttygig will do to Kamala what Obama did to Hillary in 2008.

rcocean said...

God, that is one bad sentence. I still don't really follow it -but thanks for the help.

Birkel said...

When Willie Brown said "I want to beat that thing half to death" Elizabeth Weil assumed Republicans we're making death threats against Senator Harris.

Do I have the gist?

rcocean said...

The very fact of her campaign - blah blah - is bold and brave. OK got it.

Birkel said...

Spending others' money is now defined as bold and brave.
Democratics who want a 70% or even a 90% tax bracket are the boldest and the bravest, I guess.

Static Ping said...

To the actual subject, there is simply the matter that Kamala Harris has basically nothing of note to run upon. She slept her way to the top, she used her position at Attorney General to do things that progressives now decided are horrible and non-progressives think is pretty normal and unremarkable, and she's been an unimportant senator. She's basically Obama except pretty. Her only hope is for the media to cheer lead her along like they did with Obama, but so far that hasn't happened in any sufficient manner.

Gahrie said...

Try to diagram that sentence,

Most people would fail today. They don't teach sentence diagramming in schools anymore. Hell 10 years ago when I taught in middle school, none of the English teachers knew how when I suggested it.

walter said...

"Everyone knows" Tammy Baldwin is shakin' shit up!

walter said...

Wisco Senator, folks!
1st in line with her rubber stamp!

chickelit said...

Marty asked: So the question should be: for whom does Sen. Harris front?

How "beHoldered" is she?

EAB said...

Why is it bold and brave for someone who has been CA Attorney General and is now a Senator to run for President? Seems pretty common (no matter how well or poorly they’ve done in those offices...)

Clyde said...

"others of whom will see her female body and her brown skin, and want" to vote for her based solely on those qualifications, rather than any policies she might promulgate.

FIFY. That's a helluva lot truer than opponents "wanting her dead." We don't "want her (or any other Democrat) dead." We want her DEFEATED, for the good of the country.

And this bit of bloviation:

"They want a transformative leader who will push this country forward. They want a rescue, a captain to steady our faltering ship of state and restore the rule of law. Most of all, they want a winner—whoever that is, just tell them, they’ll vote that way."

Describes the reasons why we voted for Trump to a T, because we saw a country that needed to be rescued from the ravages of the lawless Obama gang. And we got it. KAG 2020.

exhelodrvr1 said...

Time against race.

rhhardin said...

Typical diagramming failure

"For them to diagram sentences is ridiculous."

Diagrams have "them" as the object of "for."

The actual structure is that "for" marks the subject of a to-infinitive, and subjects of non-finite verbs (verbs not carrying tense) are in the objective case.

That's something hugely interesting that diagramming conceals.

Nichevo said...


AllenS said...
She ain't goin' nowhere.

4/8/19, 3:24 PM


No, Sanders will want her for ticket balancing.

Nichevo said...


Francisco D said...
Ms. Weil wants a "transformative leader who will push this country forward ..."


When will they learn? What country do they think this is? I got news for you Sunshine: AMERICANS DON'T LIKE BEING PUSHED!

Kevin said...

"In Washington, she hasn’t done much—let’s be honest, who in the Senate has in recent years?"

I expect this is the more exciting article between Harris and Booker.

Booker: the less accomplished, less female, less enticing matchup with Trump, who people will still want to kill.

TJM said...

She made her career the old fashioned way - she slept her way to the top. What a feminist icon she is, right up there with Rosa Parks! But for a moronic national media without any morals, she'd be nowhere

Lost My Cookies said...

Some of whom want her dead? Is that really what these nutcases think? Do they need that much drama in their lives?

Aggie said...

So they want her dead. Who is they? Are we once again trotting out that old gollem from the left's fever swamp, the vast American Cracker Class?