The one of bidenologist is the new fashionable profession in Washington. Like those observers who during the Cold War interpreted even the slightest signal from Moscow to unravel the intricacies of the Kremlin, the bidenologists Ever since the disastrous debate between the President of the United States and Donald Trump in Atlanta on June 27, they have been trying to figure out whether Joe Biden is more confused than before, whether he finishes his sentences worse, whether he has less reflexes than usual or whether those around him are overly protective of him. All this information seems insufficient to draw conclusions about the physical and mental capacities of an 81-year-old man convinced, despite the signs to the contrary, that he can win the election.
A good bidenologist Nor is she taking her eyes off Vice President Kamala Harris. If Biden decides to withdraw (something she said Friday she will only do after the intervention of the “Lord Almighty”), Harris appears to be the most likely and safest choice to replace him, given that she already has the public support of prominent members of the party. And if he does not throw in the towel and is elected for another four long years, it is increasingly likely that she will have to step up in the event that the president’s health worsens.
Harris enjoys a bit more popularity than the boss (although the difference is almost imperceptible and in any case both are below 40%), and some of the many polls that entertain (and confuse) journalists, analysts and voters these days place her in a better position to beat Trump.
So, after three and a half years in one of the most thankless jobs in American politics, the first woman and first non-white person to serve as vice president is facing her most difficult balance yet. If she is eager to step forward, she cannot be seen to be too obvious, and any gesture she makes is inevitably overinterpreted, as was the case Thursday during the celebration of the Fourth of July, Independence Day, on the South Lawn of the White House.
In a brief speech, Harris showered Biden with praise and then, after watching the fireworks from one of the balconies of the presidential residence, gave him a hug that was widely analyzed from below by those attending the event. Wasn’t it a somewhat forced display of affection?
Knowing what’s happening outside means understanding what’s going to happen inside, so don’t miss anything.
KEEP READING
Before the spotlight was once again on her, Harris, 59, had already been gaining ground in the Biden administration in recent months, after an initial period during which resignations in her team dominated the headlines, there was talk of a lack of harmony with the president and the favorite pastime in Washington was to show their disappointment with this daughter of an Indian and a Jamaican who came to the city to make history. In the early stages of the legislature, she was tasked with dealing with relations with Mexico and Central America, as well as the southern border, two poisoned gifts. Her prospects improved when, after the Supreme Court decision that overturned the presidential nomination two years ago, Harris was given the job of dealing with the relationship with Mexico and Central America, as well as the southern border, two poisoned gifts. Roe v. Wade, took the reins of the fight for abortion rights, a key electoral issue.
That commitment was underlined the day in the spring of 2023 when Biden and Harris announced they would be running again as an electoral duo. Harris was convincing in the afternoon at a pro-abortion event at Howard University, a historic black educational center in Washington known as “the Mecca.” It was in its classrooms that the vice president completed her law studies before beginning a brilliant career in California that led her to become attorney general and senator in Sacramento.
A difficult position
Then came her leap into national politics, her disappointing performance in the 2020 Democratic primaries and her signing as the second in command of a candidate who sought to rejuvenate and diversify his offering. After the high of the promise of what the two could do together and with the perspective that Biden came with the sole intention of serving as a “bridge” for a new generation, came the disappointments of the vice presidency, a double-edged position.

On the one hand, it has been the most reliable source of American presidents for half a century. On the other hand, it is an almost impossible job to fill, so much so that Benjamin Franklin proposed giving those who held it the title of “your superfluous excellency.” It is not advisable to stand out too much, or to contradict the boss and, in the worst case, if that boss is Donald Trump, you can end up like Mike Pence, with a mob calling for you to be hanged during the assault on the Capitol.
Given the peculiarities of Biden, the longest-serving president in history, Harris faced the added difficulty of convincing the world of her abilities as a replacement if necessary while observing all those rules. Now that that possibility is approaching, her collaborators point to a change of attitude, which, they say, came months before the debate, around the time that special prosecutor Robert Hur defined Biden as “an old man with a bad memory” in the report on the handling of the secret papers he kept from his years as Obama’s vice president. The “ticket had to be strengthened,” say those advisers.
As a testament to this new role and her desire to break out of the Washington bubble—a bubble that in her case accentuates her official residence, a colonial house buried in the grounds of the Naval Observatory, northwest of the city—Harris has undertaken some 60 trips this year, according to estimates by The New York Times. The New York newspaper has been on a single mission for a week: to force Biden’s withdrawal (and who knows, maybe Harris’ promotion).
Although she has repeated these days that she is not, to use the football simile, warming up on the sidelines —“I’m just Biden’s running mate,” she insisted on Tuesday—, the Trump campaign, which is more or less silently attending the spectacle of the disintegration of its enemy, is preparing, according to Axiosa plan to attack Harris, who they see as a more difficult opponent. That plan is to discredit her, to present her as too liberal, inexperienced and weak to assume the presidency. And when it comes to Trump, we can expect those attacks to be personal and the bullets to fly loaded with misogyny.
fuck it, thread of kamala harris’s funniest veep moments, starting with “you think you fell out of the coconut tree?” 1/ pic.twitter.com/wyo4j2WPxt
— silly goose (@bailey_s26) July 3, 2024
Meanwhile, Harris’s figure is experiencing a new spring on social media, which has been filled with memes demanding a correction to those who underestimated her and celebrate his eccentric comments—sometimes reminiscent of baseball player Yogi Berra’s Dada philosophy—grouped under the hashtag #KHive (in the style of Beyoncé’s Beyhive). The most successful one includes a quote about a coconut tree. She said it at an event at the White House aimed at promoting opportunities for the Hispanic community. Suddenly, she blurted out: “My mother told us: ‘I don’t know what’s wrong with you young people.’ Do you think you just fell out of a coconut tree? You exist in the context of what you live and everything that came before you.” In the video, she herself seems to respond to her witticism with one of her hearty laughs.
Needless to say, the bidenologists They have been mulling over the quote for days, trying to understand not only its meaning, but above all how the context of what the United States is experiencing, with a president in free fall, will affect the future of the country and that of Kamala Harris. Which, in view of everything that preceded her, may be the same thing.
Follow all the international information on Facebook and Xor in our weekly newsletter.
.
.
_