Joe Biden has chosen California Senator Kamala Harris as his running mate on the Democratic Party's ticket. A talented lady, she has a bright future ahead of her. She is a second generation American whose parents migrated to the United States.
Her father is from Jamaica and mother of Indian origin. They divorced when she was barely 6 years old. Her name Kamala means Lotus in Sanskrit. But her connection to India almost ends there as she is as American as Apple pie. In US the voters mostly cast their ballot looking at their Presidential nominee. But if elected she will be in a unique position - a Vice President at the age of 54 when Biden will walk into the Oval Office at 78 being sworn in as the oldest President in History of the United States. He is expected to pass the baton to the younger Kamala Harris, who has a future ahead with a golden opportunity.
Facing the dual headwinds of COVID-19 and an economy in recession, Trump has a tough task ahead of him. This has not only put his supporter in backfoot here in the United States, surprisingly a lot of folks back home in India too. Many Modi supporters who align themselves to Trump by default think (erroneously) that the mercurial American Businessman -turned - President will send his Central Command to defend India in case the later is attacked by China, just because Modi held Trump's hands in the highly published "Howdy Modi" event in Texas.
At the same time a few back home have predicted that if Kamala Harris becomes the Vice President because of her Indian origin she will openly support India in every international forum. Such assumptions are highly fallacious and strictly fantasy. When I corner them with my arguments that foreign policy doesn't work that way, they get defensive - "Well, I don't care much about American Election", though they care enough to post their comments about it on regular basis every other day. I rest my case.
It should be noted that rarely a Vice Presidential nominee matters and helps a whole lot to his or her running mate during campaign. Very few remember the VP debates from past. It's said that the post of VP isn't worth a bucket of warm spit - a person who forever lives in the President's shadow and represents the President in the funerals of Third World leaders.
Only if and when the President dies or resigns from office, the Vice president is elevated to the President of the United States. Most recent examples are Lyndon Johnson becoming the President on the aftermath of Kennedy's untimely Assassination in 1963 and Gerald Ford taking over the White house in 1974 after the resignation of Richard Nixon, post Watergate Scandal.
Both hardly left a huge mark as Presidents. Johnson didn't opt for reelection in 1968 for his webbing polpularity. Ford lost to Jimmy Carter in 1976. Last VP who was elected as President was George Bush Sr., nearly 30 years ago in 1988. Al Gore, Bill Clinton's VP lost in the year 2000. Consequent Vice presidents Dick Cheney and Joe Biden refused to run for the office of President.
With the high profile Presidential candidates at loggerheads and center of national attention, will the likes of Mike Pence make any difference ? For the Republicans it's Trump all the way, no one is even close to his charisma among its GOP base. But I am sure Kamala Harris who has galvanized Democratic Party, especially its African American base will not be taken lightly by her opponents. I am sure she will be a great asset to Joe Biden and his campaign.
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