New Age | A Democratic Glimmer of Hope

BY withdrawing his candidacy for president, President Biden has played a “presidential gambit,” and he has played it with extreme precision. He has opened the platform for Vice President Kamala Harris to step in and challenge the Republican nominee, Donald Trump.

Kamala Devi Harris, born October 20, 1964, is the current 49th Vice President of the United States. She served as the Senator from California from 2017 to 2021 and as the Attorney General of California from 2011 to 2017. As vice president, she is constitutionally the right person to succeed the president in the event of the president’s failure to do his or her duty or death. After Joe Biden endorsed her candidacy, she said that in her long career as a prosecutor, she had “seen predators who abused women, fraudsters who ripped off consumers, con men who broke the rules for their own gain. So listen to me when I say, I know Donald Trump’s type.” She slammed Trump, who is facing a number of federal charges and has pleaded guilty in New York. This Friday, Harris informally collected enough votes from Democratic delegates to the National Convention, to be held in Chicago from August 19 to 22, to officially become the Democratic Party’s nominee for president. Those who urged Biden to withdraw his candidacy have backed her, including former President Obama.

And Republicans are panicking. Republican strategist Karl Rove said Friday that Vice President Harris would use “momentum” after the Democratic National Convention to overthrow Trump and advance in the presidential race. This is a very notable development. On the other hand, Republican lawmakers who see national security as a top priority are backing away from Trump on key issues, including the war in Ukraine, preserving the NATO alliance and protecting Taiwan from Chinese aggression. Furthermore, the Washington Post reported that 24 of Trump’s 42 former Cabinet members have endorsed him, with the rest opposed.

It is very difficult to understand what Trump says, because his speeches are full of lies, half-truths, innuendo and vulgar language. But Trump has plans if he becomes president again.

Two videos or documents that have been distributed by Republicans can be considered their blueprints or plans for the future. They are called Agenda 47 (series of videos) and Project 2025. The so-called Agenda 47 videos are available on the website; careful journalists have summarized their messages. Here are a few.

Trump would build 10 state-of-the-art “freedom cities” on federal land and innovation hubs to “create a quantum leap in the American standard of living,” celebrate “a year of festivities across the country” from Memorial Day 2025 through July 4, 2026, “in honor of the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence,” designate Mexican cartels as foreign terrorist organizations and impose the death penalty on drug dealers and human traffickers; pardon most of the rioters who attacked the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, to prevent Joe Biden from being certified as president; require police to enforce “stop-and-frisk,” the practice of stopping and frisking citizens for weapons and drugs; crack down on doctors who provide gender-affirming care to minors and “pink-haired communists” who promote critical race theory or “inappropriate” political content in schools; and by executive order end a longstanding policy of granting citizenship to U.S.-born children of undocumented parents. And many more things like that.

The Heritage Foundation created Project 2025, which included an advisory board of more than 100 conservative groups. It’s a 900-page guide to reforming the federal government. It has four pillars, the first of which is abortion and social issues, but those issues have been finalized by the U.S. Supreme Court, which recently overturned the Row v. Wade decision. The second pillar focuses on federal agencies, employees, and policies. It says the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration would be abolished because it addresses environmental degradation. Third, it proposes abolishing Homeland Security but creating a new department with 100,000 employees to address immigration. It also wants to fire staff and grantees at the U.S. Agency for International Development who “engage in ideological agitation on behalf of the DEI agenda.” DEI stands for diversity, equity, and inclusion. Fourth, immigration recommends finishing the wall along the U.S.-Mexico border and taking “a creative and aggressive approach” to responding to drug cartels at the border. By the time they are implemented, the executive branch of government will be gone.

These bizarre claims and plans make you wonder if these are writings of sane people. When confronted, Trump dismissed the initiative and wrote on social media that he knew nothing about Project 2025.

Kamala Harris said on July 25 of this year, speaking before the American Federation of Teachers, “Can you believe they put that on paper? Project 2025 is a plan to take America back to a dark past.”

It would be a historic election in US history and for the survival of democracy.