Breaking: Kamala Harris, Exit Stage Left [with comment by Paul]

Unsurprisingly Kamala Harris exited the Democratic presidential field today. The handwriting has been on the wall from the very beginning. She’s merely the latest example of a prominent political figure who succumbed to the media siren cries and sycophants around her who told her that she was the “next Obama,” but who was clearly unprepared for the order-of-magnitude step increase that is a presidential race. (Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker was the Republican example of this problem in 2016. Raised tons of money, seemed battle hardened from his three Wisconsin elections, but he had clearly not thought the matter through very well.)

The New York Times reported as much in their story about the disarray and dysfunction of the Harris campaign a few days ago:

Health care policy and the identity of the Democratic Party became much-debated issues this year, but she had never given the details of either matter extensive thought as she rose from local prosecutor to California attorney general to the Senate. . .

Then there was Ms. Harris’s campaign message. Extensive polling led her to believe that there was great value in the word “truth,” so she titled her 2019 memoir “The Truths We Hold” and made a similar phrase the centerpiece of her early stump speech: “Let’s speak truth.” But she dropped the saying out of a belief that voters wanted something less gauzy.

This part is especially delicious:

Dan Sena, a former executive director of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, met early with Ms. Harris’s team and came away concerned that they were overly reliant on political thinking shaped in California’s idiosyncratic political system.

Ya think?

And this is especially telling about the state of mind and the center of gravity in the Democratic Party at the moment:

There are also generational fissures. One adviser said the fixation that some younger staffers have with liberals on Twitter distorted their view of what issues and moments truly mattered, joking that it was not President Trump’s account that should be taken offline, as Ms. Harris has urged, but rather those of their own trigger-happy communications team.

Predictably, the identity politics left is sounding their usual trumpet. This, from “She the People” founder Aimee Allison:

“The Democratic field became much less diverse today, after the only Black woman in the presidential race dropped out. It was evident when Sen. Kamala Harris launched her campaign that she would be a formidable contender for the White House — one who was able to attract a  multiracial and enthusiastic base that would fuel her historic bid.

“I had hoped that she would be able to recapture some of that early excitement. As a Black woman, I know from personal experience that Kamala has to work three times as hard as some of the other candidates in this race to get half as far.

“Kamala’s presence in the race helped blaze a trail for the next generation of women of color. She ran a competitive campaign that has forced us to re-think what it means to be electable.”

Actually she ran a terrible campaign, with canned lines that flopped, along with issue positions that flip-flopped. I doubt she’ll be back, though she can likely be senator from California for as long as she wants to be.

So I guess now Elizabeth Warren is the closest the Democrats have to a woman of color in the field. (Heh.)

Chaser: Here’s how the “certified smart guys” handicapped the race at the beginning of the year:

Chaser #2:

PAUL ADDS: I love the line about Harris, as a Black Woman, having to “work three times as hard as some of the other candidates. . .to get half as far.” Harris had to work Willie Brown at least three times as hard to get as far as she did.