As horrific images reminiscent of Saigon 1975 continue in Afghanistan, Vice President Kamala Harris has been missing in action.
Earlier this year, she often stood awkwardly behind President Joe Biden for speeches, but not Monday during his defiant diatribe. When the White House released the now-infamous Sunday photo of Biden sitting alone at Camp David, Harris was only among the president’s on-screen virtual advisors.
It’s likely that the historically unpopular vice president hopes to (selfishly) distance herself from the catastrophic withdrawal, of which even friendly media has been critical, while more partisan voices call for impeachment.
“Harris, who ran aggressively against Biden for the Democratic Party’s 2020 nomination, has been eager as vice president to be seen as loyal, while at the same time sharing in the administration’s successes to pave the way for another potential run at the top job,” a lengthy Los Angeles Times analysis noted this week.
Four months ago, however, after the president ordered our ignominious surrender abroad, she boasted of being the last person in the room before Biden made his fatal decision.
“I carry a great, great sense of responsibility, if not the seriousness of the responsibility, to be in this position and be a voice for those who have not traditionally been in the room,” Harris told CNN, while playing racial and gender games.
As a new senator in 2017, the radical Californian voted for a failed effort to rescind the 2001 Authorization for Use of Military Force passed in the aftermath of the September 11 terror attacks.
Harris, who’s been declining interview requests from major news outlets all week, leaves Friday for a major junket. It won’t be to Europe, but rather Singapore and Vietnam. This is her second international sojourn as vice president, following a disastrous visit to Guatemala and Mexico City in June.
“The prospect of Harris visiting Vietnam at this particular moment raised the possibility of the worst photo op for an American in that country since Jane Fonda donned a helmet there in 1972,” Fox News reported.
Others have since piled on the cruel symbolism.
“The VEEP writers could not have scripted this better,” former White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer tweeted Wednesday.
Harris finally ended her public silence Thursday with a short message to the “National Association of Black Journalists” virtual convention.
Now she’s high-tailing it out of Washington, D.C.
“She goes to Singapore to avoid the eyesores of rampant homelessness in her hometown, and instead view how a competent government runs a city,” a California-based political consultant emailed PJ Media Thursday. “As for Vietnam, she could have saved the air travel money, hotels, and advanced security teams by eating at one of the dozens of excellent pho restaurants in Orange County. She might also learn from the people here in ‘Little Saigon’ about the meaning of freedom and how hard work and not perpetual government handouts enable a minority group to succeed in America.”
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