Too bad social media wasn’t around in the late 800s. The tweets, YouTube videos, and TikTok reel about the Cadaver Synod would’ve been a hoot.
It’s a wacky story: In January of 897, Pope Stephen VI demanded that Pope Formosus be tried for perjury (and more). Only trouble was, Pope Formosus had died about seven months earlier.
No matter. They exhumed his corpse and propped it onto a throne. And then they deposed him like they would any other witness — “When you were bishop of Porto, why did you usurp the universal Roman See in such a spirit of ambition?” “Objection, your honor! Leading the defendant.” — and appointed a deacon to “speak” on behalf of the rapidly-decaying ex-pope.
Apparently, the deacon’s answers weren’t very persuasive: Pope Formosus was found guilty. His body was mutilated and tossed into the Tiber River like a lawn dart. (Isn’t history fun?)
So, there’s precedent for demanding answers from a dead body!
And this brings us to an EXCLUSIVE story from The Hill: “Exclusive: How ‘no daylight’ from Biden crippled the Harris presidential campaign.” It includes an extended excerpt from the book, “FIGHT: Inside the Wildest Battle for the White House,” by Jonathan Allen and Amie Parnes.
Normally, political books about Republican campaigns are hit-or-miss, mostly because conservatives and journalists distrust each other; you can’t give an “insider” account if you never were on the inside. But their post-mortems on Democratic campaigns tend to be much more accurate. After all, they really were on the inside!
According to Allen and Parnes, Kamala Harris sought the mantle of the “change candidate” — the one who’d shake up the status quo. With record numbers of Americans unhappy with the direction of the country (and “Bidenomics” 30 points underwater), even if she wanted to, Harris couldn’t run as Biden, Part II. It would’ve been political suicide.
Trouble was, President Biden ordered her to stay right by his side:
[Kamala Harris] could risk looking hypocritical by making clean breaks with Biden on policies she had supported as vice president, rejecting parts of their record to forge her own agenda. She could identify new issues to run on that avoided the pitfalls of turning her back on the Biden era. Or she could rely on voters to see her gender, her genes, and her “lived experience” — a middle-class upbringing, schools outside the Ivy League, and a career as a prosecutor — as symbols of change.
Biden and his loyalists took the first option off the table.
He would say publicly that Harris should do what she must to win. But privately, including in conversations with her, he repeated an admonition: let there be no daylight between us. “No daylight” was the phrase he had used as a vice presidential candidate in 2008 to bind Republican nominee John McCain to an unpopular president, George W. Bush.
Kamala Harris had (roughly) 100 days to convince the American people that she deserved to be the next president. With President Biden’s “no daylight” demand, it was impossible for her to stake her own identity. Biden’s ego was such that he’d rather Harris spend 100 days defending the Biden record and lose than to denounce it and win.
That was a selfish decision.
The excerpts also make it clear that Biden loyalists and/or propagandists were controlling Harris every step of the way:
Almost everywhere she went, Harris walked among former Biden aides who sought to defend his presidency. Her campaign was run by a former White House deputy chief of staff — whom she had just empowered to box out her own confidants — and a phalanx of department heads who had served Biden until the previous month.
The day before Harris’s first interview, a joint appearance with [Vice Presidential nominee] Tim Walz, she dived into the recurring question of whether and when she would let daylight shine between herself and Biden. Veteran Democratic communications strategist Stephanie Cutter launched into a proposed preamble — a list of all the items that made Harris proud of her work with Biden.
“Wait, wait, wait!” said Sean Clegg, a longtime Harris adviser who was regarded with suspicion by the Biden holdovers running the campaign. “Let’s not do this. Let’s not go down memory lane.”
That was the last time he was invited to media prep. Cutter, another Harris confidant later joked, cut him out.
Biden was trying to safeguard his legacy. It didn’t help him if Harris won the White House by throwing him under the bus — that would almost be as bad as Trump winning! Instead, the only way Biden could preserve his legacy was if Harris won while also kowtowing to the greatness of Joe Biden.
And they went for it. Trouble is, it didn’t work.
Related: New York Times: Dems Now ‘Regret’ Their Response to Trump’s Speech
Hilariously, the article does include Kamala Harris’s chair specifications:
Leg height no less than 15 inches; floor to top of seat height no less than 18.9 inches; arms on chairs may not be very high, arms must fall at a natural height; chairs must be firm.
Her chairs might be firm, but Biden’s mind had already gone soft. And the “no daylight” edict was just too much for a jumble-mouthed candidate like Kamala to overcome:
Her rallies and convention speech had not answered the question of why she was running for president — or how her vision for the country would deliver for voters — other than having been next in line. She was running out of major moments to explain a vision to a broad audience. Her September 10 debate with Trump would offer another opportunity — perhaps a last chance before voters cast early ballots — to establish that key part of her narrative.
But the day of the debate Biden called to give Harris an unusual kind of pep talk — and another reminder about the loyalty he demanded. No longer able to defend his own record, he expected Harris to protect his legacy.
Whether she won or lost the election, he thought, she would only harm him by publicly distancing herself from him — especially during a debate that would be watched by millions of Americans. To the extent that she wanted to forge her own path, Biden had no interest in giving her room to do so. He needed just three words to convey how much all of that mattered to him.
“No daylight, kid,” Biden said. [emphasis added]
One Last Thing: The Democrats are on the ropes, but the donkeys are still dangerous. 2025 will either go down in history as the year we finally Made America Great Again — or the year it all slipped through our fingers. We need your help to succeed! As a VIP member, you have exclusive access to all our sites: More stories, more videos, more content, more fun, more conservatism, more EVERYTHING! And if you CLICK HERE and use the promo code FIGHT, you’ll receive a Trumpian 60% discount!
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