Reprinted from www.counterpunch.org
Senator Vance official portrait. 118th Congress.
(Image by Wikipedia (commons.wikimedia.org), Author: United States Congress) Details Source DMCA
J.D. Vance
As Joe Biden inches toward retirement, right-wing attacks on his presumptive replacement, Kamala Harris, are already beyond the pale.
The meanness of spirit and naïvete' can sometimes be breathtaking.
Take a vicious recent commentary by David Suissa in LA's Jewish Journal.
Suissa welcomes Trump's nomination of JD Vance as a "breath of politically incorrect fresh air" and a "middle finger to identity politics."
Suissa presumes that Trump has big-heartedly chosen Vance for the VP slot out of a selfless bow to "the best man for the job."
By contrast, Suissa implies that the choice of Harris means just to fill the Democratic ticket with a woman of color. Her prominence, he implies, is strictly the product of her politically correct race and gender.
The level of deception is mind-boggling"but deadly characteristic of the Trump Cult.
Far from a bearer of proven competence, Vance is a 39-year-old misogynist and homophobe with virtually no background in government and zero preparatory experience to serve as either Vice President or President of the United States.
Like Trump, Vance is a hollow media creation. His claim to fame is as the author of a book allegedly about "hillbillies", a fortune made as a tech speculator, and a blind ring-kissing fealty to Donald Trump despite all the nasty things Vance once said about him. Like Trump, Vance is a wholly-owned, climate-denying subsidiary of the fossil/nuclear fuel industry.
Aside from his brief stint in the US Senate, Vance brings zero administrative or foreign policy preparation to competently handle the highest or second-highest positions in our government.
And very far from what Suissa says about him, Vance's anointment is pure demographics. To anyone who was listening, the core of Vance's acceptance sales pitch was as a child of Appalachia serving as Trump's designated toady in Ohio, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin and other Rust Belt bulwarks whose electoral votes will decide the presidency.
Vance's nomination only makes sense as the middle finger of a GOP campaign desperate to win midwestern electoral votes. This is, after all, a ten-state election, and Vance's demographic plays in at least five of them. None of which has anything to do with any presumed capability to actually handle the job(s) for which Trump has him running.
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