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Our View: Harris for the sake of the country

Kamala Harris will be a strong and determined leader as president. She has been as close to the White House as you can be for four years, has led her own initiatives and spent an inordinate amount of time in the Senate chamber delivering tiebreaking votes. She knows the Senate players. Her years as a prosecutor in California both expanded and fine tuned her toughness.

Her opponent, applying every tactic he can to return to an office he was fairly denied, daily drives wedges between Americans and between the United States and countries overseas as he pitches disorder, chaos and gloom.

Broad swaths of people have been trampled in his wake. Immigrants, Muslims, Latinos, Haitians, the residents of Detroit, law enforcement at the Capitol, and the people of Springfield, Ohio, and of Aurora, Colorado.

As for Springfield, his vice presidential running mate says it was OK to fabricate a lie in order to make a larger point. With Aurora, he labeled a city based on the behavior of a few to enrich his criticism of immigrants.

He has mocked those in the military and used Arlington National Cemetery for political purposes.

Those who have faulted his decisions and abilities, high ranking military and senior department heads, he has threatened with prosecution. Retribution has been his promise in recent weeks.

Then, and now, with no evidence, his claims undermine the credibility of American elections. He has threatened so many county election officials and volunteers with untruthful attacks that many have given up their positions. He has called for more votes to be found (Georgia), and at least was aware of the effort to push forward alternate electors.

He dismissed early voting and the use of ballot boxes as opportunities for cheating, until it was obvious that rhetoric had harmed his own turnout. When asked if he’d support the results of the coming election he said, if he loses, he would not because the only way he’d lose is because the Democrats cheat.

He has said he’d believe Russian intelligence before that of his own agencies, and that he’d withdraw from NATO. He attempted to leverage military support to a country that borders Russia into personal political gain (the first impeachment).

On Jan. 6, he sat idly by watching while Congress was savaged, the mob threatened his vice president (“hang him”), and he later claimed the deaths, injuries and property damage were peaceful (his second impeachment). Hundreds pleaded or were found guilty and he refers to them as martyrs.

He “knows Putin,” and with that the Ukrainian war would not be ended to Ukraine’s advantage. He’d withdraw the U.S. to its borders. His unpredictability could have deterred world leaders up to no good, but unpredictability is not a reasonable strategy, nor a desirable characteristic for a president.

Dozens of senior former administration leaders and White House staff members who served under him have said he’s unfit to lead the country.

He fully and successfully funded vaccine production, but then wouldn’t champion its use. Rather than the battle against COVID-19 being a national effort, he let the states fight among themselves for their citizens’ health. And, as we learned recently, he sent vaccines to Putin before they were fully available to U.S. citizens.

The bulk of his large tax reduction benefited high earners and added significantly to the national debt. In pressuring China with tariffs, a country that deserved them, he applied tariffs to other countries as well, alienating needed allies.

And, does he not understand that tariffs are not an economic growth strategy and ultimately hurt consumers as higher costs to business are passed on?

He’d use the military to oust undocumented immigrants, and to silence his critics. Those are not missions the military wants.

His rhetoric is full of violence. Of course, he repeatedly claims the media is lying; the truth exposes him: crowd sizes, economic gains, relationships, “the best,” “the greatest,” again and again.

He punches with his lies and by loudly bullying his critics.

There is more, which is extraordinary.

The U.S. has its challenges. Plenty of rational concerns can be cited in a civil fashion about the widening economic gaps, the strength of the two coasts as opposed to the middle of the country, the sieve at the southern border, the role of government agencies at multiple levels. But addressing them, and finding improvements, will come from others, not the past president.

For everything American, America must have Kamala Harris as president.