Kamala Harris was fine

OPINION: The vice president dominated the debate against the former president by simply showing the country what a normal presidential candidate looks like. But will it matter?

Editor’s note: The following article is an op-ed, and the views expressed are the author’s own. Read more opinions on theGrio

Black people are never “amazing” and are rarely “awesome.” 

While they might feel fantastic, Black elders — especially in the South — seldom admit it. Even at their emotional and physical finest, they are often reluctant to jinx their current state of equanimity. So, when asked how they are doing, they often respond with a locale-dependent, technicolor expression that describes a status somewhere between “I can’t complain” (I’m doing rather well, thank you) and “I can’t call it” (things aren’t so bad). At best, they are “aight.”

In Georgia, someone who’s having a perfectly reasonable day is “just making it do what it do.” If a New Yorker’s current state of being is sufficiently adequate, they might tell you they are “just maintainin’.” Aside from: “The white man ain’t killed me yet,” there is a popular colloquialism that is commonly used among Black South Carolinians (and probably other Southerners; I haven’t seen the flash polling data so I can’t call it) that perfectly describes Kamala Harris’ presidential debate performance: 

“Just holdin’ it in the road.”

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 According to the Washington Post, “Harris dominated Trump.” The pundits at Politico concluded that “Harris won the debate — and it wasn’t close.” My colleague Toure said, “Kamala wiped the floor with him.” Even political novices are hailing Harris’ debate performance as a mollywhopping that hasn’t been witnessed since a Montgomery, Ala., riverboat tourist turned a folding chair into Thor’s hammer. 

She was fine. 

To be fair, those who contend that Harris beat Trump like he stole something (an election, perhaps) are not wrong. For most of the debate, he was angry, flailing and flustered; she was composed and on message. Trump vomited vile, racist, absurd conspiracy theories like Joe Rogan had a baby with Marjorie Taylor Greene while Harris stuck to her talking points. She was smart, articulate and, more importantly, presidential. Conversely, there is only one way to encapsulate the dotardly juvenile belligerent incompetence that defined Harris’ outmatched opponent’s behavior: 

Donald Trump was Donald Trump. 

To paraphrase the late great orator Dennis Green, “They were who we thought they were.” Harris is a professional politician who currently holds the second-highest-ranking job in American government. For the entirety of the two decades that Harris has served in elected office, no one has credibly accused her of being unqualified or unprepared. She figuratively stepped into the ring with Trump and delivered a technical knockout, but her debate performance was not “awesome” or “amazing”; it was Kamala Harris-like. She performed like a prosecutor or a senator or a politician who has never lost a race in her entire career. She looked like a president of the United States debating an entitled, inept, racist, hyperbolic liar who makes up for his political ineptitude by being racist and lying a lot.

Still, Harris’ performance was not flawless. She adeptly dodged questions she didn’t want to answer. When asked about race, she only offered boilerplate answers. She glossed over her position on funding a genocide in Palestine. She didn’t dismantle Trump’s idiotic economic argument that foreign governments pay tariffs, not American consumers. She ultimately acted like a professional politician.

Considering her ill-informed opponent, it is likely that Kamala Harris understood she didn’t have to focus on policy or counter Trump’s ever-shifting, sometimes nonsensical political positions. Anyone who has studied Donald Trump’s political career knows that he’s not quite the “stable genius” he cosplays to ear bandage-wearing rallygoers in wraparound shades. Just as a Ferrari owner doesn’t have to worry about losing a race to an Uber driver in a Nissan Altima, voters understand that Trump’s entire political approach is like a kindergartner playing bumper cars in a state fair parking lot. She knew the only way she could lose was if she crashed her car. 

Ultimately, Harris’ resounding victory probably didn’t change the minds of most voters. Neither logic, policy or the ability to form complete sentences are likely to move MAGA voters who believe that Haitian immigrants with jobs and access to grocery stores are hunting cats to slow-cook in their Walmart crockpots. And since Harris and Trump have been candidates on the national political landscape office for nearly a decade (Trump as president and Harris for the U.S. Senate), even the mythical undecided voters weren’t waiting to see who won a two-hour rhetorical fencing match to choose a side in the most important presidential race in modern history. 

This was not a political debate. It was a television show. 

And yes, Kamala Harris’ debate performance was still important. Unlike Donald Trump, Kamala Harris does not have the privilege of gliding through life while radiating incompetence, ignorance and public incoherence. To emerge victorious in November, she has to do what presidential candidates are supposed to do. She has to be articulate and calm and factually correct when she appears at debates that don’t matter. She has to give intelligible answers during sit-down interviews with mainstream media outlets. Harris can’t raise her voice or interrupt white people or spin around like a coked-up Tasmanian devil when she is challenged. Because she is Black, a woman and a presidential candidate, she has to be reasonable and rational and presidential every second of every day, including last night’s debate. 

Fortunately, Kamala Harris actually is all those things.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t matter that Harris’ opponent is a feeble-minded, scatterbrained, wannabe dictator who is the living, breathing embodiment of not presidential. Despite Trump being dragged like a Black kid showing out at a grocery store, it is still almost guaranteed that most of the white people who witnessed the nationally televised spanking will still vote for the spoiled, tantrum-throwing crybaby. Make it make sense. 

For most non-white people in America, excellence is a requirement, but it does not automatically translate to success. Being awesome does not guarantee victory. Still, if you are Black in America, you can’t complain; you can only maintain. Ultimately, last night, Kamala Harris did what all Black people do. So, while I understand why people rated her debate performance as “excellent” and “awesome,” I also know how America is doing.

And some of us are just holding it in the road. 

Michael Harriot is an economist, cultural critic and championship-level Spades player. His New York Times bestseller Black AF History: The Unwhitewashed Story of America is available everywhere books are sold.

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