Gabby GIffords

Potential Vice Presidential Nominees With Kamala Harris If She Replaces Joe Biden

Discussion has begun of potential Vice Presidential nominees who would join Vice President Kamala Harris on the Democratic Party ticket, if President Joe Biden decided to withdraw from the race, which seems more likely by the day.

Speculation has that Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer might make for a “dynamite” ticket with Harris, making it an all female competition against two Republicans, Donald Trump and JD Vance, who could clearly be called male chauvinists at the least.

What an exciting race that would be, but the question is whether it would be a winning race. Whitmer, being from Michigan, a crucial swing state, could be a dynamic addition to the race, but it would seem a major gamble to have an all female ticket.

Other possibilities of running mates for Harris include:

Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear
North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper
Arizona Senator Mark Kelly

Shapiro is Jewish, while Buttigieg is gay, either being a step forward on those factors. Shapiro is also from a “swing state” and Buttigieg now lives in Michigan, a “swing state” after earlier being Mayor of South Bend, Indiana.

Beshear and Cooper have been successful as Governors in Republican states, and North Carolina could be in play in the upcoming election.

Kelly, whose wife Gabby Giffords, was a victim of an assassination attempt in 2011 when a member of Congress and has recovered quite well, is a former astronaut and from another “swing state”.

The potential Vice Presidential list is very impressive, and any of the list of six individuals would add to a ticket headed by Harris! All are younger than Harris, except Kelly who is eight months older than Harris, and Cooper who is nearly seven years older at age 67.

The US Senate Vote On Expanded Background Checks For Guns: A Slap In The Face Of Gabby Giffords, Aurora And Sandy Hook!

The Manchin-Toomey Expanded Background Checks Bill to regulate purchase of guns by Al Qaeda terrorists, gang members, rapists and murderers, and mentally unstable people at gun shows and on the internet, went down to a defeat in the US Senate yesterday, only able to gain a vote of 54-46, when 60 votes was needed to overcome the filibuster which holds up action unless that number is reached.

This is a slap in the face of former Congresswoman Gabby Giffords and the others who were victims in Tucson; those killed and wounded in the movie theater in Aurora, Colorado; and the massacre of 20 children and six educators at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut.

It also comes right after the Boston Marathon Massacre, which left three dead and 170 wounded, and it says to the nation that we are not willing to do the simple act of requiring expanded background checks as a minimum.

Four Republicans were courageous enough to oppose the National Rifle Association, while four Democrats were unwilling to do what was right, because of their fear of retribution when they came up for reelection, three of them in 2014.

But as much as one wants to keep his job, if a Senator has no principles except his or her own advancement, it means we have forgotten what our government is all about–doing what is best for the American people, and preserving their security and safety, the first and most important role of any government!

Probably only if these four Democratic Senators and the 42 Republicans who voted against expanded background checks had members of their own families killed or wounded, would they get the message!

This is a sad moment in the history of the US Senate, particularly when up to 90 percent of Americans and 80 percent of gun owners support such expanded background checks to preserve some of the lives of our children and our loved ones!