Kamala Harris has what it takes

Kamala Harris has what it takes to fill a big political stage. During Sunday’s announcement of her 2020 presidential run, the California senator looked very much like a political contender who belongs in the big leagues.

It’s always a great unknown leading up to such events whether a particular politician has the charisma to carry off the successful launch of a presidential campaign. Whether that certain someone has what it takes to step up to a microphone, heart pounding, and seize the moment. All this while tens of thousands of supporters hang on every word and a ravenous political world lurches forward, ready to pass savage judgment: Is this a pathetic political pretender or the Next Great Hope? To policy wizards, pundits and most candidates themselves, the answer is unknown until the first words of that first speech begin ringing out of the forum’s public address system.

Harris’s introductory remarks were predictable enough for a progressive Democratic candidate seeking the party’s nomination in what may prove to be the most crowded political field in U.S. history. The content of her Oakland speech did little to differentiate her worldview from those of the dozens of other progressive politicians eyeing a nomination that will move its winner within close reach of the White House.