The withdrawal of President Joe Biden from the November 5 US presidential race, Kamala Harris’s selection of Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate, as well as her own joyous electrification of the Democratic campaign are the factors that have shifted the momentum, energy, prospects and pace of the Harris candidacy.

That momentum has now neutralised the ground that the weak Biden candidacy had conceded to former president Donald Trump after Biden’s poor showing at the first debate.

It has now established a beachhead of ascendancy and an irreversible lead over the Republican camp.

The Philadelphia rally marked this turning power in the campaign because it generated a tectonic shift of the plates in favour Harris. It also threw the onus on the Republican camp of Trump because he is now the old man in the race.

All his shenanigans inclusive of the January 6 storming of Capitol Hill by his mob are coming to haunt, discredit and decelerate his campaign, with a lot of help from Trump himself with his unceasing and repetitive campaign errors of misjudgement.

All the polls are reflecting this tectonic shift in the momentum that has mobilised strengthening and radiating waves and a tsunami of support for the Harris-Walz team with still 78 days left in the campaign.

The further strengthening and domino effect of Monday’s star-studded first session of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago added another tectonic after-effect from the brilliant speeches of endorsement of the Harris-Walz team, delivered so powerfully and energetically by former secretary of state Hilary Clinton and Biden, both bringing the house down in sustained and unrelenting approbation.

The focus is now exclusively on embellishing the Harris candidacy and promoting the policies and programmes designed to attract a buy-in from both the middle and working classes in swing and battleground states.

There was an uncanny connection and sustaining reinforcement of campaign issues among the speakers that was well co-ordinated and skilfully choreographed at the convention.

STEPHEN KANGAL

Caroni