UNITED States President Joe Biden quitting his reelection bid was good news for many world leaders. Not because Biden was unfit to be US president again, though there is some truth in this assessment.
It is because they don't want Donald Trump to be in the White House again. But is Kamala Harris, a Biden endorsee, a Trump-stopper? With about 100 days to go for the election, her task is not going to be easy.
Judging by the enthusiastic reception to Harris's first rally speech in Wisconsin and her announcement that she had garnered enough delegates to secure her nomination, she may have crossed a big hurdle. Campaign contributions, too, have shot to US$100 million since Sunday.
Should Harris win the nomination and by some miracle defeat Donald Trump in November, she must not be another Biden. But first, why the 78-year-old Trump would be bad for the US and the world. One is his age, though there is no law disqualifying one of such age from becoming US president.
Trump is already showing the incoherence of his age. To surrender the controls of the nuclear button to one so unstable could end up as an invitation to global disaster. The other is his love for "alternative facts", the most glaring of which was his claim that the 2020 US presidential election was stolen from him. Should he lose this November election, be ready for another claim of a "stolen" election.
Worst of all is Trump's politics of hate. No one, including nations, are spared. During his first stay in the White House, China was hammered with the harshest of trade sanctions. His second stay there could be worse for China and others which do not share his worldview or geopolitics.
Harris may be a better choice for the US and the world than Trump. A Reuters/Ipsos poll conducted between Monday and Tuesday, seems to concur with this view.
The poll found Harris leading Trump 44 per cent to 42 per cent among registered voters. But better doesn't mean the best. She must endeavour to do what the best would do. Harris has enough motivation to do that. If she wins, she will be the first woman president of the country, and one of colour, too.
Many have been given the opportunity to rise above the crowd of presidents, from George Bush, Bill Clinton to Barack Obama, who with his "Yes, We Can" enthusiasm, arguably had the best chance to rise above the rest, but he let it slip, slide away.
All these failed not because they erred in the US, but because they blundered in the Middle East. The Middle East makes or breaks a US president. And by the way, Israel isn't the Middle East.
This Harris must know. She must not go telling the world that Israel isn't committing genocide, like Biden did. Biden stood in the way of justice for the Palestinians. Harris mustn't. For sure, the Palestinians don't elect an American president.
But what is made to happen there by US geopolitics can ruin the political career of an American president as it nearly did for Biden.