As Vice President Kamala Harris weathers a barrage of ferocious attacks on her competence and on her identity, she might consider calling up Tommy Vallely.

Vallely, a senior advisor for Vietnam at Columbia University’s Weatherhead East Asian Institute, was a decorated combat Marine in the Vietnam War and is a longtime friend of former Secretary of State John Kerry.

He recalls the euphoria after Kerry, who was decorated for his heroism in the Vietnam War, won the Democratic presidential nomination in 2004; it’s not unlike the Harris high of the past week and a half. He also remembers how quickly it dissipated when a Republican front group called Swift Boat Veterans for Truth smeared Kerry's war record with duplicitous, but effective, attacks that were credited, in part, with sinking his bid.

Chris LaCivita helped perpetrate that particular smear campaign 20 years ago, and he now co-chairs former President Donald Trump's 2024 campaign. Then, they went after Kerry's integrity and patriotism. Now, racism will be at the core of the assaults against Harris.

Already, the dog whistles are sounding: Republicans are calling her an unqualified "diversity" candidate. At the National Association of Black Journalists conference this week, Trump raised inane questions about Harris’ racial identity, accusing her of “all of a sudden” becoming Black despite her attending Howard University (one of the most prominent historically Black colleges and universities in the nation), being active in the country’s oldest Black sorority and identifying as biracial for years. She’s the daughter of immigrant parents from Jamaica and India.

"It's going to get worse," Vallely warns. His advice to Harris is to strike back but not to........

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