Month: October 2024

Another Response to Andrew Sullivan

RE: “He’s Winning This Thing“

Dear Andrew,

If there is anything more embarrassing than Howard Stern and Stephen Colbert fangirling over Kamala Harris in their interviews, it’s you fangirling over a candidate you say you’re voting against. Like when Trump describes his word salads as “the weave.” You really think that’s clever? When I think of “the weave” in relation to Trump, I think of something else coming off the top of his head. It’s like a thatched-roof cottage up there.

And when you say Harris’ answers to substantive questions are generalities like “I believe in building consensus. We are a diverse people. Geographically, regionally, in terms of where we are in our backgrounds. And what the American people do want is that we have leaders who can build consensus”, quite so, but at least air is a substance. As opposed to Trump, who in his Detroit speech said: “I said who the hell did that, I saw engines, about three four years ago, these things were coming, cylinders, no wings, no nothing, and they’re coming down very slowly, landing on a raft in the middle of the ocean someplace, with the, circle, boom, reminded me of, the Biden circles that he used to have, right, he’d have eight circles, and he couldn’t fill them up, but then I heard he BS with the popular vote, I don’t know, I don’t know, couldn’t fill up the eight circles, I always loved those circles, they were so beautiful, they were so beautiful to look at, in fact the person that did that, that was the best thing his, the level of that circle, was, great, but they couldn’t get people, so they used to have the Press, stand in for the circles, because they couldn’t get the people, then I heard we lost, oh, we lost, now we’re never going to let that happen again, but we’ve been, abused, by other countries, we’ve been abused by our own politicians really more than other countries.”

He’s winning this right now? What kind of country is this where he COULD be winning right now?

I agree with you on some points. Like, Pennsylvania being as central as it is, Harris’ running mate should have been Josh Shapiro and not Tim Walz. But exactly what “bold and risky” thing do you propose she do that wouldn’t piss off her voter group, which lest we forget, is basically everybody in this country who’s not already for Trump, and can’t agree with each other on everything, maybe not anything?

We can’t get Obama back. For various reasons, we couldn’t get Pete Buttigieg to run, and I think both of us would prefer that. But Harris would have both of them in her corner. And as I said: We could have Biden, and we all suspect how that would play out. When you said he should bow out, you knew what the options were. This is what we’ve got. And if you can’t back Harris, you know what you’re going to get.

I know Harris’ problems. But it’s a little odd that the Michiganders who hate how Biden-Harris have not stood up for Palestinians think that Trump and Jared Kushner would be any more sympathetic. I find it hard to be believe that all the people who voted against abortion bans and supported state abortion rights in the midterms would go along with a guy who is going to support a national abortion ban. (And don’t say he wouldn’t. I actually believe that the guy who was in the Jeffrey Epstein Frequent Flyer Club doesn’t really care about banning abortion, and I can believe that the guy who had Elton John perform at his wedding party doesn’t really care about persecuting gays, but he caters to the people who DO.)

I have been asking myself over the past week or so: How is it that Ruben Gallego can be leading Kari Lake for the US Senate race in Arizona by 10 points in one poll, incumbent Democratic Senator Jacky Rosen is leading Sam Brown in Nevada by anywhere from 2 to 13 points, and incumbent Democratic Senator Bob Casey is leading David McCormick by anywhere from 2 to 8 points, yet polls in all three states show Trump either tied or leading?

Is Trump really that popular and Harris really that unpopular? I wouldn’t doubt it. After all Trump was unpopular enough that he lost to Biden even though Republicans made some downballot gains in 2020. But Harris is certainly not as repellent as Hillary Clinton, and neither is Biden, though you seem to be actively repelled by both of them while you almost seem to admire Trump’s skill (or chutzpah) and obviously admire Vance.

But the “Lamestream Media” wants to make this a horse race to the very end, and Nervous Nellies like you are part of the project. If anything that might help Democrats get out the vote. After all, everyone thought Hillary had it in the bag, and we know how that played out.

Like I said, Andrew, you should really apply for a job with Trump’s campaign, or apparently, his Cabinet. Cause you’re giving him better advice than he’s getting. Or seems to follow.

Or, Donnie can just go along like he has been, like going to the Detroit Economic Forum and telling all the people in Detroit what a terrible city Detroit is. At this rate, he’s gonna win Michigan by 5 points. Not because Trump is so wonderful or because Harris is so terrible, but because no one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.

The 2024 Debate of Vice

The last presidential debate (with Kamala Harris) reamed Donald Trump about as hard as his behind-the-scenes meeting with Vladimir Putin at Helsinki in 2018, and I don’t think he enjoyed it as much. In fact, the only reason that that debate didn’t kill Trump’s campaign the way the Biden-Trump debate killed Biden’s campaign is that Biden was running mainly to keep Trump from being president again, so once he became a liability to that, he deferred to his running mate, whereas Trump is running mainly to stay out of prison. So given that Trump is just as timid in regard to a rematch as he was with Putin at Helsinki, the main suspense in the 2024 race came from anticipating the vice-presidential debate of October 1, between Vice-President Harris’ running mate, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, and Trump’s running mate, Senator JD Vance of Ohio.

I did not really get to see it, because I work from home, and as is often the case on Tuesday evening, and especially on the first day of the month, the entire population of North America was maniacally cramming the call queue like it was a 24-hour McDonald’s drive-thru and emergency calls were Big Macs.

The most controversial aspect of the whole thing was that after ABC anchors made some mild fact references against Trump in his last debate, the Trump Party worked the ref in complaining about “bias”, and the mainstream media, as it does, caved. CBS announced prior to the event that their journalists, Norah O’Donnell and Margaret Brennan, would not engage in live fact-checking. Which as at least one comedian put it, is like running an NFL game without referees. But this was probably because CBS assumed that if the journalists had to ask questions AND fact check Vance, they’d be there till Election Day. This was not a very good idea. Especially towards the end of the debate when Vance said it was rich that Walz was calling Trump a unique threat to democracy when he peacefully left office like every other president in history. AFTER January 6. Saying Trump peacefully left office after that is like asking Mrs. Lincoln, “Other than that, how did you like the play?” In fact earlier, when Vance continued to blame illegal immigrants for the problems in Springfield Ohio – after he and Trump were brought up on charges for harassment and menacing by a Haitian community group – CBS moderator Margaret Brennan said, “And just to clarify for our viewers, Springfield, Ohio does have a large number of Haitian migrants who have legal status, temporary protected status”, Vance immediately complained, “Margaret, the rules were that you were not going to fact check and since you’re fact-checking me, I think it’s important to say what’s actually going on” – and this led to so much cross-talk that CBS cut the candidates’ mics. Which only confirms that Vance and the used-to-be Republican Party saw the no-fact-checking pledge as intended to be in their favor, which in itself is an indication that they see an advantage in lying.

You would think, given that Walz was the guy who popularized calling Trumpniks “weird” and was on board with that whole JD Vance/Couch thing, that he would be at least as forceful as Kamala Harris was in her debate, but the impression I got from commentators was that he was too “Minnesota nice.” Whereas Vance made a positive impression not so much by real virtues but the simple fact that he is not Donald Trump, does not mug for the camera when the other person is talking and does not act like a brain-damaged orangutan, only without the maturity and sense of grooming. As one pundit put it, maybe Walz was assuming that if he really ragged Vance, when Vance does a better job of presenting as a Homo sapiens than Trump does, it might backfire. Indeed, most commentators were pleasantly surprised that this debate marked a return to mutual civility. Which is good in and of itself, but not so good when both sides agree that the enemy is going to destroy the republic and one has a lot more evidence for that theory.

Walz did at least get the line of the night, in reference to that last election that JD seems to think went swimmingly, when he said, “When Mike Pence made that decision to certify that election – that’s why Mike Pence isn’t on this stage.”

One thing I saw on MSDNC after the fact was where they had a group of college voters and exactly one of them said he got a better impression of JD Vance from the debate, and even then he phrased in terms of Vance coming across a lot better when he has time for preparation.

But given that CBS by and large did not fact check Vance’s smarmy bullshit, and Walz was mostly not inclined to do so, this just confirms my suspicion that the media is setting this up to be a horse race to the very end, despite the fact that the Democratic ticket is composed of normal people with political credentials and the opposition is composed of JD Eyelashes and King Bingbongbingbangbing.

On presentation it was a draw. On substance, it was leaning Walz. Walz started slow but frequently made eloquent cases in his favor and against the Republican position, even if a lot of us thought he could have gone for the jugular. Meanwhile JD Vance came off as just presentable enough to be an acceptable substitute for Donald Trump as President should Trump keel over and die, which I imagine Republicans are praying very hard to happen right now. But then again they have probably given up assuming that God will answer their prayers, since Trump is still alive.