After the Biden/Trump debate I said this:
The contrast between the two men was stark: Biden pale, stumbling over words, hoarse and sometimes mumbling; Trump loud, nasty, vicious … and apparently vigorous. Never mind the contrast was stark in another way: Biden on point, addressing the questions, honest and forthright, in command of details, backed up by an impressive first-term record; Trump spewing lies and worse, refusing to answer questions, demonstrating a lack of understanding of diplomacy, tariffs, NATO, and every goddamn thing else. One man, even though he started biting back after the first few attacks, appeared weaker than the other, and is that what voters’ lizard brains will focus on come election time?
It certainly seems to be what the media’s focusing on … in fact I’d say the media, from the New York Times and Washington Post right down to “liberal” MSNBC, is rooting for Trump. For sure CNN, and in particular CNN’s debate moderators, who never fact checked or pushed back on a single Trump lie.
Yeah, yeah … Biden should have been a place-holder, an intentional one-termer, and the Democratic Party should have been busy these last three and a half years grooming Kamala Harris or another young, strong candidate to run in 2024: a Pete Buttigieg, a Mark Kelly, a Gavin Newsom. Shoulda, woulda, coulda. It’s too late now, and all this media talk about Biden dropping out might as well be promises about how great it’ll be when Trump gets back in and starts wiping his ass with the Constitution again, because that’s what’ll happen if Biden does drop out.
So yeah, I’m voting for the old(er) guy. I’m not crazy. To paraphrase David Sedaris, when the flight attendant asks if I’d prefer the chicken or the platter of shit with bits of broken glass in it, I ain’t asking how the chicken’s cooked.
Then, this weekend, the earth shifted. Suddenly everything looks different.
To be fair, I was in a despairing mood when I wrote about the debate, and that was before some asshole took a shot at Trump and gave him the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to pose heroically with blood on his face, fist in the air (even if it was staged somehow). The debate and Trump’s ear were a one-two punch to Biden, and then he got Covid and was filmed slowly and hesitantly climbing into Air Force One like the old man he is, and meanwhile the media and most of the pundits and Democratic Party leadership decided he had to step down … and then he did, and threw his support behind Harris, and suddenly everyone’s united and on board, which I thought would never happen.
I’m not just happy I was wrong. I’m delighted I was. And here’s me smiling to prove it!
In that earlier post, I mentioned Arizona Senator Mark Kelly, along with California Governor Gavin Newsom and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. Over the past couple of days their names have been bandied about as potential vice presidential candidates to run with Harris. Conventional wisdom has it Harris needs a white man as a running mate to offset the impact her ethnic femaleness might have on voters. Even though Americans elected Barack Obama president two times in a row and then gave Hillary Clinton a three-million-vote margin over Trump, Republican appeals to racism, resentment, and revenge are always popular with voters, and who knows what dirty tricks Trump’s minions are already plotting? So the CW? Probably right.
It’s going to be a race between optimism and hate, and in spite of ample evidence to the contrary I think there’s more good in us than bad. Kamala can and will win. Thank you, Joe, for doing the right thing. Go, Kamala!
Too many “smart people” are moaning about only one hundred or so days left to campaign. Grow up Rachel M! If we (US) were half way civilized, our laws would limit presidential campaigns to 100 days and $100 million, period; enough of the 2 – 3 year money grubbing cycle. Harris’ challenge is to secure as much effective legislation as possible as soon as possible, since she has so little legislative experience; that’s where Joe and Obama can really fir in. I’m looking forward to the prosecutor debating the felon!
I find my psyche improves if I avoid all news, especially prior to important elections. I plan to start traveling about October, until November 4th. Unless trump wins, in which case Todos Santos, Baja Mexico will be my home for a while.
But some screen crawl must have told me my favorite president is stepping down in favor of his VP. This strikes me as a good thing overall, hard as it must have been for Pres Joe. Who is a fighter and a comeback kid in politics. But Democrats can sometimes put country and party ahead of ego. Can you imagine trump stepping down in favor of someone younger? And a woman at that.
If our media was not oligarch owned and operated then Biden would win in a walkaway. But that sells no clicks and views, so now our feeble, corrupt media can sell us a new horse race. Of course it’s pretty important to the media owners that Harris loses, for tax purposes and influence reasons. So expect the same garbage election coverage and fascist bias from our 1%er media overlords. And the traitor Elon Musk.
But win or lose, all I can do is send the Dems a few bucks and vote. So I’m trying to ignore the whole thing and be productive in my personal life.
Luckily, even if trump ‘wins’ again the chances of him and his Supreme Court lackeys pulling off a successful Nazi putsch are pretty low because trump is so staggeringly stupid and lazy. And his cultists are just the same.