With a week to go, Democrats are flying their top talent around the country as fast as they can between the seven states that matter, holding rallies hoping to increase supporters’ enthusiasm and aiming to get favorable local news coverage.
They hope short video clips from the rallies will be lifted and shared across social media, maybe grabbing a moment of attention from any remaining, elusive undecideds. These are the Democrats’ tried and true tactics and tricks.
Thursday night my wife and I attended one of those rallies here in Atlanta. Opening acts were Spike Lee, Samuel L Jackson, Tyler Perry, and the Senator Reverend Ralph Warnock. The work of black men like these has special resonance here in town, and the crowd loved ‘em.
Senator Warnock, now preaching from the pulpit of Ebenezer Baptist Church, Martin Luther King, Jr’s church, tried out a parable about geese. Something about how the head goose in their flying V formation has it the toughest, wind in its face and all. Somehow he steered that around to how Kamala Harris is the leader we need, facing adversity, you know, doing perseverance, that kind of thing.
It was a reach, but he made it work because the reverend is a natural storyteller, and because important black leaders like Senator Warnock have taken Atlanta far, made our town what it is, and sometimes it’s pretty great.
But wait, there was more. Then came Bruce Springsteen singing about the promised land and dancing in the dark, and then Barack Obama and then Kamala Harris, and they say 23,000 of us attended. We filled up an old high school stadium just outside town. A cloudless late summer afternoon led to a gorgeous night, supporters stocked up on signs, souvenirs and t-shirts, and everybody left convinced that Kamala Harris should be the next president.
Trouble is, all of us arrived thinking that same thing; the Democrats’ A-Team was preaching to the converted. By now they’ve flown far away to do the same thing somewhere else, and it still feels like the Democrats could lose this election to Donald Trump and J D Vance.
Since at least Thomas Frank’s 2005 What’s the Matter with Kansas we’ve puzzled over how people can vote against their own interest. How could America possibly be about to elect Donald Trump and J D Vance? Let’s consider.
First, people resent being told what’s good for them. That’s the rap on Libs and Dems and Progressives, and I buy it, mostly. I think we can be a little sanctimonious. Andrew O’Hagan wrote, “people don’t mind being exploited so long as they can choose it themselves.” Lots of people, apparently, don’t mind the former president exploiting them when it’s all in good fun, when it’s just owning the Libs.
Just don’t you lefties point out that’s what’s going on. No lectures from the high and mighty. Chris Arnade writes well about this frame of mind, a sort of mix of disillusion and resentment, in a worthwhile column, A Stalled American Dream.
But the bigger part, I think, is pretty simple: year after year, in survey after survey of issues critical to voters, the lofty idea of preserving the American system of government ranks below pocketbook.
Consider: Covid 19 caused inflation that reached a peak of 9.1 percent in June 2022. Prior to Covid, inflation had become so rare that people who hit voting age the last time inflation was as high (10.3% in 1981) are now over sixty years old. That means nearly the entire electorate has grown up and lived their entire voting lives with lower inflation than on the Biden watch.
Inflation bad, Biden bad. Biden bad, Democrats bad.
Said another way: raising interest rates is the main way the Federal Reserve fights inflation. Before Covid the rate the Fed charges banks hadn’t been above 5% for sixteen years. Nearly an entire generation of homebuyers has come of age since the last time home loans cost as much as they do now.
Covid and the resulting inflation were not the Democrats’ fault. But inflation hits an incumbent party where it hurts. In voters’ pocketbooks.
During the 1970s Jimmy Carter addressed the nation in a sweater, urging people to turn down the heat to save energy. He was mocked by Republicans for asking the American people for sacrifice. There those Libs go, telling you what to do.
Communications was never the Biden administration’s strong suit. It’s fair to say “malarkey” didn’t exactly build a bridge to young folks. Exasperated by inflation and the bad polling it brought, Biden became something of a scold. Finally he decided to teach us a thing or two about the economy.
In a May 2024 CNN interview he explained that “The fact is that if you take a look at what people have, they have the money to spend.” Never mind your own complaints about the price of bacon. People can handle inflation.
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When he was president, we all saw how Donald Trump was in over his hair and we all understood that after vanquishing the former president, the distinguished senior politician Joe Biden would become a storybook transitional figure.
Candidate Biden told a 2020 rally, “Look, I view myself as a bridge, not as anything else.” Accepting the endorsements of Kamala Harris, Cory Booker and Gretchen Whitmer, “Mr Biden told a rally … ‘There’s an entire generation of leaders you saw stand behind me. They are the future of this country.’”
That May he told a fund raiser, “I view myself as a transition candidate … likening his would-be presidential appointments to an athletic team stocking its roster with promising talent: ‘You got to get more people on the bench that are ready to go in — Put me in coach, I’m ready to play. Well, there’s a lot of people that are ready to play, women and men.’”
Rather than allow the bench some playing time, Biden put the eventual nominee in the preposterous position of having to mount a fifteen week presidential campaign. The president’s reluctance to exit the race doesn’t matter tactically between now and election day. But a second Trump administration, if that’s what is to come, will weigh heavily on the Biden legacy.
WAIT. STOP.
This isn’t a public hanging for Joe Biden. Right now there’s a presidency to be won. And here late in the day it feels a whole lot like Vice President Harris might lose this race.
Recall that in the 2020 primary season Harris dropped out before the Iowa caucuses. It turns out the Vice President still isn’t the transformational campaigner we dreamed she’d since become.
Her campaign is all measurements and tactics and considerations and not enough gut. She’s micro targeting to reach smaller and smaller constituencies and not macro messaging. She hasn’t sunk her teeth into this thing.
She said that the deaths of young women at the hands of immigrants “should never have occurred.” What kind of visceral connection with people is shouldn’t have ‘occurred?’ The rally in Atlanta on Thursday night ‘occurred.’ THESE WOMEN WERE MURDERED AND I, KAMALA HARRIS, AM HERE TO STOP IT!
Everybody is uneasy. Nobody wants to think the good guys might lose, but surveying the landscape it’s hard to feel that the Harris campaign has convinced people she can win. The Democrats have spent a billion dollars in three months without gaining an edge. Maybe the country just wants to do something else.
As closing arguments begin this weekend the Democrats aren’t driving home a powerful closing message; they’re madly shoring up constituencies. ‘Trump: Bad’ is the best reason the Harris campaign offers to get less engaged people off the couch and out to vote.
Project Fear was the pejorative term used to dismiss ‘Remainers’ in the 2016 Brexit referendum, those who warned of the disasters to come if the UK left the European Union. The Remainers were right, but their fear campaign failed to conquer the forces of xenophobia and isolationism on the ‘Leave’ side. As Project Fear redux, ‘Trump: Bad’ may not work, either.
Among ourselves we no longer discuss policy. In worried discussions with friends, we wonder whether our system of government will survive. Jesse Rhodes, a UMass Amherst professor, thinks that in a society in decline, “politicians can speak to the worst aspects of human psychology and human emotions and get a positive response.” Sounds like a moment made for Donald Trump.
Elias Canetti argued that
“the mere possibility of violence can be enough to keep people in check. Power seekers thrive on creating a climate of fear and uncertainty, where people are made to feel constantly vulnerable to sudden eruptions of violence. This atmosphere forces individuals into a state of passivity, where they either comply with the power or submit to its authority in order to avoid becoming targets.”
Indeed, for Trump fear is a basic campaign tool. In his own words, “Real power is — I don’t even want to use the word — fear.”
We have heard lifetimes by now about the former President’s vulgarity, his crimes and the frightening places he would lead the country. Yet he may become our next leader.
Given his ongoing intimidation campaign, it’s worthwhile to note the bravery of public figures who will be exposed in the event of a Trump victory, like judges Tonya Chutkin, Juan Merchan (and his daughter), Special Prosecutor Jack Smith, soon-to-be-Senator Adam Schiff, former Representative Liz Cheney, former Joint Chiefs Chairman Mark Milley, former Trump Chief of Staff John Kelly and an array of other former Trump officials.
It’s equally important to note the timidity of figures who have been critical of Trump in private but who won’t speak truth to camera in the closing days of this campaign, while it might matter: Senator Mitch McConnell (“stupid,” “despicable”) and Mitt Romney (“phony,” “fraud”).
The quote attributed to Churchill, approximately that ”you can always count on Americans to do the right thing after they've tried everything else,” is currently in doubt.
You can see the stress all across the country. Few are surprised but everyone is alarmed. It’s the moment we live in. Decorum is lost. Half the electorate has transformed the pageant of democratic choice into a cheap carnival of low threats, leering and graft.
Trump threatens “the enemy within,” his opponents, who are also his fellow American citizens. Harris acceded to radio host Charlamagne Tha God’s characterization of Trump as a Fascist, then confirmed it to CNN.
Anger and hatred find a ready market, if not in the larger affairs of man, then at least in the United States in 2024. And like where there’s a branding opportunity for casinos, vodka, steaks, get rich schemes, bottled water, apparel, trading cards, sneakers, watches or even bibles, there stands the Republican nominee for president.
Kamala Harris might yet win this race and let us all hope so. If she loses, it means all those best tricks and tactics of the Democrats aren’t working and most of the country isn’t persuaded. It means the country just wants to do something else. Simple as that.
If that is true I don’t know what you can do to stop it. Maybe worse, if the country just wants to do something else, it means the Democrats won’t know what to do next.
There’s a week to go. The Democrats have Springsteen and Obama one day in Atlanta, Beyonce and Willie Nelson in Houston the next, surrogates out full speed ahead and both sides have their media in full wail.
If Donald Trump wins, a comprehensive plan for dismantling the government stands ready. The US Supreme Court is in his pocket.
It’s battle stations. All hands are on deck and have been on deck, for too long. Everybody is worn out. This is serious. Please vote. It’s the final week. Here we go.
Next, a column about America’s place in the world, and where we go from here. Content is always free but paid subscriptions are served with extra love.
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Excellent succinct summary of where this country is and where it might be headed. It's extremely frightening for many of us. I hope enough to stop the runaway train in time.