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This weekend, I witnessed the Vibe Shift firsthand.
When we met for lunch, my mother’s first topic was the DNC. Who spoke and how great they sounded. How excited she was about the whole thing. She corrected me on “Comma-lah’s” name, which I’d apparently been mispronouncing, and used that as a springboard to discuss Kamala t-shirts. She didn’t mention that watching the DNC had been inspiring enough to get her volunteering to write postcards and stuff mailers. It was clear that she was all-in on the program without ever discussing policy—or even Donald Trump.
Dad chimed in a couple times to note that the overall messaging was much more positive, except for Bernie Sanders, who sounded unchanged from the last ten years. He appreciated this. I’d say he represents a section of the populace with immense distaste for Trump, but a comparable disdain for politicians who spend too much time talking about the man.
I had been under no illusions that Mom would vote anything but Democrat. Dad, not so sure; I’d have given good odds of a protest vote if the Libertarian candidate wasn’t such a non-entity. More likely that he abstained. But the last couple weeks appear to have left him much more comfortable voting D. The same has to be true for Mom, too, as I never saw this level of enthusiasm for anything Biden did or said.
That’s the Vibe Shift: apathy to enthusiasm.
It doesn’t take a coordinated blitz of friendly op-eds, since my parents were getting this straight from the TV. It doesn’t take an iron grip on that TV presentation; the DNC herds their cats, but they can’t convince Bill Clinton to get off stage. And it doesn’t even take a winning policy slate. The Democrat base, the casual never-Trumpers, maybe even the grillpillers? They’re just glad to have a candidate under the retirement age.
My dad loves Tim Walz. I haven't seen him like a politician this much in decades. It's weird to me, because I'm way too cynical. It feels like when my wife makes me watch TikTok videos that have obviously been staged, and I can't enjoy them because I can't suspend disbelief, while she does. She's not a gullible person in general, her job depends on not being taken in, but she enjoys the videos and I can't. My dad is a smart guy, and a very cynical guy about politics, but Tim Walz' nice-guy schtick really works for him. He teared up repeating lines from one of Walz' speeches to me (my dad tears up a lot as he's gotten older, actually, and it makes me very uncomfortable), and he won't stop inventing things he wants Tim Walz to say to J.D. Vance.
I don't really get it. I like Tim Walz' schtick well enough, as schticks go it's better than some, but buying into lock stock and barrel seems kinda over the top. On the other hand, he's so out of the great white north that it seems Republicans won't come up with decent attacks before we get to November. ((Before someone brings them up, no, the horse semen attacks weren't decent, nor were the weirdo implications about race fetishism. The riot stuff might stick eventually, but it hasn't so far.)) Idk, I just can't get up that kind of enthusiasm. When I listened to Pod Save America after the debate, I'd hear them curse and think that I need to work on cursing less.
Trump supporters seem grimly determined. It's hard to get excited about Trump anymore, we know what we're getting.
I feel bad for JD Vance. I identify a little with him, and he's just getting hammered on bullshit day in and day out, over and over. I don't think he's doing great, but he can't get out of his own way. In many ways, 2024 Vance is like 2020 Harris: he's running against his own type. We're seeing it, once again, with Dave McCormick, who will spend millions of dollars telling me he was in the army for a minute and likes hunting; until I read his wikipedia I never knew he got a fuckin' PhD from Princeton, and he never brings up that he ran one of the world's biggest hedge funds. Vance and McCormick are running against their own achievements and their own intelligence and their own qualifications, which says something absolutely tragic about the Republican base electorate.
It's not hard. Tim is a guy everyone knows. Almost Forrest Gump-esque in his sincerity. Join the military, teaches at a school, coaches a football team and then runs for office. Minneapolis is one of the few non-coastal American cities with a positive storyline from the last decade. Dude has made no money from politics, loves his kids, is religious and just kinda does his thing.
You know when people say, "I'd vote for a random dude off the street, rather than a slimy Harvard educated lawyer."........ Tim is the random guy off the street.
Even Trump seems to like the guy (I know wikipedia is obviously biased, but the events happened)
Kamala is clearly going for a "neapolitan ice cream" sort of campaign. She needed an inoffensive flavor combination. She picked an inoffensive VP candidate.
I don't. You saw it with Bloomberg, and you see it with Vance. The typical executive types are too used to talking to intelligent people. Politics is a craft. Like standup, you need to work your audience. Meet them at their level. Vance is like people I meet in my peer group. The main problem with Vance is he's too smart to work for Trump. He can't play a wise-cracking used car salesman because he isn't one. He was only chosen because of the paypal mafia's outside support. He knew what he was getting into. Should've known better.
Ive never met someone like Walz. Every person who served I know underplays their service. Every teacher I know doesn't start pedophile adjacent clubs for kids (except the one who was arrested for giving 16 year olds booze and we all knew was a creep). Walz is an outlier in my life in that he simply lies about everything in very important ways. Much more important than Trump saying he had the biggest crowd somewhere. If Walz was in Vance's position he'd already have dropped out, that is how bad he is and how extreme the Democrat media advantage is.
What? I dont even understand this comment. Are you saying Walz is a pedo because he appears to be an actual good person?
How does this comment have 9 upvotes?
What makes you feel like he is an "actual good person?" Hes a hardcore LGBT ideologue that started a social club at his school that could easily be used as a vehicle for grooming.
A more common place for abuse has always been church youth groups. Every town I have lived in has had a scandal with one, and those are just the abusers that get caught.
More teachers than religious groups engage in sex acts with their subordinates. Even per capita it is very close.
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