It didn’t take long.
Shortly after Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris appeared Tuesday on stage in Philadelphia with Gov. Tim Walz, D- Minn., her choice for running mate, the Trump disinformation team vaulted into action. Walz, according to the Trump crowd, was a proponent of defunding the police. He wanted to let convicted felons vote – something you might think the Republicans would support since their own candidate for president is a convicted felon. They criticized Walz’s populist roots, made fun of his demeanor, his speech and attacked his record of serving in the National Guard – conveniently forgetting their own candidate never served a day in the service and got out of military service because of “bone spurs.”
After reading all of the instant accusations against Walz, I was half expecting to hear he had flat feet, eczema, psoriasis and halitosis. One social media posting accused him of being a bedwetter.
Democratic activist Richard Ojeda, who spent 24 years in the military, defended Walz, accusing Republicans of distorting the governor’s record (there’s a shock). “This man did 24 years in the National Guard, deployed overseas and he was selected for the highest seat in the enlisted world,” Ojeda told me of Walz. “He was operating in that position and then he retired. This guy is a solid guy.”
At the end of the day, the GOP looked like those chimpanzees in the zoo who are kept behind glass walls because they fling their fecal remains at everyone. So far, very little of this has stuck to Walz, who remains affable and effective at blocking the demagoguery. Still, the GOP won’t give up its attempts to demonize Walz and Harris. The Democrats had to know it was coming, and if they didn’t then they’re more headless than I thought. The Republicans are certainly heartless.
The accusations against Harris and Walz have been crazy, okay even weird, clearly indicating that even if there is doubt about whether or not the Harris/Walz ticket can win, the MAGA party is certainly melting into a puddle of its own vomit, tears and sweat over the prospect of losing. Walz, speaking before the Philadelphia crowd, did not hesitate to go after Trump, Vance and the GOP in general. For the Democrats, it was a joy to behold.
Walz said he couldn’t wait to debate Vance – if Vance could get up off the couch. “You see what I did there,” he joked to the crowd and then smiled. He, of course, was referring to the debunked notion that Vance had sex with a couch – a rumor so ensconced in the public eye that the AP had to run a headline that said JD Vance did not, in fact, have sex with a couch.
That’s a headline I never thought I’d see, but nonetheless, by making fun of Vance and smiling at his own joke, Walz came across as serious, yet light-hearted and that’s what the Democrats have seemingly lacked – at least according to them and their harshest critics.
Of course, Vance is an easy target. He’s as honest as Trump, as genuine as plastic and as appealing as a hot, steaming pile of Republican rhetoric. He has little chance of being an effective debater; or as Ojeda said, “He’ll get stomped like a Narc at a biker rally.”
Democrats tell us Walz is the populist they need, the football coach, grandfather and working-class father we all respect. He’s unpretentious, serious, funny and cutting. His wide grin and easy manner remind me of a more affable Don Rickles. His energy feeds into the Harris energy and the Democrats are ecstatic over the possibilities.
Trump, meanwhile, has dissolved under Walz’s addition to the Democratic ticket. Insiders in the Trump camp who still can nominally engage in cogent thought believe Trump made a horrible choice in choosing Vance and it will cost them the election. They’re running around with their hair on fire while trying to pull it out.
Who’s left arguing Trump’s case but Stephen Miller, who has no hair to pull out (though he once stenciled some on his head). Miller appeared on Fox News Tuesday to tell us that the Harris/Walz ticket “Will turn the entire Midwest into Mogadishu.” Hatred, fear and incendiary rhetoric have always been key to the Trump campaign, but turning Miller loose is a step into incendiary desperation. He has all the appeal of roadkill. Of course, that probably is still better than Donald Trump’s reaction.
The former president posted on his Truth Social page a long litany of vile, racist comments, displaying his stunning ignorance and then said Biden wasn’t going to give up so easily on a second term. In essence, he begged Biden to “take back the nomination, beginning with challenging me to another debate.”
If you believe Trump sounds desperate, it’s only because he is.
Joe Walsh, the former Republican candidate for president who ran against Trump, is among a group of Republicans supporting Harris. He put it this way: “Walz brings something Democrats have sorely lacked for quite some time; a populist voice. We’ve been living in populist times for a while – regular folks are pissed off about changes in their lives and their country – Republicans demagogue this moment, but Democrats haven’t recognized this moment. Democrats have become increasingly elitist and out of touch with regular folks. Waltz is a left-of-center populist who can speak with and relate to regular, working class folks. He’s just what the Democratic Party needs.”
In other words, Walz speaks to the roots of the Democratic Party – working class citizens. That’s the same group that supports Biden. Walz may well serve that wing of the Democratic Party, keep it energized and at the same time help reach out to those voters who, for whatever reason, are still on the fence about the November general election.
White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre acknowledged in Wednesday’s briefing that Harris reached out and sought Biden’s advice on who she should appoint as her running mate. Her choice offers some insight into how much influence Biden had in the process – even if she and Biden never speak publicly about their conversation regarding that choice.
A Democratic strategist also confirmed to me Wednesday that more than 40 of the Democrat’s top donors and strategists circulated a letter that Harris read, endorsing either Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear or Walz as her running mate. In the end, everyone was happy with her choice. The next three months determine the wisdom of that choice. A victory will be seen as a watershed event, the final flushing of Trump and his minions into the infernal swamp from which they emerged. A decisive victory will force the Republican Party to re-evaluate itself and re-energize itself with those who are more constitutionally minded than Donald Trump, the Heritage Foundation or JD “shapeshifter” Vance. It will be the leverage more sane Republicans will need to seize back control from the lunatics.
But a loss by the Democrats would be crushing to their hopes and to a majority of Americans who find the authoritarian leanings of Trump to be intolerable. That’s what’s at stake. And the Democrats had to make a decision in just a few days about a VP candidate which usually takes place over a few months. It’s not like they were under any pressure.
Conventional wisdom says a vice presidential nominee has little effect on the outcome of the election, but this year may be the exception to the rule. The ability of running mates to work together as a team has never been more crucial to the party’s efforts.
Those in the Harris camp say Walz emerged as her choice because, as one Harris staff member said, “they got along real well from the start.” Nice to hear. Hundreds of millions of people in the U.S. and many more abroad hope that the relationship grows and endures.
On Monday night I got a chance to see Pat Benatar and her husband Neil “Spyder” Giraldo in the closing days of their cross-country tour at a concert outside of Los Angeles.
They have been together, like my wife and I, for more than 40 years. Hard to believe, since we’re all still 19. But, anyway, as Benatar sang some of her most intimate love songs I noticed she sang them while looking directly at Spyder. He hit us with some great guitar licks while she sang with a passion borne of mutual struggle, strife, friendship and decades of love. The words seemed more meaningful and resonated far more than when I heard some of those songs in the 80s – you know when we all wore outfits and our hair in ways we either can’t or would be too ashamed to do today.
The next three months on the campaign trail will seem like 40 years to the American electorate and to the teams of Harris/Walz and Trump/Vance. They’ll have to be able to look at each other at the end of that journey with similar affection Benatar showed Monday night – at least politically – if this country is to survive.
Donald Trump’s mental decline becomes more apparent every day. Vance’s fear of women, his desire to destroy voting rights and both of their desires to turn back time to “Make America Great Again” when that past was never great for children, minorities, those of certain faiths and those in the LGBTQ community, are taking a toll on this country.
Still, they endure and the Harris/Walz ticket will have to gel fast, in the thick of battle and with a congeniality that wins over critics. Legitimate questions remain about their ability to convert the energy the Democrats have demonstrated so far in the last 17 days into electoral votes in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and Michigan – states the Democrats must win to retain the White House.
As I reflected on Benatar belting out the lyrics to “We Belong Together,” as Spyder mesmerized the audience with his guitar, I wondered if at the end of November Harris and Walz will say, “We belong together,” and more importantly will the country and our allies join in singing that chorus – as members of the audience did with Benatar in Southern California.
I’m damn sure I’ll never hear Trump and Vance singing that to each other. I’m sure the majority of the country won’t, and I’m sure no one but Putin would ever look longingly into Trump’s eyes and sing “We belong together.”
So, Democrats hit us with your best shot.
Watching Trump and Vance meltdown in public is funny, weird, creepy and dangerous. But the more it becomes apparent that Trump is slipping, the more dangerous he and his vile movement become. For the country to come together, Trump cannot win. After all, who the Hell wants JD Vance a heartbeat away from the Presidency? I’m told even Trump doesn’t relish that thought.
