There were so many uplifting and inspirational messages that we all heard for the last four days that it might be easy to lose the forest in the trees. But like dominos, when the first one goes over, it starts a chain reaction. And if you lined them up right, the end result is beautiful.
Cast your mind back just a couple of months. On the one hand you have Traitor Tot, and he’s been running on the same whiny, infantile white grievance politics he used when he farted his way down that rattletrap escalator. American Carnage. The message has always been, Your life is sh*t, and your job is sh*t, but if I sell the business, somebody worse will take over. So shut up and be grateful, and if you’re good, maybe I’ll throw you a dog treat.
And on the other hand there was Joe Biden. In his 2020 campaign announcement, he started with the horrors of Charlottesville, the dark nature of Trump’s campaign and agenda, and announced the election was A battle for the soul of America! And in 2024 it was democracy itself is on the ballot! Because if Trump wins a second term, it’s an express elevator to a dictatorship! Geez! Anybody got a straight razor I can borrow for about five minutes?
That’s why there were so many double haters out there. It wasn’t just the fact that they were once again presented with Grumpy Old Men schtick. especially the doom-and-gloom message that’s been reverberating for the last nine years. Hell, even dirt-poor farmers in Afghanistan have their religion to lift them up and give their lives joy and purpose. These two parties were giving us nothing to live for.
And then the miracle moment. Biden did the selfless, noble thing, and turned the whole mess over to Kamala Harris. I don’t know whether or not Biden knew about Harris’s message switch before he stepped down, but I have to believe he did. If she was going to continue to prosecute the Freedom is on the ballot message, why bother to do the switch? It wasn’t resonating, who cares who is delivering the message?
But Harris brought a message of Hope and Joy! And it was a balm to the soul. But for once it seemed to be more than an empty campaign promise. With Trump, everything would be handed to you. Elect me and I’ll cut your taxes! Elect me and I’ll punish your enemies! Elect me, and 11 million undocumented immigrants will be gone, and companies will be knocking on your door to give you high paying jobs. As my mentor Jon Stewart used to say, If you smell bullsh*t, then call bullsh*t. And that’s pure bullsh*t.
Harris on the other hand, didn’t peddle empty promises. In fact she warned, right from the start that This isn’t going to be easy. It’s going to be hard work, but hell, we don’t mind hard work, we like hard work! And when she spoke of the benefits she said, We are not going back to a world where we enjoy less freedom and rights than our mothers did! And working together, we can make a better future, not just for ourselves, but for our children and grandchildren too! exactly what every parent, including those dirt-poor farmers in Afghanistan aspire to. In a matter of weeks, people were lifted up and carried away by the vision of a brighter future.
Meanwhile, Traitor Tot and his Hillbilly Imbecile were stumbling around like a couple of grizzlies with bad molars in an antique shop. They denigrated veterans, including Harris’s VP pick Tim Walz. They denigrated women. They celebrated the horrific abortion bans, they predicted more doom-and-gloom, including a 1929 style depression if Harris got into office. And in so doing, they abandoned the battlefield to the Democrats.
What did I say above about dominos? When they are set up correctly, the resulting show can be beautiful. And that was the 2024 Democratic convention. Mainly because they took that ball Trump, Vance and the GOP handed them, and they headed for the end zone. Just a quick reminder:
- The GOP has been the patriotic party and the party of the military since the Vietnam war protests of the 1970’s
- The GOP has been the party of law and order since Reagan in the 1980’s
- The GOP has been the tough on Russia party since the 1980’s when Reagan intoned, Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
- The GOP has been the party of the family and family values since Newt Gingrich’s Moral Majority of the 1990’s
- The GOP has been the tough on crime party since the Bush and Giuliani days of the early 2000’s
- And most amazingly, the GOP has been the pro economic growth party since I was born, even though research shows that since the end of WWII, the Democrats have produced 85 million new jobs while the GOP has created a paltry 34 million
A month ago, at the GOP convention, not a word was spoken from the dais about a single one of those positions or platforms. It was all Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump, Trump. It was like the GOP was giving the old fart a gold watch after 50 years of faithful service. It wasn’t a convention, it was a beatification.
And in four beautiful days, the Democrats picked up those balls like an assistant after basketball practice, and they ran with them. And at the end of four beautiful, magnificently scripted days, they debunked every. goddamned. one. of. those. myths;
- Bill Clinton pointed out the 50 million to 1 million imbalance in new job creation by the Democrats since the Berlin Wall fell
- They graphically displayed their respect and reverence for the troops that Traitor Tot calls Losers and suckers
- They pointed out the family values they espouse, such as don’t ever let somebody tell you who you are. You SHOW them who you are. And a beautiful reminder from Kamala Harris that Blood doesn’t make a family, LOVE makes a family
- Walz stuck the shiv in nicely when he said, ‘While some states were busy banning books in school libraries, we were busy banishing hunger in schools!’
- They had cops and Sheriffs on the stage, bemoaning the fact that Trump’s bullsh*t policies made their jobs more dangerous and difficult, both on the border as well as in their hometowns and cities
- They celebrated their immediate support for NATO and Ukraine while Trump told Putin to Do whatever the hell he wanted
- Former Defense secretary and CIA Director Leon Panetta took to the stage to bemoan Trump’s sick obsession with dictators and his clear and present danger as Commander in Chief in a time of international crisis
- Former congresswoman Gabby Giffords spoke chillingly about her near assassination during the GOP’s Tough on Crime campaign
- American heroes like former Marine Jason Crow, and combat double amputee Lt. Colonel Tammy Duckworth took to the stand to castigate Trump for his belittlement of soldiers and veterans
- And speaking of traditional family values, VP pick Tim Walz, as well as Senator Duckworth and others testified to the wonders of IVF in fighting infertility, and giving them the chance for the families they so desperately wanted
And at the end of this four-day combination lovefest and GOP beatdown, you know what? The. Emperor. Has. No. Clothes! The Democrats took every goddamned one of the alleged values that the GOP has been claiming for years, and made each and every one of them their own.
And it matters, and here’s why. For her acceptance speech, Kamala Harris drew more than a half a million more viewers than Traitor Tot did. Over the course of the four days, the Democrats attracted more than five million more viewers than the GOP did.
Which put the contrast between the two parties in a bright spotlight. As Jacob Soboroff on MSNBC put it, Last month, at the GOP convention, on the night of Trump’s acceptance speech, I was literally surrounded by signs reading MASS DEPORTATION NOW! Tonight, there was barely a hand in the place that wasn’t waving a USA placard, and when Harris gave her acceptance speech, there wasn’t a single hand that wasn’t waving an American flag.
There’s your contrast, and in the end, all you need. After all, speeches come and speeches go, and half the time people don’t listen. but the visual images stick in your head forever. On the one hand, you had a convention full of outdated male macho bullsh*t, and a crowd renewing their fealty to their graven Idol. And on the other side you had a crowd spending four days celebrating hope, unity, a brighter future, patriotism, and appreciation for the greatest country in the history of the planet. Advertising can’t buy that kind of stark contrast. As Coach Walz likes to say, 75 days. Hell, that’s easy! We’ll sleep when we’re dead!
I thank you for the privilege of your time.
“Hell, even dirt poor farmers in Afghanistan have their religion to lift them up and give their lives joy and purpose.”
Gonna have to disagree with you, Murf. Those “dirt poor farmers” aren’t allowed to have “joy and purpose” if they live under Taliban rule. What possibly kind of “joy” do the Taliban leaders express? You watch them and listen to them and there’s NO joy in their lives. They do what they believe is the will of Allah, not because they “enjoy” it but rather because it’s *expected* of them. And they force that belief on their subjects.
There’s a reason why American evangelicals have been so often compared to the Taliban.
You’re partially correct but Afghanistan isn’t just anywhere. There’s a reason it’s been resistant to conquerors going back to Ghengis Khan and even before. There are few cities and most of the people live in villages in mountains and valley that even now are remote. They neither know nor care much about what goes on in Kabul or less but still reasonably populates areas, much less anything outside their country. It’s true that many of the young boys were sent off to madrassas and got indoctrinated with the Saudi Wahabi brand of Islam but still, out in those remote areas the Taliban was only briefly liked. Once the masses out in those mountains and valley learned the cost of the Taliban running things, and how vicious they were even to practicioners of even the strictest forms of Islam which wasn’t strict enough for the Taliban they had no use for them. If their country were to be attacked by foreigners or foreigners tried to change it they would do what they’ve done for thousands of years – fight like hell to repel them no matter who was in charge in Kabil. Then afterwards go back home and resume lives of strict Islamic living and simply not be as extreme as the Taliban.
It’s a subtle difference to be sure, and one which westerner’s have trouble understanding. Yet we see signs of this same thing lately within the Evangelical movement. Their brand of Christianity is extreme and they think everyone should adhere to it BUT younger people in particular don’t seem to think certain things are unforgivable “sins” that must be met by god’s harshest of judgements and punishments. They can and will preach their way but are hesitant about IMPOSING it. Again, it’s subtle but it does matter some and over time can matter a great deal. When a Tim Walz talks about “mind your own damned business” it I think resonates more widely than people might thing even with our “ChrisTaliban” types.
Their leaders will always promote a vision of persecution but again, I think there are signs that just as so many look around and don’t see the “carnage” Trump talks about, bombed/burned out buildings and streets they can go to their churches, even mega-church palaces and worship how they damn well please. The contradiction is when they are honest with themselves a bit jarring. Trump and the GOP will get the overwhelming share of their votes to be sure, but just a little will peel off. Whether it will build over time remains to be seen, but as with the majority of Afghans with their own quite real and ruling Taliban out away from the center of power they will practice their own strict version of Christianity and usually not kick up a fuss if no one stops them from doing so.
In the end though I’ll get back to where I started. Afghanistan is one unusual place and they aren’t at all enamored of the Taliban. They live hard lives scratching out an existence and their religion, THEIR version which believe it or not is strict isn’t the batshit insane weird Taliban’s version. It IS a comfort to them.
If you’ve never done so I suggest you read The Afghan by Frederick Forsyth (and some other work of his that focuses on events in that region) which is a complicated read because of the way it jumps around some but gives some insight into Afghanistan, it’s people and the complicated aspects of how the Taliban rose to power and how, too late the bulk of Afghan’s realized they’d made their own bargain with the devil.
” Just a quick reminder;
The GOP has been the patriotic party and the party of the military since the Vietnam war protests of the 1970’s
The GOP has been the party of law and order since Reagan in the 1980’s
The GOP has been the tough on Russia party since the 1980’s when Reagan intoned, Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!
The GOP has been the party of the family and family values since Newt Gingrich’s Moral Majority of the 1990’s
The FOP has been the tough on crime oarty since the Bush and Giuliani days of the early 2000’s
And most amazingly, the GOP has been the pro economic growth party since I was born, even though research shows that since the end of WWII, the Democrats have produced 85 million new jobs while the GOP has created a paltry 34 million”
Also, have to dispute a few of your points as your timeline is just a bit off.
The Vietnam War protests began in the late 1960s and Nixon capitalized on that issue in 1968.
The “party of law and order” nonsense also began in 1968 with Nixon, largely responding to the Vietnam War protests but also some of the civil rights unrest that was further intensified after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.
The “tough on Russia” bit started long before Reagan came along. Maybe you’ve forgotten about the 1950s “witch hunts” determined to root out “Commies?” “Communism” was more a stand-in for “Russia” (which, at the time, was the REAL driving force for Communism; the Sino-Soviet split in the Communist world wouldn’t happen until the 1960s). JFK managed, briefly, to take some of the GOP’s “We Hate Commies/Russkies More” spotlight during the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Berlin Airlift but Goldwater’s anti-Russia stance is partly what led to the “Daisy” commercial. Nixon would temper the hate a bit during his 1968 campaign and his presidency so it would be fair to say that Reagan brought the “tough on Russia” act back (though, remember, Jimmy Carter was the one that called for the Olympic Boycott to be held in Moscow because of Soviet “involvement” in Afghanistan; oddly, there weren’t many GOPers congratulating Carter for that).
On the “family values” nonsense, Gingrich pushed it, but the GOP had been backing that since Reagan’s term, in no small part because of Reagan’s selling out to the “Moral Majority.” And, after Gingrich’s many publicized failures on applying “family values” to his own life (don’t remember when “adultery” and “divorce” constituted permitted “family values”) as well as later “scandals” that caught many a “family values” champion in their nets (Larry “Wide Stance” Craig, Dennis Hastert and Mark Foley, just to mention a few), the whole “family values” nonsense proved it to be just pure nonsense (more along the lines of typical GOP hypocrisy of “This is the rule you must follow without exception but I can choose to follow it depending on how I feel today”).
The “tough on crime” also dates back to Nixon at least. Or Reagan at the very latest.
And that “pro-economic growth” bit? Well, that’s just been how they’ve sold the tax cut nonsense that makes the rich get richer and the poor stay in their place with very little real evidence of moving up the economic ladder. Well, if you start off poor and you’re willing to engage in political prostitution, then you can move up the ladder of economic well-being. We’ve seen it time and time again. And certain racial/ethnic minorities find their own Judas goats, willing to sell out their own people as long as they keep their own benefactors happy. Everyone remembers how “Reagan cut taxes” but no one seems to remember that he did that while also increasing the Social Security and Medicare taxes on wage earners. I’m old enough to remember seeing my first paycheck after the Reagan tax cuts went into effect and, sure enough, the Federal withholding went down a few pennies–I was making minimum wage at the time–but that little bit was offset by the increase in the FICA withholding and my state tax withholding went up a bit as well (the states had to make up for the loss of tax revenue that Reagan’s tax cuts would cost the states) so that first paycheck was a few dollars less than the previous one, even though I worked the same number of hours for the week. Reagan’s “trickle-down economics” (which his future VP, George H W Bush, correctly described as “voodoo economics” while running against Reagan) never “trickled down” to anyone. The money that the business owners, especially corporations and multinational companies, made went into their own pockets or to the shareholders’ pockets (and that capital gains tax cut that was ballyhooed, was another nothing–the companies were supposed to take those savings and reinvest in their businesses through new hirings and improving/updating production facilities, but, once again, they went to paying the CEOs and board members and to the shareholders). It was all a big con–and, as we all know, you can’t spell “conservative” without “con.”
Be a Real Patriot.
Vote Democratic, not traitor.
I wonder if President Biden did a “selfless and noble thing” or just finally said “fuck it. life’s too damned short and I’m on my downward tumble to the end”. You know, we’ll never really know because mind-reading is impossible. I still remember that not all of President Biden’s work in the past was oh so noble. (Anyone still remember Professor Hill? hmmmm? Biden worked hard to give thomas a much fairer shake than he earned or deserved-that is a man who did not belong anywhere NEAR the s.c.). Yeah, it seems to have worked in V.P. Harris’ favor but in the back of my mind I often think he was done with it all especially after the debate. It’s tough to run a credible campaign when party bosses, etc. are working against you-not saying it can’t be done, it can, but at 80 years old? That has to be exhausting, degrading, and a whole lot of other crap I myself wouldn’t want to deal with at the end of my life. I’m still very pissed at what the party did to President Biden but done is done. I do think however it’s possible he just got sick of the constant in-fighting, bullshit, etc.
Hmmmm….. What if President Biden did INDEED grow weary of all of the exhausting and degrading crap show that American politics has become, along with the ageism infection so rampant today, concluded that his Veep has gotten to the point of handling the presidency, and orchestrated the melodrama we all witnessed beginning late July? I read an article posted on the USA Today website that posed that exact question, and I wouldn’t be surprised if that isn’t what did INDEED take place.