So I finished the book, and where should I begin? I guess I'll go in chronological order. The book is basically Harris's account of the campaign. It started back around the same time I started my last post, when Biden had his debate. And uh...yeah, the media reception was a lot worse than my own. Of course, as I said, I value facts along with presentation. Most people want presentation. The hollywood people freaking out screaming about losing our democracy stands out to me. Reminds me how I felt the whole time.
Anyway, Harris didnt want to really get too involved. VPs are supposed to be loyal, and she didnt wanna do anything that would appear as breaking from the president to advance her career. That's kind of part of the environment. You dont want an overly ambitious VP who uses you as a speedbump to their own rise to fame. So she tried to be loyal, support Biden as she could, but in the long term it held her back.
It seems clear that being in that circle and that "swamp" to use a Trump word corrupted her sense of objectivity, if you want my honest views. She was in Biden world. She thought what Biden did was great. She was more focused on loyalty to Biden, even into her own campaign, compared to actually responding to the will of the people. This theme appeared late into the book as she was reflexively trying to defend Biden, only to be reminded by campaign staff that the public HATED Biden. It just didnt click with her. Like, she was just too lost in the sauce for her own good, and I feel like this was a fatal flaw of her campaign that I can't help but point out.
As things started, these kinds of errors in judgment kept appearing for me. Like one of the first things she had to do with pick a VP. I can't disagree too much with the logic she ultimately followed. She didnt like Kelly in part because he was soft on labor. Shapiro was too ambitious and had liabilities on Gaza. Walz was loyal, and much like Biden, she wanted loyalty. She didn't choose him because he was progressive, but because he was loyal and didnt even really want the job it seemed. Anyway, why do I criticize her here? because her first choice was actually buttigieg but she didn't feel she could go that route because idpol. She thought a gay guy with a black woman was too much for america to accept. First of all, I wish dems would stop thinking this nonsense. It's not too much. Most people don't really care. And those who do wouldnt vote for her anyway. I mean, there's that 40% of America that's just so beyond the pale and in their own little alternate reality, you can't reach them, and shouldn't try. And honestly, Pete Buttigieg? Ew. He's more moderate than Biden. Nah. Walz was a better pick, although I guess it doesnt matter since the campaign went right anyway.
The convention got relatively little discussion. Her platform didnt get much discussion either compared to how much importance I put on it. For me her platform was a disappointment, and the convention alienated me, but that was Harris for ya.
One thing that irked me was the whole Gaza thing. She seemed to "not get it" on this too. She was a staunch defender of Israel, although had a similar middle ground position I did. But when approached by protesters she actually got annoyed. She was like "dont people realize it's me or Trump?" Which is...the same entitlement complex that dems often fall into, and often alienates me from supporting them. Like really, if I'm making demands of politicians, that's the last thing I wanna hear. And she leaned into it in her response like they're being irresponsible and want trump to win and the whole "I'm speaking" thing she often does.
To be fair...I wasnt particularly sympathetic to these guys either. Like, I get it, they're loud, annoying, and I thought the gaza obsession was a gross misuse of political capital. if you're gonna go ride or die on an issue, why some foreign policy thing halfway across the world that doesn't even have much to do with us? But yeah, I just didnt like how she handled it. Because the "its me or trump" thing just gives me PTSD flashbacks from Hillary. And we as know....she lost much like Hillary, and part of it was democrats staying home, and this cause was...a factor. Im not saying it was THE factor, or even the biggest factor, I think economic angst probably sums that up, but it was a factor.
Yeah...like...she just wasn't the person for the job. To be fair, the DNC wouldnt allow us to have "the person for the job", you know how the DNC is if you follow this blog, but yeah. It was just apparent. Anyway, this is a huge reason I dont want her to run again, and I wish she'd take a page from Hillary and disappear into the woods afterwards. Not permanently, but I dont want her to be the future of democratic politics. She had her chance and was done. But I digress.
To be fair, some of her frustrations are akin to mine. She seemed deeply frustrated that Trump and his campaign could lie and throw so much crap around and people believed it. She was swarmed by protesters on 9/11 who were MAGA and while secret service wouldnt let her engage them, she genuinely wanted to know wtf she wanted and what she was doing wrong. And she was even thinking economically, like, is it your healthcare? Your wages? What? Why do they hate her so much?
And here I'll do a quick plug. First of all, as I said, a lot of MAGA is a cult. Cant win them over, won't win them over, they're brainwashed. Dont even try. BUT...as someone disaffected, let me give an elevator pitch.
Yeah...it is healthcare, wages, the whole shebang. The economy sucks. Reaganism has ruined America. I'm soured on job creation. We are working for rich people who dont care about us and who wanna work us as hard as possible while paying us as little as possible. Democrats have historically been the answer to that, advocating for solutions that make our lives better, but in the modern era, they don't. They end up compromising to the center, offering band aid solutions at best, and they don't get it. And Harris also doesnt get it. For as many little tax credits as she had, they weren't big enough to actually fix the problems. We need a UBI. We need medicare for all (or at least a public option a la her 2020 healthcare plan). We need free college with TOTAL student loan forgiveness. We need to realize jobs and work aren't the answer. If you want a more detailed explanation, I'd advise her to read Andrew yang's "The War on Normal People" and to consult with him on the subject. He's about the only one in America who DOES get it. But until we get someone like that, we're gonna go back and forth in this 2 party system swinging between fascist republicans and do nothing democrats, and yes, I consider her a do nothing democrat. yeah, she had solutions but they werent big enough.
And before people like her ask, gee it sounds like you want life to be easy and you dont wanna work. No crap. And that's another reason I dislike harris on a visceral level. She has this attitude like "were not asking for things to be easy, we like hard work." Leave that kind of virtue signalling crap to republicans and that 40% of the country that's too brainwashed to know what's good for them. For the rest of us, yeah, we gotta abandon this obsession with work and life being hard being a good thing. It's not. it sucks. And quite frankly, a huge aspect of social progress is that life SHOULD be made easier for us. Maybe you'll face a lot of resentment from people for saying it. Well, a lot of them are gonna hate you anyway, and you should just resign yourself to that. But I honestly think economic angst is the biggest reason why her campaign didnt go over, and why we keep losing to Trump. Because Harris, as well as the dems before her, keeps coming off as an out of touch dem who doesn't understand anything. Like, all those Biden solutions dont matter if your wages arent keeping up with the cost of living. And idk, I feel like Harris kinda cared but she didnt understand the reality we're facing and we need to think beyond that.
Anyway, I will say, for much of the middle of her campaign, I do sympathize with her otherwise. Imagine trying to offer something, even if it is anemic, only to be met with some dude who just lies about everything, and goes on about immigrants eating peoples' pets, and half the country STILL wants that guy. It's frustrating as fudge. But that is the modern reality. And the sooner we realize those people should be written off and ignored the sooner we can get to focusing on the people who do matter and winning them over.
She spent a lot of time focusing on the hatred she and her supporters got from Trump. Again, those guys are irredeemable, they're buttholes, the best we can do is try to be better. It sucks things are like that, but that's just how they are and again, you cant win those people over, you shouldnt even try.
Which brings me back to the frustrations. Going into the final stretches in october, I was deeply frustrated with Harris going full centrist, campaigning with Liz cheney, going on interviews not to distance herself from Biden. And this moment infuriated me. I think she was on the view? And she forgot what she was gonna answer to how she would be different than Biden. She answered nothing really, which is bad enough, but she was frustrated with herself for failing to remember her actual answer: that she would put a republican in her cabinet. NOOOO!!!! HELL NOOOO!!!!!! THIS IS THE LAST THING I WANNA HEAR!!!!! And she did eventually give that response IIRC based on my own blog and yeah...I hated it. I HATED IT! Like...this is what dems need to learn. We got 40% of the country. They are deplorables. They're cult members. Screw them. Stop trying to appease them. Stop compromising our values and our ideology to try to win them over. I dont want republicans in the cabinet, if anything, look at trump. Trump doesnt give AF about our half of the country. And while our policies would help theirs, they won't accept them because of their twisted ideology and values. So you know what? Just dont even listen. Govern based on how the half that vote for you want. Stop trying to appease these people.
One thing that I wanna talk about that I didnt know was that she actually did try to get on Joe Rogan, but Rogan played games with her with the scheduling and scheduled trump for the day she wanted. And then she didnt wanna be in texas on a different day because it would take away from her campaigning and yeah. That's why she didnt appear. It seems pertinent to mention because she was blamed for not going on Rogan. She wanted to, but Rogan wasn't really playing ball with her, and she even basically said that yeah, Rogan wanted Trump, and gave preferential treatment to Trump while being more standoffish with her. JUst thought that should be mentioned since she got hammered for that afterwards. Like she didnt reach out to the dudebros because she didnt go on rogan. Well, she was a very busy woman being campaigning and all and rogan wasnt really intent on making it happen. Ya know, because the dude lost his mind after COVID and it's no secret he's pro Trump.
Going into the final stretch, she seemed more optimistic, same as me. Her internal polling had her ahead, the Selzer poll was a huge indicator that she was ahead. There was some guy who thought she would win Nevada, which would indicate she would be ahead. So she went into election day thinking she was gonna win.
And then she didn't. Strangely enough despite being a candidate, her knowledge of the math seemed hazier than mine. I knew something was up early on just based on how the safe states were performing. Like...if the entire map is R+5 relative to predictions, well, that's not a good sign. And it seemed like the swing states went in a similar way. But yeah she didn't seem to realize she lost until well after midnight. I was dooming starting at 10-10:30. It stung her. She went to bed, didnt give a speech. I stayed up until it was called around 2 AM. She conceded the next day. And yeah she certified the election on January 6th, unlike Trump, who incited his followers to attack the capitol.
At the end, she realizes that yeah, we just voted for fascism and she seems on a similar page to me, saying our immediate concern is the mid terms so we can get checks and balances on the government. She realizes project 2025 was a long term plan by conservatives. But hey...this is why I take a more direct, abrasive approach that's confrontational to them. She decided to take the wimpy moderate approach, and it failed like it always does. She didn't win over people on her economic vision, and millions of democrats who voted in 2020 stayed home. She done screwed up.
Again, from the outside looking in, her msitakes were obvious. She was schrodinger's candidate early on, both moderate and progressive, but then the wave function collapsed and we got a moderate biden clone except she had no public option and she wanted more republicans in her cabinet.
At the end of the book she talked about how her thoughts are with gen Z. And how we needed to create the jobs of the future for them. And I'm just thinking, no, no more jobs. No more talk of jobs, and work, and employment. We need mass redistribution. FFS, talk to Andrew yang. He'll explain it better than I can on such short notice and she'll probably take him seriously as he was one of her campaign opponents in 2020.
And uh...yeah. We all know my views on Harris at this point, why she lost. So yeah, final thoughts? She was NOT the person for the job. To be fair, Im not sure who would have been, given the options realistically available, but yeah....this book soured me on her. She doesn't get it. I dont think she really understands why she lost and what she did wrong. She's part of that establishment dem culture that just...is in their own little beltway world and doesnt understand how normies think. She means well to some degree, and at times I could sympathize with her, like her final remarks about how people regretted their decision in Trump's first week in office were "yeah, people really are that dumb." But yeah...she didn't really connect with the voters she needed. Her policies didnt connect. Her message didnt connect. She just was a poor fit for the job. Another centrist dem who no one fricking wanted but we had to vote for her or we got the other guy. And that isnt a winning message.
I hope in 2028 we get someone better. SOmeone who actually has a vision. Someone who actually understands politics. Who doesnt cede ground to the right in appeasement, and who proposes an ambitious vision for the country that CHALLENGES the right, not concedes to them prematurely. The problem with biden is he didnt do enough. The problem with harris is she didnt propose enough. People didnt want Biden, they didnt want that brand of politics, so they voted for Trump instead. And that's the core reason she lost. And yeah. That's where I stand on this.
Okay book, Im glad I read it, but really. I hope she isn't it in 2028. Or Gavin Newsom for that matter. Or Pete Buttigieg. Or the rest of the worthless centrists. Ro Khanna, AOC, Andrew Yang, a few early names that stand out to me. That's who I want.
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