Cromwell

If you were to use one word to describe J.D. Vance’s vision for America, it would be “sacrifice.” Women would sacrifice their careers and their reproductive freedom to stay home and have lots of kids. Men would lead households with far less income than they have today. LGTBQ people would go back in the closet. Businesses would be much less profitable. Consumers would pay higher prices and have fewer choices. Unhappy couples would be forced to remain together for the sake of their many children. Some degree of censorship of the internet and the MSM would probably be necessary. In short, material prosperity, freedom, and opportunity would take a back seat to stability and traditional religious values.

The Democrats had the Great Society; Vance wants the Godly Society, as defined by Thomas Aquinas. It would look like something between Ireland in the 1950s and Franco’s Spain, depending on how much force was required to bring it about.

The problem with this program, of course, is that it has very limited support within the Republican Party and absolutely none elsewhere. Even Trump doesn’t really buy into it. So how can it happen? Through patience, a large measure of stealth and misdirection, and the abuse of federal power on a massive scale.

The Trump program of deterrence through unlawful cruelty inevitably led to a backlash that shaped the 2020 election. Harris was caught up in it; like all of the Democratic candidates other than Biden, she took positions on the border during the debates that she undoubtedly regrets today. When she became VP, however, she followed the Biden line without public dissent.

Biden wanted a system that was humane and generous, but orderly. In spite of his best efforts, circumstances overwhelmed him: the end of the pandemic took away his best reason to keep migrants in Mexico; political turbulence and climate change all over the world made immigration more attractive; left-wing legal assaults on his program were largely successful; the system was underfunded; and the GOP was more interested in scoring political points than in moving legislation to improve the system.

Today, the border is the biggest issue in GOP commercials all over the country. Harris is fighting back by touting her past as a prosecutor and by blaming Trump for the failure of the border legislation. Will that work, and does her new hard line represent her true position on the issue? As to the first question, the answer is no, but she only needs to blunt the attacks, not to make them disappear; as to the second, Harris doesn’t appear to have strong convictions on immigration, so don’t expect a sudden shift to open borders if she wins unless the wind starts blowing hard from the left, which is unlikely.

I see no reason to believe that Harris disagrees with Biden on the fundamentals of his Middle East policy. Even if she did, it would be suicide to abandon Israel altogether. As a result, it won’t happen.

But I expect to see differences in nuance, partly in an effort to unite the party, and partly out of conviction. I think Harris will tell the world that she is completely dedicated to the defense of Israel, but that she has no intention of handing Bibi a blank check. America will protect Israel from attacks by Hezbollah and Iran, but offer no guarantees of support for offensive operations, particularly those that unnecessarily endanger civilians.

That is as it should be. It is not in the interest of America to play Imperial Germany to Israel’s Austria-Hungary.

Here is what I would say if I were in her position:

1. TRY TO LOOK BOTH STRONG AND GLAMOROUS: Four years ago, I conducted a thought experiment as to whether American men would vote for Angelina Jolie for president. I concluded that they would. Harris should be aspiring to a subdued version of that image.
2. EMBRACE IDENTITY, BUT TRANSCEND IT: Say something like “I’m half Asian, half black, but 100 percent American.” The public will love it.
3. RESPOND DIRECTLY TO THE REAGAN QUESTION: Americans are far better off than they were in 2020. Lay it out and explain why, focusing to a large extent on Trump’s chaotic response to the pandemic.
4. PROSECUTE THE CASE AGAINST TRUMP: In clear language, set out the man’s crimes against the public, starting with events that occurred before his presidency. Don’t pull punches here.
5. DRAW CLEAR DISTINCTIONS ON THE ISSUES: Talk about climate change, guns, abortion, Ukraine, Gaza, inflation, the border, and financial help for Americans who need it. Explain how Trump’s ideas will only leave America poorer, weaker, and alone in a dangerous world.
6. FINISH BY DESCRIBING TRUMP’S VISION FOR AMERICA IN THE 1950S, AND EXPLAIN WHY WE NEED TO LOOK TO THE FUTURE, INSTEAD: Trump doesn’t have a plausible way of getting us back to 1950, but if he did, he would be imposing second-class status on tens of millions of Americans. The country has always looked to the future, not the past. It must continue to do so.

A Trump commercial on the alleged failures of Biden and Harris on immigration prominently features footage of Harris dancing in a slightly goofy way. What is the point of that, and will it work?

Trump is clearly attempting to show that Harris is a fundamentally unserious person who is unaware of or indifferent to the suffering that illegal immigration supposedly causes the American worker. I don’t think the average person will get that impression from the footage, however. I think she just looks like someone who, on occasion, has a good time. That’s normal, not stupid or weird.

It is fair to describe Donald Trump as a man of no convictions when it comes to abortion; he was pro-choice most of his life, but he turned pro-life in order to win the nomination in 2016, and now he’s Mr. States’ Rights. His only real motivation is to use the issue to win power. J.D. Vance, on the other hand, is genuinely anti-abortion, but he chose to swallow his scruples in order to further his political ambitions. I will leave it to the reader to decide which of these positions is morally worse.

Harris, on the other hand, is a conviction politician when it comes to reproductive rights. Does that matter? Yes, because it means you can trust what she says on that issue. Trump and Vance will change positions on a dime if it serves their interests. No promise they make, regardless of how public it is, will be worth the paper it is printed on.

To the left wing of the Democratic Party, Obama was a failed president. Why? Because, when given a huge majority in Congress and the opportunity to fundamentally remake America–to, in my terminology, put an end to the dollar store economy–Obama bailed out the banks and increased inequality. He asked for a stimulus that was way too small and then embraced austerity almost immediately, thus prolonging the recession unnecessarily. Biden, on the other hand, went big with his stimulus and embraced the concept of dramatically reducing inequality during the pandemic. He was the more consequential president.

Jonathan Chait is having none of it. In his view, Obama was far more important. His successes in staving off economic disaster in 2009 will be remembered far more favorably by historians than by the left. Obamacare is a far more significant piece of legislation than the IRA or the infrastructure bill. He accomplished this by moving to the center, unlike Biden, who moved to the left after he was elected. The lesson of this for Harris is that she, too, should move to the center.

Is either side reading history correctly? I would say no. The left is wrong to undervalue Obama’s successes in saving the American economy without much of a playbook in 2009. Yes, he bailed out the banks and worked with capitalists instead of smashing them, but that was the price of regaining economic stability; reducing inequality by turning the Great Recession into a depression and impoverishing rich and poor alike was not a legitimate objective. It is not accurate, however, to suggest that the successes of the Obama years were the result of moving to the center; Obama only managed to legislate when he had the huge majority between 2008 and 2010. After that, it was pretty much status quo.

It is true that Biden moved to the left, at least in rhetorical terms, in the late stages of his campaign and during the first two years of his presidency. It is also true, however, that he only had a tiny majority in both houses, and that his legislative triumphs were the result of negotiations with Manchin and Sinema and even with some Republicans. He was actually a more bipartisan president than Obama, the leftist economic rhetoric notwithstanding, because he had to be.

What can Harris learn from the supposed distinction between Obama and Biden? Not a damn thing. If she wins, she will be lucky if she has even the tiny Biden majority in Congress. She won’t be able to get much meaningful legislation through the system. Her presidency will look like the second term of Obama and Clinton–a little bit of incremental change accomplished through negotiations with centrist Democrats and a few reasonable Republicans. Her biggest accomplishment will be to keep Trump out of power, not to put an end to the dollar store economy.

Ronald Reagan famously benefited from the euphoria arising from American successes in the 1984 Summer Olympics. Could Harris profit from a similar vibe after Paris?

Not to the same extent, certainly; the 1984 Olympics uniquely were held at home during a period of rapid recovery after the Fed significantly reduced interest rates. But the ambience associated with the Olympics–Americans of all colors and creeds happily rooting for victorious athletes representing a united country–is inconsistent with Trump’s dystopian vision of the nation. Anything that persuades the undecided that America isn’t going to hell in a handbasket has to help at least a little bit.

In an act of breathtaking cynicism, Trump suddenly announced he supported eliminating income taxes on tips while he was in Nevada. His real purpose, of course, was to win the state, not to help workers. Not to be outdone, Harris followed suit about a week ago. Does this idea make sense, other than politically?

The answer to that question is an emphatic no. First of all, it would blow yet another large hole in the budget. Second, it would create an artificial distinction between two essentially identical forms of income that would cause employers and employees alike to game the system. All over America, service providers would see their wages slashed, and the demands for tax-free tips would become deafening, even possibly from doctors and lawyers. Finally, from the perspective of a consumer, the pressure to tip people who clearly don’t deserve it has become unbearable. This would make it a thousand times worse. Is that what we really want?

C: The last time I saw you, you were extremely depressed about your options with the election. Has anything changed?

M: Things are better, but hardly good.

C: Let’s break that down into its two components. Why are things better?

M: Because Biden is out of the picture. He clearly wasn’t physically or mentally capable of governing America for another four years, and he didn’t have any use for businessmen like me.

C: Is Harris an improvement?

M: I don’t know yet. She can’t be much worse.

C: So why are things hardly good?

M: Let’s talk about my alternatives. I’ll start with Harris.

C: OK.

M: I don’t have any idea what she stands for. My guess is that she’s sort of an opportunistic centrist who will say anything to get elected. I’ve heard some things about her being more friendly to business than Biden–particularly with regard to Silicon Valley–but she hasn’t said anything meaningful about the economy that sets her apart from him. Until she tells me otherwise, I have to assume she supports raising my taxes and sticking her nose in my business. I obviously don’t support that.

C: So she has a lot to prove to you?

M: Exactly.

C: What about Trump?

M: He wouldn’t raise my taxes, but he would be a disaster in two different ways.

C: Which are?

M: First, his tariffs. Cars are built with lots of imported parts. The tariffs will raise car prices, which will cost me business and money.

C: Makes sense. And the second one?

M: His phobia about electric cars. Our company is committed to EVs. We can’t be a world leader without them. Trump hates them. He wants to rebuild the economy of the past. He’ll just crush our business and leave everybody poorer.

C: But Trump has eased up on EVs since he got Musk’s support. Doesn’t that make you feel better?

M: No, because I don’t sell Teslas, and Musk is only in it for himself. There’s nothing to prevent Trump from taking actions in office that make money for Musk and hurt all of his competitors. Besides, you can’t trust anything Trump says about anything. He could go back to bashing EVs at any moment.

C: So who is the lesser of the evils?

M: I don’t know yet. I need to hear a lot more from Harris. I probably won’t decide for another month or so.

C: Thanks for your time.

A few years ago, I wrote a post in which I argued that, since rural residents were the only true Americans, they should be entitled to additional votes for their livestock. The post was, of course, satire.

J.D. Vance has advocated that parents with children should be entitled to additional votes. He has since dismissed this proposal as a thought experiment, by which he means that it is impracticable, not that he considers it conceptually wrong.

Is there any meaningful difference between my satire and his thought experiment?

If Trump wins the election, Vance will be his heir apparent, and DeSantis will be lost in the political wilderness for the foreseeable future. But what if Trump loses? Will DeSantis be able to win over the base in 2028 by saying “I told you so?”

I doubt it, for three reasons. First, the base has never shown any inclination to forgive disloyalty, which DeSantis displayed by running against Trump before his time. Second, DeSantis will retain all of the personality defects that made him a poor candidate the last time around. Finally, Vance has economic ideas that, whether you agree with them or not (I obviously don’t), are actually intended to help struggling American workers. DeSantis has never shown that he wants to improve anyone’s life; all he wants to do is stick it to woke people.

I’ve been watching the Olympics since 1968. The most memorable games for me were in 1972, both for good and for ill, but I have at least shards of memories of all of them.

1984 was unique in that it induced euphoria among Americans that ultimately had implications for the election. For the quality of the spectacle and the competition, however, you could make a very good case that this one was the best in my lifetime.

The French–left, right, and center alike–have reason to be proud. Partisan strife will resume tomorrow.

Ezra Klein argues that Harris has flipped a switch. Biden was determined to win by reminding the American people of how big and bad and dangerous Trump is; Harris is trying to diminish him and make him look bizarre and contemptible. In other words, Biden called Trump a man on horseback; Harris says he’s a man on golf cart. Is Klein right, and can the new tactics work?

As to the first question, everything I see says yes. I have mixed feelings about the second. On the one hand, I have pointed out on numerous occasions that debate opponents who patronize Trump have the most success. In addition, the notion that Trump will behave even more outrageously to get attention, and thus offend centrist voters even further, makes some sense. On the other hand, it is a mistake to completely disregard the danger that Trump presents to liberal democracy in America. If you’re not genuinely afraid of what a Trump presidency could mean for us, you haven’t been paying attention.

Vance and Trump are already starting to raise questions about Walz’ military service. Are we about to see a repeat of the successful campaign against John Kerry?

No, for three reasons. First, Walz is not at the top of the ticket. Second, Kerry was running during wartime, so he was compelled to put his military credentials at the center of his campaign. Walz is on the ticket because he comes from a rural area and sounds like everyone’s favorite uncle; the military part is just gravy. Finally, Trump, you will recall, is “Cadet Bone Spurs.” What can he say about Walz except to thank him for his service?