Okay guys, we're gonna find out tomorrow, but I've developed a hard position on the veepstakes.
I'm all-in for Tim Walz. And he's been rising in the betting markets.
Turns out Josh Shapiro brings some nasty baggage that's not the product of whackjob GOP oppo. When Shapiro was PA AG, a 27-year-old first grade teacher was brutally murdered in her apartment with multiple stab wounds on her body, including in the back of her neck. Shapiro let this be ruled a _suicide._ If you saw the diagram of where the knives went in, your jaw would hit the floor. The coroner's reasoning, which Shapiro signed off on, is that her door was locked, there was no sign of forced entry and there were no wounds consistent with self-defense. None of that is dispositive.
Then it turns out the suspect's parents are big Shapiro donors. YIKES. The SCOPA just allowed the victim's parents to file an appeal four days ago. This puppy is going to be on the front pages of PA papers for awhile. If it is as it clearly appears, it looks like some steroidal Shapiro corruption.
This criticism is not of a piece with my lefty bros' preference for Walz over Shapiro. This has nothing to do with opposition to teachers' unions, support for vouchers or loud pushback on the excesses of the Gaza protests (which set Bulwark hearts all a'flutter). I do agree with Rick that Walz talks the economic populist bro talk while being an affable, happy warrior, something which bridges the gaps between progressives (who love his record as WI governor) and the older whites in the Upper Midwest that Biden had in his pocket. But this is really less about the strengths of Walz, of which there are many, than the downsides of Shapiro that are coming to light, which is what the vetting process is all about.
My boy John Fetterman, who has similar pointed criticisms of the Gaza protests and the excesses of the campus left, also thinks that Josh Shapiro is a snake in the grass. All politicians have to be extremely ambitious and all are narcissistic to some degree. But too much of it is toxic. Josh Shapiro is too much about building his own brand. And if you listen to him on the stump, he's not much of a happy warrior; he's pretty damn strident and angry. We all love that stuff when it's directed at Trump, but it's at odds with VP Harris' more joyful approach. Kamala Harris needs a team player by her side.
Turns out I was the victim of lefty YouTube clickbait. The suicide ruling is much less of a major scandal than the potential appearance of a conflict of interest that I think Shapiro could've survived. His office's role was in refusing to revisit the coroner's ruling and then shunting the case to the Philly DA to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest because he's close friends with the fiance's family. It's all detailed out in an article in the Philly Inquirer today.
Which, of course, I appreciate. I don't like to see my gov embroiled in a major scandal.
I think the Walz decision against the odds-on favorite Shapiro had more to do with Shapiro's headstrong personality and strong ambitions. We're not gonna get Gaza off the radar screen anytime soon; Israel is on the brink of war with Iran (through their proxies Hezbollah in Lebanon). We have two carrier groups in the Mideast right now; Kamala has been spending a lot of time with Joe in the Situation Room, trying to defuse things. Chemistry with a VP and the ability to work together seamlessly is critically important.
Chemistry matters if you win, and that's looking better every day.
No one can stop all the problems spinning around the world, October surprises, etc, during a campaign, but one of the secrets in winning campaigns is that Teflon - where the population is set on a candidate and nothing can stop it.
Trump had it in 2020 - and Kamala's got it this time.
they say the first rule of VP selection is "do no harm" as in don't fuck up the Momentum that Kamala's enjoying right now.
If Shapiro's got negative baggage, that becomes the news cycle and undermines the top of the ticket and her Momentum.
Just like Vance became a distracting negative storyline for Trump, these revelations could short-circuit Kamala's Momentum.
Plus, unfortunately, (and even without scandals), Shapiro would bring the whole Israel-Gaza debate back to the top of the news cycle, which I'm guessing the Harris team would rather keep under the radar.
So I see why Shapiro could be a bad choice in the "do no harm" column, just by the fact that all of these issues would become the news, distracting from Kamala's progress and Trump's (and Vance's) woes.
I always think that Job One is Defeating Trump. What's the point of good "chemistry" if you don't win the White House?
Dems don't need negative narratives now (even if they're false!) so I understand why you favor Walz.
I sure hope Kamala and her team don't sabotage their own success with a wrong VP pick tomorrow.
Shapiro wouldn't have been a terrible pick by any means. But he was oversold, especially by the Never Trump Industrial Complex (hello, Bulwark!).
Look, our crazies are _at least_ an order of magnitude less crazy than their crazies. But our crazies can cause problems and get butthurt over the stupidest things, too, and we Democrats need to go into the convention as unified as humanly possible.
If the hard progs love Walz and hate Shapiro, so much the better for everybody ;)
I agree. I went to college in PA, and still have many friends there. Governor Shapiro would not have been a terrible choice, but Governor Walz is a better choice.
There is no sense in adding to the baggage that normal candidates all come with.
Governor Walz has no underlings who sexually harassed one of their support staffers to the point that she quit, requiring the Shapiro administration to fork over $295K.
Governor Walsh is not a Zionist. If Governor Shapiro were ever so slightly more open-throated about his support for Israel, he would deserve the label. This was especially off-putting about Shapiro for young people. (Full disclosure: my daughter is half-Jewish, as is her stepfather, my husband.)
Governor Walsh has a sense of humor, and Governor Shapiro is considered to have a very sharp tongue.
I could continue but won't bother.
Governor Walsh is a teacher, so he's used to wrangling adolescents, which should be very helpful in wrangling the House Trumplican Caucus. He's also used to farms, so the smell of the House Trumplicans' ghastly rhetoric won't disturb him unduly.
I am relieved that Tim Walsh is the nominee for vice president.
I also think Walz is a better pick, but I chafe at "Zionist," Caroline, which is not-so-thinly-veiled code for "Jew" with an inevitable whiff of antisemitism.
Theodor Herzl was the original Zionist. He was a supremely humane and urbane man, a Democratic Socialist who believed that Arabs and Jews in the British Mandate should have equal rights. He advocated for a Jewish homeland as a refuge from European persecution to be perfectly sure, which makes him a Zionist, but he would have taken some land in Uganda or New Zealand and feared that ultra-religious Jews would read the Holy Land as bequeathed by a Biblical land deed, and that way lay disaster.
But what's done is done and the leftist critique of "Zionism" is based on the critique of settler colonialism, which is a suicide pact. Should every American whose ancestors immigrated here off themselves so the land can be returned to the indigenous population and the descendents of slaves who were brought here involuntarily? That's the logic of the critique.
We all want a ceasefire. We all want humanitarian aid dispatched to Gaza to avert a starvation crisis. We all think Binyamin Netanyahu is the worst PM that Israel ever had and is overreacting. But we also recognize Israel's right to defend itself from Islamist extremists who have the elimination of all Jews in Palestine (i.e. genocide) in their charters. Harris, Walz and Shapiro are all of one mind on this, as is the majority of the Israeli population who loathe their Crime Minister as much as we loathe Trump.
We can fairly critique Josh Shapiro on many other things. Even mentioning "Zionist" in the same sentence with him is rhetorical dirty pool.
The Middle East conflicts are a quagmire of competing agendas, ideologies, even terminologies, and Shapiro on the ticket would have brought that whole simmering issue to the top of the campaign.
Job Number One is to Defeat Trump (and Project 2025). And with Tim Walz I think we have a better chance of achieving that.
So pushing into a newer news cycle, it seems Trump's duelling Atlanta rally tonight in the same college sports arena as Kamala's a few days ago, has patches of empty seats. Trump is big mad about that and ranting about the crowd size of the very rally he's headlining. It's scrumptious ;)
Of course it's the fire marshal's fault, although why a fire marshal would close the doors when the arena is under capacity is anybody's guess, LOL. They were keeping out his fans and forcing them into a line -- the same garbage he tried to pull about "crowds" at his Manhattan court cases. They're doing this because they're a _college_ (colleges are always hotbeds of Radical Left Marxists) and my gosh, if they can do that to poor Trump supporters at a rally, imagine what they'll do to them in the election.
Then there's officially backing out of the ABC debate and "agreeing to" one on FOX, in a giant arena with Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum. That's obviously not an agreement with the Harris campaign (they probably heard about it the way we all did). Something tells me Kamala Harris could get the word out, fill (at least) half the stadium with her cheering fans and march right into the lion's den. Something else tells me that this is a sucker's game and would be nothing like even a televised presidential debate, which are always fake debates anyway, but just a grotesque spectacle.
I think she should march right into the lion's den and eat Donnie alive.
In front of his own audiece.
A. If she doesn't, then it's fuel for "she's afraid of me". Plus, he definitely won't do ABC because she didn't do FOX. Win/win for Trump if she passes.
B. If she DOES the FOX event (whatever it is) and cleans his clock (or even holds her own), then she's winning over Trump voters on his own turf, and his subsequent no-show at ABC confirms him as a coward, and she get the whole ABC hour.
So I think it's a command performance for Kamala to walk into the FOX den and, if she cleans his clock, WIN the ELECTION right there.
Kamala, if you're listening, go on into there and clean his clock; show his own people that you're a better choice. It'll be the most watched TV in the campaign, and you can close the deal right there and then. Call his bluff.
I certainly see the rationale for this, Abe, but I don't think it's a slam dunk, either, which is why I posed the question. Allow me to play devil's advocate: FOX isn't a news channel; it paid $787.5M for lying about the last election. Will FOX cut off the mics after their allotted time a la CNN? I doubt Trump would have let FOX "agree" to that. Will Trump be able to roam around on stage and stalk Kamala the way he did Hillary? Will it become a nonstop namecalling fest in front of an audience, a large chunk of whom are gleefully open racists and misogynists and who don't accept Kamala's legitimacy as a candidate? There have been debates in front of audiences before, but of a few hundred at most. For obvious reasons, there has _never_ been a presidential debate in front of a stadium crowd.
It would certainly be quite a spectacle, but I think you're engaging in magical thinking if you imagine it might change any minds in either the rally crowd (Trump crowds don't have minds to change) or the FOX TV audience. It would certainly generate huge sympathy and energy for Kamala supporters, but they're already juiced up to the max, so it's hard to see a need for that if it's all Kamala would get out of the experience. It will not instantly "win" the election for her. Democrats placed too much hope on the Biden debate. Be careful of that here.
As for "now Trump can say Kamala won't debate"? Who CARES what Trump says? The obvious riposte to that is "yeah ... on FOX." What Team Kamala can do is submit a set of reasonable rules to FOX -- limit the crowd size to the normal size of presidential debate audiences, mic cutoffs when time has expired. Trump will refuse them, of course, and then Kamala can say that Trump really doesn't want a debate, he wants an ugly spectacle.
And then Kamala can sit down in front of actual journalists at ABC.
I didn't realize it was a "full arena audience" -(just looked up the specs) - that's not a debate, that's a Roman coliseum kill the lion situation.
Sounds like a team-Trump brainwave to counter-program his cowardice in backing out of ABC.
And in that MAGA mob situation, you're right, all she'd get is insults and chants "lock her up" - it would be an ugly spectacle. So in that case, she'd be lowering herself for no gain.
Let Trump/FOX do their bullshit so-called debate, it'll be the same old shit show, while the ABC gig will have decorum and Trump's no-show will hurt him.
Overall, I see K rising in the polls, especially in swing states, money flowing in (for offices, signs, ads across multiple platforms, etc), and the calendar works for her: a week of VP headlines, then FREE saturation coverage with the convention, and more self-fulfilling polls, while Trump gets more desperate and more crazy.
Yesterday's rally he was trying out insults with the MAGA mob: low-IQ, stupid, can't even read, most radical VP in history, worst VP in history, lunatic, horrible person. That's the extent of Trump's strategy: hurl misogynist insults; he doesn't realize he's insulting every woman in America, and driving them to the Dems. So let him rant. So much for "defining" Kamala. Must be panic in Trump-world.
Yep, Abe, it's a Roman coliseum. Trump thinks of these things literally in terms of professional wrestling. So I agree with you that this was a head fake they knew VP Harris would never agree to, as a way for Trump to flip the script while avoiding a debate with a woman prosecutor who clearly terrifies him.
Did FOX even agree to this? I can't imagine it has anything in writing saying it did. Baier and MacCollum are from the news side of FOX and I can't imagine them wanting to "moderate" a debate in an arena setting. It wouldn't be Hannity, Doocey or Watters fluffing Trump with endless softballs; they'd want to get in some tough questions for Harris so they'd have to toss in at least a token tough question or two for Trump. All Trump would have to do is raise his eyebrows and smirk and you'd have an arena of MAGAloids booing the moderators. That would be a shot in the arm for Newsmax, OANN and RSBN.
Carville and Sharpton were on Psaki and they both entertained the notion of Kamala doing the debate but I don't think they're fully grappling with the logistics. What makes me against the idea is doing it in a goddamn arena. If it were an auditorium seating a few hundred I'd likely be okay with it.
Kamala's rollout has been absolute perfection; not a single misstep. I think what made her '20 primary run less than stellar is that she did it in the left lane and adopted the most hardcore flavor of lefty positions to compete with Liz and Bernie, and I don't think that's who she is. I think she was pandering in the primary and pandering is poisonous to a politician because it makes them come across as inauthentic. I think she has the perfect response to the horse race gotcha mongers who ask why she's "flip flopped" -- she can say she just spent 3 1/2 years working in an administration and seeing what is possible.
Pivoting towards the center in the general election is Politics 101.
Kamala's choice of VP will show how far she'll pivot to the center vs appease the far Left vs address the electoral college map.
Personally, I don't think the country's ready for a gay VP, even though Pete B is an outstanding politician; Josh Shapiro would clinch PA's 19 votes on the electoral map but again, I don't think the country's ready for a black woman Prez and a Jewish VP; sadly, I think her choice has to be the person who best helps win the election (ie, defeat Trump) in a highly polarized and racialized country, and that would be Mark Kelly - a famous white man who would provide "balance" on the ticket.
Just speculation on my part, but I think Kelly would bring the balance plus help the electoral map (AZ's 11 EC votes) plus help raise the Dem prospects re Kari Lake.
So from a purely practical strategy - beat Trump!!! - I think choosing Kelly would be the smart move.
On the other hand, I hear a lot of talk about Prez/VP "chemistry" and somehow I don't see that chemistry between Kamala and Kelly.
So who knows? She's got an A+ brain trust in her campaign team (look what they've accomplished in 2 weeks) and I'm sure they'll make the right decision to achieve the mission of beating Trump.
I just posted about this at the top of the thread. Shapiro has a nasty scandal that's going to be in the PA papers for awhile. Kelly's out of the running (don't know exactly why, but the most recent reports have it down to Walz vs Shapiro).
I am _firmly_ for Walz over Shapiro (Shapiro is my gov) and I explain why up top.
I was very much moved, Rick, by your description of the quiet, patient, high-stakes negotiations to free the hostages held by the criminal Putin regime. I wonder whether the Wall Street Journal, which carried out a systematic smear campaign denigrating our president’s mental acuity, has the grace to feel differently about him now that their journalist Evan Gershkovich has been brought home.
Thanks for highlighting the serious people doing the work for our nation. It feels good to have the Americans back on American soil. It feels great to be proud of President Biden, VP Harris and their awesome team of diplomats.
Trump's ploy to wiggle out of having to debate Kamala Harris is right out of his life-long playbook: renege on an agreement, then impose conditions at odds with the original deal.
"I like the cement, Mr. Cement Contractor...it's the price I don't like.. "
Something rarely mentioned about Kamala Harris is that she is an attractive woman. Attractive women - meaning, to put it crudely, a woman who is fu'able - are targets of special ire by weak men like T. Not only is she presidential, smart, articulate and able to express joy and happiness, but she's good-looking and completely out of T's reach. He was able to leverage his celebrity for a quick lay with Stormy, a few lays with the Playboy bunny, (which were really about power, sex for him is a power thing), but Kamala Harris? Never in a million years. And he knows it.
Kamala is 57 and post-menopausal so I wouldn't describe her in sexualized terms, but she is no doubt a very handsome woman, incredible cheekbones and a thousand-watt smile. The MAGAloids tried to run the sexual calumny on her, that she "slept her way to the top," but since there's no infidelity scandal associated with it (no aggrieved party), it doesn't go anywhere.
Someone needs to clue Trump in that she's "blasian." You know ... like Tiger Woods ;). I remember about two decades ago during Tiger Woods' heyday when he was winning every golf tournament in sight (and golf was a nearly all-white game two decades ago). My late dad followed golf and he was so proud for him and so amazed at his skills. I don't know if Donald Trump, Mr. Golf Guy, ever said a single word about Tiger Woods. He was a force of nature and doubtless intimidated Trump.
Would we see Flynn's fingers in Egypt's $10,000,000 'donation'(alleged) to Former President Trump? Flynn, where you see smoke, there is Flynn. Will it keep him busy over the next several months?(to leave everybody else alone)
OMG! President Biden’s comments, his hand on the back of the young lady who started to cry..he is always full of COMPASSION, SYMPATHY, DIPLOMACY, the ultimate statesman, a true patriotic president who shows his love and caring in all of his actions. President Biden is the best President in my lifetime! And I am not a youngster. What a beautiful example he has set for VP Harris. Compare this to the “self-licking” trumpliCons. Great term Rick! You are correct, that Biden will be highly regarded, I propose we remove the felon’s face from the list of presidents. I’ve already demanded my mayor get the trump felon name off of the building in Chicago!
The rude champion of the world, referring to a valid question as rude!! Any person supporting this DEADLY seditionist-inciter, CONVICTED Felon, RAPIST should be shunned, humiliated and ignored forever or until they learn their lesson. Meanwhile, President Biden is getting things done from the White House. He can do more with the retrumplicans running around with their hair on fire. Trump is not only weak, he is dangerous and backed by a former republican party turned cult. When we get our win, we MUST address the corruption of money across the political board. But Democrats have the sanity & leadership ability among its members to make real change for EVERYONE, in a positive way. Trump-supporting politicians-shame, shame, shame on you!
As usual, you nailed it, but I particularly loved this episode of The Elephant in the Room. Regarding Trump, thank you so much for saying what I wish a number of men I love would also say: Trump is weak, and he's always been weak. This is why he is not fit for leadership of our nation, and to me it is fundamental and the end of the inquiry, yet I keep hearing, "but the economy." What makes it hurtful is the failure to recognize what you point out: the weakest men are the most abusive to women. Why should I ever be expected to vote for a man who is abusive to women? He cannot help himself, as you say, and I love that Kamala Harris is his kryptonite so that finally, maybe finally, Trump's true nature will be revealed in such a way that the scales will fall from the eyes of those he has fooled.
Dementia Don
CNN and Joe Rogan say Donald is becoming boring given his same old speeches. Some new names for Don:
Dullish Don
Dull Don
Dusty Don
Dreary Don
Draining Don
Hum-Drum Don
Ho-Hum Don
Mind Numbing Don
Tedious Trump
Soggy Don
Okay guys, we're gonna find out tomorrow, but I've developed a hard position on the veepstakes.
I'm all-in for Tim Walz. And he's been rising in the betting markets.
Turns out Josh Shapiro brings some nasty baggage that's not the product of whackjob GOP oppo. When Shapiro was PA AG, a 27-year-old first grade teacher was brutally murdered in her apartment with multiple stab wounds on her body, including in the back of her neck. Shapiro let this be ruled a _suicide._ If you saw the diagram of where the knives went in, your jaw would hit the floor. The coroner's reasoning, which Shapiro signed off on, is that her door was locked, there was no sign of forced entry and there were no wounds consistent with self-defense. None of that is dispositive.
Then it turns out the suspect's parents are big Shapiro donors. YIKES. The SCOPA just allowed the victim's parents to file an appeal four days ago. This puppy is going to be on the front pages of PA papers for awhile. If it is as it clearly appears, it looks like some steroidal Shapiro corruption.
This criticism is not of a piece with my lefty bros' preference for Walz over Shapiro. This has nothing to do with opposition to teachers' unions, support for vouchers or loud pushback on the excesses of the Gaza protests (which set Bulwark hearts all a'flutter). I do agree with Rick that Walz talks the economic populist bro talk while being an affable, happy warrior, something which bridges the gaps between progressives (who love his record as WI governor) and the older whites in the Upper Midwest that Biden had in his pocket. But this is really less about the strengths of Walz, of which there are many, than the downsides of Shapiro that are coming to light, which is what the vetting process is all about.
My boy John Fetterman, who has similar pointed criticisms of the Gaza protests and the excesses of the campus left, also thinks that Josh Shapiro is a snake in the grass. All politicians have to be extremely ambitious and all are narcissistic to some degree. But too much of it is toxic. Josh Shapiro is too much about building his own brand. And if you listen to him on the stump, he's not much of a happy warrior; he's pretty damn strident and angry. We all love that stuff when it's directed at Trump, but it's at odds with VP Harris' more joyful approach. Kamala Harris needs a team player by her side.
Tim Walz for VP !
well done, Bob.
You nailed it.
Tim Walz for VP
Let the Blue Wave become a Blue Tsunami and wash away the Trump era.
Turns out I was the victim of lefty YouTube clickbait. The suicide ruling is much less of a major scandal than the potential appearance of a conflict of interest that I think Shapiro could've survived. His office's role was in refusing to revisit the coroner's ruling and then shunting the case to the Philly DA to avoid the appearance of a conflict of interest because he's close friends with the fiance's family. It's all detailed out in an article in the Philly Inquirer today.
Which, of course, I appreciate. I don't like to see my gov embroiled in a major scandal.
I think the Walz decision against the odds-on favorite Shapiro had more to do with Shapiro's headstrong personality and strong ambitions. We're not gonna get Gaza off the radar screen anytime soon; Israel is on the brink of war with Iran (through their proxies Hezbollah in Lebanon). We have two carrier groups in the Mideast right now; Kamala has been spending a lot of time with Joe in the Situation Room, trying to defuse things. Chemistry with a VP and the ability to work together seamlessly is critically important.
Chemistry matters if you win, and that's looking better every day.
No one can stop all the problems spinning around the world, October surprises, etc, during a campaign, but one of the secrets in winning campaigns is that Teflon - where the population is set on a candidate and nothing can stop it.
Trump had it in 2020 - and Kamala's got it this time.
https://kamala4prez.substack.com/p/teflon-kamala
I've also seen that golden tipping point in the polls, where her ascending blue line has actually crossed Trump's falling red line.
America has had it with Trump.
And Walz seems like the perfect "balance".
Fingers crossed, but the end of the malignant Trump era may be at hand.
they say the first rule of VP selection is "do no harm" as in don't fuck up the Momentum that Kamala's enjoying right now.
If Shapiro's got negative baggage, that becomes the news cycle and undermines the top of the ticket and her Momentum.
Just like Vance became a distracting negative storyline for Trump, these revelations could short-circuit Kamala's Momentum.
Plus, unfortunately, (and even without scandals), Shapiro would bring the whole Israel-Gaza debate back to the top of the news cycle, which I'm guessing the Harris team would rather keep under the radar.
So I see why Shapiro could be a bad choice in the "do no harm" column, just by the fact that all of these issues would become the news, distracting from Kamala's progress and Trump's (and Vance's) woes.
I always think that Job One is Defeating Trump. What's the point of good "chemistry" if you don't win the White House?
Dems don't need negative narratives now (even if they're false!) so I understand why you favor Walz.
I sure hope Kamala and her team don't sabotage their own success with a wrong VP pick tomorrow.
Success! So relieved that it's Governor Walz!
Shapiro wouldn't have been a terrible pick by any means. But he was oversold, especially by the Never Trump Industrial Complex (hello, Bulwark!).
Look, our crazies are _at least_ an order of magnitude less crazy than their crazies. But our crazies can cause problems and get butthurt over the stupidest things, too, and we Democrats need to go into the convention as unified as humanly possible.
If the hard progs love Walz and hate Shapiro, so much the better for everybody ;)
I agree. I went to college in PA, and still have many friends there. Governor Shapiro would not have been a terrible choice, but Governor Walz is a better choice.
There is no sense in adding to the baggage that normal candidates all come with.
Governor Walz has no underlings who sexually harassed one of their support staffers to the point that she quit, requiring the Shapiro administration to fork over $295K.
Governor Walsh is not a Zionist. If Governor Shapiro were ever so slightly more open-throated about his support for Israel, he would deserve the label. This was especially off-putting about Shapiro for young people. (Full disclosure: my daughter is half-Jewish, as is her stepfather, my husband.)
Governor Walsh has a sense of humor, and Governor Shapiro is considered to have a very sharp tongue.
I could continue but won't bother.
Governor Walsh is a teacher, so he's used to wrangling adolescents, which should be very helpful in wrangling the House Trumplican Caucus. He's also used to farms, so the smell of the House Trumplicans' ghastly rhetoric won't disturb him unduly.
I am relieved that Tim Walsh is the nominee for vice president.
as a former teacher myself, i love your analogy about "wrangling adolescents" - that experience will serve Walz well
I also think Walz is a better pick, but I chafe at "Zionist," Caroline, which is not-so-thinly-veiled code for "Jew" with an inevitable whiff of antisemitism.
Theodor Herzl was the original Zionist. He was a supremely humane and urbane man, a Democratic Socialist who believed that Arabs and Jews in the British Mandate should have equal rights. He advocated for a Jewish homeland as a refuge from European persecution to be perfectly sure, which makes him a Zionist, but he would have taken some land in Uganda or New Zealand and feared that ultra-religious Jews would read the Holy Land as bequeathed by a Biblical land deed, and that way lay disaster.
But what's done is done and the leftist critique of "Zionism" is based on the critique of settler colonialism, which is a suicide pact. Should every American whose ancestors immigrated here off themselves so the land can be returned to the indigenous population and the descendents of slaves who were brought here involuntarily? That's the logic of the critique.
We all want a ceasefire. We all want humanitarian aid dispatched to Gaza to avert a starvation crisis. We all think Binyamin Netanyahu is the worst PM that Israel ever had and is overreacting. But we also recognize Israel's right to defend itself from Islamist extremists who have the elimination of all Jews in Palestine (i.e. genocide) in their charters. Harris, Walz and Shapiro are all of one mind on this, as is the majority of the Israeli population who loathe their Crime Minister as much as we loathe Trump.
We can fairly critique Josh Shapiro on many other things. Even mentioning "Zionist" in the same sentence with him is rhetorical dirty pool.
The Middle East conflicts are a quagmire of competing agendas, ideologies, even terminologies, and Shapiro on the ticket would have brought that whole simmering issue to the top of the campaign.
Job Number One is to Defeat Trump (and Project 2025). And with Tim Walz I think we have a better chance of achieving that.
Interesting, as usual. Thanks, Leigh Silverton.
I meant thanks, Rick Wilson of the Lincoln Project.
Trump is a Chatty Cathy doll. Full stop.
Rick - whatever happened to the years-old NYC call-in radio jock routine " Hello, Donnie from Queens; what's on your mind?"
So pushing into a newer news cycle, it seems Trump's duelling Atlanta rally tonight in the same college sports arena as Kamala's a few days ago, has patches of empty seats. Trump is big mad about that and ranting about the crowd size of the very rally he's headlining. It's scrumptious ;)
Of course it's the fire marshal's fault, although why a fire marshal would close the doors when the arena is under capacity is anybody's guess, LOL. They were keeping out his fans and forcing them into a line -- the same garbage he tried to pull about "crowds" at his Manhattan court cases. They're doing this because they're a _college_ (colleges are always hotbeds of Radical Left Marxists) and my gosh, if they can do that to poor Trump supporters at a rally, imagine what they'll do to them in the election.
Then there's officially backing out of the ABC debate and "agreeing to" one on FOX, in a giant arena with Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum. That's obviously not an agreement with the Harris campaign (they probably heard about it the way we all did). Something tells me Kamala Harris could get the word out, fill (at least) half the stadium with her cheering fans and march right into the lion's den. Something else tells me that this is a sucker's game and would be nothing like even a televised presidential debate, which are always fake debates anyway, but just a grotesque spectacle.
What should Kamala do? What do y'all think?
I think she should march right into the lion's den and eat Donnie alive.
In front of his own audiece.
A. If she doesn't, then it's fuel for "she's afraid of me". Plus, he definitely won't do ABC because she didn't do FOX. Win/win for Trump if she passes.
B. If she DOES the FOX event (whatever it is) and cleans his clock (or even holds her own), then she's winning over Trump voters on his own turf, and his subsequent no-show at ABC confirms him as a coward, and she get the whole ABC hour.
So I think it's a command performance for Kamala to walk into the FOX den and, if she cleans his clock, WIN the ELECTION right there.
Kamala, if you're listening, go on into there and clean his clock; show his own people that you're a better choice. It'll be the most watched TV in the campaign, and you can close the deal right there and then. Call his bluff.
I certainly see the rationale for this, Abe, but I don't think it's a slam dunk, either, which is why I posed the question. Allow me to play devil's advocate: FOX isn't a news channel; it paid $787.5M for lying about the last election. Will FOX cut off the mics after their allotted time a la CNN? I doubt Trump would have let FOX "agree" to that. Will Trump be able to roam around on stage and stalk Kamala the way he did Hillary? Will it become a nonstop namecalling fest in front of an audience, a large chunk of whom are gleefully open racists and misogynists and who don't accept Kamala's legitimacy as a candidate? There have been debates in front of audiences before, but of a few hundred at most. For obvious reasons, there has _never_ been a presidential debate in front of a stadium crowd.
It would certainly be quite a spectacle, but I think you're engaging in magical thinking if you imagine it might change any minds in either the rally crowd (Trump crowds don't have minds to change) or the FOX TV audience. It would certainly generate huge sympathy and energy for Kamala supporters, but they're already juiced up to the max, so it's hard to see a need for that if it's all Kamala would get out of the experience. It will not instantly "win" the election for her. Democrats placed too much hope on the Biden debate. Be careful of that here.
As for "now Trump can say Kamala won't debate"? Who CARES what Trump says? The obvious riposte to that is "yeah ... on FOX." What Team Kamala can do is submit a set of reasonable rules to FOX -- limit the crowd size to the normal size of presidential debate audiences, mic cutoffs when time has expired. Trump will refuse them, of course, and then Kamala can say that Trump really doesn't want a debate, he wants an ugly spectacle.
And then Kamala can sit down in front of actual journalists at ABC.
That's my counterpoint, anyway.
I didn't realize it was a "full arena audience" -(just looked up the specs) - that's not a debate, that's a Roman coliseum kill the lion situation.
Sounds like a team-Trump brainwave to counter-program his cowardice in backing out of ABC.
And in that MAGA mob situation, you're right, all she'd get is insults and chants "lock her up" - it would be an ugly spectacle. So in that case, she'd be lowering herself for no gain.
Let Trump/FOX do their bullshit so-called debate, it'll be the same old shit show, while the ABC gig will have decorum and Trump's no-show will hurt him.
Overall, I see K rising in the polls, especially in swing states, money flowing in (for offices, signs, ads across multiple platforms, etc), and the calendar works for her: a week of VP headlines, then FREE saturation coverage with the convention, and more self-fulfilling polls, while Trump gets more desperate and more crazy.
Yesterday's rally he was trying out insults with the MAGA mob: low-IQ, stupid, can't even read, most radical VP in history, worst VP in history, lunatic, horrible person. That's the extent of Trump's strategy: hurl misogynist insults; he doesn't realize he's insulting every woman in America, and driving them to the Dems. So let him rant. So much for "defining" Kamala. Must be panic in Trump-world.
Yep, Abe, it's a Roman coliseum. Trump thinks of these things literally in terms of professional wrestling. So I agree with you that this was a head fake they knew VP Harris would never agree to, as a way for Trump to flip the script while avoiding a debate with a woman prosecutor who clearly terrifies him.
Did FOX even agree to this? I can't imagine it has anything in writing saying it did. Baier and MacCollum are from the news side of FOX and I can't imagine them wanting to "moderate" a debate in an arena setting. It wouldn't be Hannity, Doocey or Watters fluffing Trump with endless softballs; they'd want to get in some tough questions for Harris so they'd have to toss in at least a token tough question or two for Trump. All Trump would have to do is raise his eyebrows and smirk and you'd have an arena of MAGAloids booing the moderators. That would be a shot in the arm for Newsmax, OANN and RSBN.
Carville and Sharpton were on Psaki and they both entertained the notion of Kamala doing the debate but I don't think they're fully grappling with the logistics. What makes me against the idea is doing it in a goddamn arena. If it were an auditorium seating a few hundred I'd likely be okay with it.
Kamala's rollout has been absolute perfection; not a single misstep. I think what made her '20 primary run less than stellar is that she did it in the left lane and adopted the most hardcore flavor of lefty positions to compete with Liz and Bernie, and I don't think that's who she is. I think she was pandering in the primary and pandering is poisonous to a politician because it makes them come across as inauthentic. I think she has the perfect response to the horse race gotcha mongers who ask why she's "flip flopped" -- she can say she just spent 3 1/2 years working in an administration and seeing what is possible.
Pivoting towards the center in the general election is Politics 101.
Kamala's choice of VP will show how far she'll pivot to the center vs appease the far Left vs address the electoral college map.
Personally, I don't think the country's ready for a gay VP, even though Pete B is an outstanding politician; Josh Shapiro would clinch PA's 19 votes on the electoral map but again, I don't think the country's ready for a black woman Prez and a Jewish VP; sadly, I think her choice has to be the person who best helps win the election (ie, defeat Trump) in a highly polarized and racialized country, and that would be Mark Kelly - a famous white man who would provide "balance" on the ticket.
Just speculation on my part, but I think Kelly would bring the balance plus help the electoral map (AZ's 11 EC votes) plus help raise the Dem prospects re Kari Lake.
So from a purely practical strategy - beat Trump!!! - I think choosing Kelly would be the smart move.
On the other hand, I hear a lot of talk about Prez/VP "chemistry" and somehow I don't see that chemistry between Kamala and Kelly.
So who knows? She's got an A+ brain trust in her campaign team (look what they've accomplished in 2 weeks) and I'm sure they'll make the right decision to achieve the mission of beating Trump.
We'll know soon enough.
I just posted about this at the top of the thread. Shapiro has a nasty scandal that's going to be in the PA papers for awhile. Kelly's out of the running (don't know exactly why, but the most recent reports have it down to Walz vs Shapiro).
I am _firmly_ for Walz over Shapiro (Shapiro is my gov) and I explain why up top.
I was very much moved, Rick, by your description of the quiet, patient, high-stakes negotiations to free the hostages held by the criminal Putin regime. I wonder whether the Wall Street Journal, which carried out a systematic smear campaign denigrating our president’s mental acuity, has the grace to feel differently about him now that their journalist Evan Gershkovich has been brought home.
Thanks for highlighting the serious people doing the work for our nation. It feels good to have the Americans back on American soil. It feels great to be proud of President Biden, VP Harris and their awesome team of diplomats.
Excellent commentary Mr Wilson!!
Trump's ploy to wiggle out of having to debate Kamala Harris is right out of his life-long playbook: renege on an agreement, then impose conditions at odds with the original deal.
"I like the cement, Mr. Cement Contractor...it's the price I don't like.. "
The beauty is, Kamala's gonna be there either way ;)
Something rarely mentioned about Kamala Harris is that she is an attractive woman. Attractive women - meaning, to put it crudely, a woman who is fu'able - are targets of special ire by weak men like T. Not only is she presidential, smart, articulate and able to express joy and happiness, but she's good-looking and completely out of T's reach. He was able to leverage his celebrity for a quick lay with Stormy, a few lays with the Playboy bunny, (which were really about power, sex for him is a power thing), but Kamala Harris? Never in a million years. And he knows it.
Kamala is 57 and post-menopausal so I wouldn't describe her in sexualized terms, but she is no doubt a very handsome woman, incredible cheekbones and a thousand-watt smile. The MAGAloids tried to run the sexual calumny on her, that she "slept her way to the top," but since there's no infidelity scandal associated with it (no aggrieved party), it doesn't go anywhere.
Someone needs to clue Trump in that she's "blasian." You know ... like Tiger Woods ;). I remember about two decades ago during Tiger Woods' heyday when he was winning every golf tournament in sight (and golf was a nearly all-white game two decades ago). My late dad followed golf and he was so proud for him and so amazed at his skills. I don't know if Donald Trump, Mr. Golf Guy, ever said a single word about Tiger Woods. He was a force of nature and doubtless intimidated Trump.
Would we see Flynn's fingers in Egypt's $10,000,000 'donation'(alleged) to Former President Trump? Flynn, where you see smoke, there is Flynn. Will it keep him busy over the next several months?(to leave everybody else alone)
OMG! President Biden’s comments, his hand on the back of the young lady who started to cry..he is always full of COMPASSION, SYMPATHY, DIPLOMACY, the ultimate statesman, a true patriotic president who shows his love and caring in all of his actions. President Biden is the best President in my lifetime! And I am not a youngster. What a beautiful example he has set for VP Harris. Compare this to the “self-licking” trumpliCons. Great term Rick! You are correct, that Biden will be highly regarded, I propose we remove the felon’s face from the list of presidents. I’ve already demanded my mayor get the trump felon name off of the building in Chicago!
The rude champion of the world, referring to a valid question as rude!! Any person supporting this DEADLY seditionist-inciter, CONVICTED Felon, RAPIST should be shunned, humiliated and ignored forever or until they learn their lesson. Meanwhile, President Biden is getting things done from the White House. He can do more with the retrumplicans running around with their hair on fire. Trump is not only weak, he is dangerous and backed by a former republican party turned cult. When we get our win, we MUST address the corruption of money across the political board. But Democrats have the sanity & leadership ability among its members to make real change for EVERYONE, in a positive way. Trump-supporting politicians-shame, shame, shame on you!
As usual, you nailed it, but I particularly loved this episode of The Elephant in the Room. Regarding Trump, thank you so much for saying what I wish a number of men I love would also say: Trump is weak, and he's always been weak. This is why he is not fit for leadership of our nation, and to me it is fundamental and the end of the inquiry, yet I keep hearing, "but the economy." What makes it hurtful is the failure to recognize what you point out: the weakest men are the most abusive to women. Why should I ever be expected to vote for a man who is abusive to women? He cannot help himself, as you say, and I love that Kamala Harris is his kryptonite so that finally, maybe finally, Trump's true nature will be revealed in such a way that the scales will fall from the eyes of those he has fooled.
Perfect perspective, Rick! How can anyone compare Joe Biden and Kamala Harris to the “pretend patriots” Trump and Vance?!