Two VP Picks, One Winner

The structure and content of the Republican Vice Presidential selection process taught us some important lessons. First, Donald Trump is easily manipulated by his broligarch fundraising overlords in Silicon Valley.

Next, Trump failed to vet even the most superficial aspects of the deeply strange and broken J.D. Vance, as stories of couches, cat ladies, and dolphin porn keep rolling into the dialogue. Finally, we learned that none of the political calculus in their process worked.

For the Democrats, there are also important lessons about Vice President Kamala Harris and how her team operates. Here’s why I think both the process of selecting Governor Tim Walz as her running mate and the outcome are important.

The first is political, and I can hardly express my delight in their skill in executing this pick. Without explicitly saying it or playing into it, Harris demonstrated by word, action, process, and selection that she understood the assignment perfectly: make the best choice.

She shored up a key Midwestern demo by selecting Tim Walz and wired down a perceived vulnerability on her ticket. She managed to find someone who defused progressive agita.

Tim Walz has a chonky cat. I’m sold.

Tim Walz may be a Minnesota prairie prog on paper, but he scans as a midwestern, Menard’s-shopping, ice-fishing, butter-carving dad-bod normie. His sheer normalcy is a political superpower, particularly when contrasted to professional weirdo and Peter Thiel acolyte J.D. “The ‘D’ is for deviant!” Vance.

Republicans and the One-Note Flute

The Republicans have been racing into the dull frame of their tired old Arthur Finkelstein model, but it won’t work. The Finkelstein model was to bellow “LIBERAL” at the top of one’s lungs until hypoxia set in.

Arthur is a nearly forgotten character today, but if you’re my age, you worked with, for, or around him at some point. As political scientist Darrell West once said of Arthur, “I’ve detected five phrases he uses—ultraliberal, superliberal, embarrassingly liberal, foolishly liberal, and unbelievably liberal.”

The vaunted MAGA/GOP message machine is broken unless their targets fit into the neat cultural boxes they’ve programmed their stolid followers to obey. “Coastal liburl bad.” “Southern conservative good.” “Midwest is America. Coastal cities are liberal hellscapes.”

They’re trying it on Walz today, and it will fail.

Competence and Good Cheer

There’s another element of Walz’s cheerful competence and get-it-done Midwest affect. Walls reeks of boring, midwestern administrative competence, again detached from the clichés of MAGA screeching about communism. He knows how to laugh about himself and engage with people outside an ideological bubble.

By choosing him, Harris has denatured an ideological aspect of the election. They can continue to focus more on optimism, freedom, her more ebullient personality, and her optimistic vision of America.

The lack of leaks is another enormous and positive sign. This was a secret until it wasn’t. It was a tightly held process until it was time to release it. This is what a functioning campaign looks like. Good campaigns leak on purpose. Bad campaigns just leak. Trump’s campaign is leaking like the Titanic.

Walz will be a stellar contrast to the strange and sour Vance as he continues to grunt and grumble through interviews even Fox can’t fix in post. He’s a real guy. A bro. A dude. A guy who knows how to put on snow chains on tires, fix shit around the house, and lead people.

Republicans Are Shook

The wildly undisciplined MAGA messages against both Harris and Walz have one thing in common: panic.

With Trump at war with his party — oh, Donald, thanks for helping put Georgia back in play — by attacking popular leaders in his own party and rehashing his old and politically stale “Muh stolen election” war stories, the GOP is nervous. Elected Republicans are getting more panicked by the day.

This is not the headline you want three months from the election:

“Trump going off book and attacking fellow Republicans — and the resulting intra-party heartburn — is hardly new for GOP lawmakers. The fact that they’re mostly staying quiet is in line with many Republicans’ long-standing practice of grumbling privately while downplaying concerns in public. Still, the agitation within the party this time appeared to cut deeper than before, dashing some Republicans’ hopes that the ex-president was exercising more discipline after his 2020 loss.

And Kemp wasn’t the only Trump-endorsing Republican governor that the former president went after in recent days. On Friday, Trump fired off multiple Truth Social posts excoriating Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee, the chair of the Republican Governors Association, for being a “RINO.” Lee’s sin, according to Trump, was that he had months ago endorsed an incumbent GOP state senator, while Trump had more recently endorsed the challenger.”

The wildly undisciplined MAGA messages against both Harris and Walz have one thing in common: panic. Trump is off the rails, Vance is off message, and the GOP is pretending they’ve never heard the name “Donald Trump.”

The frame is becoming clearer by the moment: Happy Warriors who love America versus two men who loathe the country and its people.

It will still be a rough fight, but Harris made a smart choice that stacked the odds even more in her favor.