The State of the Race – Update

 President Joseph R. Biden (D) and the rest of the Democrats seemingly made the right call in replacing him as their Presidential Nominee with Vice President Kamala Harris (D). There is now a resurgence of energy and optimism on their part, profoundly amplified by generous and original donations, and reflected in improved poll numbers.

When I wrote my last post about the State of the Race, the Democrats were at risk of inadvertently transforming safe states into battlegrounds (such as Minnesota and New Hampshire). Now mitigated, the risks are that the Republicans could lose most of the traditional swing states (including Florida, which was considered safe for them at the beginning of this election cycle).

Gov. Tim Walz (DFP – MN), surprisingly, has turned into a good runningmate choice for the Harris campaign. His folksy persona has been warmly embraced by liberals and moderates alike, and progressives are very fond of his record. Likely developed by his experience as a high school teacher, he has also shown a knack for handling bullies such as former President Donald J. Trump (R). Walz’s preferred adjective for the GOP ticket (“weird”) is a classic school insult, meant not to be confrontational, but is a package insult used to both delegitimize the target by ascribing to them qualities which are not widely accepted, while simultaneously removing any mutual premise upon which such ascription can be debunked (e.g., calling someone a liar gives them a common premise [the truth] for a rebuttal; calling someone “weird” only permits the victim to rebut by calling into question the standard upon which one is judged to be weird).

In this author’s opinion, politically, Gov. Josh Shapiro (D-PA) would have been the better pick, not only geo-politically (this would have likely secured Pennsylvania for the Democrats – and the Republicans would be very hard pressed to win without this Commonwealth), but also ideologically, as his more moderate positions could have appealed to Never Trump Republicans.

The author is cognizant that the Democrats will lose if their socialist and progressive supporters are too demoralized to vote (or vote third-party). This election will be decided upon which party does a better job “turning out” its voters. This being the case, his strong progressive record makes Walz a better choice than Shapiro for Democrats – and also for Republicans, who now have an opening to attack the Democratic ticket as being something to the left of Karl Marx.

This attack has already begun and time will tell whether it is successful (in keeping Never Trump Republicans from voting for the Democrats), unsuccessful (has no effect), or backfires (it fires up the Democratic base). What is more worrisome for Democrats is the fact that Harris is continuing along the same path which led to her 2020 Presidential Campaign’s demise, which is “flip-flopping” on the issues.

As I outlined in my previous post, the Democrats were in danger of losing this election because they were ceding the narrative to the Republicans. While the momentum has shifted and the Democrats have seized control of the narrative as a result, they are again at risk of ceding it if the Harris campaign cannot craft a consistent message. Failing to do so leaves another opportunity for the Republicans to characterize the Democrats as power hungry, in a seemingly paradoxical way: they are politically ambitious without principles (e.g., saying whatever is expedient to get elected) and the policies they actually  implement are consistently authoritarian (e.g., big spending, big centralized government).

Doing so will help to mitigate the weaknesses in the GOP ticket, potentially staunching the bleeding of Never Trump Republicans, which they will need if they are to have any hope of breaking the 48% ceiling they have reached in every election since 1992 (with 2004 being an exception).

Ultimately, this still remains a very tight race and the author again believes that this could be the tightest Presidential race since 2004 (possibly even since 2000). In the Electoral College, there are even more likely paths to 269 for each candidate (thus a tie) than in any other election this century.

What about Chase Oliver?

Some of my more libertarian friends may be wondering what my thoughts are on the Libertarian Party’s Presidential ticket of Chase Oliver and Mike ter Maat. Ideologically, there is much that I like about their platform (especially immigration) and some that I detest (e.g., permitting States to secede and supporting State nullification of Federal laws). Overall, I do not expect them to do better than the ticket led by Jo Jorgensen in 2020, especially since the Party is several fractured due to the heavy-handedness of the so-called Von Mises Caucus. The Oliver/ter Maat ticket will win less than 1% of the vote.

As for myself, I will continue to support the Democratic Party ticket this cycle. I would not characterize myself as a fan of the Harris/Walz ticket, but the Trump/Vance ticket is an undeniable existential threat to the U.S. Constitution (Trump has publicly called for its termination; Harris has not). If Trump wins, there may be no Constitution afterwards and the only difference in casting a principled vote for Oliver/ter Maat will be to defeat the fundamental principles of government by the consent of the governed.

At the moment, the only way to protect the Constitution is to ensure that Harris wins and Trump is a second-time loser and, hopefully, end his political career. His two losses, coupled with Congressional losses (either actual or failures to live up to expectations) in 2018, 2020, 2022, and 2024 should send an unmistakable message to the GOP that they should abandon Christian Nationalist-Populism. It will not ensure that they will return to their more classical liberal roots, but at least there will be an opportunity.