Bring on the childless cat ladies!
the twist in the tale
US politics might seem a long way away — and I really didn’t intend this substack to be so much about politics of this kind (I promise I’ll return to creativity and writing in the next post) but so much is at stake for all of us — including the tiny slim hope of averting the worst of the climate catastrophe.
The triumph of fascism anywhere should concern us, but especially when this is a country with so much clout and when we are so politically tied to them as ‘allies’. It is unimaginable what will happen if Trump wins.
And it’s also just been such an incredible few weeks for lovers of twisty tales.
After White Jesus supposedly stepped in and saved the Orange guy from an assassination attempt — and with that impossibly raised fist and the ‘fight fight fight’ — my heart sank. (Even though when I first saw the clip I thought he was saying ‘fuck, fuck, fuck’, which would have been much more in character.)
And then seeing so many journalists - here and abroad - practically deifying him for this.
(It’s on an Etsy Tote bag, so it must be true.)
[And btw, if you’re bored with US politics and are just here for the cat memes, scroll down towards the end.]
The dark before the dawn…
There was also that awful ‘debate’, and the poor performance by Biden, and other gaffes . So many in the media, and even in the Democrat party, smelt blood in the water.
So while Trump became more and more incoherent, racist and absurd (‘the great Hannibal Lecter’??!), much of the media focussed on Biden’s age and ‘cognitive decline’, etc etc, rather than on his actual performance-record as a legislator, negotiator, and leader of a team.
(And note, as others have pointed out — Biden has a lifelong stutter which he has to focus hard to control, and the Gish Gallop — which is Trump’s debating style to the max -- is particularly difficult to cope with and respond well to for someone with a stutter.)
The old media loves Trump. Apart from it being run mostly by billionaires, as a walking talking circus Trump is also easy click-baity news and headlines — for years to come if he gets re-elected. Much harder as a journalist to actually do the work to get your head around the mechanics of complex policy and boring old steady capable government.
Trump is pure story.
But in the blink of an eye, that story changed.
Just after the Republicans had spent their millions focussing a campaign launch almost entirely around the inappropriateness of giving a very old and rambling, octagenarian, apparently cognitively-challenged man another term…. And after Trump had announced his anti-reproductive rights Christian misogynist racist as his VP…..Biden very neatly announces he’s not going to run after all.
And in that moment when he passes the baton onto Kamala Harris, who bursts out of the gates full of energy and zest.
Suddenly the only old rambling man in the race is Trump himself.
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And Trumps weird VP choice - JD Vance - is no longer the young guy with the full head of hair among the oldies but is now neatly lined up, ready to be pounced on and skewered by former prosecutor Kamala and her minions of cat ladies and cat lady allies.
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Black Women for Kamala
Over the past month on Twitter I’ve mainly seen Black people in the US standing by Biden. (‘He rode with Obama, so we’re riding with him.’)
But the night it was announced that Harris would be the nominee, a group of Black women rapidly organised an impromtu ‘Black women for Kamala’ zoom, hoping they might get up to a thousand attending.
But as more and more women poured in to the virtual room they had to contact the CEO of Zoom and get it changed to a webinar. Within a few hours they had 44,000 Black women on the call, raising over a million dollars in a few hours towards Harris’s campaign.
Since then there’s been folllow-up White Women for Kamala, and White Dudes for Kamala zooms also raising millions, and these millions are mostly made up of small donations from individuals. But the buzz and excitement of this being led by Black women is just wonderful to witness. (Take a back seat, yo’all.)
Meanwhile, all of Biden’s campaign funds were also effortlessly transferred to Harris because the funds were set up for them as a team ticket.
So after all those weeks of big-name Dems (looking at you, George Clooney) flailing about saying Biden had to resign because he was too old and incompetent, but unable to suggest who could safely replace him at this late stage (and Australians remember well what happened to Labor when they panicked and swapped out Gillard for Rudd2 at the last minute back in 2013)… a master-stroke of timing and accuracy was about to be released.
Old political dogs do sometimes have new tricks up their sleeves.
Well played old man!
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Which bus?
As others have put it, voting for a candidate or a party is not like hailing a taxi. It’s more like getting a bus, and you’re extremely unlikely to find a bus to take you right to your destination. You just have to look for the bus that takes you closest to it. And avoid the bus that takes you off to somewhere unsafe and where you definitely do not want to be.
The US doesn’t have the benefit of Preferential voting (or compulsory voting — or even voting on a Saturday and all the many pre-poll and postal voting options we in Australia take for granted). So without a Preference system the decision basically is Red or Blue.
(Get on the bus that gets you closest to the things that are important to you. And that still gives you the right to vote and protest and make change and have a public service. And then get active in grass roots ways.)
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So yes, the horrific genocide in Gaza continues… and the Democrats have been awful on this. Biden beyond terrible, but it looks like Kamala will be less terrible.
In the past week, while no means perfect, Kamala Harris has openly refused to attend that obscene Congress session that treated Netanyahu as a hero. And so far she does seems to be strong on at least calling for an immediate Cease Fire.
Something hard to imagine from a US Presidential candidate just a few weeks ago.
So… cautiously excited!
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Meanwhile, while the old media was celebrating Trump…. TikTok and Twitter were doing their thing: eg this hilarious video from Alan on Tik Tok
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And they’ve also discovered an old clip of J D Vance bemoaning that the US is run by ‘childless cat ladies’ with no ‘physical’ stake in the future of the country.
(Hang on, isn’t this guy a member of the Catholic Church, which has been run by childless men for yonks?)
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Then the next question (or one of them) is who will she name as her VP on her running ticket.
(Unless I’ve been too slow sending this out - as usual - and this has already happened by the time you read this - so sorry… speed is not my strong suit at the moment.)
I am barracking for the wonderful Pete Buttageig.
Articulate, kind, thoughtful and apparently a good legislator too. And people love voting for him.
The only objection to him seems to be…. ah, he’s gay.
But I agree with this Professor — be bold Democrats!— go for a Black-Asian Woman President and a super-articulate super-smart Gay man with two children for VP!
Kamala and Pete would be an extraordinary team.
So much has changed, so much needs changing.
And people vote for hope. And we need some kindness in politics.
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Here’s a small taste of Pete - responding to a fellow politician’s comment re gays destroying ‘merica -- :
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And re being bold — just look at how Black women have led the charge for this campaign. Not just in that amazing swiftly organised zoom, which then inspired White Women for Kamala, and then White Dudes for Kamala — the latter had 100,000 turn up on other platforms and 30,000 on Twitter/X live (which may have had something to do with their account being suspended 30 minutes later??.. hmm - yay, free speech)…
….But also check out this excellent modelling of good journalism by the woman at the Black Journalists event when she skewered Trump and kept him on point while Trump whitemansplained what a Black woman is and isn’t:
https://x.com/Acyn/status/1818714724974182488
[sorry, I’m not sure how to make these videos show up - if you know how to do it, please let me know! But this is worth clicking on, and then coming back here.]
(And btw — Pete’s surname is pronounced BOOT-edge-edge. There are youtube videos on how to pronounce his name and Kamala’s, but I think I’ve run out of space and puff.)
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So here’s to boldness, and kindness, and creating an even more fun story than the sad sack old white-right-wing drama:
There is always hope.
Never give up till the last possible moment. Surely hundreds of movies have taught us this?
Thank you for reading my lovely friends. xxxx
I would so appreciate if you could share this post with your friends, or restack or on socials or wherever. (And thank you ♥️ for the likes and comments - it all really helps.)
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perfect analysis and yes Pete is by far the best choice . the only choice xxx
I'm beginning to suspect Biden was playing 5 dimensional rope-a-dope. His withdrawal was perfectly timed.