Summary
Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, Kamala Harris’ 2024 running mate, has suggested he may run for president in 2028.
Reflecting on the Democrats’ loss to Donald Trump and JD Vance, he admitted: “A large number of people did not believe we were fighting for them in the last election – and that’s the big disconnect.”
Walz said his life experience, rather than ambition, would guide his decision.
Though his VP campaign was marred by gaffes, he remains open to running if he feels prepared.
If Republicans experience a route like they suffered in 2018, it will likely be due to the mushy indie republican-when-its-convenient voters breaking ranks in droves, just like they did in prior Dem wave years. That’s what Harris was banking on in 2024 when she paraded around her pet RINOs Liz Cheney and Jeff Flake. She just failed to understand that these wishy-washy voters are chasing less war and less disruption and more protectionist economics, something Trump was able to dangle over their heads (twice!) to win the GOP primary / national election.
Republicans don’t really seem to get it, either. Which is why they think the midterm after a wave year is the perfect time to put Grade A psychos all over the down-ballots and end up losing statewide in Alabama of all places as a result.
The “we won’t be having any more elections” crowd is heavily invested in a theory that Republicans can get their own base to sit down, shut up, and follow orders. But the last eight years of Trump should be an indication of the exact opposite. The party is being lead by the base, which means the prior generation’s power brokers like the Bushs and Cheneys and Bloombergs no longer have a place in it.
That’s completely wishful and fantastical thinking. By midterms the base will be so propagandized again to just forget about the regime robbing them blind left and right. I want to believe it, but recent history has taught me otherwise.
DOGE is currently lining up a big chunk of the Social Security Administration. There’s some speculation as to whether they’ll even be able to keep delivering checks in another few months. Onboarding new recipients will be functionally impossible.
Then you’ve got the seemingly routine instance of airplane collisions and accidents. Big historically conservative-friendly districts are losing whole swaths of their workforce. NASA is downsizing in Huntsville, Alabama and Galveston, Texas and Cape Canaveral, Florida. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
All the friendly Republican press didn’t save Congress in 2006 or 2018, and for good reason. You have a very different perspective on politics when you land on the unemployment line.
That said, if Dems fumble as hard as they did in 2002, its very possible they could hand the GOP a historic victory by disenchanting the entire liberal electorate with their cowardice and inaction.
Again, I want to believe, but recent history doesn’t provide that angle. During COVID there were people saying it was a government hoax as they were dying in the hospital. If they can be brainwashed to not believe their own fucking death, then nothing will change them.
I’m not talking about some of the moderates who don’t really mind Trump but don’t stay informed, by the way. I think some small percentage of these folks will be able to see the reality, just not in time.
Nutpicking, inflated by a media fixated on conflict over consensus. You also had stories about people dying in the hospital who were begging for the vaccine. And people who bounced through the virus unscathed who were insisting their quack remedy of choice / religious convictions were what saw them through. We got an avalanche of “Look at these stupid people!” headlines from every angle except the tens of millions busting down the door to be the first in line for the jab.
It’s not a static position. People drift across the map based on the recency of their inputs. That’s why so much of this modern media is so toxic. You’ll have people who were Gen X eco-warrior black block protesters in the 90s getting their brains absolutely cooked by DMT and Jordan Peterson. Then you’ll have people who were doing bow tie debate bro bullshit and waving Ron Paul rEVOLution plackards in the '00s who have fully embraced Warren/Bernie Social Democracy twenty years later.
But we don’t just change on The Facts. We change based on our media diet and our lived experiences. Moving from periods of economic stress to stability (and back again) may cause us to reject our institutionalized understandings of the world. Gaining/Losing friends and family shapes who we interact with and what we consider appropriate ideology/behavior.
Everyone is vulnerable to this shift. And we can all be moved in any direction. This isn’t something reserved for a rarified few. You’re just observing the people who find themselves at a tipping point.
This line of thinking has preserved whatever is left of my optimism. Let us hope my fellow Americans continue to function predictably.