When Hillary Clinton ran for president in 2016, she had more than 200 distinct policy proposals. Four years ago, Joseph R. Biden Jr. had a task force write a 110-page policy document for his White House bid.I made the link a free-access "gift" link so you can help me read this thing. I am irritated by the claims of "buzz" and "good feelings and warmth." We're being instructed on how to feel, but it seems to be about how other people feel, or so we are told.
Now, Vice President Kamala Harris does not have a policy page on her campaign website.
A last-minute campaign born of Mr. Biden’s depreciated political standing has so far been running mainly on Democratic good feelings and warmth toward Ms. Harris, drafting off legislation and proposed policies from the man she is hoping to succeed....
POLONIUS The actors are come hither, my lord.
HAMLET Buzz, buzz.
POLONIUS Upon my honor—
HAMLET Then came each actor on his ass.
POLONIUS The best actors in the world, either for
tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical,
historical-pastoral, scene individable, or
poem unlimited....
The OED tells us that this use of "buzz" was said to be "a common exclamation (of impatience or contempt) when anyone was telling a well-known story" but might have been "a sound to command silence."
"Buzz" came to mean a rumor and also the sound of a telephone (or a telephone call). Beginning in the 1940s, it became "A feeling of excitement or euphoria, esp. one induced by a stimulant; a thrill, a ‘kick’. slang (originally U.S.)" (OED). And look how Judith Krantz used it in the 1978 best-seller "Scruples":
"She walked up Rodeo or down Camden, feeling a sexual buzz as she searched the windows for new merchandise."
As for the phrase "heavy on buzz," I can understand it. It combines buzz — meaning excited but indistinct talk — with "heavy on" — meaning there's a lot of it, but "heavy on buzz" isn't a common phrase.
Looking for it I found it in an old discussion of bass guitar playing: "My pbass is heavy on buzz which is fine for punk rock and classic rock. But when I want to play some low key jazz or something it's super annoying."
Question whether the heavy-on-buzz presidential campaign is super annoying. Do we want substance? Where did Hillary Clinton get with her "200 distinct policy proposals"?
Posts
107 comments:
Not having policy is fine if you're an outsider running against a despised administration. Or if your administration is very popular and you can get by with promising more of the same. But if you're the VP for a President who had to withdraw from the election?
Yeah, she's finished.."Incredibly strong and incredibly fragile" means her speechwriters are the alcoholics, not her.
PSA: Buzz driving is drunk driving
I've actually been impressed with the coordinated press efforts towards Kamala. A deeply unpopular VP with no successes to point too - and many failures - and with huge staff turnover issues and recent past stories, serving under a failing President, gets abruptly inserted into the party's lead for President without a vote. And it's all "buzz and warm feelings" and suddenly she's neck and neck with the Republican candidate was almost just assassinated.
Maybe Trump is right, but to me his campaign should put out her policy proposals for her. Make it official looking. And simply highlight all the policies of the Biden admin that have struggled/failed. Call it her official policy stances and show the results - and make them own it or repudiate it.
Hand it out as the official policies in person in Chicago to being walking by, announcing "First time look into Presidential Candidate Kamala Harris' official policy positions" - backed by 4 years of evidence.
Reid Epstein isn’t very observant, cause Inga the other day was here talking about Kamala’s new economic policies. He should have read Althouse commentary for Kamala’s policies. Then again, I do and still don’t know her policy position beyond “Trump is bad and must not win”.
All sizzle and no steak.
Come Friday, who will be the Demmie candidates?
At the moment it looks like Harris-Walz but there is some buzziness about Big Mike Obama and Shapiro.
Big Mike would be a threefer. First black trans woman president
John Henry
Is it too early to call the Democratic convention a disappointment? 😉
But now the NYT seems to be nudging us into thinking about how we the people feel, and we're supposed to feel good... good and warm... about Kamala.
@Althouse, when you write “nudging” instead of “trying to nudge” does that not imply that it’s working? At least on you?
the most interesting thing about all of this, was the admission that polls slant their results (due to "democrat enthusiasm!"). I was surprised to hear them admit it out loud. But admit it they did..
The narrative cycle will move on as it always does. If Trump is lucky, the focus will move on to various disasters at the Democratic Convention. If he is unlucky it will be paeans to the misty-eyed farewell of Biden tonight, accolades to the brilliant Harris acceptance speech, or to another unforced error of Trump/Vance. One can only hope that there are at least a few reporters with a modicum of integrity who, still feeling embarrassment at their complicity in the Biden senility coverup, will resist playing along with the Harris incompetence coverup.
It’s just a bad idea to use the verb “drafting” in the sense of a race car using the aerodynamics of following closely on another car in sentences that include nouns like “legislation” which are more commonly coupled with that verb in policy discussions. The phrase “too clever by half” springs to mind. And cmon we are all already sick of this “vibes” bullshit. America doesn’t need vibes. We don’t need a dad. We need leaders who can make good decisions and govern effectively, neither of which has ever been demonstrated by Walz or Harris even though they have had many opportunities to do so.
Strike three.
The buzz on twitter, X, is that Harris is buzzed (drunk) all of the time. Sources are of course listed as 'people' on her staff. So typical MSM type headline.
Would explain how strange she acts and how retarded she is when she speaks without notes.
Biden/Harris regime is a sad, pathetic joke. Dementia Joe, falling apart from the start, backed up by Harris, who can't form a sentence unless it is scripted.
Harris has no platform, no stated goals, no inspiring call to arms- just the usual heres free stuff, cuz guberment money is free and you will love it.
Money Manger
One can only hope that there are at least a few reporters with a modicum of integrity
8/19/24, 6:24 AM
Can I buy some drugs from you? Wake up, Sleeping Beauty! The number of Hollywood flops and the rise of alt-media should have been proof that an "A-list" convention isn't going to be half the draw Democrats think. Honestly, they would have been much better off putting George Clooney as the candidate, but that wouldn't happen for obvious reasons.
Mark Steyn, “The vibe as veil”
Yes, they are prompting you to feel a way based on your desire to be socially acceptable to all the others who the writer is reporting who feel that way. You better feel this way because all the other girls do. If you don't you'll be excluded. Hey team, here's today's feelings theme.
There was a time when space in a printed newspaper was valuable ... which made news compete with ads. Perhaps ad space isn't selling well and rather than reduce prices the NYT fills the unsold space with this stuff.
Buzz simply means that Democrats are excited by her candidacy simply because they think she can win. If she falls behind Trump, she'll have nothing.
Buzz is great when you’re +5 in the polls. Harris is not.
Geez Louise. How do I "feel" about a Kamala Harris presidency? Terrified.
I welcome an examination of Americans' feelings, because they are more affected by one's circumstances than the happy talk of blithering pols. Personally, I feel like it would be nice to make America great again and I see that everything Kamala proposes will make the misery worse for most everyone.
John Henry hit it on the head. They wanted to make everyone feel good about her and that was going to be the way for her to beat Trump. Now the press is starting to challenge her. Either the press found some integrity (hah) or there is something more afoot. We can speculate as to what it is but I will not believe she is the actual nominee until the convention is over. (Yes I know they did a virtual committee a few weeks back to make her official.)
I read between the line poorly but even I got a news story that Kamala Harris's team was the one pushing to keep the virtual phone-in committee to finalize the nomination for her, keeping in place that plan originally made for Joe, because they wanted to thwart other forces in the Democrat party from having the nomination go to someone else.
I certainly find it plausible that DNC shenanigans are in full motion.
All hat no cattle. All sizzle no steak. Sound and fury signifying nothing. Given, Kamala Harris' limitations, this is the most effective strategy to victory.
An African or American buzz? The latter are more productive and less aggressive.
Four years ago Joe Biden hid from the world in his basement. Our hostess said the Charlottesville lie made him disqualified in her eyes. Yet he won and, to me, America has suffered mightily.
Today Kamala hides in plain sight. She has repeated the Charlottesville lie... And offers price controls as an economic policy.
Is she also disqualified in our hostesses mind? Or has that absolutely disproven liable been watered down by repetition unchallenged by the press? Are we that lacking in memory?
Frighteningly the remaining question is, will she win?
The buzz is their overuse of the word 'Joy'. They've gotten more mileage out of that word than anyone since Proctor & Gamble.
Althouse: We're being instructed on how to feel, but it seems to be about how other people feel, or so we are told.
So what else is new about this. The MAGA lean by Ann, Meade and most of the commenters found herein is all intended to condemn the Bidens, Never Trumpers, centrists and Democrats in general - simply because the opposition can read that Trump is and always was a gangster and bring up the subject here.. But his felonies approved or otherwise, never mentioned by our far-right extremists. Never disagree with The Boss.
Perhaps a short trip to Howell this week to join the White Supremicist/KKK rally with Trump will make y'all happy. But watch out for snipers who can shoot as well as Leroy Jethro Gibbs.
My apologies for repetitive comments. When I hit "publish" I got a message the comment did not go through.
Our generation has had quite a nice run through a set of years that allowed us to avoid an existential war, against most odds. The result has been the world we see today - anxious, naive, and needy as it is. If I were completely amoral, I would wish for a Harris victory to give the people what they want.
Any existential dread out there? No? Good.
Keep your eyes on the right to control your bodies, girls. Kamala will take over and keep you safe while you keep your right to not be under the thumb of weird men who don't care about your problems and don't understand you, OK? We promise.
This is what it is all about at this point. The right to "health care" and the obligation to accept the rest of the world in your spare bedroom, until the big, big flash comes. When it does, many will welcome it. The rest will make big money and get exactly what they want until the end. A world without America (and that's where we're headed with this) is not a safe place.
I'm one of the few that sees Lionel Shriver as an optimist.
You are happy at how they celebrate this soul less ring wraith this destroyer
No hat, all cackle.
Rush rush, got the joyo?
Buzz buzz, gimme joyo
Rush rush, got the joyo?
Yo yo, no no joyo
"What's the buzz, tell me what's happening."
All right, look. Here's the deal. I'm the star of the show, okay? So if I decide to bust out a solo, do me a favor and give me the freedom to rock out.
Man, I wanted to read your response to John Henry, but you’d already removed it, damn you! 😆
It’s much too early for your simpering bullschiff.
Any time the number has a three or a multiple of three you say "bizz". Anytime there is a seven or multiple of seven you say "buzz". Twenty one is "bizz buzz". The advanced version requires a change of direction at every bizz and buzz…
Doctrev wrote: "Not having policy is fine if you're an outsider ..."
This is the most important comment; people have accepted that Kamala Harris has no policies. But of course, she does have policies:
Deficit spending is a policy. It causes high inflation and ensures that interest rates on housing will be 7% for the duration of her vice presidency. The Democrats are buying votes with tax dollars and borrowing those dollars to do it. This is a policy.
High inflation and interest rates RIPPLE throughout the economy, raising the price of gasoline and groceries (and literally everything else) obscenely.
Untrammelled immigration is a policy. This results in UNAFFORDABLE housing as these migrants push up demand for a limited supply of available housing. This CAUSES homelessness. But, because house prices are high, then the taxes collected by levying PROPERTY TAXES remains high. Thus benefiting government employees at the expense of the rest of us.
These are just a few of her policies. I won't go into all of them.
The interesting issue the Deep Staters have is convincing America that Kamala Harris has no policies. If she has no policies, then of course, we cannot BLAME HER for these policies. That is their strategy.
And Doctrev's comment shows that this strategy is working.
Based on a highly unscientific poll of my wife’s white, college educated female friends, buzz is all you need. Most of them are buzzed all the time anyway.
Buzz is that feeling you claim to enjoy the night before you wake up with a massive hangover.
The gad said: “Trump is a gangster”.
You know Trump was loved by the right and left until he came down the escalator. Now he’s a gangster? What a lame comment. Gimme some examples of gangsterisms or shut up.
It's the buzz of the hive mind.
I wasn’t responding to John Henry — to him “Big Mke” is Michelle Obama.
Old and busted - That the Media are an arm of the Democrat Party. At this stage - it's just tired, sad and pathetic.
"whether the heavy-on-buzz presidential campaign is super annoying"
Nah. The buzz buzz works on Dem-leaning LIVs. And of course no one believes she doesn't have "policies." Ads are heavy on untrammeled abortion. Record is reliably prog. Border czar kept gates wide open. Expect more spending, more green transition, BAMN. Meanwhile, the campaign gives the handful of remaining moderates in the middle just enough room to rationalize a lefty vote. Smart.
Democratic buzzers can cause anaphylactic shock in a population. Case in point: human rites, Mengele dreams, [catastrophic] [anthropogenic]
immigration reform, medical mandates, progressive prices, ethnic Springs, nationwide insurrections, etc.
Every time I see a picture of Harris, she's smiling. And immediately my mind goes to the Undisputed Truth's fabulous song. Probably not the kind of buzz she wants. Link (Can you dig it?)
Trump is and always was a gangster, according to gadfly. Don't forget the "always was"! It's just that it was fine for him to be some unspecified type of gangster, obviously a different kind from "Chicago Way" Obama, right up to the point where bought and paid for blue places on the map turned red on Election Night 2016. And we never talk about his "felonies" - funny, I remember talking about them a lot here, while their manufacture was underway. Though maybe "manufacture" implies too much coherence - maybe I should have said "cobbling-together."
I'm waiting for new material.
Given, Kamala Harris' limitations, this is the most effective strategy to victory.
You must be sober this morning, Howard.
My words exactly ... and the sizzle is from road-kill raccoon.
Think of this as an advertising campaign. The public is being subtly plumped and puffed. Next comes the steer. From the candidate, there have been no press appearances of substance, no opportunity for reporters to ask about policy positions, or any of the standard material normally required of Presidential Candidates.
Aren't you anxious? But wait! Let us not forget, the Legacy Mainstream Media is a department within the Democrat machine, a fully-vested partner. This week will be the Harris/Walz beauty pageant. But don't expect too much in the way of policy commitments. Whatever commitments that are made, are made to be broken - as we've amply seen with every Democrat presidential administration and congressional leadership since the Obama years.
“Forward, the Blight Brigade!”
Was there a shim dismayed?
Not though the media knew
Someone had blundered.
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die.
Into the valley of Death
Rode Harris - Walz.
"felonies". fify.
Yes… I understood that. I guess you had to be there.
Buzz always reminds me of the Emily Dickinson poem I read for forensics in high school. “I heard a fly buzz when I died…”
My phonology prof told the class that 'buzz' sounds like the Navajo word for 'testicles' and it would normally elicit snickers from his Diné students when he was explaining the difference between vocalized consonants and voiceless consonants.
They stopped pushing "joy" once everyone noticed that it was a keyword you could use to see which media entities are controlled by the Deep State. "Joy" has always been very, very useful in manipulating a population.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strength_Through_Joy
"Heavy on buzz" refers to her campaign manager, named Buzz, who really, really needs to go on a diet,
https://cdn.openart.ai/published/o0tP6fxxvEyGVKEQAWkf/lsd2DC0H_ItYk_1024.webp
Gadfly is well named. It is persistent, irritating, and critical, but only a stimulus for it rather than anything substantive. So it will annoy you constantly to get your attention, but it will never provide anything you’ll find satisfying or constructive.
Good comment w/a good idea for Trump's team.
MadTownGuy,
"My phonology prof... "
Hello fellow linguist...
Too many promises have been made, to too many small special interests have been pandered to. You want intersectionality? They're all coming together this week, on the streets of Chicago - all playing the game from their spot at the trough for the next 4 years. The Democrats have to artfully juggle - that's this week's theme:
Give them the old Razzle Dazzle,
and they'll never catch wise
Althouse asked: Do we want substance?
Most of America is too stupid for substance. Average attention span is at goldfish level. Heard on the radio this morning Dems might not even put up a policy platform at the Chicago convention this week. The don't need to. The brainwashing has been quite successful. Harris is the perfect candidate to accelerate America's decline. This is her real mission. Like doing jack shit about the southern border. She's very good at it.
The GOP ran an orderly, contested primary season. One person won all the primaries and got all the delegates. That person was nominated at a peaceful, orderly "normal" convention. Popular people were given convention speaking times. A Pro wrassler announced Trump for the nomination. . They passed a party platform that runs 20 or so pages of plain language easy to read text. That platform lays out what the party plans if they win.
The Democrat party ran a closed primary season that bypassed the normal order to favor Joe Biden. Other candidates were not permitted or welcome. Biden got 14 million votes and won all the delegates. We were told by virtually everyone that Biden was a sharp as a tack "Super Ager". All that ended June 26th in one single 90 minute debate. A month later Biden announced on X that he was dropping out and endorsed Harris. There is no policy statement on her website and no platform on the D's website. there is some talk that we may have to wait until after the election to find out where they want to take the country. The DNC will feature Biden, the Clintons and Obama.
The media is going to have to set new records for gaslighting to pull Harris/Walz to a win.
I'm Through With Buzz
As some wise man (Schopenhauer?) once said, "Every noxious insect thinks it's Socrates."
Well-put, Dixcus. There are plenty of policies. But the first policy of Democrat Policy Club is to never talk about Democrat Policy Club.
All that is left of this convention is to see how much everyone submits to Anita Dunn, ringleader of the new Red/Green Alliance. All the dogs are wagged. And Green doesn't stand for environmentalism anymore. It stands for the war in GAZA. Kamala Harris isn't much less of a figurehead than Biden. The Democrat operatives will wait out the Convention to calibrate precisely how much they need to submit to the Caliphate. We're Canada well on our way to becoming Britain. Meanwhile, Harris will take her emotional cues from someone like Megan Markle and swing petulant to demanding, while being reported as impactful but actually being irrelevant.
If Harris wins, that Maoist anti-Semite Anita Dunn will begin her 13th year quietly leading White House "policy" by the nose.
Note that the Times reporter took his cues from and quoted Anita Dunn.
There is no doubt that Harris' team is the one that kept the online delegate vote- and it was a smart move because an open convention would plausibly have dumped her ass too. Unlike John Henry above, I think it is far too late to dump her now even though it is still technically possible to do so.
I think in the press what you are seeing right now is an open acknowledgement that the massive propaganda push is probably not enough win her the White House, even with mail-in-vote fraud. She needs to win the national vote by at least 3% for the fraud to carry her the rest of the way against Trump and if you compare the polling averages to those from 2016 and 2020, she is far behind where Clinton and Biden were at this exact same point in the cycle. The press are openly encouraging her to run a more substantive campaign but I think Harris is completely incapable of doing so.
I for one look forward to hearing what President Harris is told to read off the teleprompter. I bet she can read her lines as well as Obama ever did, and of course she will outperform Biden in her declamation.
She's negrodocious vaginatastic! Two, two, two oppressed groups in one!
Had a friend in high school and after, whose formal first & middle names were Milton B, tho he went by Buzzy. Never heard him called Milton, except for those 1st day-of-class roll calls by teachers who didn’t already know him. He loved pot, so wasn’t unusual for Buzzy to gave a buzz on…
gadfly is always ready with an incomprehensible comment. I assume you think the jury did not need to reach a decision to convict.
Biden gave Democrats what they wanted and what they could get. They want other things that they aren't likely to get and won't talk about during the campaign, but formulating the next generation of proposals takes a while. Another VP might have been able to come up with a policy program by now. Harris, with her aversion to work, didn't. Biden was running as a status quo president (whatever new departures he might take if reelected). Harris didn't prepare anything new, so she's inherited the Biden platform until she does.
Trump isn't a gangster. What the Pelosi-Biden controversy reveals -- for anybody who didn't see it sooner -- just how gangsterish politics are. It's about clout and throwing one's power around to get what one wants. Trump hasn't mastered that yet, at least not in the political sphere.
P.S. Anita Dunn is Jewish herself and Michelle Obama is not and never has been a man. She's also not going to be the nominee.
"The interesting issue the Deep Staters have is convincing America that Kamala Harris has no policies. If she has no policies, then of course, we cannot BLAME HER for these policies. That is their strategy.
And Doctrev's comment shows that this strategy is working."
Aside from your strawmanning, I simply noted the Harris campaign strategy. President Trump has multiple vectors to attack her on, both as retort and counter example. It is why he is going to win.
"Heavy on buzz" should be a synonym for "all hat, no cattle". Is the country, no the world, ready for a social media marketer over those who do something useful for others in the world.
"It is possible for the mind to indulge in false logic, to make the worse appear the better reason, without instant exposure. But for the hand to work falsely is to produce a misshapen thing—tool or machine —which in its construction gives the lie to its maker. Thus the hand that is false to truth, in the very act publishes the verdict of its own guilt, exposes itself to contempt and derision, convicts itself of unskillfulness or of dishonesty."
Harris going full bore on the college-grad delusion that thinking an idea is the same as doing something in the real world. Harris for president of Online America
I heard from one report thatHarris was nominated a couple weeks ago in the virtual "closed" voting. The convention is all wag the dog. The roll call is just Potemkin village stuff.
They better be careful with that “buzz” thing when they have a candidate that behaves like Kamala.
“ Why does Auntie Kamala talk like that?” “She is just happy, sweetheart.”
Wine moms of America Unite!
Lazarus: Anita Dunn is a card-carrying Maoist. Many of her peers in the small-and-large-C communist Left were and are ethnically Jewish, but that doesn't stand in the way of their political anti-Zionism, of the extreme stripe of From the River to the Sea.
If you are also responding to my post with your comment about Michelle Obama: of course she's a woman, and I've never said otherwise. She also never wanted to be involved in electoral politics, and Bernardine Dohrn has said that she and Bill Ayers had to placate her through years of tough times in the Obama marriage as Barack insisted on continuing to run for higher offices and serve in the state senate. Michelle and Barack's lies about their extensive terrorist baggage is public record now, and only something really catastrophic happening to Kamala Harris would make the Party turn to Michelle now.
My first office job in the late 80s still had an old-timey phone system that must have been 20 years old. The admin "Buzzed you" and then told you " so-and-so was on Line 4". So, I can see why "Give me a buzz" meant phoning in the 40s or 50s or whatever.
But what about Bees? Buzz, Buzz goes the bee. Guys used to be nicknamed "Buzz" too. Maybe that had to do with Military air force service. And then there was the "Buzz cut". I heard that in old TV/movie once.
"Michelle Obama is not and never has been a man."
Where is Crocodile Dundee when you really need him.
The Democrats I know don’t like her and are disappointed in how she got there but there’s no way in hell they’ll ever vote for Trump. I guess it’s like us conservatives holding our noses to vote for McCain, Romney,Bush & Dole.
"heavy on buzz" = alcohol consumption
Somebody better let the Democrat party know...
Greg Price
@greg_price11
The official DNC platform has been released and it makes at least five mentions of “Biden’s second term.”
Tough look for the Democrat copy editors.
https://x.com/greg_price11/status/1825557327300510072?
From Cankles to Cackles. Feel the buzz. (just add batteries)
Oso Negro said...
She's negrodocious vaginatastic! Two, two, two oppressed groups in one!
8/19/24, 10:06 AM
If she comes out as bi-sexual, Trump will stop campaigning, no sense wasting money on jet fuel.
People on X are asking if Harris has been drinking (alcohol) prior to public appearances -- due to her babbling. "She's one, two, three times the limit.."
There's nothing you can drink that can't be drunk.
Nothing you can do that can't be done.
Nothing you can say but you can learn how to play the game.
It's easy.
All you need is buzz.
All you need is buzz.
All you need is buzz, buzz.
Buzz is all you need.
She is the buzzkill
She is the buzzkill
He is Teh Walzrus
Don’t pick the Jew
Don’t pick the Jew
Jewga Jewga… Jewga Jewga
I'm staying with my initial assessment 😉
It's going to be a great Domocrat National Convention. 1000 Chicago cops have already called in sick.
Cankles to Cackles
That’s all they do
First they suck up
Then they fuck up
They wear pantsuits too
h/t the Stylistics
My neighbor best friend was Buzz. His parents named him Burgess, but that demanded a Nick name.i
When we reached high School Buzz made some bad grades and his father shipped him off to Georgia Military Academy for discipline. But he came back 2 years later all squared away. GMA morphed into Woodward Academy but it kept its strict discipline tradition. And all my kids went there. I remember as they left Woodward for college the tuition bills went way down.
Buzz...as in Windrip...?
Buzz Light.
"We carefully brew our beer to be perfect for anywhere there's fun because when there's fun, there's a Bud Light there."
That sounds like something she would say.
Buzz is hype. Works in show business until the curtain goes up.
Since when do the Dems love a ruthless prosecutor? Just one more supposed deeply held value that has changed 180 degrees and they don't even see it about themselves.
Won't mention femnist buzzer as it must have been mentioned above.
Original Magic Wand by Vibratex with IntiMD Trigger Pin Point Attachment
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