Writes David Brooks, in "How Harris Can Finish Strong" (NYT).
Why are we talking about drama? David Mamet's idea was about how to command the attention of the audience. If Harris is reduced to the level of needing to get us to pay attention, she is already falling far short of what it takes to become President. And somehow this brings us back to a topic that's annoyed me for a long time, which I mark with my tag "how does Kamala feel." The election is not about her feelings, and there has always been something insane about acting like it is.
The convention went so well, we were told, because the theme was joy, and Kamala was joyful. No, she wasn't, but they seem to have thought they could keep that bubble bouncing for her super-short run to Election Day. What about our feelings? Are we left with vicarious feelings, whatever reflected joy might drift our way or whatever concoction is served up as the "ruling passion of her soul"? Or are we just supposed to pay attention — like the audience David Mamet wants so bad — pay attention and take instruction to go vote as we are told?
The comments over there — the ones I've read, anyway — are all about one thing: Brooks's assertion what Trump wants is "to dismantle the elites who he thinks have betrayed regular Americans." And that's an apt focus for Trump haters. If Brooks is right about that, Trump is the hero of this screenplay.
ADDED: My first "how does Kamala feel" post came on November 9, 2020: "Where will Biden put Buttigieg?" I was quoting Axios: " How would Kamala Harris feel about having a potential 2024 rival lurking the Cabinet and building a donor base from a perch at the United Nations — and around New York City's big donors?" And I wrote:
I hope that doesn't become the key question at every turn — How would Kamala Harris feel? Ugh. I hope this isn't the beginning of a new phase of semi-conscious misogyny: Because the Vice President is a woman, we must think about the Vice President's feelings. Does anyone ever wonder how Mike Pence feels?
Semi-conscious misogyny.
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Jeez, how clueless can a hack be? We want leadership and competency of command, not entertainment and plot devices.
"That suggests that [Kamala] Harris needs to show the American people her strongest, most acute and controlling desire, the ruling passion of her soul."
...To be the ultimate girlboss. Hillary too. That's what they all want. The only problem is that like dogs chasing cars, they don't really know what do with it once they catch it except to use it to be an even greaterer girlbosserer.
Being the alpha female isn't a means to another end goal, it is the end in itself.
Whenever one can't scrape up enough actual misogyny, "semi-conscious misogyny" provides a great fallback.
An amusing twist the left (yes, left) using Mamet as their quotable…
…such poor analogies, like they still assume they are manipulative superpowers. There’s mounting evidence not everyone they need to manipulate is responding in the way they desire…
Well her strongest most compelling desire is “power and prestige”. Plain and simple. She wants to be “the fist woman president” because she wants the prestige and the power. Not because she cares one whit about anyone else. Because it’s all about HER. (Obviously Hillary was the same way). No thank you.
Amusing even Brooks has figured out they are an Executive by committee….
Does anyone ever wonder how Mike Pence feels?
I always wondered if Mike Pence felt anything.
By the way, I think you typo'ed "2002 for "2020."
Amusing Brooks understands what ‘drain the swamp’ means to Trump.
Gutfeld made an excellent point recently. The media interrogates Trump with gusto and high energy, while they softly and meekly question Harris. The media are the chief people worried about her feelings, as they don’t want to be the one that brings her down. They must be nonplussed at how well she brings herself down even with all the coddling.
"It’s unclear what Harris wants most deeply, other than the vague chance to do good and to be president." Even that is not clear. What evidence do we have she "deeply" wants a vague chance? What evidence of depth on anything has she supplied? On the record, she is a collection of attitudes and platitudes, anxiously presented. Of course, in 2020 Dem voters rejected her out of hand. Today, it serves them to have a POC figurehead, who can be counted on to keep prog policy going full steam.
"Why are we talking about drama?" Because that is how US elections are run and reported. For the LIV soap opera audience.
"somehow this brings us back to a topic that's annoyed me for a long time, which I mark with my tag "how does Kamala feel." The election is not about her feelings" It isn't and it is. It isn't in the sense that she will ultimately have to make decisions about rela things in the real world. But it also is: in the absence of any arguments about anything, she runs on the projection of feelings (abortion good! price gouging bad!), and many voters in turn judge her and her prospects on the basis of feelings (Trump bad! Kamala joyful! yay POC!).
"Semi-conscious misogyny." Is it still misogyny if it also fits the facts?
Everytime I see or listen to VP Harris I hear "Like a Rolling Stone" in my head as her leitmotif.
We touched on this earlier in the week but it looks more and more like a real question. Is Kamala on a "one way ticket to Palookaville"?
In other words, is the match fixed with Kamala set to throw it? She can't just come out and say "Screw it, vote for President Trump", fixed fights are never like that. She needs to keep it close and then go down in round 7 as if she really lost.
She sure is making a lot of mistakes. It is possible that it is because she really is dumb as a box of rocks. OTOH, we may be misunderestimating her.
But it is looking more and more like the fix might be in. Like she is throwing the election.
John Henry
The dust up with DeSantis highlighted how she is neither fish nor fowl.
She is not the President, running for continuity.
She is not the challenger, running for change.
She is stuck claiming she'll do the same things as Biden, only different. This would have been resolved in a normal primary that conferred legitimacy on her program by demonstrating it was supported within her own party.
She is also opaque because she has to represent a program that is not visibly her own, so what is there to talk about besides how she feels about the job?
Screw feelings. Feelings aren't reality. How about we figure out what the candidates will do in the real world, based on their enunciated policies and past histories in office?
I know what Trump wants. He wants to dismantle the elites who he thinks have betrayed regular Americans.
I'm not a mind reader, I don't know what Trump really wants but that's what I hope he wants.
"[Trump] wants to dismantle the elites who he thinks have betrayed regular Americans."
And David Brooks imagines he's one of them. What a pathetic fraud is Brooks, NYT's kept conservative.
Years ago Ace of Spades had a great article about the "MacGuffinization of Politics" that explains much of how we ended up here. Basically, politics turned into a vehicle for the personal heroic narrative of politicians, activists, staffers, etc. He noted that the press covering Obama at the time rarely focused on actual policies, but instead wrote stories on the struggle to achieve those policies, framing Obama as the protagonist.
Trump, unlike almost all of the rest of the GOP, understands this: he has spent much of his adult life in and around show business, and understands the power of theater, of spectacle. Harris doesn't, because she's spent her life as a bureaucrat and a party hack. At this point, I don't think that she has the ability to change her course. Even if she tried, it would come across as fake, and might very well have the opposite result from what she intended.
I know what Trump wants. He wants to dismantle the elites who he thinks have betrayed regular Americans.
I think the elites foolishly attacked Trump and made themselves his enemy. Had they read the Art of the Deal, they would have looked for how to work with him, and he would not now be trying to dismantle them.
It's pretty much irrelevant what Kamala's "strongest, most acute and controlling desire" is. But it is relevant and now perfectly clear what the strongest, most acute and controlling desire is for the people who are pulling her puppet strings (and who have been pulling the puppet strings of Biden for the last 3+ years. Namely, the replacement of the white/deplorable voters and the resulting "fundamental transformation" of the United States and its constitution into an authoritarian, permanently socialist, financially destroyed, and militarily crippled country. Just look at their actions. It's absurdly obvious to anyone above an amoeba.
Frankly I do nto care what the people running for President of the USA feel. I want to know what policies they are going to implement. What they believe. We got that with Reagan (and were lucky), Obama was a cypher while running but his past gave him away (and stupidly the American people elected him and he gave it to us good and hard). Our journalists have to ficus on feelings etc because they are incompetent (at a junior high level) in doing any reporting or analysis of political philosophies. Western Civ is in a decline and if we do not watch it, we will wither away into nothingness.
Mr Wibble's reference to the AoS post is spot on.
I found Kamala arresting the the mother of the girl with Sickle Cell Anemia pretty dramatic. https://www.instagram.com/robertfkennedyjr/reel/DA4WT-HvgVE/
At the ripe old age of 62 I don't expect to live long enough to see a Chinese-American running for the presidency and pundits allowed to use the word "inscrutable."
I remember that post. Good memory.
After Joe Biden it's hard to trust politicians' vague desires to "do good." Once, "doing good" might have been simple. Now that there are so many organized groups out there (except perhaps for the majority) "doing good" means feeding the ones in one's own coalition. "Good intentions" don't always have good results, and for Harris "doing good" means spending money to offset the bad results Biden/Harris has already created.
I am a mind reader. He wants REVENGE.
Fortunately that amounts to pretty much the same as what David Brooks said.
She and her campaign staff really are that dumb. See the video from the townhall where the teleprompter Harris was using was allowed to be seen on camera- proving that even the questions and questioners at the event had been scripted into the event.
Mamet may have said that once, but it's hardly reflected in his plays, which are shallow dramas about weak characters reacting to persecution, some of it unwarranted, some of it imagined. He writes classical tragedy heavy on hubris.
So, perhaps an apt, if sophisticated, characterization of Harris, but not at all how Brooks interpreted it.
Her "strongest, most acute and controlling desire" is, as someone else mentioned, power and privilege, but I would add that she wants it without actually doing anything. She's lazy and not very bright.
It's a plan to show the Trump voters that they can't win against the swamp because it's votes that count, not voters.
I still don’t know why Kamala wants to be president other than white-hot ambition. This is the kind of person Jefferson said should be disqualified on those grounds from pursuing the office.
So, reality is just badly written drama?
People see to many well-crafted stories and start imagining that they are, themselves, in one of them. But real life is a mess without clear resolution. Sort of like Harris's career.
That worked out well for Obama.
"It’s unclear what Harris wants most deeply, other than the vague chance to do good and to be president."
I'm pretty sure that what Harris wants most deeply is to get her soul back. But that's not going to happen.
She doesn't want to be President. After the Trump debate exposed Joe, Barack Jefferson Pelosi looked around the room and saw Kamala trying to slide under her desk. They nailed her. If anything, she a front-woman for whatever group has been guiding Slow Joe the past few years. Minus, by the grace of God, Jill.
She wants to win very badly but just doesn't have the brains to pull it off without major ballot fraud.
David Brooks is nothing more than a cleaned-up, effete, mincing version of Thomas Crooks.
When you are as empty a vessel as Kamala Harris, you can't find your deepest desire using both hands and a seeing eye dog. And if you can't find it (and she can't) it's impossible to communicate. Once again some fop at the NYT writes a useless piece. Different fops, different days, but it's all useless.
She'd be doing better if her ambition were white-hot. She hasn't had to work hard to get any job and hasn't had to work very hard in any job she's had. She'd like to be the Queen Bee, but she's never shown much drive in anything.
“It’s unclear what Harris wants most deeply, other than the vague chance to do good and to be president.”
I can’t tell for certain because her head blocks one of the letters in the magazine title, but looks like X has photos of Kamala on the cover of “Vague Magazine”.
It used to annoy me at first when passengers after boarding my Uber would ask “how are you feeling today?”. I realised they are only doing what they have been asked to do. Not their fault.
My reaction as well. If he would explicitly state that intention, he’d win in a landslide.
What is Kamala's quest of the hero to overcome those things which prevent her from achieving a specific, acute goal? It seems she's not being so much thwarted in her attempt but pushed along to make it easier to achieve.
With all that, she flounders.
"The convention went so well, we were told, because the theme was joy, and Kamala was joyful."
I'm getting the vibe that Trump is trying to steel the joy theme from Harris. He seems sunnier lately. Harris is pretty dour most of the time now.
Strongest, most acute and controlling desire, the ruling passion of her soul:
Bill Clinton - Meet women.
George W Bush - Daddy's approval
Ronald Reagan - Defeat communism/USSR
Hillary Clinton - Power. Her payment for supporting Bill all those years.
Kamala Harris - We will work together, and continue to work together, to address these issues…and to work together as we continue to work, that we will convene to work together...we will work on this together.
What was the question?
Would it be inappropriate to ask if the VP is taking mood altering medication?
I want to know if there is a chance “the nuclear football” is going to take on a whole different meaning…. Knowwhatimean? Knowwhatimean? Nudge nudge.
She wants to keep the men in her life happy so they won't hit her. Sadly, this is not a protagonist's intention and she can be nothing but a supporting character with it.
Ayn Rand said any woman wanting to be US President is bad psycho
comparing notes with Benedict Arnold?
a well told chronicle = i was reading the cc
is Kamala James Taggart wannabe? [Presdient of Taggart Transcontinental in Atlas Shrugged]
did not Kamala strive for 'happy endings'
Tucker Carlson's interview of Pence in Iowa told us who Pence is and he ended his campaign right there.
Yeah. Don't mind that the baggie of coke in the White House was for her.
Oh, she has a goal all right. She wants to win the approval of her distant father, a Marxist professor, by turning this country into a one-party totalitarian communist hellhole.
Drama is a JournoListic style guideline.
😯 I forgot all about that. If it had been during Trump nobody would be allowed to forget it.
Mark Twain said the main difference between fiction and reality is that fiction has to make sense.
Which one of these guys is Brooks?
...or leave her for the hired help.
That suggests that [Kamala] Harris needs to show the American people her strongest, most acute and controlling desire, the ruling passion of her soul
Why? They think that lying is the better strategy. They don't want folks to know what she wants.
It's obvious that Harris is 100% on board with making this election about her feelings. Haven't you noticed that she only gives interviews to friendly outlets but still can't talk about her policies when asked point blank about them? It's almost like she can't be bothered to actually sit down and learn what policies her team has developed for her campaign. It's feelings and vibes over nuts and bolts.
Vagina - The Campaign
Too many mistakes in the first draft...
I think Brooks is right, "what Trump wants is "to dismantle the elites who he thinks have betrayed regular Americans.""
If you're one of those elites, you will naturally oppose Trump because you think you've been doing a good job. Everyone else ought to realize that the elites live in a bubble and think a bunch of things which are not true are true and they act accordingly.
As for Harris, I don't think she's given any thought about what she hopes to achieve by being president. If she had, we'd have heard what it is by now. She has integrated the elite mindset into her world view and will be little better than a figurehead.
Even Trump, who wants to return the US to democratic rule, will have to fight against career government officials every step of the way. We need 10 "Trumps" in a row, to return the US to some semblance of being ruled in the interests of the people.
Here is what I feel - Trump exaggerates, but the Dem ocrats, including Harris, lie, lie, lie. The "Joe Biden is sharp as a tack" lie ALONE deserves a drubbing at the polls. That was egregious lying. Lying of the first water. They need to be taught to never do that again.
Salmon Rushdie said that to create a compelling hero in your novel, you put your protagonist up a tree and then throw stones at him. So basically the Democrats have been turning the wrong fellow into a hero.
One of Trump's signature lines is 'this election is not about me," after which he tells the audience he's just the impediment stopping 'them' from doing bad things to you. Remarkable in that it's coming from a narcissist. Other talented politicos are at least as narcissistic -- Obama is an example -- but have the same rhetorical device down pat. Kamala is so out of it that she could never pull it off.
Fleetwood Mac - Little Lies
I am curious as to what your evidence the he is a "narcissist" is. What actual things that he has said convince you of that? Do you think it is it possible that you have been lied to, or do you rule that out entirely?
I think that Joe Biden is a sociopath because I once had the misfortune of going into business with a sociopath, and the similarities between them are pretty strong.
As California Attorney General, Kamala Harris jailed a woman whose daughter was hospitalized with sickle cell anemia and missed 60 days of school. The woman lost her job and her house because of the truancy prosecution. Kamala Harris is an amoral monster. "Vague chance to do good" is not in her makeup.
"By the way, I think you typo'ed "2002 for "2020.""
Thank you.
Sorry it took me so long to fix it.
Even Brooksie recognizes that she's an empty pantsuit.
The solution? Make up something to be passionate about! 3 weeks to go!
Yeesh.
That was a great post. Not in the same genre as "Kaboom," but a classic nonetheless.
Wow. They don't even know how to hire actors who can fake it.
Here’s that video on the Peruvian Marching Powder…
https://x.com/ZadeSmith4/status/1841946464177816015
"I know what Trump wants. He wants to dismantle the elites who he thinks have betrayed regular Americans." From Brooks' keyboard to God's ears.
But like everything Brooks' writes, it's facile and oversimplified, but 'close enough' to reality to seem insightful. Trump doesn't hate elites. In fact, one of his greatest weaknesses is how much he is impressed by elites. It's why he would gush over his 'friendship' with Tom Brady or Tiger Woods and why he was always name-dropping. Trump's infatuation with elites contributed to the failures of his first term, because he was too easily impressed if people told him some oily hack was "the best ever."
Trump doesn't want to destroy the Elites; he wants to destroy the Management Class that currently occupies the Elite perches in our pecking order. In his view--and in Musk's, Peter Thiel's, a few others—the managerial class has massively overstepped its bounds and usurped the rightful power of the "real" Elites: the Entrepreneurial and Ownership class, people who rise by creation, risk-taking, innovation, and building rather than rule-following, policy-setting, opinion-manipulating.
Both the "ownership" and "managerial" classes tend towards oppression, which is why the middle-working class* will alternate between them: Bush of the ownership class was replaced by Obama of the management class. BUT starting in 2008, the Managerial Class wildly metastasized, growing in size and power but lacking sufficiently well-educated and self-disciplined managers (in contrast to the immediate post-War era) to have any chance of success. The results of this wide-spread incompetence is all around us.
Trump is the unlikely avatar of the working-middle class because his enemy is their enemy: the oppressive, incompetent, domineering, and self-righteous Managerial Class.
*In contemporary America it is almost impossible to draw a clear distinction between the "Middle-" and "Working-Class," and for the purposes of this argument it is helpful not to try. People who are self-supporting through their own labor and who do not have the option to stop working.
Depends on the elites. Aside from being an elite himself, Donald Trump has support from industrial oligarchs and entrepreneurs alike. No shame in admitting that. And while Kamala has raised a billion dollars from the oligarchs it hasn't helped her. Media support is fanatic for her. Why?
The frantic approach to Kamala makes zero sense, unless you say 'Epstein."
If it's a competition for attention, then the election's over. The world is tidally locked to Trump.
Holy shit. The worst political ad ever?
Why would you talk about men like we are an alien species?
can't talk about her policies when asked point blank about them
Even her campaign slogan, "Obviously," marks her as a politician who can't be bothered to explain why we should vote for her.
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