FOUR MORE YEARS — The Weekly Opine

The Trump corruption swamp is returning to the White House. (Photo credit The Weekly Opine)

We’re going back

Yesterday morning USA Today ran a headline that read, “How Kamala Harris Lost.” If I was editor at USA Today the headline would have read, “How Democrats Lost.” Because ultimately, Democrats paved the way for a shocking, crushing defeat to the most unfit presidential candidate in U.S. history. For those keeping score, that means in the last three presidential elections, Democrats have lost twice to the morally corrupt, criminal felon Trump. Democrats’ failure to defeat Trump extends beyond whatever Vice President Kamala Harris did, although she did make several significant missteps.

The single biggest reason Harris lost to Trump was the unforgivable selfish arrogance of President Joe Biden. Biden forever tainted his legacy by ignoring his obvious feeble mental acuity and loss of physical stamina. Biden staying in the race until late-July doomed Harris, and probably anyone else who would’ve run against Trump. It did not help that groups such as the Congressional Black Caucus foolishly pledged fealty to Biden, even as the walls crumbled around his campaign. Anyone who thinks Biden would have defeated Trump should join Biden at the doctor’s office and have their head examined.

The peak of President Joe Biden’s stumbling and fumbling was when he waited too long to drop out of the race. Vice President Kamala Harris gave a sterling effort but fell short. (Photos credit CNN, NBC News screenshot)

Debt of gratitude

All of America, democracy lovers and newly discovered fascists alike, owe Vice President Kamala Harris a debt of gratitude. She ran a clean race, refusing to lean into the tawdriness exhibited on the other side. Harris accepted election results without threats of lawsuits and violence. During the campaign she represented, as she often said, all Americans in a way that told the rest of the world there is still sanity in many United States government officials. Harris exudes compassion and grace. In her speech yesterday afternoon she closed saying now is “not a time to throw up our arms but to roll up our sleeves.” Thank you, Kamala.

Initial analysis: choices matter

In hindsight (isn’t hindsight always so perfect?), Democrats were too quick to set aside Harris’ weak showing in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary and anoint her. Back then, Harris dropped out in December 2019, even before the first primary vote. Unfortunately, on July 21 this year, when Biden belatedly announced he was dropping out, there wasn’t time to set up a traditional primary to find out if Kamala had acquired the right stuff.

However, Dems should have figured out a way to “kick the Harris tires” against other big names such as Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer and Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro. Vice President Harris may still have ended up as Dems choice but by automatically throwing in with her, without an opportunity to compare her against other options, Democrats took a big risk with an untested candidate who previously flamed out on the national stage. Especially someone from California, a state much of the country despises as THE bastion of liberals gone wild.

After installation as Dems’ candidate, Harris made a bad choice, choosing Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate. Within weeks, the affable Walz was back peddling, answering questions about fabrications on his resume. Choosing Walz was a strategic error, given Walz hails from a state Democrats have won every presidential election since 1972 and did so again Tuesday night. Walz was not up for the task, a slightly goofy man who got smoked by JD Vance in the veep debate. Better choices would have been Arizona Senator Mark Kelly or Pennsylvania’s Shapiro, both representing strategically critical swing states.

Optimism was present on both sides when Election Day voting commenced at 6 a.m. (Photo credit The Weekly Opine)

As it stands, Democrats are the party of college-educated elites, while a struggling middle-class yo-yo’s from one party to the other each election cycle, voting for “change” in search of better lives. Republicans are the party of blue-collar evangelicals clinging to false promises by politicians who sound like tent-revival preachers.

With Harris’ defeat, the floodgates open for all comers in 2028. (Assuming the U.S. still has elections because, who knows, the same group of fascist-supporting Americans who elected Trump may support the concept of no more presidential elections in this country.)

Assuming the presidential election happens in 2028, there is ample time to evaluate candidates. Although it’s fair to ask today, is Harris finished as a presidential candidate? Harris has never won a presidential primary - not in 2020, not in 2024. She lost the presidential popular vote in 2024, something Democrats had not experienced since 2004. Or could Harris bounce back ala Richard Nixon, who lost in 1960 to JFK but won in 1968? It’s too soon to count Kamala Harris out.

Turning away turn out

Going forward, progressive media should, from the outset, show candidate’s electoral vote count including states “not called” but, based on decades of history, virtually guaranteed to go blue or red. For example, California and Illinois should have been included in Harris’ electoral count right from the start. That would prevent the scoreboard from looking so lopsided which, potentially, demotivates voters. On Tuesday, Harris immediately went down 23-3 and at one point it was something like 117-21. Not a good look for the psyche of people who had not made it to the polls yet.

Regardless, The Weekly Opine missed badly, forecasting large numbers of voters would defect from Trump in the privacy of the voting booth. Clearly, that didn’t happen.

What we are left with, as Father Michael Pfleger said during our expansive interview, is a revelation of the true America. Tuesday’s vote confirms roughly 50% of the population still believes in an imperfect, still-evolving democracy, while the other roughly 50% of the people side with fascism, racism and misogyny. And the evangelical church is now delegitimate, a force for evil rather than good.

What happened?

In two of the last three presidential elections, Democrats lost to the worst presidential candidate in U.S. history. Therefore, Dems must engage in serious soul-searching. First and foremost, Democrats must learn to aggressively compete, and separate wheat issues from chaff issues. And then focus on wheat issues. Here are four key Harris mistakes from the campaign:

First, Kamala saying she wouldn’t change anything Biden did – despite his abysmal approval rating of 38 percent – was a terrible answer that surely hurt her with undecided voters and anti-Gaza war voters. The Trump campaign pounced on Harris’ unfortunate statement, turning her words into a TV ad. Harris’ refusal to put more distance between herself and Biden cost her dearly.

When voters choose “That” it means your message doesn’t resonate. (Photo credit The Weekly Opine)

Second, Biden, Harris and their spokespeople did a lackluster job communicating wheat issues, e.g., the improving economy, declining inflation and the administration’s leadership passing the CHIPS and Science Act and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. The media didn’t help, focusing too much attention on outlandish things Trump said rather than the undeniable economic progress made under Biden/Harris. (Amazingly, MSNBC political analyst Jonathan Capehart admitted topics like CHIPS, infrastructure and the economy are not sexy things to cover.)

Third, the Trump campaign ad showing Harris’ full-throated support of a chaff issue, the government providing trans prisoners healthcare assistance, was disastrous. Never in a thousand years should a vice president (with bigger future aspirations) get caught up discussing funding the transition process for a prisoner’s sex change, a concept that’s inane, and inflammatory, to millions upon millions of voters.

And finally, during her Fox News interview, Harris should have quickly admitted the Biden administration’s missteps dealing with the border, and then pivoted to explaining the administration’s subsequent positive border initiatives. Instead, she engaged in an undisciplined, argumentative, 5-minute back and forth as Brett Baier bullied her. The whole interview was a bad “look” for Harris, and I was stunned when progressive media claimed falsely that Harris “won” the interview.

The bottom line

According to AP VoteCast, young people age 18-29 voted for Harris 52% to 46% for Trump. Blacks went for Harris 83% to 16%. Latinos 56% to Harris 42% for Trump. Boomers went for Harris 50% to 49%. White men voted for Trump 59% to 39% for Harris. Women age 18-44, even after the strong push about abortion rights, still only went to Harris 55% to 43%. That is a disturbing indictment of many women in America, who happily accept the second-class status Project 2025 has in mind for them. In all demos, Harris lost ground, sometimes significant ground, compared to Biden’s performance in 2020.

How her racial identity factored into the outcome is unknown, but you can bet Harris’ combination of race and sex hurt her in a country still operating in the 20th Century, when it comes to race and women.

I’ve spent the past 36 hours reflecting on the results and cannot reconcile that 50% of America is OK with women dying in parking lots due to suffering a miscarriage and not having access to life-saving care. Not to mention that, twice now, this country has rejected wholly qualified women candidates in favor of a fascist, racist, misogynist rapist who is a 34x convicted felon.

Like the Roman Empire and Nazi Germany, America could be headed for catastrophic decline.

Remember Judge Merchan? He’s got next. (Photo credit AP News)

Here comes the judge… maybe

A forgotten man during the election’s homestretch, Judge Juan Merchan lurks in the shadows. That is, so long as he does not further delay sentencing Trump. Currently, November 26 is the most anticipated courtroom date in America since October 3, 1995, when the O.J. verdict was announced. Despite Trump’s election victory, will Merchan have the guts to sentence Trump to prison?

Or will the judge join the long line of media, politicians and legal accommodators who paved the way for Trump’s rise in the first place?