The uplifting pageantry of the Democratic National Convention is over, leaving a national hangover of possibility. Judging from mainstream media headlines, a sense of relief is spreading, the page is turning — and not just for Democrats.
Ever since a certain indulged heir rode down his golden escalator, the nation’s been in a funk. Encouraged to hate our neighbors, a good chunk of the country did it. Coaxed to see bizarre conspiracies, many of us saw them. Pumped up on political violence, too many of us went there.
It’s been a nearly 10-year slog, an emotionally draining chapter in American history that made many wonder, in earnest, whether our democracy could survive. Maybe Ben Franklin’s wry quip about a “Republic, if you can keep it,’ was more prescience than cynicism.
Last week’s Democratic National Committee rejoinder was that we will not only keep our republic, we’ll eventually fulfill its promise.
Democrats are reclaiming ‘“freedom’” and the American flag
As both Harris and Walz stressed their commitment to all Americans regardless of how they vote, Kamala Cowboys, country music, and football players on center stage proved that the Harris comms team knows the importance of iconography.
Democrats are embracing unabashed flag-waving patriotism once again, after what felt like a forced hiatus. Too many images of Trump weirdly caressing the flag were a turn-off, a revered American symbol cheapened into a prop. Just as Christians refusing to feed the poor screams hypocrisy, waving the flag after Trump’s January 6 mob beat police officers with it just felt wrong.
Not anymore. Harris-Walz are reclaiming flags and “freedom” as the language of patriotism, displayed in giant block letters behind many speakers who talked about how Republicans have bastardized both.
Freedom, as a construct, has been Republicans’ political football, a gaslighting catchphrase to describe the opposite of freedom. The misleadingly named Freedom Caucus, for example, strives to restrict personal rights like voting, gay marriage and abortion, while the Freedom Foundation exists to bust worker organizations and unions. House Speaker Mike Johnson, an anti-gay, anti-science, anti-abortion Christian nationalist, calls his legislative agenda “Individual Freedom.” Trump has gone so far as to appropriate Harris’ authorized campaign use of Beyoncé’s “Freedom” soundtrack, a move that earned the Trump campaign a cease and desist threat.
At last week’s DNC, when he accepted the nomination for vice president, Tim Walz dad-splained the difference:
(W)hen we Democrats talk about freedom, we mean the freedom to make a better life for yourself and the people that you love. Freedom to make your own health care decisions. And yeah, your kids’ freedom to go to school without worrying about being shot dead in the hall.
In contrast, Walz said, “When Republicans use the word freedom, they mean that the government should be free to invade your doctor’s office. Corporations [(should be]) free to pollute your air and water. And banks [(are]) free to take advantage of customers.”
About the Minnesota law providing breakfast and lunch every day, Walz said, “So, while other states were banishing books, we were banishing hunger.”
Trump-Vance amplify division; Harris-Walz reach across the aisle
In selecting J.D. Vance as his running mate, Trump signaled that he is doubling down on his culture wars. Instead of expanding the MAGA base to include moderates, Trump remains focused on a relatively narrow swath of the electorate., He says they doesn’t need voter outreach because Harris will “steal” the election anyway. Trump is obviously setting up Stop the Steal 2024 with the same stolen election lies he’s spread since 2020.
Harris and Walz are signaling the opposite. They don’t want to insult or malign MAGA voters. With their decidedly more centrist message, Harris and Walz are offering an olive branch and permission structure to leave a man who has shown in words and deeds that he will harm them.
The Trump-Vance culture wars, as advanced by Republicans in Congress, are but a ruse, a public relations beard to disguise the GOP’s true raison d'etre: the protection of wealth. Trump punches down on immigrants and vulnerable people with his right hand to distract supporters from what he’s doing with his left: robbing the till. He’s admitted on record that political contributions, as he sees them, are made to secure favors in return. He fulminates hatred — a strong psychological addiction —- so his base won’t notice how he’s enriching his wealthy donors at their expense.
Competing economic policies: help the rich vs. help the common man
Trump’s top billionaire donors — corporate CEOs, oligarchs and trust fund recipients of inherited wealth — are spending hundreds of millions to elect Trump because he has promised to cut their taxes again and tank federal safety regulations that cost them money. According to Forbes, many dozens of billionaires have already given more than $1 million dollars each to help re-elect Trump.
Fossil fuels, big pharma and predatory corporations know Trump will protect them, but fear (not without reason) that Harris will hold them accountable.
The GOP’s us vs. them selfish political paradigm follows the malignancy of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision and lays bare its destructive force of unlimited money in politics: The extremely wealthy aren’t dependent on free supplies of clean water, they can import private tanks and install their own desalination equipment if it comes to that. They don’t worry about climate change, because they can afford to build lux retreats high in the Swiss Alps, complete with vertical farms for growing their own produce.
But the middle class can see floods, droughts, and increasingly extreme weather with their own eyes, and even the most skeptical know now that climate change is no hoax.
The Trump-Vance campaign also keeps telling voters that President Joe Biden caused the price of bread and gas to go up, even though current prices reflect factors beyond any president’s control including the Federal Reserve, foreign wars, and post-pandemic adjustments.
When Biden took office, the Trump economy was in shambles. Under Biden-Harris, the U.S. staged the strongest COVID-era economic Covid comeback among all advanced economies in the world. Spiraling inflation was carefully reined in, prices are still decreasing, and we got the soft landing Biden promised.
Will our better angels prevail?
The stakes this November are exceedingly high. It’s not hyperbole to say the outcome of this election could forever bend the trajectory of the greatest human experiment ever undertaken. Despite the MAGA base enabling a man who would do them — and us — harm, Harris-Walz are modeling President Barack Obama’s advice on national grace:
(I)f a parent or grandparent occasionally says something that makes us cringe, we don’t automatically assume they’re bad people. We recognize that the world is moving fast, that they need time and maybe a little encouragement to catch up. Our fellow citizens deserve the same grace we hope they’ll extend to us.
With 71 days to go, they are spreading joy and a renewed commitment to freedom and the American flag. They are also staying on message that economic policies, in the right hands, can benefit the common man.
Here’s hoping the common man will listen.
