America knows how to create a blockbuster.
The last two weeks with respect to the US presidential elections have been anything but normal. But let's talk about the last three days first.
After a disastrous debate three weeks ago, many wanted Biden to bite the bullet and make way for a younger candidate. But the past weekend saw his rival, Donald Trump, nearly take a bullet.
The Shooting Will Surely Solidify Trump's Base
The former President was addressing a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania when a lone wolf fired a shot towards the former President, with one grazing his ear. One rally attendee was killed and two others were critically injured. The FBI confirmed that the shooter, Thomas Matthew Crooks, a 20-year-old Pennsylvanian native, was shot dead.
Presidents, vice presidents, former presidents, and presidential candidates all have a sense of impregnability with Secret Service protection. Yet, there is a violent history of assassinations, with former President John F Kennedy, his brother Robert Kennedy, and Martin Luther King Jr, all of whom were assassinated in the 1960s. Republican figurehead Ronald Reagan too, was shot at but survived an assassination attempt in 1981.
The assassination attempt on Donald Trump took the world by storm. And even in a heated political cycle, his opponents Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and former President Obama were quick to condemn the attack and express solidarity with Trump for a speedy recovery. Trump’s acolytes, on the other hand, were quick to blame Democrats and the mainstream media for constantly castigating their candidate, thereby blaming them for the events that unfolded.
It’s well evidenced that Trump has not been so gracious with his political opponents, including inciting a mob when he disagreed with the election outcome like the events of the January 6 insurrection. Trump has also threatened to govern with a vendetta cudgel against all those he feels have wronged him, including his former deputy, Mike Pence.
The Republican Party, which has so long unequivocally backed gun ownership and the Second Amendment, reluctant to implement gun reforms after major attacks, perhaps finds itself in a quagmire on this occasion.
Political pundits predict Saturday’s unfortunate episode as one that will further solidify Trump’s base and give the former President a boost in the polls.
A Florida Judge Comes to Trump’s Rescue
In a turnaround of fortunes, a Florida judge dismissed the case involving Trump’s alleged mishandling of classified documents.
The ruling marks a critical juncture in the ongoing legal scrutiny surrounding Trump's activities post-presidency, potentially impacting future legal and political landscapes. The judge's decision underscores the complexity of prosecuting high-profile cases involving sensitive national security matters.
JD Vance is a Calculated Pick for Running Mate
The GOP convention is underway in Milwaukee, Wisconsin as planned.
Donald Trump has made appearances on WWE before, and he marched out “ringside” with a bandaged ear to country singer Lee Greenwood’s iconic “God Bless the USA” in the most American/WWE ‘scripted for a protagonist’ moment possible.
He appeared like Lazarus, the biblical character resurrected to life. Messiahs don’t die, they get resurrected and so has Trump’s campaign from the fires of felony charges. Donald Trump received the formality of delegate count, as delegates from Florida pushed the final numbers sealing Trump as the Republican nominee for president.
Earlier in the day, there was much speculation on Trump’s impending Vice President pick. The reported shortlist was narrowed down to North Dakota Governor Doug Burgum, and Marco Rubio, the Florida Senator and once Trump’s GOP competitor in 2016. However, Florida residency issues became a problem, as Trump is also a resident of the Sunshine State. This ultimately doomed Rubio's Veep bid and delayed his much sought-after 2016 plans of being on the ticket.
Eventually, the coveted prize went to Ohio Senator, JD Vance who turns 40 in August and is an entire generation younger than Trump.
Vance made his claim to fame as the best-selling author of “Hillbilly Elegy”, a New York Times bestseller turned Ron Howard film. The memoir chronicles Vance’s youth growing up with poverty and hardships in the rustbelts of Ohio, then finding his way to the Marine Corps and Yale Law School, where he met his future wife, Indian-American Usha Chilukuri.
If the ticket is successful, Mrs Vance may become the first Second Lady of Indian origin. Indian-American conservatives and some Indian nationalists on X have already warped this as a “pro-India” stance.
Vance was a former Never Trumper in 2016 and called him an “idiot”, among other things. Vance has had a meteoric rise in the GOP, winning the coveted Ohio Senator seat vacated by Rob Portman; the key swing state that sends candidates to the White House.
Vance and Trump grew up in different eras and different wealth classes. What connects them now is not their past but their future. In picking a millennial, the septuagenarian is signalling that MAGA is greater than just Trump, and Vance is the next line of successors.
While Trump remained the same in many ways, he has changed in the way he ran for office since 2016. The first time around, he picked Mike Pence, a milquetoast White Christian conservative from middle America, who had served in Congress and had Gubernatorial experience. It was appealing to the base then. The fallout with Pence aside, Trump now doesn’t need to appeal to a larger crowd, he has his own base. It’s now almost incumbent on other establishment politicians to morph into MAGA.
Trump has picked a firebrand national conservative in Vance. A former Trump critic-turned-acolyte and a MAGA loyalist, Vance will prioritise fiscal conservatism, be a national security hawk, and push for global isolationism, a far cry from the Truman doctrine of American foreign policy.
In Milwaukee, it was an epochal time in conservative politics as the GOP became MAGA. Candidates buy into a system that Trump has changed altogether. Just earlier this year, as Trump’s trial began, the elections were Biden’s to lose. Post the debate debacle, gaffes galore and the Butler bullet, these elections now seem like Trump’s to win.
And... the Debate
The debate was a storyline straight out of the satirical HBO show Veep, where two gerontocratic Presidents run for a second time. It was also the first time since 1952 and 1956 when the WWII decorated Supreme Allied Commander and later incumbent President Eisenhower defeated Democrat Adlai Stevenson.
It’s a sense of déjà vu to have the same candidates vie for the top job, and yet witness something new in how President Biden stuttered and faltered, setting off an extreme set of panic waves for the Democrat establishment while causing excruciating pain.
The contest was billed as more than just an encore, a battle, if you will, between an old man and a con man. Donald Trump is no spring chicken; he is only three years younger than his political foe. Yet, his supporters and the Republican establishment have shone the spotlight on Biden’s cognitive abilities, or apparent lack thereof. For Joe Biden, it’s a Dickensian sense of “best of times, worst of times” with his three and a half years in the engine room of the most powerful economy.
The current President inherited a pandemic-hit country, with the economy in a downward slump in 2020-2021. On the domestic front, his report card reads A or A+ with significant legislative victories, including the passage of the American Rescue Plan Act, which was the best panacea to the pandemic, including mass vaccinations, delivering direct stimulus payments, expanding unemployment benefits.
Biden's administration has made developmental strides with the passage of the bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, with the vision to upgrade American roads, bridges, and broadband infrastructure. A push for domestic manufacturing, with the CHIPS and Sciences Act aimed to fortify domestic semiconductor production, reflects on foreign policy by strengthening national security and competing with China in chip warfare.
Biden’s foreign policy report card is a bit checkered. As I wrote earlier, “On the foreign policy front, several tinderboxes could spell one-term presidency. It started with a hasty retreat from Afghanistan, thus ending a two-decade failed war, where Washington replaced the Taliban with the Taliban. Then Russia marched into Ukraine like it was 1939. And of course, the forever quest for peace in West Asia. Trump will brag about bringing Arab states and Israel closer to the Abraham Accords. Biden is caught between supporting the US’ forever ally in Israel and failing to stop the humanitarian bloodshed that’s morbidly covering Gazan ground.”
Apropos of America’s national sport baseball, Biden could not hit this one out of the park. This should have been a “slam dunk”, as he faced someone who many of the American populace deem a convicted felon. However, during the debate, Biden wasn’t coherent and came off as weak and more pusillanimous. As evinced from televised presidential debates from the 1960s, damage done during these debates is long-lasting, and not easily reversed.
While Joe Biden lost the debate, Donald Trump did not win. Trump was his usual caustic bombastic self, propagating ideologies over ideas, critique over conversation, innuendos over inquiries, and vituperation over vision. The former President remained weak on issues. His incendiary tirades failed to attract new followers to his cause, but his political gobbledygook was eagerly embraced by his existing base.
According to CNN, Donald Trump lied over two dozen times in the 90-minute debate on issues ranging from his economic and foreign policy record to abortion and immigration. Trump refused to answer direct questions on inciting a mob during that infamous day on 6 January 2021, dodged questions on his conduct, and made his trial seem like a vendetta witch hunt.
Since the debate, a complete pandemonium has unfurled among the Democrat base. For too long, Democrat loyalists have adopted a policy of “vote blue, no matter who”. Biden’s base is ruffled, as the frailties of ageing and dwindling mental faculties have set off alarm bells redolent of the Titanic when it hits the iceberg. It’s afloat for now, but there is the impending doom of a sinking ship.
As the famed Hollywood dapper dan and lifelong Democrat, George Clooney confesses, the Joe Biden he voted for, knows, and considers a friend is no longer, energetic, engaged, and does not exude confidence that he can serve for another four years.
Like I had written for The Quint, Democrats used to fall in love, while Republicans used to fall in line. However, the tables seem to have turned, where Democrats coalesce behind the established party candidate and don’t want to challenge the incumbent, certainly not the candidate who defeated Trump the first time, even though he seems incapable of stopping a second Trump presidency, especially after the events of the last three days.
(Akshobh Giridharadas is based out of Washington DC and writes on diverse topics such as geopolitics, business, tech and sports. He is a two-time TEDx and Toastmasters public speaker and a graduate of the Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy. He tweets @Akshobh. This is an opinion piece. The views expressed above are the author’s own. The Quint neither endorses nor is responsible for them.)
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