A View From the Q Train

Joy Comes in the Morning 🌴 ✡️🌻✡️🌻✡️ 🌴

Wow, Wow, Wow: That was one hell of a convention, joyful and chock full of incredible speeches with each night surpassing the night before, but to paraphrase Democratic House Leader Hakeem Jeffries you only get to joy in November after a period of hard work, and that hard work has just begun. Still, let’s enjoy the convention afterglow for a few more hours. On Wednesday night it became clear why Kamala Harris chose Tim Walz as her running mate. He’s the teacher who guided you in the right direction, he’s the coach that pushed you beyond where you thought you could go, and the loving parent that every child needs and that many of us now miss, but no one should be fooled that he’s just a teddy bear because behind his affability is a tough as nails strategist. You don’t make it to Governor and then onto the presidential ticket by being just warm and cuddly. A special shout out to Walz’ son Gus whose tearful expression of pride and love for his father so offended right wing pundit Ann Coulter that she thought it was okay to mercilessly attack him. Unfortunately, as a hate slinger, Coulter hardly stands alone, the slog to election day will be filled with more of that after all, Trump’s response to Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro’s convention speech was to pull the Jewish card, calling him an “overrated Jewish Governor,” hardly a surprise from the “both sides” guy who dines with neo-Nazis, but still despicable and a harbinger of what’s to come. Coulter and Trump aside, everything was pitch perfect on Wednesday including the surprisingly fun music filled delegate roll call (a link to a tweet with the list of songs played is included below), purple attired Oprah tossing her usual independent stance aside to endorse Kamala and Tim, the very conservative former Lieutenant Governor of Georgia Geoff Duncan who is so disgusted with the MAGA-fication of his party that he showed up to speak on Kamala’s behalf, the speeches from former President Clinton and Nancy Pelosi, and the emotional appeal for peace and the return of the hostages delivered by Jon Polin and Rachel Goldberg, whose severely injured son Hersh has been held hostage by Hamas for 321 days. Their speech was notable for two reasons, first because, despite their pain, they expressed genuine sympathy and concern for the citizens of Gaza and second because, despite Trump’s insistence that the Democratic party is chock full of Israel hating anti-Semites, the convention crowd greeted Polin and Goldberg warmly, showering them with sympathy while chanting for the hostages to be brought home now.

Kamala, Kamala, Comma-La: Last night we didn’t get Beyonce, but instead got more of her Freedom song and a surprise video endorsement from gold medal basketball player Stephen Curry as well as an awesome performance by Pink and her very talented 12- year-old daughter Willow. We also heard from a line-up of speakers including Republican Adam Kinzinger, former Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, and Arizona Senator Mark Kelly who all slammed Trump for his affinity to dictators, his dissing of veterans, and his disparagement of allies. Kelly’s wife, former Congresswoman Gabby Giffords, also spoke, capping off speeches from several other victims of gun violence. Then there was the long-awaited acceptance speech from Kamala Harris. She didn’t disappoint at all. She delivered a five-star, two thumbs up performance that was spot on in every way. We know that because a clearly rattled Trump spent the night sh-t posting, and probably throwing ketchup at the wall. At last count he posted 40 missives, no reports on the number of ketchup bottles bashed. Still, circling back to Hakeem Jeffries, though this week was full of joy, the work has just begun, much needs to be done between now and November, and probably all the way up to inauguration day to take down Trump. The NY Times reports that RFK Jr who was polling in the low single digits, has already withdrawn his Arizona ballot application. Later today he is expected to endorse Trump in a “joint” presentation. One can only imagine what position Trump has offered him in exchange for that endorsement. The hypocrisy of the one-time environmental activist joining the climate denying, pro-oil Trump train is stunning but sadly not surprising. Whether his support will shift enough votes to Trump to blunt Harris’s expected convention bump or worse yet, permanently close the gap between the two is the question. We’ll have to wait for the next round of polls to quantify the value of RFK’s endorsement. Sadly, if his endorsement pushes Trump over the top, we’ll then be able to measure his impact in cases of polio, measles, mumps, rubella and so on.

Trouble Ahead: Trump’s Bedminster Golf Club will be hosting a fundraiser for the January 6^th defendants on September 5. Those are the “nice tourists” who created mayhem and caused a few deaths at the Capitol after Trump lost the last election. It’s sadly very fair to assume that this election we will be seeing some more of the same. Trump is already planting seeds of doubt about the election’s integrity, MAGAs in states like Georgia are already suggesting that they won’t certify election results they don’t like, and Republican officials in other states are making it more difficult for “some” voters to vote. Yesterday, the Supreme Court weighed in on some new Arizona election “voter suppression” rules. By a vote of 5 to 4 with Justice Amy Coney Barrett joining the liberal minority, they partly granted a request from the RNC for Arizona to enforce a recently passed law requiring people to show proof of US citizenship when registering to vote. Election lawyer Mark Elias said that the ruling, while not ideal, could have been worse because at least for now, a provision that would have blocked thousands of previously registered voters from casting their ballots was rejected.

And: Abortion rights will be on the ballot in Montana which could give Democratic Senator Jon Tester a bit of a boost in what is likely to be a very tough race. New Jersey Congressman Bill Pascrell, the 87-year-old Representative who’d been in and out of the hospital has died. Democrats now need to find themselves a new candidate for the November election.

#BringThemAllHomeNow

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