The Debate, Why the Democrats Aren’t Winning, and Leadership in the 21st Century

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What did you think of the Vice-Presidential debate?

Here’s what I thought. It was actually a good…debate. For once. Not just a shouting match. Yet in that, you might wonder: who won?

And I think the answer to that is: nobody did.

Let me explain, and we’ll take each candidate turn by turn.

How I Think Tim Walz Did, or Why the Democrats Aren’t Winning

How do you think Tim Walz did? Pundits are already crowing that he “lost,” because he “struggled.”

But I don’t think so. I don’t think people are going to suddenly turn around and like him any less.

He didn’t sound like a politician, and that’s a good thing. He sounded like the kind of guy you could go to the bar with, and watch a football game.

That’s a good thing. Not sounding like a politician is why Walz is so popular as a public figure. He sounds normal, to put it in his own words. He’s significantly more liked than Kamala, and it’s easy to understand why. She comes off as a politician, in the standard DC mold, using that body language, that vernacular, that jargon, that delivery. Walz doesn’t.

So I don’t think Walz lost, by any stretch of the imagination.

What I do think is that he failed in a certain way, but that’s not his fault—it’s a much larger problem with the Democrats.

The Democrats aren’t losing, per se, but they’re not winning, either. And we all know that they should be. The reason they aren’t is very simple: the economy. People don’t trust them on it, and yet they refuse, stubborn as hell, to admit it. And so they can’t do anything about it.

And that brings us to JD Vance.

How I Think JD Vance Did, or Can You Really Go From Creepy to College Boy?

How do you think he did?

I noted three particular lines he repeated.

People are struggling. To pay the bills. Times are tough.

The American Dream is fading, and feels unattainable.

We should stop shipping jobs offshore, especially to places where they become “slave labor.”

It’s hard to disagree with any of that.

Tim couldn’t say any of that, for a much bigger reason than him. The Democrats refuse, as I said, to admit any of this.

But how hard is this to say?

You see, the reason people don’t trust the Democrats on the economy is that they feel detached from reality.

We are in the midst of a major global cost of living crisis. The biggest one in half a century. And that’s after decades of stagnation.

What are the Democrats thinking? I can’t think of a political mistake more foolish than this. People everywhere are feeling dejected, miserable, and angry. China, India, Europe. Nobody has anything resembling a good economy right now.

And yet because liberals won’t admit it, they keep on losing, serially, the far right surging.

So it was left to Vance to say the things that Americans feel.

He came off as reasonable. Now, I’m not saying he is. We’ll come back to that in a moment.

If the goal was to introduce America to JD Vance as a thoughtful guy, who says, as he put it, “common sense” things, then that goal may well have been achieved. I’d bet a lot of people were nodding along in agreement…

..And I’d bet that the Republicans’ advantage on the Number One Issue, the economy, is only going to get stronger.

But of course there’s another layer to all this.

Vance’s stances on social issues. Which have been widely mocked, because they’re not just reprehensible, they’re almost incomprehensible, seeming to come from the 17th century. He calls women “childless cat ladies.” He’s against IVF, not just abortion. Etcetera.

At the debate, he did something interesting. He seemed contrite. He said: I want to learn from people more about these issues.

And that raises a certain question.

There’s performance, and then there’s reality. There’s marketing, and then there’s the product.

If the marketing is: hey, we’re reasonable guys, then is the product still something like…

We’re going to take away your basic rights. We’re going to end your healthcare. We’re going to give the mega rich even more billions. And by the way, you won’t have a democracy anymore.

So I think it’s only fair to ask whether all this was just a front, marketing, spin, JD Vance the nice guy, not JD Vance the weird, toxic-tech-bro-toxic-masculinity-Incel-creep who wants to take away the most basic rights there are in a society, and rewind it several centuries, especially for women, minorities, the LGBTQ, and many more.

Did JD Vance sell America on this new persona, the nice, thoughtful college boy? Or is America wise enough to ask again, to press, hey, do you actually still think all this? Is this just more lies from a side renowned for them, and are you actually going to take away rights right down to IVF, healthcare, association, privacy, expression, and more?

Nobody Won the Debate, and America Deserves Better

In that sense, I think that nobody won the debate.

Rather, it exposed several levels of failures.

The failure of the Dems to not have an economic message that’s totally detached from reality. Why can’t they say things as simple as JD Vance? Just say them, for Pete’s sake? The Dream feels unattainable, people are struggling, times are tough, and so on? They’ve ruled out saying that, because their media guys tell them not to, and that’s a message that’s not resonating.

They’re left with anodyne, mealy-mouthed stuff without real power in it—“the opportunity economy” and so on—but in times like this, people need to trust you, and that trust comes from acknowledging their reality, which is that things are not good for most people. The Dems aren’t trusted because they can’t even say the most basic words about the plight of most Americans that JD Vance did, and that’s sort of embarrassing, stupid, and insane, if you ask me.

Meanwhile, the debate failed to really get to the truth of who JD Vance is. Is he the thoughtful college boy who’s going to moderate and check Daddy Trump’s worst, most reckless, and most crazy impulses? That’s the image he wanted to portray. But nobody pressed him enough, asking: hey, do you still want to take away IVF? Because that’s creepy, weird, and obsessive, since it has nothing to do with you.

And if you do, what’s with your obsession with other people’s freedoms? Why are you like fixated on taking those away? How is that “common sense” and how does that square with restoring the Dream? Isn’t the Dream that we can all pursue life, liberty, and happiness? So why are you like creepily into just making everyone try to live the way you want them to?

Those are serious failures, by the way.

In all this, I’d bet that many Americans are going to come away trusting the GOP even more on the economy. Than they already do. Because it’s true, that jobs shouldn’t be shipped offshore to places that are indeed one step above slave labor. It’s true that people are struggling and the Dream feels out of reach. These are the most elementary truths of all when it comes to the economy. It is common sense, and…

What does it say when JD Vance says it, but the Democrats won’t?

At the same time, Americans might just buy into the image Vance portrayed, which softens the GOP as some kind inquisitive force for freedom. Is it? Has Trump really moderated enough to be interested in expanding people’s freedoms? I doubt it, myself, but these days, I can hardly bring myself to place much trust in the Democrats either. Hey, at least they’re not the fascists is hardly the stuff of grand inspiration.

The Democrats need a sharper message. A more powerful one. Real vision. Rooted in what life is like today for people. Not just what their cosseted advisors imagine it to be.

The GOP, meanwhile, has a very strong message, on the issue that matters to people most, the economy, and they’re managing to sort of cast a spell that they might not be as bad as they seem on social issues.

So who won? I think everyone lost.

The reality is if the GOP wins, the economy will probably improve, but only at the expense of basic rights. If the Democrats win, their muddled economic vision will probably stall out, but at least, hey, it won’t be the Handmaids’ Tale.

Not exactly wonderful choices, if you ask me.

And so here I am, like so many. Uninspired, cautious, hesitant, and doubtful. In that sense, nobody won. America is a society in pretty grave circumstances, and it deserves better leadership than this.

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