The 2024 Democratic National Convention (DNC) has wrapped up and the election is officially on: former President Donald Trump (R-FL) and freshman Senator J.D. Vance (R-OH) will face Vice President Kamala Harris (D-CA) and Governor Tim Walz (D-MN).
Americans were not eager for a rematch between Trump and President Joe Biden (D-DE), which would have been the first presidential rematch since 1952. But time will tell if Americans will be eager about Biden’s replacement at the top of the ticket in Harris.
There are three massive points of irony we’ve found in this convention, and the first lies in the sole purpose of the convention: to award delegates to a presidential nominee based on the popular vote.
For a party that talks an awful lot about abolishing the Electoral College, kneecapping the influence of big money in politics, and protecting “democracy” – obligatory “we are a republic” retort – they seem to be okay with the metrics of this convention.
We’ve discussed this before, but it’s worth reiterating. Biden had obvious cognitive and voter enthusiasm problems in 2020, but Democrats were able to ride the racial angst and chaos of the COVID-19 Pandemic to get him elected. His popularity quickly plummeted into the high-30s, low-40s shortly into his first term, with the disastrous and embarrassing Afghanistan withdrawal being the beginning of the end of his honeymoon phase. Democrats had every opportunity to open the door to a new frontrunner. They made it next to impossible for Congressman Dean Phillips (D, MN-03) and self-help author Marianna Williamson (D-CA) to propel themselves in the primary, and the same lack of courtesy was extended to Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., who in October, abandoned his primary bid for a long-shot, glass-mountain Independent campaign. Reports are now swirling that Kennedy will suspend his campaign and endorse Trump, with the candidate himself set to address the nation in Phoenix, Arizona, at 10:00a.m. Friday.
They had other options but doubled down on Biden. He predictably swept all delegates and seemed to be barrelling towards a re-election campaign for which only the deepest Democratic officials were enthusiastic.
Obviously, it all came crashing down after the debate, and their fear of a Donald Trump rout in tandem with down-ballot liabilities prompted them to stage an effective coup against the president.
Some Democrats we’ve spoken to argue that they “realized it wasn’t working” and had to change their strategy.
Except politics and transparency don’t work that way. We’re sure the left would be enraged if Trump was hemorrhaging in the polls and was replaced as quickly as his electability came crashing down. The people were given their choices, the party made sure to relay to the public that Biden was their guy, and they voted accordingly. They got upset about what they chose and decided to reshuffle the deck after discovering the dealer had a Blackjack instead of playing through and taking the loss.
It’s even more ironic that Biden’s sudden suspension didn’t seem to disappoint too many Democrats, despite him winning eighty-one million votes in 2020.
It’s a serious detriment to their credibility and their responsibility to their voters, their platforms, and the constituents they represent. It’s also completely disingenuous to the American public, as one of these candidates will end up running the country in just a few short months. Even Americans who can’t stand Democratic policies and principles will still have a Democrat for president if Harris should win the election. It’s certainly not fair to the rest of the general public, especially third-party registrants or apolitical citizens, that party business flouted public opinion.
Yet they say Donald Trump is a threat to democracy. What’s ironic here is that they’re peddling the same alarmism that they did during the 2016 election. One could only speculate what a Trump presidency could have consisted of since he had never held elected office, but claims that he would start World War III, crash the economy, and take away everyone’s rights certainly didn’t pan out.
Now, the left is acting as if Trump didn’t do four years and are dusting off the same platitudes again.
Enter the next point of irony: the platform on which Harris and Walz are running.
Harris and company act as if she hasn’t been vice president for the last three-and-a-half years, yet she pledges to fix all of the problems that we saw emerge under her boss. Why couldn’t she have a hand in fixing problems of inflation, national security, and foreign policy? After all, she was a tie-breaking vote in the Senate for two years and she was immediately crowned Biden’s “Border Czar” after taking office, a claim that mass media is now trying to walk back while gaslighting the public that such a designation was never made.
It’s one thing to run on fixing the infinite problems a country faces, but it’s another to make the same vow when you’re already in a position to do something about it.
Democrats must seem to think that four more years of Biden-esque policy is what’s needed and desired amongst the public. If so, why isn’t Harris talking about how great things are? They tout Biden’s record and say he’ll go down as a great president, but find little to discuss when they get out on the street and talk to actual people who are struggling.
Finally, the irony of Harris running mate: Governor Tim Walz.
Walz was one of the few actors who made the United States an international embarrassment by failing to quell riots that resulted in two deaths, $500 million in damage, over 600 arrests, and damage to 1,500 properties. The five-day period resulted in the second-most destructive period of local unrest in U.S. history after the 1992 Los Angeles riots. He dragged his feet at getting the National Guard involved, placed blame on the Twin Cities’ mayors, and his wife even admitted to keeping windows open to smell the “burning tires” at the Governor’s Mansion.
Nothing says “the party of the people” quite like sitting in an ivory tower and taking in the unrest. And nothing says healing national divisions quite like a guy who couldn’t have been more ineffective if he tried when the largest metropolitan area in his state burned for almost a week.
To say that Walz has proven to be an unmitigated disaster for public safety would be an understatement. Suffolk County law enforcement feels similarly, as they became the first police organization in the state to throw their support behind Trump on Saturday.
The 2024 DNC and the Democratic ticket are encapsulated by the left’s lack of self-awareness and the irony within. We hope these instances of irony are simply relegated to the campaign trail and don’t seep into the White House. Neither side is perfect, but it feels markedly more difficult to feel accurately represented by a party governed by ironic principles and ouroboric ideals than the party who has run a strong campaign and never backed down for another nominee when it seemed defeat was certain.
