With joy and unity
A couple of Democratic events here in WNC over the last week drew far bigger crowds than I’ve seen in nearly two decades. A fundraiser for a county commission candidate at a nearby farm on Thursday drew hundreds. A district-wide gathering featuring a slate of statewide candidates at a rural farm west of here drew 400-500. An ice cream social at a city park shelter on Sunday exploded to 300 and became a local happening.
That energy is popping up in unlikelier places:
On Saturday afternoon, around 500 golf carts reportedly paraded through the Villages, a retirement community in Central Florida, in support of Kamala Harris for president — roughly 200 more than the number that reportedly showed up for President Biden ahead of the 2020 election.
Saturday’s rally was part of the newly minted Harris campaign’s efforts to engage Florida voters and recruit volunteers to boost Democratic support.
With roughly 30% of Florida voters affiliated with neither the Republican or Democratic parties, per the Tallahassee Democrat, some attendees saw the turnout as a sign of a notable shift for the largely conservative community.
Jennifer Rubin suggests this morning that the way to fight autocracy is with optimism, joy, and humor. Less-engaged voters want to support the winning team. Democrats need to start acting like winners.
But while the Trump-Vance ticket has shown itself to be a joke, what it represents is not. This is still a serious fight. Rubin attended the Anti-Autocracy Conference last week featuring totalitarianism expert, Ruth Ben-Ghiat, who told the assembly:
This is an anti-autocracy conference because autocracy is what we are looking at if Donald Trump is reelected.
I know many Americans feel this is hyperbole, even after MAGA attemped [sic] to overthrow the government to keep Trump in office illegally. In my line of work, we call this a coup attempt. Even now, Trump is continuing to use his rallies to market strongman rule to Americans. Just a few days ago he praised Xi Jinping, a Communist dictator, as “brilliant” because he rules with an “iron fist.”
What’s important in pushing back against this dark movement is finding the common ground most Americans share:
Norm Eisen, co-founder of State Democracy Defenders Action✓ — which hosted the conference together with conservative group Principles First and advocacy group Democracy Forward — told me, “There is much more that unites us as Americans than divides us.” He laid out 10 principles at the conference that “define what a long-term right, left and center coalition would look like to unify the vast majority of Americans against Trump’s authoritarianism and ensure that the American democratic tradition continues — and that Trump led autocracy is permanently banished from the American political scene.” These principles boil down to:
- Democracies rest on rule of law; someone who denies the sanctity of the Constitution and serially violates our laws cannot be president.
- Democracy cannot survive without truth, facts, science and evidence.
- Free and fair elections are the essence of democracy, where power resides in the people.
- Civil discourse must be the means to resolve differences; compromise is essential to governance.
- A democratic government cannot operate without an independent, nonpartisan civil service, and subject matter expertise is essential to good government.
- An ethical government free from corruption and self-interest is essential to our democracy.
- The United States is the indispensable nation for international stability, economic prosperity and democracy. Our military takes an oath to the Constitution, not to a single leader.
- Democracies require and ensure widespread prosperity. Democracies that deliver economically for citizens require a domestic calm, commitment to the rule of law and opposition to cronyism.
- A vibrant, independent press is vital to democracy.
- Equality and civil rights (“All men [and women] are created …”) are foundational to our American creed.
What surprised Rubin was (despite the serious topic) the atmosphere of “camaraderie and humor.”
Adam Gallagher and Anthony Navone wrote that humor “disrupts dominant discourses and challenges power ‘by disrupting the language and symbols used by those in power to represent reality in a particular way and providing alternative interpretations of that reality.’” Moreover, “Authoritarian leaders and regimes rely on projections of unshakable power; using fear to maintain control,” the authors wrote. “No wonder they hate jokes.” (Not coincidentally, Trump has said he hates being laughed at.)
Americans are anxious for connection, for in-person relationships and for fun. Especially when enlisting previously apolitical people, optimism, joy and, yes, humor can help hold movements together. No wonder Vice President Harris’s laugh is already is unnerving MAGA scolds; perhaps they grasp the power of happy warriors.
It helps that Donald Trump’s vice presidential pick, Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio, is, as Harris campaign co-chair Mitch Landrieu told CNN, “one of the most unprepared people that we have ever put up to hold the vice presidency of the United States.” Vance barely meets the minimum requirement to be 35 years old and native-born, Landrieu said:
“He didn’t even run a business. He’s never run anything. And he’s about to be one heartbeat away from the largest entity in the world, and the one that’s the most important,” Landrieu said. “So it’s a fair question to ask: How would we know whether you have the capability to run domestic and national security policy for the most powerful country in the world, which you may be called to do on a moment’s notice?”
Expect the contrast with Harris’s upcoming VP pick to be stark, starker even than the choice Sen. John McCain’s made in 2008 to choose Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska . She saw her role as spokesmodel. What helped sink McCain’s candidacy then will help sink Trump’s now.
Plus, as America has seen recently, Trump the Unhinged is becoming more unhinged. His act is old and stale, and he is now the old man in the race facing an energized Democratic Party and a happy warrior in Kamala Harris.
Anecdotally here, independents are getting off their couches and getting involved in the fight.
The lighthearted memes cropping up around the Harris campaign feed the excitement. So what if they are silly or unintelligible to older voters? They’re working. As Barack Obama once cautioned, don’t be buzzkills.
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