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Culture War Roundup for the week of August 26, 2024

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I have no trouble acknowledging that there are many people that support a bunch of Democrat policies that I don't like much. If, for example, someone just doesn't think they should have to pay their student loans, they're probably going to vote Democrat.

On the flip side, the enthusiasm for Harris is genuinely hard to understand. I accept that the firmware update worked as intended and people really mean it, but it is genuinely puzzling to me what they're seeing that they're excited about. The answer is apparently as simple as the fact that she's 60 and lucid rather than 80 and comatose, which is fine as far as it goes, but doesn't really get me to understanding excitement.

As a bit of an extra point, I think if you'd told me this was how it was going to go down a few years ago, I would have thought a bunch of Democrats would be annoyed that they didn't get a say in picking their candidate. Instead, everyone just happily agreed that they're coconut-pilled now, that they're not going back, and that it's time embrace what can be, unburdened by what has been. That, above all else, is why I can't stop thinking of the situation as embodying the NPC meme. It is very hard for me to believe that people authentically watched some teleprompter speech and thought, "wow, now I can't wait to get out there and campaign"; I don't think it was astroturfed, but I do think that this is almost entirely an exercise in groupthink.

You make the mistake of the intelligent.

Politics are not really about policy. Kamala has a poor track record and every policy she's advocating is, at least in its current form, going to be disastrous in concept or execution. This has not tamped down the enthusiasm for her any.

She is photogenic, she smiles for photos, she looks attractive for her age and isn't obviously decrepit. Trump looks like a shriveled tangerine. America lies about a lot of things, in particular, that they don't care about looks. Obama wouldn't have gotten anywhere near the electoral success he did had he been unattractive. Don't hate the player, hate the game. The meta in American presidential politics is to run a supermodel or attractive actor who will say the right things. They can be more easily understood as a figurehead for what will let Americans feel good about themselves.

I hate Kamala, but she's definitely got a shot as America's president given that she is an accurate representation of what one half of America believes itself to be. Attractive, opportunistic, professionally presentable and economically illiterate.

There's also the side factor that - well, teenagers who only remember Trump and then Biden as president see a chance for Hope and Change in their generation. They haven't had that yet. Older people got their Hope and Change, when's their turn? Older people got their Vietnam to feel good about, why can't they get to feel good about Israel?

well, teenagers who only remember Trump and then Biden as president see a chance for Hope and Change in their generation.

Men 18-29 are now a Trump-leaning demographic.

Men 18-29 have always been a Trump-leaning demographic. His brand is winning bigly and actually putting up a fight on behalf of red team. The newer, younger ones, though... those guys have seen him win, fail to achieve many of his right wing aims or win the culture war while in office, then lose, whine about losing, and get a clown invasion of capitol hill condemned as an insurrection. How much impact he had on each one of those outcomes is limited, but people like winners.

Young men, a Trump-leaning demographic, are not switching to Kamala Harris. The suggestion is preposterous. It can only be made in the fatalistic Motte fantasy world where people continue to not know anything real about Donald Trump.

How much impact he had on each one of those outcomes is limited, but people like winners.

Fight! Fight! Fight!

They can also abstain from voting or go third-party, which is positive for Kamala.

I don't detect the energy that Trump's campaign had in 2016 in 2024. He's a known quantity now and he didn't actually "drain the swamp", "lock her up", or do any of the things that young men actually wanted.

You seem to assume that the Motte is fatalistic because it lives in a fantasy world. In fact, the Motte is fatalistic because both sides of the political fence have failed to make a cogent argument for rationality and truth-seeking order. Both sides are retreating from this; some are even loudly claiming that this is the dead end the Enlightenment tradition has led us into. The entire COVID debacle had people here very loudly slashing their wrists over the mass denial, the reaction, the overreaction, the bad science, and the memory-holing. Even the most pure of quokkas would, having being equipped with basic powers of observation, have felt a collapse akin to finding out how stupid and apathetic people really are about being at war with racists who think COVID is a big deal anti-vaxxers who believe COVID isn't a big deal people who refuse to isolate people who refuse to wear chin diapers people who think it's bad to campaign publicly for BLM during social distancing people who don't social distance Eurasia Eastasia conspiracy theorists people who think COVID spending is a bad idea people who think COVID didn't disproportionately hurt black people [software update pending, please hold, fill in the blank as you wish depending on what the people in power want you to hate].

This place doesn't have many shared values anymore but one of the very few is a desire for truth seeking out of a belief it produces better outcomes and that houses built on sand cannot stand. Finding out that the truth is like poetry, and that most people fucking hate poetry, even if it can recognizably produce better outcomes, is like finding out the Earth is flat and that proving it isn't makes you into the lunatic they burn at the stake.

Call it learned helplessness it you want, I prefer the pithy "Oh shit, people really are that stupid and easily led" and "if they could mindfuck millions of people into doublethink this easily, what else are they mindfucking us into?" Older people remember the Iraq war, maybe next time the powers that be will pick a juicier target.

I don't detect the energy that Trump's campaign had in 2016 in 2024.

Trump is polling higher than he ever has before. A month ago he was shot in the head and dodged a bullet. Then he got on his feet and started a fight chant.

The people saying they don't feel 2016 energy are all people who, in 2016, were certain that he was going to lose and could never possibly win. This time 2016 the Republican party was abandoning him in droves, "grab them by the pussy" was coming out and convinced everyone that this campaign was finished, and Hillary was giving interviews about how far ahead she was. This feels some some new meme fatalist consensus: but the same doomsayers were doomsaying then too.

People aren't satisfied with Trump? After 4 years of Biden Trump looks better than ever before. People remember peace and a stronger economy and groceries that didn't triple in price. He didn't drain the swamp? Gee, yeah, I wonder what happened.

This is what I'm talking about: the fatalism here is people who don't like Trump and never liked Trump rationalizing increasingly desperate forms of depression. What on earth does this have to do with the Enlightenment? The average poster here is pretty smart, but I doubt 1 in 10 could give a coherent definition of that period of time without consulting Google. Desire for truth? Maybe in principle, but I see bullshit repeated here all the time.

I thought Trump was going to win in 2016. I actually won money off of people for betting on it.

I don't think he's going to win now. It's not guaranteed, but Kamala is less of a disaster candidate than Hillary Clinton for the majority of Americans who don't pay attention to politics.

https://x.com/greg_price11/status/1829250723659559419

Kamala: "The climate crisis is real that it is an urgent matter to which we should apply metrics that include holding ourselves to deadlines around time."

Kamala Harris is probably the stupidest major parth candidate of the last 30 years. Hillary, for all her flaws, was cunning and smart. Once people internalize that Kamala isn't smart -- she wants to tax unrealized gains, she wants to end gasoline cars, she can't fix the border -- people will not accept Kamala as "less of a disaster".

Trump is polling higher than he ever has before.

Eh? Kamala jumped ahead as soon as she was anointed and only dropped slightly.

In 2016, at this time, Trump was supposedly -10.

In 2020, at this time, Trump was supposedly -10.

Now, polls have Trump around -2 to +2. He looks great in swing states. The indictments consolidated support, the assassination attempt consolidated support, and RFK's endorsement represents a new base of support. Trump looks better than he's ever looked, his favorables are better than they've ever been, 4 years of Biden makes Trump's presidency look even better in hindsight -- and somehow, all I hear on the Motte is how Trump is definitely, for sure, this time, we mean it, decisively, finally, no joke, losing.

On the flip side, the enthusiasm for Harris is genuinely hard to understand. I accept that the firmware update worked as intended and people really mean it, but it is genuinely puzzling to me what they're seeing that they're excited about. The answer is apparently as simple as the fact that she's 60 and lucid rather than 80 and comatose, which is fine as far as it goes, but doesn't really get me to understanding excitement.

From what I have seen, in my very blue bubble, it's 90% the euphoria of believing you were doomed and suddenly realizing you have a good chance of winning. Immediately after the attempted assassination of Trump, the mood among Democrats was bleak indeed. Pretty much everyone believed the election was basically Trump's to lose, and Biden gave little reason to hope.

The DNC had no real mechanism to force Biden to withdraw, and I was pretty convinced he would never do so voluntarily. Even if he did, I thought they would have to have an emergency primary, with the unappetizing choice of Harris (who until five minutes ago was considered an even worse candidate than Biden) or equally bad prospects like Gavin Newsom.

That the Democrats actually pulled off (1) getting Biden to withdraw, (2) instituting Harris in his place as a fate accompli, and (3) making it seem like a smooth transition, was actually a pretty impressive bit of political maneuvering. Republicans spent a little while trying to generate crocodile tears about the undemocratic nature of the process, but not only did this not stick, but the whole thing basically pushed Trump's post-shooting boost right out of the news cycle.

Now it's increasingly looking like Harris's race to lose. All the stuff being thrown at her and Walz look like cheap shots that aren't landing. Of course the Democrats are ecstatic. I was personally convinced Trump was going to win, and now if I had to place money, I'd bet on Harris. I think she will have to screw up hugely, or Trump will have to pull a hat trick of the type that is not really his forte, for her to lose. Any October surprises or sudden catastrophes will only help her.

To be clear, I absolutely agree there is nothing about Kamala Harris personally to inspire excitement. She's a political nothing (like most VPs, to be fair). But the fact that she's basically a generic Democrat with nothing terrible in her closets (as far as we know) and will be the first (POC) woman president is enough to make Blue tribe giddy at the prospect of the Revenge of Hillary Clinton.

fate accompli

It's "fait accompli".

As a systemic victim of shitty autocorrect, I'd say there's no point in correcting people on the spelling of foreign phrases.

As a systemic victim of shitty autocorrect

There's a fairly-simple solution to autocorruption; turn it off. It's what I do every time I get a new computer, browser or word processor.

The problem is that I fucking hate typing on touch screens, and anything that can help me minimize it is a plus. There's an open question if the medicine is better than the disease, and if the best solution isn't just to postpone my shitposting until I'm in front of a keyboard.

if the best solution isn't just to postpone my shitposting until I'm in front of a keyboard.

This is certainly what I do (I hate touch screens even more than normal, as I'm used to typing with fingernails).

was actually a pretty impressive bit of political maneuvering.

In some countries, they refer to this as a "coup".

I generally agree with the rest of your post, but it isn't Kamala's race to lose. Right now, this is a toss up, which means it's about the next "thing" that turns into the "current thing" that each candidate has to respond to. Remember, Harris got a two free news cycle passes in a row - when Biden dropped out followed immediately by the DNC. In the next few weeks some-"thing" will happen. Then, the race actually starts.

In some countries, they refer to this as a "coup".

No, it isn't.

First, a party can nominate whoever it wants; it doesn't have to go through a "democratic" primary process, and the Democrats only did that in the most disingenuous way possible for this election.

Second, it's absurd for people on the right to try to claim that, both, A. Biden is mentally unfit; and B. It's a "coup" to replace him. If A, then B must happen in the name of civic responsibility.

I'll grant that a lot of Democratic Party shenanigans stink to high heaven, and this whole election process makes them look like the most cynical operators. But it's rich for people, most of whom don't even think Biden was legitimately elected in the first place, to try to claim that switching out nominees in this case is somehow deeply illegitmate.

Trump followed with the RFK Jr. endorsement followed by the Gabbard endorsement. The latter didn't even make a splash; it barely got an offhand mention here. If you have a "thing" but the media downplays it, it's not a "thing".

That's a very fair counterpoint. I hadn't thought of that.

Coup has two meanings in a way which makes this confusing. The term derives from the French "couper" meaning "to cut" in common French but closer to "to strike" in fencing terminology, which is where the relevant English idioms get the word from, including coup d'etat, coup de theatre, coup de grace etc.

So we have "coup" meaning an achievement analogous to a well-executed hit in fencing - the dictionary describes it as "successfully achieving something difficult" but I think it is only idiomatic if the achievement is an apparently sudden and surprising victory in an adversarial setting analogous to a duel. In this case Pelosi and other Democratic elites removing Biden cleanly is clearly a coup.

We also have "coup" used as a shorthand for "coup d'etat" - specifically the idea of a sudden violent replacement of a government (although again "coup" is only idiomatically correct if the success is so spectacular that only minimal violence is actually needed - otherwise it is a civil war or a revolution). The replacement of Biden by Harris is clearly not a coup d'etat - the rules as written were followed and there was no threat or use of violence.

To me "coup" implies coercion. And, while I don't know what happened behind closed doors to get Biden to step down, so far at least I have not seen any evidence that there was coercion.

Wait you think Biden did it willingly? It is pretty clear they told him step down or we will 25th amendment you. Legal? Yeah. Coercive? Yeah.

I don't know, the fact that it happened on twitter without any visible involvement of the man himself (and famously even the wrong signature) does it for me.

When a political party replaces one candidate with another candidate (who is in fact the deputy of the current candidate) that can hardly be called a coup. Coups involve replacing the government, Kamala's government position (VP) hasn't changed, she's just now the person standing to be the next president instead of Biden.

Candidate choice is an internal party matter for the Democrats (as it is for any political party). There is nothing even remotely coup-like about this.

This is absurd. Candidate choice is not an internal party matter. We have these state run things called primaries that have determined nominations for a long time in this country. I know it’s convenient to say “internal matter” but most internal matters don’t require the local Secretary of State to get involved.

But it is still true. You are right to point out state involvement. But most states have no law about whether delegates are bound legally and those that do almost invariably have an exemption for the candidate withdrawing. Plus many other exemptions for being unbound after rounds of voting or if their chosen candidate is doing too badly.

But regardless of all that the Supreme Court held that state election law cannot override a parties internal processes in any case. It is literally legally an internal matter.

Regardless of the primaries, the delegates were legally free to pick Kamala. All the DNC delegates are bound to do is in good conscience represent their voters. If they in good conscience think their voters would no longer want Biden they can and indeed should switch even if he didn't step down. Note this rule was changed in 1980 when they were trying to replace Carter as acandidate with a Kennedy, and only their own internal rules prevented them from doing so. So this is something that has been planned for. The only thing they have to do is manage the political fallout if any.

The truth is the primaries are theatre legally. The only thing that binds the parties are their internal rules. Hence an internal matter.

There are principles of norms and there are legal realities. The fact is people have understood for a long time that primaries are how we pick candidates. The fact is those processes are run by states.

And now when the Dems were going to lose they claim “well it is just an internal matter” ignoring the norm that even involved the state!

Except they did the same back in 1980 but were stopped only by their internal rules. Which they then changed, so they could do it if they wanted. The fact they haven't needed to, doesn't change the fact they were prepared for it, over 40 years ago.

People can understand all sorts of things, it doesn't mean those things are true. As long as the DNC is competent at convincing their voters then we have established there is no actual other impediment. In fact the Supreme Court relied on the ultimate norm. The Constitution. The first amendment is what allows the parties this broad latitude.

Is your position that norms should override Constitutional rights? Because that seems somewhat problematic for other rights you probably support. Its certainly been the norm in blue states to make owning guns difficult. Does that trump 2A rights? If New York is forced to allow open carry will you curse this overriding of norms?

At the end of the day, what happened was legal. Indeed it would have been legal even without Biden stepping down. With him stepping down it is both legal and I would argue within the norms most people consider. My delegate will choose someone other than my candidate if they step down or die is one of the norms of primaries after all.

If enough people dislike how it was done, they can punish Democrats at the ballot box.

Funny enough I don’t think the 2A protects guns if I’m relatively pro guns.

And my broader point is that a lot of what makes a society work and a constitutional order work is respecting for norms. Pushing things to the legal breaking point is not a good thing. This is pushing a norm to a breaking point.

As for Biden “stepping down” he was forced out. Again norm breaking.

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Is your position that norms should override Constitutional rights? Because that seems somewhat problematic for other rights you probably support. Its certainly been the norm in blue states to make owning guns difficult. Does that trump 2A rights?

The problem is the inconsistency. As you point out, Blue Tribe norms almost always trump constitutional rights. New York's laws, as a practical matter, actually do override the Second Amendment. The reverse almost never happens.

If New York is forced to allow open carry will you curse this overriding of norms?

No, but then again, this will not happen. I will happily put up money on this.

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The answer is apparently as simple as the fact that she's 60 and lucid rather than 80 and comatose

and she's not Trump. Don't forget who this election's really about. This is the elation of "oh shit we can win" that followed the desperation after Biden's debate performance. I honestly think this is explained by fairly standard human emotional dynamics.

Of course the emotions get narrativized, but that's just what humans do unless (and often still when) they have uncommonly large amounts of self-honesty

The idea that you were, at one point, bound to lose (particularly immediately after the assassination attempt) and, all of a sudden, you're now bound to win is pretty exciting in itself, no?

One could argue that the Dems had a say in picking their candidate - in 2020, when they accepted Harris as the person who would take the reins if the President became killed or incapacitated. Now the President is sort of incapacitated - yes, it's a very odd sort of incapacitation that apparently means you can no longer run for Presidency but can still function as a President, technically - so Harris takes the reins for that one particular thing.

Personally, I'm not too sure whether the tension inherent in Biden being smoked out by the media and party elites has been quite resolved yet and might still come up and bite Harris on the butt after the convention fever is out, and it is certainly not confirmed that Harris's current lead will continue, but I guess it'll take until November to see what will happen.

One could argue that the Dems had a say in picking their candidate - in 2020, when they accepted Harris as the person who would take the reins if the President became killed or incapacitated.

huh? there was a primary for the VP slot that I didn't know about?

No, but there's an election where you vote for a ticket consisting of a president and a VP.

but that election is between the two major parties, not a selection of VP candidates.

Look me in the eyes and tell me that you, personally, believe that this constitutes picking your candidate.

I dunno? It's not my job to pick the US Democratic Party's candidate.

A lot of people do seem to think that way, though, from the speed at which they united behind Kamala. I'm just spitballing for reasons why that happened. I could, of course, also just go with "they're dumb lib NPCs who do what they're told", but that doesn't seem quite the satisfactory explanation.

I dunno? It's not my job to pick the US Democratic Party's candidate.

Well then - you might have your answer for why some people have such a hard time believing it's not an astroturf.

A lot of people do seem to think that way, though, from the speed at which they united behind Kamala.

I don't see how that follows.

The idea that you were, at one point, bound to lose (particularly immediately after the assassination attempt) and, all of a sudden, you're now bound to win is pretty exciting in itself, no?

I don't relate to politics that way, no. I have trouble empathizing with other people that do, at least outside of people that are directly involved in campaigns or work in policy positions. It's not a sport, I'm not cheering for it, and I don't get excited about it in this fashion. Politicians are, at best, instrumentally useful when it comes to getting the things I want done.

But sure, this does seem to be exactly how other people relate to it. Their team was down big in the second half, suddenly got a quick score, and now they might win. Wow, how exciting! Is Kamala Harris good, or committed to any particular values, or someone that earned the job? Who gives a shit, she got a pick six and now those Republicans are so fucked! They can't stop her!

The shape of my understanding for how this works has certainly evolved slowly, arriving much after events unfold, and it has not done wonders for my opinion of my fellow man.

I dunno, I think many people are excited now because they can see it's useful to be. That extra bit of voter zeal for Harris could make a difference to the election, whereas the same wasn't plausible with a Biden ticket. It seems more rational now to add one's excitement to a pot that could overflow into an electoral win. Whether Harris is herself all that exciting is a secondary consideration.