The Witness Chronicles, September, 30, 2024

Base? What base?

Photo by Jose M on Unsplash

Is a ‘Faithful Following’ Enough?

MAGA alone is not going to do the job

It’s hard not to hammer on this fact when you are trying to understand what could happen on Election Day. Donald Trump and JD Vance are not growing their base. The opposite may be the case.

Over 700 Republicans and former members of the first Trump administration have endorsed Kamala Harris. Vance is proving to be extremely unpopular across the spectrum of voter groups. Trump inexplicably does things like going to a Jewish anti-semitism conference and basically threatens all Jews if he loses. And he supports a NC governor candidate who described himself as a black Nazi, calling him the equivalent of two Martin Luther Kings.

I mean, really? Which brings us to that faithful following, as in ‘Trump rallies his faithful following’, a headline we see, with variations, over and over. It appears he is insulated from reality by his handlers because when he confronts it, bad things come out of his mouth.

One of the most notorious examples is his appearance in front of the National Association of Black Journalists in which he claimed Kamala Harris had recently ‘turned black’ while the panelists on stage with him looked on in shock.

With these two Republican candidates, it is far too easy to cite examples like these. They spout this divisive stuff out daily, if not hourly. And there appear to be no limits on who they will ridicule, hate on, or threaten.

It’s hard to see how this legitimately wins the election. When I try to read some data geek’s attempts to interpret the polls, all I can think is thank god that is not my job. It’s a colossal waste of time and tells us nothing. We learned that in the last midterms when polling consistently got things wrong.

Harris has an eleven point lead over Trump with women. And that is not only based on the abortion rights issue. The man is a serial sexual abuser and has a running mate with serious issues around childbearing, single women, and cat people.

I think about all of this when I see the polling headlines. There is so much more going on if you are inclined to try and see where this is going. Harris appears to be motivating young people who have not previously voted, but will they actually vote? Perhaps more important, she is gaining with older voters who are far more likely to vote.

Trump and Vance are laying the groundwork for this year’s stolen election claims by implying illegal immigrants are being brought here to vote for Democrats, though this defies logic on many levels. First, if you are illegal, why would you risk getting caught just to vote? And if illegals are voting in big numbers for Democrats, why are there so many Republicans getting elected to the Senate and House?

If this is the best they can come up with, that plan will fail but it will once again divide the country and create distrust with our election processes, which can backfire on Republicans too.

Illegals cannot vote here, by law. There is no evidence that they do or that they can. They cannot and the system has been very efficient at seeing that they don’t. Like virtually everything the Trump camp is running on, this is an entirely made up crisis.

Unfortunately if this race is as close as polling says it is, we are in for months or even years more of this lying. That’s why a lot of us are praying for something like a landslide for Harris, unlikely as that may be. We need definitive proof that no matter what he claims, Trump lost and lost big.

My only hope for this possibility is the way Trump and Vance are working away at alienating as many voter groups as possible and placing all their eggs in the basket that goes by the acronym MAGA, the faithful following or whatever they call themselves.

You know, they’re ones who aren’t really leaving the rally, they are just stretching their legs, or something. Frankly, if they are leaving the rally it may be a sign that even they can see a con going down.

Or maybe Trump found a lie or insult that finally offends the faithful. It could happen.

Note: since I wrote this yesterday, the Trump/Vance campaign has turned the volume up on their hate speech, which I did not think was possible. They are now claiming Kamala Harris is ‘mentally disabled’ and repeating it every time they speak to anyone. Vance, in particular, has been lying about virtually everything, so it will be interesting to see how far he goes in tomorrow night’s debate with Tim Walz.

Ordinarily, I don’t think vice presidential debates make much difference, but Walz’ job tomorrow night, beyond introducing himself to voters, will be to counter the onslaught of lies and hate we can expect to hear from Vance.

Frankly, this is all despicable and anyone who votes for these people really needs to rethink what they are willing to accept in politics, because this is just wrong. The statements they have been making are causing more and more Republicans to come out for Harris.

Your subscriptions, paid upgrades, and small donations, via Buy Me A Coffee, are the only compensation I get for my writing, beyond the satisfaction that some find value in it, which is a big deal. Please consider supporting my work. Thank you.