476 Comments

Donald Trump's entire candidacy and Presidency and the idol worship that he engenders is ALL vibe. They're taking it back from him..

Expand full comment

I'm going to be MAXIMALLY charitable to JD Vance and assume that his "postmenopausal females" comment meant, "In the environment of our hunter-gatherer ancestors, postmenopausal women contributed by looking after their grandchildren."

Of course, in our hunter-gatherer environment, JD Vance's function would have been to fight against enemy tribes and hunt woolly mammoths with a pointed stick, not to run for office, so there's that.

Aren't you all glad we live in a technologically advanced civilization?

Expand full comment

This is where we are: If vibes win this election for a sterilized agar cube, I'm on board. No way forward but through.

But also: They seem like genuinely nice people and they aren't wearing armbands.

Checks out. Endorse.

Expand full comment

Price controls? On food? On energy? Did any of these geniuses think to look back to the experiences of the early to mid 1970’s when Nixon put them in? Why should that experience be different this time?

Expand full comment

Re convention playlist selections: I'll be disappointed if they don't roll out Three Dog Night's "Joy to the World." Sad to say it's not my original idea... but hopefully that means it's already making the rounds!

Loving Mellencamp's "Small Town" as Walz's "walkout" music too: Great song, and it really works for him.

Expand full comment
Aug 15·edited Aug 15

Okay. I just listened to the JD Vance audio.

Give me a minute. I need a minute.

Okay.

Deep breath. Exhale.

Wow.

The quote about the "postmenopausal women" is one thing, a bad thing certainly, but listen to the delivery. It's that NPR-like delivery, like he's choosing his words very carefully because he wants to be precise. He wants everyone to understand. It's clear he considers this a subtle and sophisticated argument, one he's spent a great deal of time formulating. It's like listening to Elizabeth Warren without the passion, but all the earnestness. The buzzwords. There's got to be 4.385 metric fuck-tons of buzzwords in that roughly two minute clip. I would need a transcript to pull them all out. If they were golf balls they'd fill the Houston Astrodome. This is what passes for erudition in the world JD Vance lives in.

It's great that your mother-in-law took a sabbatical to take care of her grandchild, JD. Good for her. Good for you, by the way, who saved all the money you would have had to pay for child care. But that wouldn't have been a big problem, JD, would it? Because you're a millionaire venture capitalist with a billionaire sugar daddy. But good for her. I'm glad she had the freedom to make that choice. I'd bet a lot of people would like to make that choice. But they don't give year-long sabbaticals to people who work at Home Depot. You only get that when you're an elite professor of biology somewhere.

The host. Why didn't that guy ask Senator Vance, a man in a position to make things happen, why he hadn't drafted legislation that would help working class people make the same clearly beneficial choice his mother-in-law could make because of her wealth? Wonder what he would have said?

Good Lord. This guy. This effing guy.

Expand full comment

Did none of J.D.'s conservative friends tell him that mothers are supposed to be raising their own children?

Expand full comment

He's weird AND creepy.

Expand full comment

"But simple and straightforward can be effective—in popular music, and in presidential politics."

🎵Sweet Ka-ma-laa! Ba ba ba! Good times never seemed so good!🎵

Expand full comment

Thank you Bill Kristol for The Beach Boys’ Good Vibes! Succinct description of the energy that most of us never trumpers are feeling now. I have had a large weight lifted off my shoulders in recent weeks. Any questions about policies and campaigns seem less dire now. Power of positive thinking has returned.

Expand full comment

Let's hope it delivers the right results.

Expand full comment

All I have to say is I'm glad ya'll are starting to get on board with the fact that outlining a specific policy agenda at this point isn't going to win Harris any votes. On its own, I seriously doubt it would change anyone's vote, but handing ammunition to Faux & Friends, who will spin it into utter nonsense, absolutely will.

Many of us here are political wonks who would like a concrete outline, but I hate to say it, the people deciding this election don't really care. Is that how it should be? NOPE. But we can't wishcast things into reality. If Harris has any shot of winning, it's going to be riding a wave of good vibes to counter Trump's absurdity.

Expand full comment

I had made a flippant comment about the dare I say it, weird conversation JustDumb had with whomever. After considering what they were saying about women they were making the point that in their opinion women existed only to procreate, raise children and of service men. What they were saying is women should not be considered as human in their own right. What a great message to give your daughters

Expand full comment

I worked for Ted Cruz's Presidential campaign (feel free to mock me now), and from my experience it seems like we have a classic mistake from the pundit class: running a campaign to gain voters vs running a campaign to gain industry recognition.

What the pundits and columnists are really saying is that they need content and they need something from the campaign to give them relevance. Media is about content, content, content. If you want a job in media after the campaign, then you feed your friends. But NO ONE remembers the countless white papers every primary candidate released in 2016, because none of it mattered.

I'd argue that Bill doesn't take it far enough. Everything you do on a campaign is about vibes. Every policy piece, every speech, every event, every last one is about communicating a vibe to the voters. Anyone who says otherwise isn't on a campaign, they're trying to sell a book.

Expand full comment

Media: “Please give me relevance, please, please, please!"

I love that idea!

Expand full comment

That's right. And since there's hardly any time to stuff ourselves full of content it'll be mostly vibes. Which is exactly what it usually boils down to in the end anyway, of course. In fact, let's outlaw white papers from now on. 😉

Expand full comment

This is an interesting take. So.... What vibes are the Trump Campaign sending right now? Specifically, what vibes are they sending to their base? I don't know.

I suspect it's something like, "In a world where socialism and communism and fascism and wokeness and transgenderism and atheism threatens our American Way of Life and where hordes of migrants, many released from insane asylums and prisons walk over our borders, murder our neighbors and register to vote as Democrats, one man stands tall. One man has the strength, the power, the vision to make America great again. Donald Trump is that man."

It amazes me that that works, but I saw a post from a family member this morning that convinces me that it does. It starts, "For those of you who say, "I can't believe you are voting for Trump" and then goes on to give all the reasons: against socialism, for the 2nd Amendment, for more Supreme Court justices, for the Electoral College and the Constitutional Republic, for law and order, for the military and veterans, for "the right to speak my mind and not be censored," for secure borders, for legal immigration, for "the right to praise my God without fear," for the unborn, for liberty, freedom and the American dream, against evil and for the future of the country.

This is utter nonsense. It's insane. It's 100% vibes. Does this come down to which kinds of vibes do you like? I think it might.

And I just don't see the "rage vibe" being more powerful than the "joy vibe." Am I wrong about this?

Expand full comment

Odd to learn that Good Vibrations was co-written by someone who gives off bad vibes like Mike Love.

As for Harris promising controls on food prices, if that could actually be done, I'd be thrilled. I'd prefer she not over-promise, although remembering Trump's statements in 2016 about healthcare, I guess overpromising rarely hurts politicians.

And if it's bad policy to actually try to use the power of the federal government to stop corporate gouging - which we have been inundated by since the pandemic - put me down for some bad policy, please.

Expand full comment

This is what good vibes looks like:

https://youtu.be/WkwZ_A49hb8?si=VvvbvYX3KJdV1Yj-

The Harris campaign on YouTube just released a 10 minute discussion between Harris & Walsh with topics ranging from taco spice levels, to music, to the future of America. They make an amazing impression. Forward looking, and all smiles. Its near perfect.

Expand full comment

And this is what it could sound like, swapping out Caroline for Kamala...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzmXIWXvqIU

Expand full comment

Totally love the "keep the vibe going" idea. That said, I recently viewed a YouTube video posted by a young woman - her father had gone full NEWSMAX/MAGA, and basically disowned her. Through the tears, she spoke about how Tim Walz was so much like her "old" father. She welcomed his presence into her life and lamented the grief brought by the hate, vitriol, and division sowed by the cult.

This is a LOT more than vibes!

Expand full comment

Wholeheartedly agree with keeping the vibes flowing. But another, equally optimistic, song wouldn’t be a bad idea. Might I suggest expanding the repertoire to include an occasional playing of Feelin’ Groovey? Keep it simple. Different words once in awhile.

Ba da, da, da, da, da, da

Feelin' groovy

Expand full comment