(Crowd) Size Matters

Morning dispatch

Good luck competing with this, Donald.

Since President Biden announced he will not be running for re-election and endorsed his vice president, Kamala Harris to replace him, the corporate media have lost interest in the candidates’ ages. This, despite the fact that Donald is now the oldest candidate ever to run for the presidency in American history.

Corporate media also choose, as they have for years now, not to dig into the plethora of evidence of Donald’s corruption and the corruption of those closest to him—the questions about the $10 million he allegedly received from Egypt in advance of the 2016 election, the $2 billion Jared Kushner received from Saudi Arabia in advance of the White House (ostensibly for his non-existent expertise in managing investment funds, but more likely for services rendered—or, even more alarmingly, services to be rendered if Donald were to get back into the White House). Donald’s deteriorating mental health and cognitive decline are similarly of no interest. Ditto, his racism, misogyny, cruelty, and his fascism.

It is obviously too much to expect the corporate media to start caring about these crucially important things at this late date—although independent media will continue to focus on them even after the election is decided in November.

Perhaps the powers that be think that neither Donald’s actions nor character are relevant to American voters. Or, has they have for almost a decade now, they’ve made the calculation that all of it is already baked in to voters’ judgments about Donald anyway, so there’s no need to mention them ever again.

We’re starting to see some cracks in the Trump campaign, however, that need to be exploited by the Democrats even if—especially if—the corporate media ignores them.

Since Biden passed the torch to Harris, the Trump campaign has been completely knocked back on its heels. Their entire campaign strategy, we’ve been told, was based on running against Joe Biden and they just haven’t been able to adapt to the new reality. One of the reasons this has been so difficult for them is that the Republican Party platform, such as it is, is almost entirely devoid of policy. Basing a campaign on attacking one specific person is short-sighted at best and, so far, they haven’t been able to land an attack against Harris that will stick. Not only have they failed to define her, she’s shown us that she’s been perfectly capable of defining herself.

Despite the fact the weakness shown in conceding that you wish you were still competing against the other guy, Donald posted the following:

What are the chances that Crooked Joe Biden, the WORST President in the history of the U.S., whose Presidency was Unconstitutionally STOLEN from him by Kamabla, Barrack HUSSEIN Obama, Crazy Nancy Pelosi, Shifty Adam Achiff, Cryin’ Chuck Schumer, and others on the Lunatic Left, CRASHES the Democrat National Convention and tries to take back the Nomination, beginning with challenging me to another DEBATE. He feels that he made a historically tragic mistake by handing over the U.S. Presidency, a COUP, to the people in the World he most hates, and he wants it back, NOW!!!

This was in part in reaction to the last two weeks: First, Vice President Harris, due to her impeccable rollout, and then the Harris/Vance ticket, with its passionate surrogates and off-the-charts rallies, have driven Donald almost entirely off the front pages of major newspapers. (When the only headline of note is, “Trump complains about campaign as advisers try to focus on attacking Harris,” things are not going well for you.); second, the Harris/Walz rallies themselves are massive, with audience sizes orders of magnitude larger than anything Donald could hope to attract. Hence, the meltdowns, the lashing out, the disappearing from public view for days at a time.

There’s one way of framing all of this that shouldn’t be too big a lift even for today’s media: A man who can’t adjust to new circumstances, who can’t respond to new facts on the ground, who can’t figure out a way to take on a new opponent because his campaign is all attack and no policy, is utterly unfit to lead.

Donald Trump is not now and never has been a leader. At this point, the staggering amount of evidence supporting that conclusion can’t be ignored.