The Vibe Shift
This is not only a political movement. This is a social movement. This is an inflection point. And this is, to me, a spiritual movement…
- Tracy Nailor, 56-year-old Atlanta pediatrician.
The excitement is electric. Kamala Harris is the Democratic candidate for president in 2024 – confirmed Friday when she received pledges of sufficient electoral votes.
The next thirteen and a half weeks are going to be so crucial to the future of this country that it seems imperative to record and share reflections and impressions. It is an inflection point for us all. So I’m going to track these weeks in my blog.
I’m not naïve. She could fail to win. But in seventy-two hours she turned American politics around, and she is still doing so.
No question, we live in a world with challenges that would be paralyzing to the faint of heart. What we deeply don’t want is a set of leadership choices that locks in the paralysis before we even get out the starting gate. But that was pretty much what many of us were feeling during a presidential campaign that had bogged down as a contest about which of two over-seventy-eight-year-olds was least uninspiring. With my brain I knew who deserved my vote in that setup. But could he win? Young people, African-Americans, and Arab-Americans were, apparently, giving up on Biden. I could understand why. I felt peeved with my country for getting us into to such a pickle.
Cautionary phrases about the Kamala honeymoon are repeated frequently. But, says Michelle Goldberg of the New York Times, “no iron law of politics” says a political honeymoon has to end. “Yes,” Goldberg continues, “she’ll have to explain her shifting positions on issues like fracking, single-payer health insurance, and border enforcement. But when it comes to Trump, we’ve seen that the feelings he evokes in his supporters matter more than the inconsistencies in his record. Maybe he’s unique, or maybe that’s just how politics works in a highly polarized country with a short attention span, a fragmented media and a longing for change.”
But let’s take a few minutes to enjoy this moment for what it is. First, those of us who believe Trump is a danger to America’s future have a realistic possibility to challenge that Trumpian future. Secondly, the choice of a Biden alternative occurred rapidly. We know a testing primary would have been a good way to put Harris through her paces and to give the nation more participation in the choice, but the fact is, nobody wanted to oppose her. Is this a moment to wring our hands about that? We’re sensible enough to recognize that in the pinch we were in, the pragmatic move is the right one. Thirdly, amazing as it seems, she is a woman, a woman of black and Asian origin. And while all kinds of work has proceeded over years to get us to the point of having a black female vice-president, when it came time to endorse her for the presidency, this was not a DEI choice. It was simply the right and appropriate choice. And fourthly, for all of us women participating in the extraordinary turn-around of female consciousness and inclusion that has been the mark of post-World War II western society, Kamala sums it up, models the things we have been learning and asserting and applying throughout our lifetime – finding voice, discovering what it is to be yourself on a big stage, mobilizing the range of gifts that women bring to high office when they use their authority and intelligence to make a difference.
Kamala signifies a future worth fighting for. We are not bogged down. We have seized history by the throat. We can be proud participants in American democracy because our candidate is an emblem of smarts and a capacity to rise to the moment.
Said Jess Bidgood of the New York Times on July 25, “A presidential race that felt to many Democrats like a dispiriting slog toward an all-but-certain defeat by Trump suddenly feels light. Hopeful. People are even feeling….is that joy?”
Yes. Joy is exactly what we feel. An informal poll of friends abroad indicates the joy has global reach. In this hot summer of global warming and environmental deterioration, in this world network of displacement and desperation, in the midst of war in one crucial part of the world and incipient war in another, in this American gridlock of a deeply divided culture, we are enjoying a boost of energy and good humor.
Will Kamala Harris be able to translate a magnificent opportunity into a win? Will she gain in strength and confidence? According to standard beliefs about American politics, she is not an ideal candidate – she has done poorly at winning the confidence of staff and of stating a clear vision for the country. She flubbed in 2019. But that was then, and this is now. She’s a learner. People who have been watching her say she has grown in stature in the last two years, in the wake of the Supreme Court’s Dobb’s decision. Rallying women to defend essential rights to needed health care as well as the right to choose, she has connected with people, and in the past thirteen days those connections have grown. She calls all of us to step into who we are and accept the challenges before us. The rest of us were slow to foresee what the moment would look like. But she knew, and so far, she has shown herself ready.