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The NPC VP: Naked and Afraid
Welcome back to my life everyone.
I just watched Harris’ concession speech and it seems to me that she is as relieved as the rest of us that she lost. Did you feel that too? There are some people, I think, that have this thing in them. People who are working on, but never completing, a novel. People who have done half of a PhD (or EBD – Everything But Degree). That is, people who get involved just enough to claim an awesomeness ultimately thwarted by circumstance. If only…
As I catch bits and bobs of analysis, I’m struck by how much focus is placed on data and strategy. Americans’ top concerns were economic and Harris didn’t address that. Trump ran a bro campaign and that tells us something—etc. etc. blah, blah, blah.
None of that matters. She lost because she is unbelievably stupid.
For four years she has been an NPC VP. (NPC meaning non-player character. In video games the pre-programmed characters that move the story along.) Stand here, say this, do that, get off stage. Her aim was to level up to NPC President. But an NPC can’t play. Only a player can play. And she is no player.
She is, however, incredibly stupid.
And she knows it. And worse yet, she thinks we don’t know it. Or hoped so.
Her primary concern over the last 100+ days was to hide how dumb she was. Stick to the script, turn it back to Trump, survive the next 10 minutes… then the interviewer would ask a question… oh no! OH NO!
A simple question. Like being stripped naked in the coliseum.
She reminds me of a careerist soccer mom who swings by the field after work to watch the second half of her son’s game and pulls the coach aside to tell him what he’s doing wrong. When he puts the whistle on the clipboard and says, “Would you like to coach?” she shies away, too busy, just trying to help. Then misses the next few games.
There’s a part of her that wanted to be president, I’m sure. Maybe, just maybe, she could become the Commissioner Gordon of the USA. Sitting at a big desk next to the Red Phone, ready to make the call that saves the day.
But somewhere inside there’s another part. A part that says 3 hours with Joe Rogan will blow her cover. A part that thinks of the press conferences, the world leaders, the fact that there’s no bat phone.
I think she’s a little relieved today. She can forever claim to be an EBP.
And that’s fine by me.
Published in General
Good to see you!
She liked the part where she stood around with celebrities and they said how awesome she was. The work part? Uggggh.
Harris and FJB both just wanted the title, not the actual job. FJB was just more ruthless about it, and was better able to conceal his true lack of abilities.
I feel like the Walz speech is going to be more emotionally psychedelic, but I haven’t seen either one yet.
I am very glad that she dodged Rogan. I might have tried to listen to that. I can be stupid like that.
Oh I absolutely would’ve listened. She’s hilarious. The whole say something banal followed by the ‘I think they bought it’ look of pride just never gets old.
EBD stands for Everything but Dissertation.
Everything but difference
I was in the hospital waiting room and forced to wait…and wait…and wait. After what seemed like an eternity ABC finally (!) showed Kamala’s fifteen minute (groan) concession speech. She said she’d called Trump and conceded. Surely do hope he didn’t have to listen to the whole blessed thing. After fifteen seconds he might have decided the Presidency just wasn’t worth it.
Casey! LTNS.
Other people have suggested Kamala is relieved. I’m missing it somehow. I think she expected that this whole thing was easier than it turned out to be. If FJB can do it, she should be able to as well.
I don’t think she’s stupid, not at all. I think she’s a horrible, horrible candidate, which is why she got bounced super-quick in 2020.
Vapid? Unformed, in terms of policy and philosophical underpinnings? Yes, yes, etc. A Rogan interview, any long-form, really, would have unraveled the delicate packaging she’s been placed in, and shown the gaps in her abilities.
The thing is, with Joe in obvious decline, wouldn’t a VP spin up a bit of a shadow preparatory workstream on her own, get her policy head on straight so she could have easy conversations on relevant subject matter? Basically, practice to be president?
It was always a real possibility, and she either didn’t prepare adequately, or thought she did, with the results lying bleeding at her feeties. VPs have all day for this stuff, since they have such a limited agenda and schedule.
Nope. Just cackle and lie about abortion, and you’re good.
I’ve usually heard it as ABD. All But Dissertation.
Ah, yes. You are correct.
I was listening specifically for the word “concede” in any form, or a reasonable synonym, didn’t hear it. I suppose I could listen to it again . . . no. It was vapid drivel like all her “speeches,” “interviews,” etc. I was a little surprised that she never used her patented phrase, “Let me start with this; I was raised in a middle-class neighborhood.”
I did note her use of the the word, “fight” in the salad that led to the idea of her trying to borrow prestige from another incident from a few weeks ago.
Dumber than a sack of rocks? Not likely. After all she passed the Bar – assuming she didn’t cheat on that too. If the claims of the plethora of former employees are true, methinks she’s a lazy, arrogant spoiled brat who got where she is (was) with a combination of other anatomical attributes along with a ruthless and unprincipled political party.
DEI fails again
I’m pretty sure none of these titles are official
Piled higher and deeper. (To go with the BS and More S)
Great to see you back, Casey!
One of the things we can anticipate in the future are analyses of whether Kamala Harris recognized how far in over her head she was.
She did try to avoid situations that would display her possible lack of intelligence, her definite lack of knowledge and understanding, and her history of incompetence. So maybe she recognized that she had, for thirty years, been carried aloft by others to a level far beyond her abilities.
But at times she expressed such confidence that what she was saying was valuable and useful that maybe she was unaware that she was talking nonsense and had nothing useful to add to the situation. Maybe she really did think she had earned all the jobs she had occupied.
I had thought the original 2020 Democratic plan was optimistic in its objective of having Kamala Harris ready to run in 2024 for President after a one-term President Joe Biden. The theory was that Kamala would use the time as Vice President to prepare herself for the presidency.
The flaw all along in that plan was that Kamala Harris had THIRTY years of political experience, knowledge, and competence to make up for in that four years. Since she has been carried by others ever upward in politics, she lacked the experience, knowledge, and competence that a normal politician of her age would have had.
[No, it does not have to be specifically experience in politics, as a candidate can get a functional equivalent in business or other environments. See Donald Trump, J.D. Vance, Ronald Reagan.)
Kamala Harris got every job she has had based on who she knew, not on what she did. And she appears to have little to no interest in learning new things, so she is intellectually stuck at a very low level of experience.
ABD’s in the OED. QED.
I love the Jackson 5
I thought I was doing Hair.
He debated Harris, and before that Biden, and before that Clinton. He has developed superhuman resistance. A Kryptonian-level tolerance for stupid.
“…while I concede this election…”