Kamala Harris is making politics fun once again
After President Biden quit the presidential race and endorsed Vice President Harris, I sat with my daughter, phones in hands, toggling among legacy media sites, social media platforms and group chats. We were, as my daughter informed me — as an X post informed her — “hope scrolling”: greedily devouring signs that Democrats had shaken off their “disarray” and escaped the doldrums that seemed to have doomed their election chances.
But we were doing something else, too — something familiar that I couldn’t quite place.
And then Lena showed me a TikTok supercut of Kamala D. Harris set to the Chappell Roan song “Femininomenon,” and I suddenly understood exactly what we were doing.
We were having fun.
The younger voting-age set was recasting Harris as “brat” (a “girl who is a little messy”) as in the album — and the viral tweet — by British pop star Charli XCX. (That’s the reason the Harris campaign has gone lime green online.) Coconut tree videos proliferated, as did clips of Harris dancing, laughing and striding purposefully in heels.
Meanwhile, Democrats of all ages eyed the candy-store array of potential vice-presidential candidates who could help our nominee crush Donald Trump come November. Ooh - how about this one? He’s a swing-stater and an astronaut and a devoted husband!
We watched a clip of Pete Buttigieg eviscerating JD Vance not with “if only” wistfulness but with “we got this” glee.
When was the last time it was this fun to be a Democrat?
Sure, we’ve had moments of hope and relief. But fun? Maybe eight years ago, when I bought a blazer and took my 11-year-old daughter with me to vote for Hillary Clinton. That was a fun moment.
The gut punch that followed, and the growing realization that President Trump was going to do far more harm than Candidate Trump had promised, helped persuade Democrats to choose the least exciting possible candidate the next time around.
Biden has done great things as president, but it was never exactly fun to root for him — not when he was campaigning for the nomination and not during his term. Even his best speeches and appearances were … competent. He never gave us zingers to spike our dopamine or rhetoric to get our hearts racing. We consumed Biden-related social media content — videos of him falling, invading personal space or staring into the ether — as little or as squintingly as possible.
And then, of course, watching the June debate was … what’s the opposite of fun? Torture?
When I caught some of the Republican National Convention on TV, I felt a little envious. I did not covet the roster of he-man D-list speakers; the platform of outdated, nonsensical and/or unpopular policies; the questionable slogan (basically, Make America Great Again Again!); or the nominee, whose acceptance speech began in the general vicinity of graciousness and then got lost in an hour-long loop of rambling self-congratulation.
But I did envy the Republicans their fun. From their goofy ear bandages to their sequins to their elephant slippers to their ability to put Trump’s likeness on every conceivable garment (including one that declared, cheekily, “I’m voting for the convicted felon”), they appeared to be having a ball.
Maybe this is one of the secrets of Trumpism. Trump’s followers follow him partly for the twin pleasures of watching a showman and being part of the show. Trump rallies have over-the-top party energy; Trump nicknames draw titters from the crowd. When Trump lies, he’s essentially riffing on whatever combination of words — “incredible,” “great,” “huge,” “terrific,” “loser” — is most fun to say and telling whatever story (Immigrants are stealing our jobs! Crime is the worst it’s ever been!) he thinks will get the crowd worked up. It works! It’s fun to get worked up.
“Drill, baby, drill” makes no sense at all, either as a critique of Biden (whose administration has granted more oil and gas permits than Trump’s) or as a solution to high gas prices (which are set by global markets). But it’s fun to chant, isn’t it?
As a Democrat, I think politics and facts matter. I am both amazed and horrified at the contempt Trump and his followers show for truth, for the business of governing, for the law and for the democratic process. Climate, abortion, health care, transphobia and economic injustice are not just matters of life and death; they are matters of life and death that we can do something about. That’s serious business.
But is fighting the good fight — and fighting it fairly — incompatible with having a good time?
Or is having a good time one key to getting people on our side to join the party, so to speak? If the numbers of new donors and new volunteers this week are any indication, Democrats were poised and ready to get to work. They weren’t waiting for the perfect candidate. (If they were, they’d wait forever.) They were just waiting for a candidate whose competence and energy and, yes, silliness gave them a chance to have fun.
Trump’s going to have to find a new nickname for his new opponent. “Laughing Kamala” turns out to be just what we needed.