Welcome to Thunderdome. The essential divide between Republican insiders on how to attack Kamala Harris is stuck, swinging back and forth between the question of inauthentic climber or authentic leftist. Is she an untrustworthy chameleon who was against fracking before she was for it? Or is she a San Francisco Democrat elitist who was the furthest senator to the left?

When the George W. Bush re-elect had to tangle with John Kerry, they went the unreliable flip-flopper route — something Chris LaCivita is very familiar with as the then-media advisor to Swift Boat Veterans for Truth — to great success. But that may have been a political attack with more credence in a bygone era, and Kerry never had as much media buy-in as Kamala does this time around for her policy meandering. Principles? Ha! It’s 2024, people, get with the times.

Whatever Republicans decide, the current method of attack from their candidate seems designed to make people angry without speaking to any of their priorities. Instead of blasting her energy policies or her fickle ways, the impression of the average voter is that the Trump-Vance top of the ticket has gone after the vice president for her lack of children, for sleeping her way into office and for being insufficiently black. In an election that’s all about the economy and the border, very little of that has been the focus in the first week. If Trump personally showed a surprising level of discipline in letting Joe Biden fall apart while staying quiet, he’s doing the opposite right now — flailing for a method of attack that hits through and griping about things no normal voter cares about.

It’s not going great, as Isaac Schorr writes:

Harris is the no. 2 in command in a historically unpopular administration. “Border czar” or not, she failed miserably in her enumerated task of stemming the flow of migrants into the country. During her first run for the presidency she ran as some kind of pseudo anarcho-communist, calling for the abolition of private health insurance and the implementation of the Green New Deal while flirting with the disbandment of ICE and marginal tax rates of up to 80 percent. It hardly got better once she flamed out of the race; remember that time she called on ordinary Americans to donate to a bail fund for the rioters and looters burning businesses to the ground in Minnesota? Guess what the press’s defense of that is: that she didn’t put her own money where her mouth is. Brava, Madame Vice President, truly you are a profile in courage and inspiration to us all. With all of that material to work with, what is Trump attacking her over? Oh yeah, this.

On the other side, Democrats have achieved new focus with Kamala at the top of the ticket that they never had under Biden. The message discipline around their current ad campaign — freedom and the future — manages to combine an abortion message and an age hit without seeming off-putting. Pay no attention to the aged president, the most powerful Democrat in the country being even older and the decrepit solutions they have on offer for what ails the nation. In a made-for-TV sprint to November, this is the kind of frame that can stand up, benefiting from the lack of a primary test or perhaps even a debate.

This is still a coin flip of an election, having returned to its pre-debate status in multiple swing state polls where the map still helps Trump. Harris still has major problems in Rust Belt states (well, except Michigan), which she may try to address with her VP pick. But there’s no question who’s leaning in and who’s spazzing out at the moment, and the betting markets are noticing. If Trump’s going to mitigate a convention bounce coming out of Chicago, he is going to have to find a new plan of attack.

There’s a better way to go after Kamala

From Abigail Shrier:

The question Republicans ought to confront before leveling any attack is: “will this energize my supporters more or hers?” For nearly every ad hominem salvo currently flung at Harris, the answer is: hers.

Moms from both political parties have had enough with inflation, with gender ideology in the schools, and with criminals on the streets. Many felt betrayed by the party that took its marching orders from the teachers unions during Covid — and kept kids out of school for years. 

Randi Weingarten, president of American Federation of Teachers, just endorsed Harris: “She has a record of fighting for us,” Weingarten said. Harris in turn praised Weingarten as “an incredible friend and advisor to the president and me.” That ought to be enough to send many moms to the polls to vote Republican for the first time. It’s a mistake to make them uncomfortable or place them on the defensive.

Harris has never stopped being a San Francisco politician. Republicans should remind the public of that and ask Wisconsin residents: are you ready to become California? Liberals and conservatives are fleeing Harris’s home state, where she was US senator and attorney general. Would Pennsylvanians like to know why?

Ten million migrants have entered our country since Harris was put in charge of the border. Are they ready for millions more? Would they like to find their own schools and hospitals so overrun that American citizens are sent away, as happened in New York and Texas?

The vast majority of American families prefer Republican policies. It’s the messengers who are so often the problem. And perhaps that’s especially the case this year.

An aura of gloom trails J.D. Vance, and his instincts need recalibration. He seems to believe he is in a primary, talking straight to his base, growling at Democrats. And many on the right are cheering this strategy: stop worrying about the guys in man-buns, they say. They never vote for us anyway!

Typically, the vice president plays attack dog to keep the presidential candidate’s hands clean. But Trump and Vance both often seem like pit bulls straining at the leash. Why did the elegant, brilliant Usha Vance fall for J.D.? There must be a sweet, loving side to this guy, which he ought to let voters see. If the Mitt Romney – Paul Ryan ticket had too little fight, this one currently suffers from too much: too aggressive, too man-cave, too full of resentment to please the American heart, which still has a fondness for things like joy and hope.

If Republicans want to win, they must put Harris through the 2024 primary she never had. Inform voters of the record Harris is now scrambling to disavow, and the media is working desperately to erase. And most trying of all for Trump-Vance, they must hold two ideas in their heads: Yes, you got played. And also, bitterness will sink you. 

How J.D. Vance should emulate Nixon

From Henry Olsen:

Nixon’s response was roughly the polar opposite of Palin’s. He relied on his own judgment, not the advice of those close to Eisenhower whose interests didn’t match his own. He addressed the matter directly and in detail, refusing to grovel or apologize. He avoided what must have been a strong temptation to simply launch a partisan attack laced with whataboutism, something the plethora of scandals oozing out of the Truman administration would have allowed him to do.

This combination of courage, sincerity and intelligence showed Republicans and independents alike that Dick Nixon was someone to be reckoned with and was worthy of being next in line for the presidency.

Vance needs to keep his eye on the ball over the next few months. The ball is, like in Nixon’s case, the broader national electorate. He should not run away from his past, as his past defines him — it’s why he is where he is. But Vance should recognize that appealing to the American middle is different from appealing to a faction of the Republican base.

Trump’s personality often obscures how much he is a master at doing both at the same time. He has created a new coalition by using language that excites independents and conservatives, while also instinctively knowing which conservative issues are safe to push and which need to be held at arm’s length. Nixon was also a master at that while Palin was a disaster.

J. D. Vance is meeting his rendezvous with his destiny. Doing so successfully requires courage, intelligence, and the right type of moxie. He can’t worry about the brickbats his foes fling at him, nor can he worry over polls that purportedly show that many — likely partisan Democrats — don’t like him. He has to power through and demonstrate that he will neither cower nor combust in response. If he can do that, and the first signs are positive, he’ll come out of this ordeal as what Palin could have been: the conservatives’ new hope.

It’s not about the Cat Ladies

From Lexi Boccuzzi:

It’s been hard to find a news outlet in the last week that hasn’t run with a headline like “Why ‘childless cat ladies’ are J.D. Vance’s biggest fear.” While many of Vance’s comments have been taken out of context, fertility, family and childrearing have become deeply sensitive subjects, so the outrage is unsurprising. The most uncomfortable topics are often the most important. Young people’s lack of desire to build families suggests a lack of hope for the future — an alien sentiment in the United States.

I saw this firsthand as an undergraduate at the University of Pennsylvania, home to many childless, soon-to-be elites. I wrote columns in our school paper expressing my concerns about hook-up culture, transactional relationships and the lack of prioritization of dating. These columns often received the most pushback. In a pre-professional culture like Penn’s, claiming that marriage and family were our greatest contributions to society was often taboo, particularly for women. But why?

In my senior spring, I sat in a classroom of about forty-five students discussing this subject. We had just read Motherhood by Sheila Heti, which asks, as Amazon puts it, “What is gained and what is lost when a woman becomes a mother?” Heti answers: you lose yourself. Many in the class applauded this conclusion. When asked, about half confidently said that they never wanted to have kids. Another 30 percent or so said that they were uncertain, citing fears of climate change, the desire to put their careers first, and concerns over their mental health. The common theme: “With everything going on in the world [and in my own life], it would be selfish to have children.” Another way to frame it is to say that these young people just don’t feel secure enough to have kids. 

Recent polling from Pew is consistent with my anecdotal experience. Of people aged eighteen to forty-nine who don’t have children, 47 percent say it’s unlikely that they ever will. While the leading reasons people gave were that they “didn’t want to” or that “they wanted to focus on other things,” most other reasons suggested a lack of hope. Thirty-eight percent, for example, cited “concern about the state of the world,” 36 percent said they “can’t afford to raise a child,” 26 percent were worried about the environment, and 24 percent said that they “can’t find the right partner.” Even the claim of wanting to “focus on other things” hints at a desire to concentrate on things that one can control.

One more thing

I ran through a number of my concerns about the Trump-Vance campaign in my Fox News podcast this week, but one area where they definitely have an advantage is the increasing political divide between men and women — particularly young men and women. The Trump campaign is relying on Vance to be central to this effort, as well as leaning into the masculine celebrities who have been a key part of the celebrity cohort that has gravitated toward Trump. The idea of getting young people to vote is pretty foreign for the GOP, but in an election where Kamala is going to seek to maximize the young female vote with the abortion issue, the success of this effort could be a lot more determinative of Republican electoral outcomes than it has in the past. Maybe Vance can throw a few more ragers along the way?