Why Kamala stays quiet: It’s a winning play

A frequently heard complaint from Republicans these days is that Kamala Harris has shunned interviews or any unscripted contacts with reporters, most of whom are presumably friendly Democrats. A detached observer might ask why exactly this presidential candidate is avoiding contacts even with her zealous media boosters. The obvious answer is she’s already proven to be verbally challenged and cannot respond to serious policy questions without entangling herself in word salads. It may therefore be best for her to avoid falling into embarrassing situations in which her weaknesses become all too obvious as she struggles to answer questions.

Reading off teleprompter banal generalities that her media handmaidens will predictably celebrate seems to be the safest course for her campaign. And since both media hype and Trump’s stumbling about for a counterstrategy in dealing with a non-Biden opponent have created for Kamala a surge of popularity, why should she bother to change course?

Kamala may actually drive away part of her base if she sounds too 'moderate.'

Nikki Haley in an interview with Fox News wisely observed that it might be best for Republicans to stop “ranting” about Harris’ avoidance of interviews. Instead, they should make clear that unless she emphatically repudiates her long-held radical stands, we should assume those remain her positions. Certainly, Harris is not giving us any detailed information about how or why she’s changed them. The most we can tell is that some of her surrogates want us to believe that she’s moving in the opposite direction.

All of this may be well-considered strategy. But the reason behind it may not be simply Kamala’s verbal ineptitude or her obvious inability to think on her feet. Kamala has another motivation for not showing her cards too openly. She clearly doesn’t want to alienate her radical left, woke base, which adores those positions she’s held over the years. The “moderates” in her party, if any of them still exist, will vote for her out of party loyalty or because they “want to save our democracy” from the Bad Orange Man. According to an Ipsos poll in May, only 34% of Democratic voters regard a reduction of illegal immigration as an “important policy goal,” and 24% seem to have no problem with the Biden administration’s de facto open border policy.

Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Kamala’s running mate, won by 7.7 points in his last gubernatorial race in 2022. That was after Walz allowed Minneapolis to be looted and burned for several days during the 2020 “Summer of Love” and after he spoke in defense of the rioters. That was also after Walz had imprisoned the population of his state in a bizarre, protracted lockdown, in which the state government encouraged Minnesota’s residents to snitch on neighbors leaving their houses. One can’t exaggerate Walz’s woke radicalism, yet a majority of Minnesotans re-elected him in a contest against a very moderate Republican challenger.

The United States is much less “conservative” now than it was during the Reagan or even the Bush era. By now, the social left has an enormous, powerful constituency supported and abetted by, among others, woke capitalists and the legacy media. In that hegemonic mix we should also place government workers, unionized public school teachers, suburban and particularly unmarried women, and most racial minorities.

These groups have no real problem with Harris or Walz’s past radical stands. Nor are they interested in having the Democratic presidential candidate abjure them in her campaign for the presidency. Kamala may actually drive away part of her base if she sounds too “moderate.” That could also happen if she leans too heavily toward the Israeli side in the war against Hamas. She might have to pay for that indiscretion by losing her anti-Israeli support.

So far there is no stampede by make-believe “centrist” Democrats into the arms of the GOP. These centrists are largely an establishment Republican fiction, and their hypothetical flight might be a projection of the behavior of Never Trump Republicans onto the Democrats. Where I do encounter waffling or bolting is among my far less reliable Republican friends, some of whom are now embracing Kamala’s “politics of joy.”

Many of these people are now talking about what a “nice guy” Walz is, after listening to commentators on CNN and NBC and after reading the editorial page of the New York Times. Every time I encounter such “moderates” who agonize over balancing budgets and who want to be nice (like Tim Walz?), I suffer from a rush of Democrat envy. As I’ve noted many times before, I’d gladly change our “nice people” and would-be budget balancers for Marc Elias, Jim Carville, and Merrick Garland. These lying, cheating sneaks know how to win; and the future of what remains of our republic may depend on our ability to outwit these adversaries, particularly the ”fake media.”

Meanwhile, Kamala Harris, or her handlers, may have a winning plan, as they keep their base behind them precisely by not granting interviews.