The 2024 Election - What Happpened?

By late evening, I knew Trump would win. 

I had gone into the day thinking it would be a narrow contest; that is, after all, what the media endlessly told us, between coy asides hinting it may be a landslide for Harris. Still, I thought if Trump retook Georgia, and claimed Pennsylvania, that he would get to 270. That . . . didn't seem that hard of a task, which was worrisome. To be clear, I foresaw NO scenario where Trump also earned Wisconsin and Michigan. 

But by the time the first slew of data came in, I thought the tide was clearly and irrevocably Red. It felt very 2016, but I kept my mouth shut, dreading the reaction of my family. 

Well, obviously Trump won, and he did it in a convincing fashion. Kinda disproves the whole "2020 was stolen thing," unless the Democrats quietly went to Confession and changed their ways, eh? 

Yaya and Alex, who had come over to celebrate a Harris win, retired early. Smiley left a similar party at a friends house and asked me for a ride home. 

We watched Trumps victory speech, and while it wasn't mean spirited it sure was rambling. 

For those counting, I've lost 6 of the 9 Presidential Elections I've voted in (including this one), winning only in 2000, 2004, and 2016. 

 .333 may be a great average in baseball, but it sucks in politics.

So - what happened? 

There's a lot of finger pointing out there, most of it driven by emotion. I do NOT think it was because Harris is a woman. I'm 50 and I've heard guys say the most gawd-awful things, but not once in that half century have I heard a man say/imply they wouldn't vote for a woman because of her gender. I've heard a woman say that, but never a man. I think writing the loss off to misogyny is convenient while having the added bonus of being dead wrong. 

Nancy Pelosi is out there peddling the notion that a lack of an open primary and the quick coronation of Harris robbed the field of viable candidates. Mind you, they've already pulled sound bytes of her contradicting those thoughts only a few months ago, but she's sort of right. As I wrote in my pre-election piece, the lack of a primary contest wasn't a good thing. 

People are also  blaming Biden for not withdrawing earlier. F* that. The ultra rich donors and Hollywood elites forced a sitting President to step aside,  and he did so - for nothing. They got the worst-case result (for them) anyway. They should be sending Biden flowers and apology notes. 

Lifelong Democrats I know have told me that the Harris campaign, while proficient in execution, never really gave the electorate a sense of her identity. She was just "kind of there" as an "anti-Trump." 

I'm not sure I completely agree with them about "identity," but after 8 years it's pretty clear  "anti-Trump" isn't the winning strategy they needed. 

What's my take? 

I think that most of America was unhappy with the inflation of Biden's term AND the constant attempts to wave it away as irrelevant. "Inflation has slowed to only 3%!" Well, yes, but that's 3% on top of the immense inflation that preceded it. That was killing the paycheck of your average Joe, and even Jimmy Carter had the political sense, in his term, to acknowledge it sucked.  A sincere mea culpa might have gone far with the electorate, and you know what? Harris was well posed to distance herself from the fallout by being the one to issue that statement of empathy. 

I also think, and you'll roll your eyes, that the celebrity endorsements hurt. Very few people actually care who an actor chooses to vote for, but even those darling few care less for a millionaire's opinion during tough economic times.  Also, as the Sean Combs scandal continues to widen,  I don't know, maybe don't collect endorsements from players in the same industry, much less some of the folks closest to the sex slaver? The DNC trotted out his ex, J-Lo, really??

Lastly, and I think most importantly, I just don't think America trusts the media anymore. When you've got a national media hammering home the same old anti-Trump rhetoric for year #8, maybe it doesn't carry the same weight it should; and by default, neither does their praise for Harris. So the media - even if/when correct - was just ignored. Now you carry forward the knowledge that for the second time in 3 elections the media and their pollsters got it, not just wrong, but WAY WAY wrong, and the trust level falls all the more. 

Not gonna lie - I'll probably never trust a poll in a Presidential election again.

Anyway, there's my thoughts. Oh, one last one: I'm an American, and like I said I've lost plenty of elections. Life goes on. America goes on. As Biden said after Tuesday, you can't just love your country when you win. I sincerely hope the next four years are successful ones for our country.