It’s one thing to run a campaign based mostly on manufactured “vibes” when the general election is still months away.
But when there’s less than one month until election day?
You’re going to need something a bit more substantive than “feelings” — and that’s something Vice President Kamala Harris, the topper of the Democratic presidential ticket, appears to be learning painfully in real-time.
Harris has been on something of a media blitz, by her standards at least, in the last few days.
Her appearances on shows like the podcast “Call Her Daddy” and Howard Stern’s eponymous show — neither of which could be described as “hostile territory” — have actually been relative successes with her, as she faced zero pushback from the vapid and possibly brain-damaged hosts.
No, appearances on the “Beavis and Butthead” of multimedia tours is not exactly going to stretch whatever brain cells Harris has rolling around in her noggin.
And, frankly, neither should an appearance on Democrat-friendly, CBS News show, “60 Minutes.”
Despite that, Harris unsurprisingly fumbled her appearance on “60 Minutes” the instant she was pushed on something substantive.
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To his credit, interviewer Bill Whitaker actually pressed Harris to offer something more than platitudes and preprogrammed talking points in a viral 63-second clip that CBS News released ahead of Monday night’s ballyhooed “60 Minutes” election special that will speak to both Harris and her running mate, the factually-challenged governor of Minnesota, Tim Walz.
“My plan is about saying, that, when you invest in small businesses, you invest in the middle class, and you strengthen America’s economy,” Harris said in the clip. “Small businesses are part of the backbone of America’s economy.”
In a genuine bit of unintentional comedy, Whitaker effectively responds to Harris’ word salad with a “Ma’am, this a Wendy’s.” (Emphasis added.)
“Pardon me, madam vice president, but the question was how are you going to pay for it,” Whitaker responded.
Harris, clearly taken somewhat aback by actually getting pushback (the kind she would never get on a show called “Call Her Daddy”) briefly rebooted took a quick moment before launching into yet another one of her regurgitated talking points.
“Well, one of the … things … is that I’m going to make sure that the richest among us, who can afford it, pay their fair share in taxes,” Harris said, as the camera briefly panned to a positively unimpressed Whitaker. “It is not right that teachers and nurses and firefighters are paying a higher tax rate than billionaires and the biggest corporations.
“And I plan on making that [weird hand gesture] fair.”
At this point, the stoic Whitaker just had to intercede.
“But, we’re dealing with the real world here,” Whitaker interjected.
“But the real world includes …” Harris began, before Whitaker sharply cut her off with a legitimate question (again, the kind she wasn’t used to while speaking to Howard Stern).
“How’re you going to get this through Congress?” Whitaker asked. At this point, a clearly stunned Harris needed a moment to go through her mental Rolodex of preprogrammed responses.
She settled on a pretty bad non-answer.
“W — You know, when you talk quietly with a lot of folks in Congress, they know exactly what I’m talking about,” Harris said, “because their constituents know exactly what I’m talking about.”
(No, we really don’t.)
Harris then circled back to her previous talking point, by pointing out that those constituents consist of the aforementioned hard-working teachers, nurses and firefighters.
Two things worth pointing out here:
First, it’s actually genuinely sad how low the media expectations have been set for Harris and her predecessor, incumbent President Joe Biden. It’s not even a well-kept secret at this point how wildly manicured and manufactured everything is about the two. The only thing Harris and Biden are missing at this point are the marionette strings and slick plastic sheen.
Second, this writer would be remiss not to critique Whitaker a smidgen. While his pushback came from a good place of logic (indeed, how does Harris plan to enact any of her communist policies without controlling Congress?), it also failed to come from a place of truth.
Because the simple numbers just don’t agree with the worldview that Harris is peddling.
According to an IRS data analysis by the Tax Foundation, the truth of the matter is that those “rich” people that Harris is denigrating? They more than pay their fair share of the country’s taxes.
The report, citing 2021 data, noted that the top one percent of earners paid 45.8 percent of the the total federal income taxes paid, which certainly feels “fair.”
When expanding that data to look at the top half of earners versus the bottom half, the difference is even more pronounced.
“The top 50 percent of all taxpayers paid 97.7 percent of all federal individual income taxes, while the bottom 50 percent paid the remaining 2.3 percent,” the report pointed out.
It’s totally unclear how Harris plans to tilt that percentage even more in the favor of the bottom half of earners, but the worst part of it all? She probably never has to actually explain any of this as she’ll start sticking to places like the “Talk Tuah” podcast to avoid debacles with outfits that have even a drop of journalistic integrity.
And the most telling part that this “60 Minutes” episode isn’t going to paint Harris in a good light? The Democrats and their usual mouthpieces have been radio silent about this episode — just like they’ve been weirdly quiet about those reports about Harris’ husband, Doug Emhoff.
