Dear Commons Community,

More than 200 Republicans who previously worked for either former President George W. Bush, the late Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., or Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris for president in an open letter Monday obtained exclusively by USA TODAY.

The letter above from alums of the three Republican presidential nominees prior to former President Donald Trump comes on the heels of a Democratic National Convention last week in Chicago that showcased Republican detractors of the GOP nominee. At least five former aides to former President George H.W. Bush also signed the letter, which has 238 signatures in all.

A similar group of about 150 anti-Trump former staffers of Bush, McCain and Romney pledged support for President Joe Biden in the 2020 election.

“We reunite today, joined by new George H.W. Bush alumni, to reinforce our 2020 statements and, for the first time, jointly declare that we’re voting for Vice President Kamala Harris and Gov. Tim Walz this November,” the letter reads. “Of course, we have plenty of honest, ideological disagreements with Vice President Harris and Gov. Walz. That’s to be expected. The alternative, however, is simply untenable.”

(See the letter with endorsements here.)

Among those who signed the letter in support of Harris and her running-mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, include: former McCain chiefs of staff Mark Salter and Chris Koch; Joe Donoghue, former legislative director for McCain; Jennifer Lux, press secretary for McCain’s 2008 campaign, and Jean Becker, longtime chief of staff for George H.W. Bush.

Also backing Harris are David Nierenberg, Romney’s 2012 campaign finance chair; David Garman, under secretary of Energy for George W. Bush; and Olivia Troye, a former advisor to both George W. Bush and Vice President Mike Pence. Troye spoke from the stage of the DNC convention last week.

Thank you to these Republicans for putting the country before party!

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Western Governors University (WGU), one of the nation’s largest online universities, surprised many of its staff members recently by announcing they would need to work in the office if they wanted to keep their jobs. As reported by The Chronicle of Higher Education and Reddit.

In a series of meetings earlier this month, senior administrators at WGU told employees that beginning this fall, 19 of its 26 departments will be “co-located” at the university’s Salt Lake City headquarters, with staff members eventually required to be in the office four days a week. All vice presidents and directors on one team, for example, will need to move to Salt Lake City in the next one to two years, and all new hires will now be based there.The policy does not, however, apply to those with student-facing jobs, including course instructors, evaluators who grade students’ work, and enrollment and financial-aid professionals.

WGU employees who currently live within a 50-mile radius of Salt Lake City will need to work from the office three days per week beginning on October 1, and four days beginning January 1. According to a presentation leaked on Reddit, on the marketing and external communications team, vice presidents who live outside of Utah must decide by November 1 whether they will move; if they opt to do so, they must arrive in Utah by August 2025. Directors have until July 2025 to make their decisions and August 2026 to move. Those who opt not to relocate will be out of a job, though the presentation notes that “severance support will be available.

Tony

Courtesy: @Flight_19_FT28 on X

Dear Commons Community,

Maureen Dowd skewered Donald Trump yesterday in her New York Times column entitled,  “Daffy Donald, Turning Pea Green With Envy.”  She compares Trump to Kamala Harris and points out his desperateness in trying to denigrate her and her running mate Tim Walz.  Dowd comments:

“Harris can take heart that she’s driving Trump crazy. He is jealous of her looks, her crowd sizes, her star power and her vivacious, bodacious vibes.”  

Dowd also cautions:

“Top Democrats warn that Trump could still be formidable if he stops unraveling.

Kamala came across as tough talking about the military and foreign policy in her speech. But there are many tests yet to come — including vicious Trump attack lines, eventually a difficult interview and next month’s debate. She has to show she has what it takes once she steps away from the teleprompter. Can she manage to get through a minimum of policy stuff with no viral blunders?’

Good advice!

Dowd’s entire column is below.

Tony

—————————————————–

The New York Times

Daffy Donald, Turning Pea Green With Envy

Aug. 24, 2024

By Maureen Dowd

Opinion Columnist, reporting from Chicago

I have a crow in my backyard in D.C. that has been cawing for three weeks. It has been driving me crazy, so I was happy to get out of town and back on the trail.

But now comes Donald Trump cawing and cawing even louder than the damn crow.

If you need more evidence that Trump is flummoxed about how to counter Kamala Harris, just check out his daffy reaction to her dynamite convention.

Friday morning, Trump crowed on Truth Social: “My Administration will be great for women and their reproductive rights.”

Friday evening, Trump crowed, “The Republican Party is charging forward on many fronts, and I am very proud that we are a LEADER on I.V.F.”

Yeah, a leader in trying to get rid of it.

At first, I thought there must have been an Iranian hack. These posts were too ridiculous even for Trump. His modus vivendi is projection, but the posts seemed intended to back up Kamala’s line in her big speech that, when it comes to women’s reproductive rights, Trump and JD Vance are simply “out of their minds.”

Trump is usually crowing, after all, about the three conservative justices he put on the Supreme Court who would overturn Roe. If he gets back in the Oval, he’ll probably put yet another religious fanatic onto the court who will try to foist some other horrible legal restriction on the country.

And the worst part about it is that Trump is not even a true believer. He was pro-choice long before he decided to run for president as a Republican. The amoral man who was once a famously promiscuous New York playboy wrecked the Supreme Court simply because it helped him with his Christian right disciples.

Kamala ridiculed Trump in her speech, dismissing him as “an unserious man,” but the real dagger in his heart was that she trumped him in the ratings. That set off a meshuga meltdown on Truth Social, with Trump maniacally capitalizing any piffle that entered his head.

When Kamala came out onstage, looking strong and elegant in a Chloé navy pantsuit, Trump demanded: “WHERE’S HUNTER?”

Then he accused Tim Walz of résumé enhancement for his role on a high school football team. “Walz was an ASSISTANT Coach, not a COACH.”

Ripping defensive coordinators is not a good strategy for running up the vote in “Friday Night Lights” territory.

He followed up the posts with a scream-of-consciousness call to Fox News, filibustering Bret Baier and Martha McCallum for 10 minutes until Baier abruptly cut him off to throw to the Greg Gutfeld comedy show.

“At several points during the call, a familiar beeping sound interrupted Mr. Trump’s remarks,” wrote The Times’s Michael Grynbaum and Michael Gold. “It appeared that the former president was accidentally pressing buttons on the keypad of his phone.”

Trump conceded that the Democrats had “a nice-looking room” for their convention.

Friday was another day of lunacy, as R.F.K. Jr. — the anti-vaxxer — dropped out and endorsed Trump, who once proclaimed himself “father of the vaccine” for Covid. In Phoenix, R.F.K. Jr. gave an incoherent speech that went from contaminated food to media collusion and censorship to Democrats being the party of “big money.” (That last, even though he chose a billionaire as a running mate, got millions from a billionaire, and is endorsing a billionaire.)

Among other delusional statements, R.F.K. Jr. said he could still somehow win and end up in the White House. He said his former party “abandoned democracy” by swapping Joe Biden for Harris, even as he gave his backing to a man who tried to overthrow the democracy he was running.

At an evening rally with Trump in Glendale, Ariz., Kennedy said, without irony, that Trump would protect us from totalitarianism. The fast-food champion praised Kennedy, saying he wanted to clean up the food supply.

Trump loves being embraced by a Kennedy — even an off-kilter one. But the former president’s motto is more like, “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for me.”

Kennedy brought up his father and uncle during his announcement, and his other relatives must have been mortified.

R.F.K.’s cousin and J.F.K.’s grandson, Jack Schlossberg, a convention speaker, commented on X: “Never been less surprised in my life. Been saying it for over a year — RFK Jr. is for sale, works for Trump. Bedfellows and loving it.”

At an event in Las Vegas on Friday to tout his no-tax-on-tips policy, Trump continued his obsessive critique of Kamala’s performance while still mispronouncing her name, and saying that she had mentioned his name 21 times in her speech. (Trump’s name actually appeared 16 times, but everyone knows he can’t help inflating numbers.)

“She lied,” he said. “But that’s OK because a lot of people lie. They’ll do anything to get elected.”

Well, he should know.

“She’s a copycat,” he said. “She’s a flip-flopper.”

Well, he should know.

Now we begin what is going to be a very ugly slugfest between the Unserious Man and the Untested Woman.

Top Democrats warn that Trump could still be formidable if he stops unraveling.

Kamala came across as tough talking about the military and foreign policy in her speech. But there are many tests yet to come — including vicious Trump attack lines, eventually a difficult interview and next month’s debate. She has to show she has what it takes once she steps away from the teleprompter. Can she manage to get through a minimum of policy stuff with no viral blunders?

Kamala holds the hopes of a lot of people in this country who are praying that she doesn’t fall on her face in the next 72 days.

She can take heart that she’s driving Trump crazy. He is jealous of her looks, her crowd sizes, her star power and her vivacious, bodacious vibes. That’s a good start.

Meaghan McCain.  Courtesy of ABC News.

Dear Commons Community,

Conservative commentator Meghan McCain piled on praise of the Democratic National Convention on Thursday, angering many on the right.

The former “View” host, who’s the daughter of the late GOP presidential nominee John McCain, expressed her admiration on social media over the party atmosphere around Kamala Harris formally accepting the Democratic presidential nomination.

“Maybe republicans just shouldn’t have conventions… just forfeit because I DO NOT KNOW HOW YOU CAN COMPETE WITH THIS!” McCain wrote on X, formerly Twitter.

McCain gushed over a percussion performance of The Pack at the convention.

“Oh man, how cool is this drum line?!” she enthused.

She thanked Rep. Ruben Gallego, a Democratic candidate for senator in Arizona, after he honored her father.

Before the fourth night’s session even began on Thursday, she was already dishing out accolades for Democrats’ A-list impact. She called the convention “better than the last 15 years of MTV Awards.”

“Republicans cannot compete on the culture space with artists, musicians or celebrities on any level whatsoever,” she wrote.

Of course McCain got pushback from conservatives, notably Fox News Media contributor Tomi Lahren, who called the DNC performances “tone deaf” and “insulting” for “struggling Americans.”

Another person on X questioned McCain for going out of her way to compliment the gathering. “I’m not that impressed to be honest. I actually can’t believe you are,” the commenter wrote.

Others called her a RINO (Republican in name only) and accused her of being a turncoat. “You’re the Dems #1 Cheerleader, huh?!” someone wrote with a vomiting emoji.

He father was a war hero denigrated by Trump.  She has every right to express her feelings as she wishes!

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Gus Walz, the son of Vice Presidential Nominee Tim Walz, was visibly emotional as he cheered on his father at the Democratic National Convention on Wednesday.

“That’s my dad!” Gus Walz, the 17-year-old son of Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota, mouthed, blinking through a flow of tears in the audience.

He rose to his feet and pointed emphatically at his father, who had just shouted him out in the most consequential speech of his political career. His sister, Hope, 23, seated next to him, held up her hands in a heart sign.

Against stiff competition — speeches from Oprah Winfrey and former President Bill Clinton, plus a Prince tribute — the moment would become one of the night’s most resonant on social media.  As reported by The New York Times. 

Within hours, the cutaway to Gus circulated on TikTok, Instagram and X in posts that have received hundreds of thousands of views. Many of them were accompanied by the hashtag #ThatsMyDad. Another hashtag, #TeamGus, was trending on X on Thursday morning.

“Tim Walz was the headliner, but his son, Gus, won the night on social media,” Cory Smith, an NBC10 Boston anchor, wrote online.

Many supporters of the Harris campaign said they appreciated the Walz family’s unabashed displays of affection for one another. Several linked it to the more expressive version of masculinity that Mr. Walz has espoused on the campaign trail.

“You know you’ve done well as a parent when your kids are as proud of you as Gus and Hope are of Tim Walz,” Senator Amy Klobuchar wrote in a post that has been viewed more than a million times. “‘That’s my dad,’” she added, “No three words better describe our next Vice President.”

Some said Gus’s reaction had brought additional warmth to the Democratic ticket, which just two weeks earlier had gained the plain-spoken Minnesota governor as Vice President Kamala Harris’s running mate. “To see the way that he looks at his father just has me in my feels,” said Brenton Guice, a therapist and content creator, in a TikTok video.

But in more conservative spheres online, some Trump supporters posted split-screen images of Gus in tears alongside more stoic ones of Barron Trump, the former president’s youngest son, with one social media user calling Gus “an example of what is wrong with this country.” Politico reported on Thursday that the conservative commentator Ann Coulter posted and deleted a message on X that described Gus as “weird,” the term that Mr. Walz has used to disparage Mr. Trump and his running mate, JD Vance.

Such posts were fiercely criticized by other commenters, who pointed out that Gus is a minor and that his family has said he has a learning disorder.

Gus is the younger of Tim and Gwen Walz’s two children, who were conceived after the couple’s yearslong fertility struggle. The couple said in a statement to People magazine this month that Gus had seemed different from his classmates as a child: “Gus preferred video games and spending more time by himself.”

They learned when Gus was an adolescent that he had “a nonverbal learning disorder in addition to an anxiety disorder and A.D.H.D., conditions that millions of Americans also have.” Nonverbal learning disorders affect a person’s ability to process visual and social patterns. (It is a common misconception that people with nonverbal learning disorders do not speak.)

“It took time, but what became so immediately clear to us was that Gus’s condition is not a setback — it’s his secret power,” the Walzes added in their statement to People.

Mr. Walz, a former high school football coach, approached the stage at the United Center in Chicago on Wednesday night as if it were a giant pep rally, using sports metaphors to urge Democrats to make a fourth-quarter comeback against Mr. Trump.

In his 16-minute speech, Mr. Walz also discussed his family’s experience in having children with the help of fertility treatments — a topic rarely broached by male political candidates. He used the point to underscore his support for reproductive rights.

“Hope, Gus and Gwen, you are my entire world, and I love you,” he said from the stage. “I’m letting you in on how we started a family because this is a big part about what this election is about.”

When the speech concluded, Gus, wearing a blue suit and white Nike Air Force 1 sneakers, joined his father onstage and wrapped him in a tight embrace.

God bless Tim Walz and his family!

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

Robert F. Kennedy Jr. dropped out of the presidential race yesterday, leaving his independent campaign behind and aligning himself with the Republican party of Donald Trump.  As reported by Yahoo News and other media.

“In an honest system, I believe that I would have won the election,” he said today, running counter to polls but sounding very Trumpian, with talks of “sham” primaries and a “palace coup” against Joe Biden. He castigated Vice President and presidential candidate Kamala Harris for not yet granting media interviews, a common Republican talking point in recent weeks.

Kennedy didn’t quite end his campaign, but says he’s merely suspending it and will remain on ballots in some battleground states. While at one point insisting quixotically that it’s still possible he might end up in the White House, he also said, “In my heart, I no longer believe I have a realistic path to an electoral victory. I am not terminating my campaign. I am simply suspending it.”

At another speech in Arizona, Trump said of Kennedy’s endorsement, “That’s big. He’s a great guy, respected by everybody.”

Kennedy’s endorsement of the Republican candidate was not unexpected: Recent reports have him shopping around for a new side to play on, reaching out to both political parties and meeting with members of the Trump team. Kennedy’s campaign recently said he would make a statement on his “path forward” at today’s speech in Phoenix, Arizona. Trump is holding a rally in Glendale, Arizona, later today.

However unsurprising the endorsement is, from a historical perspective, rather remarkable, putting a man with the famously Blue family name into the Red. Today, Kennedy said the Democratic Party “had departed so dramatically from the core values that I grew up with.” He said the causes for his switch were “free speech, the war in Ukraine and the war on our children,” the latter stemming from his debunked anti-vaccine stances.

Although Kennedy encouraged his followers to vote Trump, he said in some states they could vote for either party. The logic was, to say the least, difficult to follow. A commenter on CNN called it “coo coo for Cocoa Puffs” and, quoting Mel Brooks’ Blazing Saddles, “authentic frontier gibberish.” The official response from the Democratic National Convention called the speech “a bizarre, rambling announcement,” with DNC senior advisor Mary Beth Cahill adding, “The more voters learned about RFK Jr. the less they liked him. Donald Trump isn’t earning an endorsement that’s going to help build support, he’s inheriting the baggage of a failed fringe candidate. Good riddance.”

Kennedy’s campaign has been beset by more problems than family ties, hurt feelings and a dead bear cub: Just yesterday he officially withdrew from the ballot in Arizona, a not-unexpected outcome given recent news reports of dwindling campaign funds and a ruling by a judge in New York State that tossed out the signatures on his nominating petition because Kennedy had falsely claimed to be a New York resident. The court found that Kennedy actually lived in California with his wife, Curb Your Enthusiasm actor Cheryl Hines, and that the New York address he supplied was not his full time residence.

Today Kennedy described the various state requirements for getting on the ballots as a nearly impenetrable tangle.

Kennedy earlier said he’d fight the ruling, but today’s announcement suggests that battle is all but over.

A statement put out by RFK Jr.’s siblings Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, Courtney Kennedy, Kerry Kennedy, Chris Kennedy and Rory Kennedy, the family called RFK Jr.’s decision to endorse Trump “a betrayal of the values our father and our family hold most dear. It is a sad ending to a sad story.”

Sad indeed!

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

After Kamala Harris acceptance speech on Thursday night at the Democratic National Convention, Fox News scheduled a phone interview with Trump to get his take on it. However, it became the usual Trump ramble and devolved into a chaotic exchange with Fox News host, Brett Baier, deciding to hang up and abruptly cut off Trump.  As reported by The Huffington Post.

Former President Donald Trump lost it over Kamala Harris during a chaotic phone-in interview on Fox News that came to an awkward end Thursday night, the last night of the Democratic National Convention.

“She’s gonna give a tax increase of four to five times what people and companies are paying right now,” Trump said of the vice president as dial tones interrupted him, apparently generated by someone pressing the buttons on his phone.

The Republican nominee posted throughout Harris’ acceptance speech, asking if the Democratic nominee was “TALKING ABOUT” him.

He then took to the conservative network, where he dismissed Harris’ polling numbers.

“There’s been a huge appeal and momentum for women voters, she’s trying to pull the youth vote, the Hispanic vote, the Black vote back in her direction,” said Fox News’ Martha MacCallum. “So what are you gonna do? What’s your strategy to rebuild the momentum that you had with those voters?”

“No, she’s not having success. I’m having success,” declared Trump, touting his support among women along with Black and Hispanic people.

Host Bret Baier tried to cut in, as time ticked down before the start of Greg Gutfeld’s show. But Trump continued, ranting about Democrats throwing President Joe Biden “out of the party.”

“And that’s why we saw a different night tonight,” MacCallum said, trying to wrap him.

“They did the same thing that they did to RFK,” said Trump.

“Mr. President, thank you so much,” Baier added.

“OK, thank you very much,” Trump said as the call came to a quick end, before the hosts tossed to Gutfeld.

Gutfeld, at the start of his late-night program, made reference to the interview’s swift conclusion.

“That wasn’t my fault, Donald.” he said.

There might still be hope for Fox News!

Tony

 Photo:  CNBC.

Dear Commons Community,

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said “the time has come” for the central bank to adjust its monetary policy, signaling that rate cuts could soon lower borrowing costs for American consumers and businesses.

Powell, who spoke at an annual conference of central bankers in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, didn’t disclose specifics about when a rate cut could arrive, or its size, although economists have penciled in a reduction at the Fed’s September 18 meeting. The federal funds rate now stands in a range of 5.25% to 5.5%, its highest level in 23 years.  AS reported by CBS News and The Associated Press.

In conveying that the Fed is likely to start cutting its benchmark rate, Powell cited some weakening in the labor market, as well as progress in battling high inflation. A slowdown in hiring and an uptick in the unemployment rate last month heightened concerns the Fed could mistake in the other direction, keeping rates too high for too long, throttling growth and plunging the economy into recession.

“We do not seek or welcome further cooling in labor market conditions,” Powell said in his speech.

“The direction of travel is clear, and the timing and pace of rate cuts will depend on incoming data, the evolving outlook, and the balance of risks,” he said.

Powell also signaled the Federal Reserve is increasingly confident that inflation will continue to cool, eventually reaching the bank’s goal of a 2% annual rate, even with a reduction in borrowing costs. In previous speeches, Powell had raised concerns that rate cuts could spur inflation to flare up, erasing the gains the Fed had made in taming the hottest price increases in four decades.

“With an appropriate dialing back of policy restraint, there is good reason to think that the economy will get back to 2% inflation while maintaining a strong labor market,” Powell said.

Wall Street surged after Powell’s comments, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average jumping 378 points, or 0.9%, to 41,091. The S&P 500 gained 1.1% and the tech-heavy Nasdaq composite rose 1.5%.

“Powell has rung the bell for the start of the cutting cycle,” said Seema Shah, chief global strategist at Principal Asset Management, in an email. “The Federal Reserve now has strong confidence about inflation’s path forward — it is time to shift to the other side of the dual mandate, and labor market risks now have their full attention.”

How big of a rate cut?

One question left unanswered by Powell’s speech was the potential size of a September rate cut. At the moment, about 3 in 4 economists polled by financial services firm FactSet are forecasting a reduction of 0.25 percentage points.

But if the August jobs data comes in weaker than expected, that could increase the chances of a bigger cut of 0.5 percentage points, experts noted. The August jobs report will be released on September 6.

“We continue to expect a cautious [0.25 percentage point] rate cut, but Powell underscored a view we have held that the Fed has room to ramp up the pace of rate cuts if the labor market deteriorates unexpectedly,” Kathy Bostjancic, chief economist for Nationwide, noted in an email, referring to basis points.

She added that she expects additional rate cuts before year-end, bringing the total reductions to 0.75 percentage points, adding, “but we see the possibility of more rate reduction if employment growth slows abruptly.”

How will this impact mortgage rates?

Already, mortgage rates have dropped to their lowest levels in 15 months, ahead of expectations that the Federal Reserve will cut its benchmark interest rate next month for the first time in four years.

But a rate cut of 0.25 to 0.5 percentage points will likely only make small changes in borrowing costs for consumers, noted Ted Rossman, senior industry analyst at Bankrate, in an email. Even so, mortgage rates could continue to decline, especially if inflation continues to fall and the job market shows some weakness, experts have noted.

“From a consumer perspective, it’s important to note that lower interest rates will be a gradual process,” he said. “The trip down is likely to be much slower than the series of interest rate hikes which quickly pushed the federal funds rate higher by 5.25 percentage points in 2022 and 2023.”

Even though mortgage rates are already declining, there hasn’t yet been a meaningful change in credit card or auto loan rates, he added.

The stock market yesterday liked what Powell said with the Dow Jones Industrials finishing up 462 points.

Tony

Dear Commons Community,

The Chronicle of Higher Education had an interesting article yesterday describing the plight of many AI scientists who are having their work “peer” reviewed by AI programs. Here is an excerpt.

When Arjun Guha submitted a paper to a conference on artificial intelligence last year, he got feedback that made him roll his eyes. “The document is impeccably articulated,” one peer-reviewer wrote, “boasting a lucid narrative complemented by logically sequenced sections and subsections.”

Guha, an associate professor of computer science at Northeastern University, knew this “absurd” remark could stem from only one source: an AI chatbot.

“If I wanted to know what ChatGPT thought of our paper,” Guha complained on X, “I could have asked myself.”

AI is upending peer review, the time-honored tradition in which academics help judge which research should be elevated to publication — and which should go in the reject pile. Under the specter of ChatGPT, no one can be sure anymore that their intellectual labor is being read and judged by humans. Scientists, even those who think generative AI can be a helpful tool, say it’s demoralizing to be on the receiving end of an evaluation blatantly outsourced to a robot. And in an ironic twist, this blow to the ego appears to be hitting the AI field most of all: Up to 17 percent of reviews submitted to prestigious AI conferences in the last year were substantially written by large language models (LLMs), a recent study estimated.

Already, there are signs that AI evaluations could be corrupting the integrity of knowledge production. Computer-generated feedback may slightly boost a manuscript’s chance of approval, and uploading someone’s unpublished data into a chatbot in order to produce a review could amount to a breach of confidentiality policies. These are problems without easy solutions, ones that organizers of computer-science conferences — the main venues for publishing research in that field — are just beginning to acknowledge.

There is a little AI poetic justice here!

Tony

Reuters. pictures.com

Dear Commons Community,

Kamala Harris gave the speech of her life last night at the Democratic National Convention. She was forceful, unhesitating, and clear in where she wants to take our country.  She did not shy away from attacking Trump presenting a dark image of what the former president will do if reelected.  Here are some highlights.  You can view the full speech here.

Harris reviewed her background and growing up in a mostly one-parent home.  She would be the first woman president if she wins, as well as the first South Asian, the first Black woman.  But she didn’t dwell on the historic nature of her candidacy.

Harris acknowledged that hers was an “uncertain journey,” the daughter of Indian and Jamaican immigrants who was raised by a single mother after her parents split up. One of her comments was a jolt when she told a story of her mother advising her and her sister to “never do anything half-assed.”

Her speech drew wild applause and left some in tears, as she formally accepted her party’s nomination for president, laid out her vision for the country and wasted no time spelling out how dangerous a reelected Donald Trump would be for women, middle-class Americans and the rule of law itself.

Harris cast herself as a seasoned fighter, drawing a direct from her years as a prosecutor fighting for women and children against abusers, to her stint as the California attorney general taking on big banks and gun cartels, to her fights to win tough elections, to her current fight to protect American democracy from Trump.

“In many ways, Donald Trump is an unserious man,” Harris said. “The consequences of putting Donald Trump back in the White House are extremely serious.”

She described the “chaos and calamity” that marked Trump’s first term as president and then the gravity of what came next: Trump incited an insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021, to try to prevent the votes for Joe Biden to become president from being counted. On top of that, Trump was impeached twice and, since leaving office, has been convicted of 34 felony counts in the hush-money case and was found liable for committing sexual abuse and defamation.

“Consider what he intends to do if we give him power again,” Harris warned. “Consider the power he will have, especially after the United States Supreme Court just ruled he would be immune from criminal prosecution.”

The vice president homed in on Trump’s attacks on women’s reproductive rights. She described meeting with women around the country in her capacity as vice president and hearing horror stories about miscarrying in parking lots, getting sepsis and losing the ability to have children again ― all because doctors in their states were afraid of going to jail for providing them with abortion care. And she emphasized that he and his allies want to keep chipping away at reproductive rights.

“Simply put, they are out of their minds,” Harris concluded, to deafening cheers.

Run, Kamala, Run!

Tony