Bedlam Farm Blog Journal by Jon Katz

Confident, Principaled, Presidential. A performance that was uniquely American. Those were the reviews of Kamala Harris’s speech.

As I read the morning opinions, I’m confronted with the unsettling possibility that if Kamala Harris emerges victorious, it will hurry the continuous irrelevance of my beloved journalism.  I guess I’m ashamed. The next great commentators will be influencers, not reporters. They seem to know what is going on in our new world.

Witnessing the transformation of Kamala Harris’s story and trajectory is addictive. Once in the shadows, she has stepped into the spotlight as a confident and formidable figure, ready to seize the moment.  To her, Trump is an “unserious” man, still a dangerous one.

The so-called experts failed to recognize the brewing revolution. For months, they overlooked the profound change unfolding before them.  Change is an easy story to miss if you get too close or lazy (or cheap).

The convention was graced with a series of impactful speeches, all delivered by women. Each speech was a compelling call to action from Hillary Clinton to Michelle Obama, Gretchen Whitney to Oprah Winfrey,  and Kamala Harris.

The spirit of Thomas Paine was alive in the convention as these potent and articulate women, who were once denied the right to vote, took the stage.

It was a stirring moment for these women, an opportunity to ignite the revolutionary revolution, which they passionately did. They are formidable warriors, eloquent, tough, and determined.

I have to say Donald Trump does not have a chance to beat this powerful Army.

This is why Kamala Harris will win this election. She’s got it all; the political system’s hoary old machinations are in deep trouble. She is not just an agent of change; she turns out to be change.

“Every night,” wrote a New York Times columnist this morning about the convention, “women have outshined male party stalwarts – sometimes the ones they are married to – in a development that has highlighted the rising power of women in the Democratic Party and left some of the most famous men in politics seemingly playing more of a supporting role.”

Hillary Clinton gave perhaps the best speech of her life. Michelle Obama was not afraid to show the anguish, racism, and cruelty Donald Trump showed her and her husband; he mumbled early this week that he liked and respected the Obamas after insisting for decades that Barack Obama wasn’t even born in America.

She explained exactly what made Trump such a severe threat to democracy, gutting his lies and grievances. She was devastating.

On Wednesday, Governor Tim Walz charmed the convention and the country with his Midwestern charm, but Oprah Winfrey, the most powerful speaker of the day, had already gone. She rocked the convention while she spoke.

“I believe this is the woman’s convention,” said Sarah Godlewski, Wisconsin Secretary of State. Duh, said a bunch of pundits. No kidding.

So that is what all this fuss is about? “Political spouses,” as the term goes, will never be the same.

It was the men who struggled to show their real emotions. Oprah, Michelle Obama, and Clinton have no such trouble. But that makes sense; it’s a women’s revolution, and the father of this one, Donald Trump, and his ideological judges have tried to take women’s right to health care and their own decisions and instead launched a revolution.

They will answer for that.

This is rapidly turning into a nightmare for the self-proclaimed righteous. Paine reminds us that Americans have never really trusted the government; that was the whole idea of the Revolution, and they especially don’t like the government invading their private spaces and decisions.

That was just how the British got in so much trouble. They said their troops could enter people’s houses—and even sleep there—at any time. Or, as the governor said: “Mind Your Own Damn Business.”

The country is shocked by Kamala Harris’s power, eloquence, and authorship.

We’ve been told thousands of times that she is a failure, as dumb as Donald Trump assured us that she is.

That is turning out to be a colossal goof. As usual, Trump has always been his own worst enemy.

He is not Harris’s biggest threat; he is her best friend on the campaign trail. Trump has never understood or respected women; he is sure he is misreading them now, and you can almost hear women all over the country turning to Kamala Harris.

This is a dark moment for journalism, or what is left of it.

This morning, they all warned us this would be a close or scary campaign. Warnings are the bulk of the news they claim to report.

For a while at least, the strong women (and their mothers) stiffened the pines of liberals and progressives, many of whom are still trembling over Donald Trump’s rise and threat.

Meanwhile, the influencers on TikTok and Instagram were beating the brains of the reporters sitting in their booths at the convention itself.

If you spent time on what the influencers were saying or doing on TikTok, you would see they understood what this was all about weeks ago.

They did not spend time in handwringing, clucking, and warnings; they were already hard at work writing their memes and hashtags, buying their beaded necklaces (the camouflage caps are all sold out),  signing up volunteers, and grasping Harris’s power and charisma right away.

“…Harris has sometimes seemed like an empty vessel,” wrote Josh Barro. “Now, she has introduced herself in a specific, warm, and uniquely American way, which provides a framework to explain the broadly popular values of freedom and justice she’s espousing.”

“There were so many impressive, effective women presenting, culminating with Harris, of course – that the remarkable almost became unremarkable; I had to force myself to pause and absorb the fact that I was witnessing a revolution.” Yes, and it’s about time.

Do you know what else will have a hard time in the coming weeks?

The media itself: Not so fast, we are warned: “Kamala Harris Faces Challenge of Translating Convention Joy to Fall Momentum.”

In other words, stay scared, no matter what. Harris seems to be off to a brilliant start. Can the media, now being made irrelevant by teenage Influencers, say the same thing about themselves? Harris can take care of herself.

People will be telling you for months how hard it will be, how powerful  Trump is, how dirty a politician. I don’t listen to those people anymore. If progressives and liberals – and women – all across the country don’t stiffen their spines now, they will deserve what they get.

For Momen, this is the time, and this is the moment. Six months ago, I wrote on my blog that the women’s revolution needed a reader, a political angel that would come out of nowhere and lead them to the mountain. I don’t lean toward hyperbole, but her speech last night persuaded me that she had finally come, just in the nick of time.

 

One of the most striking moments of the Presidential Campaign was 17-year-old Gus Walz’s emotional reaction last night to his father’s speech.

His tearful exclamation, “That’s my dad,” as his father accepted the Democratic Party’s nomination for Kamala Harris’s Vice President, excited millions of people and is a powerful testament to the changing perceptions of gender and masculinity in politics.

He is teaching the world what it means to be a man.

While Governor Walz’s speech was significant, his son’s emotional display conveyed a larger message. It symbolizes the changing roles of men and women in politics, with men embracing their emotions and women shattering their glass ceilings.  

Gender in politics is rapidly changing before our eyes. To me, that’s the big news coming out of Chicago. Men never cried in public and women were seen as weak if they did.

Democratic politicians and pollsters have noted a shift in public sentiment, with most voters now much more accepting of a woman president (excluding her opponent). This was evident during the convention, where I witnessed at least a half dozen female speakers openly express their emotions, often crying,  and it was met with understanding and acceptance. This added significant warmth and emotion to Kamala Harris’s campaign for President.

Hillary Clinton, who knows about such things, believes the time for women to rise is here; the glass ceiling seems almost archaic.

Men are different. They are by far the most violent, greedy, and emotionally blocked of the species. Maybe not so much anymore; it would be a great gift to the world if they were changing. It might even save the world.

Trump is turning out to be the best thing that could possibly happen to Kamala Harris. Donald Trump doesn’t get it and can’t grasp how to stop it. He looks like a musty old Buffalo lost in the plains and running from one circle to another. Harris, to him, is dumb, lazy, dishonest, and a potential hell on earth. He has also recently shared with us the belief that he is even better-looking than she is and much brighter. So, yeah, I get the feeling he’s not rejoining the mushrooming women’s revolution, but he is helping to strengthen it every time he opens his mouth.

I was mesmerized by the comparison of how men are viewed in the two different political conventions. Trump has long been a rabid fan of Hulk Hogan, the very macho world champion wrestler. He has  called Hogan “the toughest man on earth.”

If there is a biological opposite to 71-year-old Hulk Hogan and Donald Trump regarding men, it might be Tim Walz and his 17-year-old son. Gus cried for his father, and the Hulk ripped off his shirt on national television to praise Donald Trump as a “real American hero.” He was a prime-time speaker.

So yes, I guess there is a natural choice after all. This time, Trump shot himself in another foot.

 

(Hulk Hogan at the Republican Convention. I’m still trying to figure out what I should learn from this famous thinker. I don’t want to take my shirt off on TV)

Tim Walz is changing the very idea of what it means to be a man. A soldier for 24 years, a hugger and gun lover, and a much-loved football coach,

He showed the shocked political workers a new way to be tough. He cries often, hugs and lots, and his son is not embarrassed or reluctant to stand up in front of millions of people and sob while shouting out praise for his Dad.  As a teacher, he didn’t persecute gay students; he protected them. Ron DeSantis would have called him “woke” and got him fired.

I’m both touched and impressed. The world is sick of macho men; it is becoming clear that they are running from the fact that the plant is on fire and continuing their wars, dominations, assaults on democracy, continuous persecution of women and other “others,” and vilifying immigrants as racists and murderers.

Walz says there is a better way for real men to be strong: to embrace tolerance, cooperation, open emotion, and the love of family and neighbors.

Walz seems to love a lot of people, and a lot of people love him. I have trouble imagining Donald Tromp tolerating his sons bawling in front of him or even being around him much.

Honestly, I can’t imagine my daughter standing up and crying about how wonderful her Dad is. She’s just old enough to come from a different world, and I wonder if I was half the father as Walz seems to be.

My notion of masculinity has always seemed strange to other men.

I believe that a real man supports his daughters and wife or partners in living the lives they want and stops confusing cruelty and violence with masculinity.

Real men promote love and peace and free their emotions. Gus Walz and his dad are teaching us what it means to be a real man. Our job is not to suppress the liberation of women but to endorse and support them whenever we can. That’s what love is to me. It can be liberating to be a man.

We don’t need to be in charge all the time; we need to admit that we have blown it, and it’s time to replace greedy and destructive macho with something gentler and kindler.

Gus’s dead loves guns, but even more, he loves keeping his children alive and safe. To me, that is what a real man does.

After Gus’s touching tears, I went on Instagram and TikTok to see how our other too-often-forgotten world reacted. Would the young sneer? Teenaged boys are famous for that. No, that is left only for male political leaders and legislators.

Governor Walz and his son are scaring the piss out of them. If he is the new way, they are doomed.

Within minutes, I saw that the cutaway of Gus crying (his sister Hope was holding up her hands in a heart) was drawing hundreds of thousands of posts and views, heading towards at least a million after midnight. Most were accompanied by the hashtag#ThatsMyDad. Another hashtag, #TeamGus, was trending on X on Thursday morning.

Things really are changing. I keep reading about how tight and close this race is, yet it seems like all of the energy, enthusiasm, and change is pouring out of one side while the other keeps getting meaner, stranger, and angrier. I don’t see it turning around.

When I think about the significant time the Republican Party gave 71-year-old Hulk Hogan, one of the most traditional macho figures in America, and the very real and profoundly touching love a 17-year-old teenager gave his father, I think the winner of this election is becoming clearer and clearer all the way. And that doesn’t even take into account Michelle Obama, Oprah Winfrey, and Taylor Swift, who is coming soon to a rally near you.

You can get your tissues out, and feel free to use them. It seems accurate: The cat woman are out of their hiding spaces, and things are changing.