I’ll start today with a storm update. Because Milton took a slight southern turn before landfall, our area in north central Florida got off easy, with winds just gusting into the weak tropical storm range, and less rain than had been forecast. I never lost power, and with my wife and daughters out of state and my stalwart canine companion at my side, the storm was no more than a cozy night at home for me.
Even the storm-ravaged path across the state from Tampa to the Atlantic appears to have fared better than the worst-scenario forecasts, and although there are heartache and losses to contend with, the death count is much lower than we had feared.
As with past storms, Ron DeSantis continues to crush it in the “Great Governor” bidness. He competently managed the pre-storm organization and warnings, and staged the resources to come in afterward and get power restoration and rescue missions underway quickly. He also made a great statement re: any potential looters, which I roughly paraphrase as, “You loot, we shoot.”
And he sharply Hillary-slapped Que Mala’s pathetic attempt to play politics with the storm, and make herself look important. She wanted to cosplay as a president and force him to drop everything to take her phone calls, and he rightly pointed out that he was busy, and that the only federal official that he should logically be talking to would be the president (if we had one) and a competent FEMA official (if we had one).
Speaking of Kamala, she’s had quite a week, hasn’t she? She’s gone on what one media source called a “charm blitzkrieg” of media appearances. Unfortunately for her, her efforts were about as charming as the original blitzkrieg in 1939. (Carried out under false pretenses? Check. Leaving a trail of destruction in its wake? Check. Executed heartlessly but competently? Yes and no.)
As I said in a previous column, I think the decision to have Kamala do a round of interviews – even if they are given to bootlicking leftist presstitutes – is strong evidence that her internal polling is looking lousy. All competent leftist pols know how terrible she is at this, so things must be bad if they are risking it anyway.
And holy cats, did she double and triple down on the banality and word goulash in all of her interviews!
The biggest one was the 60 Minutes shot with Bill Whitaker. That one was bad enough even before we found out that the CBS hacks had heavily edited and “polished” what they showed. (This practice followed the pattern the Dems used with Biden for the last several years: his ads and pre-taped appearances were always horrific, which meant that the unexpurgated outtakes must have been the rhetorical equivalent of a crime against humanity!)
Whitaker actually asked her some legitimate questions, and several times – after she excreted a rambling stew of obfuscation – he followed up with a gently chiding, “Yes, but the question was X.” He didn’t go after her as hard as he could have – or as hard as every MSM interviewer always goes after every conservative or GOP candidate or spokesperson – but the fact that he pushed at all was enough to pierce her wafer-thin veneer of non-idiocy.
He asked her repeatedly how she’d pay for her plans, and if she regretted opening the border and thus allowed a quadrupling of Trump’s number of illegals getting into the country, and why she’d changed her position on so many issues. And each time he got a variation on the same response: a CAT-5 yammer storm. (“People have hopes, dreams and ambitions; I was raised in the middle class; My background is in law enforcement.”)
The brainiacs on the View tried to go much easier on her. (Unexpectedly!) But even their softballs baffled her like a wicked splitter from Ohtani when he’s really feeling it. Then Sunny Hostin asked her a question that she had to have expected: “Would you have done anything differently than President Biden during the last four years?”
Now every Dem pundit has been talking about this since they threw Biden under the bus and made Que Mala the candidate: she has to distance herself from Biden’s policies, whose popularity ratings fall somewhere between chlamydia and bestiality. That’s a tricky tightrope to walk, but she absolutely MUST do it.
So how did Sophocles Harris start her disjointed mess of an answer? “There is not a thing that comes to mind…”
And at that moment, at Trump HQ, a top aide turned and yelled over his shoulder, “Cut that video, slap on an ‘I’m Donald Trump and I approve this message’ at the end, and air-drop it into heavy rotation in every battleground state immediately!”
When she taped an interview with the execrable Stephen Colbert later that same day, she still hadn’t come up with a passable answer for that question. His variation on it was roughly, “How would you be a different president than Biden?” And she started out with, “First of all, I’m not Joe Biden.”
And the entire land echoed with a million leftists simultaneously and violently face-palming themselves.
She also gave an interview to Howard Stern, for some reason. On the upside, Stern is an unhinged, perverted crank, so he’s right in the sweet spot of her demographic. On the downside, he recently said that he doesn’t just hate Trump, he hates anyone who votes for him. In other words, he basically called half the country “deplorables.” And you know how well that works in politics.
During the interview, Stern was a real voice of reason, claiming that “the sun’s literally going to go out” if Trump wins in November. And if there is such a thing as a Pyrrhic compliment, he gave one to Kamala: “Yes, I’m voting for you, but I would also vote for that wall over there, rather than [Trump].”
Ringing endorsement there, Howie: Kamala Harris and a wall would do an equally good job as president. I’ve got to give that one a grudging, “Fact check: true.”
Finally, for the part of the electorate who finds Howard Stern too highbrow for their tastes, Kamala went on some sleazy sex podcast called “Call Her Daddy.” I’d never heard of it – because I was raised right, and am not impressed by graphic vulgarity. (Plus I’m old enough to admit that that kind of talk strikes me as extra gross coming from females. Call me sexist if you must.)
I could only think of two discussion topics that might make Kamala a good fit on that podcast: 1. The host could grill her on what techniques she used on Willie Brown to get her political career started in California. 2. They could talk about the many wonders of abortion.
They did talk about abortion a lot. Because, surprise! The sex podcaster with the sexual ethics of an alley cat in heat is a fervent abortion enthusiast. (Unexpectedly!)
The low point was when the host asked her a set-up lefty question to the effect of, “Can you think of ANY law that restricts what men can do with their bodies?” And the cackle appeared, along with the predictably brain-dead answer: NO!
And for the thousandth time, I asked myself the question that is on everyone’s mind: How can this imbecile have any chance of getting elected president?!
No one should have to explain this, to anyone older than around 8, but here goes: Laws regulating abortion aren’t aimed at restricting what women can do with their bodies—only the bodies of the baby they are carrying. (Spoiler alert, for when you take 7th grade biology: a baby has different DNA from her mother, which is true about NO part of any mother’s body, ever, anywhere.)
Besides, just about EVERY law restricts what men can do with their bodies! A few target men exclusively or almost so (coercing participation in the draft during times of war; laws against rape, the vast majority of which apply primarily to men), but nearly all laws affect men as well as women.
My fists are part of my body, and I cannot use them to punch irritating leftists in the face, no matter how much they may deserve it. The same goes for my feet, my elbows and my knees. And don’t get me started on my skull, which in addition to sheltering my national treasure of a brain, is excellent for delivering head-butts to deserving morons.
And yet, many laws prevent me from doing so, no matter how loudly I chant, “My forehead, my choice!” or “Keep your laws off of my cranium!”
White collar crimes are also done with the body – signing fraudulent checks, conning people with your mouth/voice – as are petty crimes like pickpocketing.
And any crime with a jail sentence as a potential outcome – i.e. nearly all of them – necessarily restricts what men (and women) can do with their bodies, since it dictates where your body can reside, when you can exercise or eat and etc.
So Kamala’s interviewers were sycophants, or dullards, or both. And still she has gone 0-for-8 in interviews, demonstrating an uncommon knack for metaphorically screwing the rhetorical pooch in every situation.
We cannot allow this empty pantsuit of a candidate to get elected!
One final note: Katie’s improvement has continued, and she will likely get out of the hospital this weekend. (Yes!) Emily is safely in California for a short visit, and Karen and I will still be able to head to Maine and then Vermont on Sunday, to enjoy the company of some old friends, and of God’s creation, in the form of fall leaves around Lake Champlain.
I won’t have a column on Monday, but I’ll be back at it when I get home. Have a great weekend, everybody!
Hamas delenda est!
Martin Simpson 