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I met Walt and his grandson Michael on the Byers Road Bistro over wings, pizza and beer. This was in Staunton, Virginia, which I used to be given to know is pronounced with a tough “A” like Stan the person.
Michael likes to speak, and he did. He let me know he had studied political science and philosophy, and I’ll hand it to him. The child has performed his studying. He’s erudite. I requested how outdated he was, he mentioned 22.
“You’d have cherished the 90s,” I informed him.
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“I guess,” he mentioned.
“I knew you then, in all of the espresso homes,” I mentioned, including, “I’m glad you’re nonetheless right here.”
Michael might by no means vote for Trump. He’s a uncommon voter for whom January sixth is a really massive deal. However, he additionally informed me that typically in his social group he can’t say the nuanced issues he needs to say.
I attempted to push on that, however might solely get to date. He doesn’t like the word “woke,” however understands it. He reads Hobbes and Kant and needs an actual dialog that his leftist associates and colleagues received’t at all times enable when it treads on progressive assumptions.
His grandfather, who has lived in Staunton for 50 years, and who has caught a fish in 45 of the 50 states to date, appears poised to vote for Harris.
However like so many individuals I meet, he’s not nuts about it, he doesn’t actually know who she is. Curiously, he informed me he thinks that Harris didn’t select Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro as her operating mate as a result of, “I feel he might have outshined her.”
Again on the resort, which is a beautiful place opened in 1924, I met two bikers out on the entrance porch of outdated this institution of Virginia appeal and rocking chairs, smoking.
The older of the 2 is voting for Trump. “Everyone knows it was higher when he was president,” he informed me.
His youthful pal is much less satisfied. “I don’t belief any of ‘em.” And I hear that quite a bit. He’s not planning to vote.
As the chilliness slowly began to set in on this decidedly and eventually fall night time within the Previous Dominion, two girls appeared on our stage, once more divided by politics.
The spritely blonde was all in for Trump, “I don’t care how you are feeling about him,” she mentioned, “all of us need that economic system again.”
Her pal Dottie, is a powerful Harris supporter. That is not one thing I run into quite a bit, and after I requested why, she mentioned, with out lacking a beat, “She’s a girl. It is time for a girl to be president.”
I hear this pretty typically, even from some males, although far fewer. What’s attention-grabbing is what number of girls, Trump voters or not, merely reject the paradigm. Even to the purpose of being insulted by it.
However after I hear pleasure about Harris, right here in Virginia, or anyplace else, it’s often a results of her identification, what a Black lady as president represents, not as a result of they see within the vp a uniquely certified candidate.
Because of this, although Virginia has of late been considered fools gold for the Republican presidential candidate, and the polls counsel a simple blue win, I’m not completely satisfied.
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In Staunton, as in close by Harrisonburg the place I used to be a number of weeks in the past, the joy and depth round Trump from his supporters dwarfs that of Harris backers.
In the direction of the top of our lengthy chat, Michael requested if I assumed that there are sufficient American voters who hate Trump to get Harris elected, even when they don’t like Harris.
I thought of it, and mentioned no. A number of folks hated Trump in 2016, however not sufficient favored Hillary Clinton for her to win, sufficient did like Joe Biden 4 years later to thwart Trump. On the bottom in Virginia, and elsewhere, this feels much more like 2016.
Pulling out of the small-town parking storage, already going to Carolina in my thoughts, and extra actually, my automotive, I noticed an enormous signal on a beautiful six story constructing, it reads, “Madam President.” And it actually says all of it. In all places I am going, the commonest cause I hear why persons are filling within the bubble subsequent to Kamala’s identify is that she is a girl, they’re, because the saying as soon as went, “together with her.”
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Possibly gender alone, identification politics, can take Harris excessive, however right here in Virginia, and throughout the nation, I’ve my doubts about that.
With three weeks left till Election Day, Harris is operating out of time to present voters extra and higher causes to place her within the White Home.