Relapsing On Meghan McCain
Sorry
I get it. “Log off.” Stop checking for updates. “Go outside.” Stop obsessing over what the hell is going to happen and whether an 81 year old narcissistic man experiencing cognitive decline will “pass the torch.” I should be working on draft 4 of my n*vel, I should be learning some tempeh recipe that will somehow alleviate my psoriasis. I shouldn’t be keeping up with Meghan McCain’s spicy takes on her podcast “Citizen McCain”. I shouldn’t be keeping up with this cable-news friendly political scientist who has a contrarian stance that since Joe Biden is an incumbent, he's more likely to win (this guy has something called the Keys to the White House, which though have “accurately” predicted 9 past elections, aren’t actually scientific).
But this has been way too stressful so I am going to rant.
At this point, any reasonable person would agree that having Joe Biden as a nominee of a major political party in the year of our lord 2024 is one of the worst moves anyone in politics has made in the 21st century. I’ve been thinking about the vibe of it all and why a lot of people (maybe I’m in a bubble?) can’t stop talking about it. The stakes of the situation are high, but also it exposes a type of hot mess that’s hard to look away from.
This whole fiasco reminds me of the Iowa Caucuses in 2020 where voters had to use an app to count their votes and the app glitched and failed and led to both an old Jewish socialist man and a creepy ambitious McKinsey consultant claiming that they had won. It’s not really an ideological thing, it’s more of a vibe that the people who are in charge of it all are kind of just winging it and don’t know have an actual strategy and rely on “there’s an app for that” mindset. In Biden 2024’s case, it’s not really an “app for that” but more so an expectation that despite glaring truths, with enough smoke and mirrors, it won’t matter.
Not to write fan fiction, but since this is my Substack, I am going to do that. Based on reading way too many articles about this fucking mess, this is what I THINK happened in 2022-2024 to lead us to this place:
November 2022: The Democrats did better than expected in the 2022 midterms and Joe Biden got an ego boost and decides to run again because he really wants to be like the other dudes in history with two terms and thinks its epic awesome sauce.
January 2023: He starts doing all the stuff you do to become the nominee again and freezes out anyone else from running. When I say “he”, I mean his handlers/lackeys/ consultants/ advisors. For the record, joke’s on him because I, along with thousands of Californians, voted for Marianne Williamson!
January - April 2023: Those Gen X/ Millennial/Gen Z Democrats that are like debate team kids from high school vibes start talking amongst themselves at D.C. breweries that the president seems a “little off” but don’t know what to do because whoever brings it up first and calls A,B, and C reporter will be blacklisted from working for Raytheon or whatever. They repeat “Joe Biden is the best president of our lifetimes” like it’s some cult mantra. They probably were eating ahi tuna poke fries with a lot of spicy mayo and beer that tastes like it survived a shipwreck from the Victorian era. During these outings, a few start getting nervous and maybe splinter off to the ping pong table section of the microbrewery and remark to their partners/ polycules that maybe shit will hit the fan, but once again, NO ONE DOES ANYTHING because TELLING THE TRUTH GETS YOU FIRED and working at the White House is EPIC AWESOME SAUCE.
April 2023: Joe Biden announces he’s running… the microbrewery crew feel nervous about their candidate but reassure themselves with reminders that Drumpf/ Cheeto Man/ Orange Guy is likely going to spend most of the campaign trail in a courtroom and that the Biden economy is great (Even though those ahi tuna poke fries cost the equivalent of a beachfront property in Miami). Everyone thinks Drumpf is bad, they argue, so Joe Biden can do nothing but record TikToks every 2 weeks about “democracy” and win.
April 2023 - June 2024: We all know what happened. The candidate doesn’t do that many interviews, press conferences, or off-the-cuff engagements. Ezra Klein says that shit will hit the fan but the D.C. ahi tuna fries crew just keep on chilling at their microbreweries and no one blows the whistle because TELLING THE TRUTH GETS YOU FIRED AND WORKING AT THE WHITE HOUSE IS EPIC AWESOME SAUCE.
June 2024: Millions of Americans have their worst suspicions validated, the D.C. ahi tuna poke fries crew start freaking out. Some start talking to the press, some cling on to the Dear Leader because they know that if its Kamala, she will likely clean house and they will get fired and need to find another job on LinkedIn dot com.
NOW: To make it all about me, I am now listening to Meghan McCain’s podcast, keeping up with random political scientists, unironically reading David Brooks columns, and spent a Saturday morning writing fan fiction about ambitious D.C. dweebs chowing down on ahi tuna poke fries and lamenting the fall of empire.
