Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz Diagnoses The Problem: Republicans Are WEIRD
They're so often terrified of things that aren't real.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz was on CNN Thursday morning, where host John Berman asked him about a new CNN poll showing Joe Biden with a low approval rating — 37 percent this time, largely because people are worried about an economy that according to economic indicators is doing pretty well, but which has many worried anyway.
Berman asked Walz, who recently became chair of the Democratic Governors Association, whether he thought Biden’s low poll numbers would “be a drag” on Democratic candidates for governor next year, but Walz rejected the premise that Biden or Democrats need to worry too much about the polls a year out, noting that Biden’s numbers have more to do with general dissatisfaction with Washington and dysfunction, even though the source of that is Republicans.
Democratic governors, Walz said, have been “enacting Joe Biden’s agenda across the country” and getting far higher approval rates than Republicans. As for the top of the ticket, Walz said,
“It's gonna be a binary choice next year. It's gonna be either the guy who is in court today, or one of the folks who were weirdly on that [Republican debate] stage last night, versus a guy who is delivering. So I don’t worry that much about it. […]
“What matters is, are you affecting positively the people across the country, so I think by the time we get to next November, they’ll know what that choice is.”
Then Berman asked Walz about a comment he’d made in a recent interview with Politico, where he talked about the excellent crop of current Democratic governors and the real good for people that they’ve been able to achieve in states with Democratic trifectas. In that interview, Walz said the choices between Democrats and Republicans are pretty clear:
“When we’re running against the generic Republican, our races are always really close, but there’s no such thing [as a generic Republican]. These guys are weird. Once they start running, their weirdness shows up, and especially with the nominee on the other side.”
Asked to expand on that, Walz agreed vigorously with himself:
Walz: I'll stand by that. Well look, just the strange things they become obsessed with, demonizing our children, becoming obsessed with people's personal lives in their bedrooms, restricting freedoms.
I'm surrounded by states who are spending their time figuring out how to ban Charlotte's Web in their schools, while we're banishing hunger from ours with free breakfast and lunch. That’s what the public’s looking for.
But Governor, what if the children are wrong? Sounds like you’d feed them even if they read Toni Morrison books!
Walz went on, adding that Republicans just can’t seem to help themselves when it comes to “issues” that play well on Fox News, but that leave most people wondering what the hell they’re so mad about: “They will weirdly obsess with everything to be mean, and cruel, and small in their ideas.”
For instance, among many other GOP obsessions, there’s that nonsense about allowing “abortion up until the moment of birth,” which is demonstrably not real. It just doesn’t happen. Nor is anyone telling children to hate themselves for being white, trying to turn anyone gay, handing out porn in schools, or plotting to install a Marxist dictatorship by regulating kitchen appliances.
Why, there’s a meme about that, even!
Walz closed by bringing it back to Biden, noting again that on issues like protecting abortion rights, helping the middle class, and fighting climate change, Democratic governors are getting it done, and Joe Biden’s legislative successes like the Infrastructure Law and the Inflation Reduction Act are providing the federal help needed to do that.
“Those are things people want to hear about, not demonizing some child because of who they are, and at the end of the day, Americans are better than that.”
Makes sense to us; the trick will be to keep reminding voters that they really do care more about that stuff instead of the imaginary Death Of America demons the Republicans are trying to scare them with.
[Aaron Rupar on Twitter / Politico / CNN]
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I do love the backstory on the "Kids afraid of bunny" meme:
The photo was taken in early 2015 by Camera Shy, a professional photography service based in Utah that specializes in family portraits. The image first appeared online when Camera Shy posted it to their Facebook[1] page on March 14th, 2015, with the caption "And sometimes bunny sessions go like this…"
https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/kids-scared-of-rabbit
Isn't Minnesota the liberal hell-hole that just posted a $2.something billion surplus this week?