I actually voted for Harris and thought after the debate that she would win. She missed her big opportunity to appeal to the working class on inflation, the border and China.
Sticking it to China has strong bipartisan support. She could have easily been for:
1. Ending the De Minimis tariff exception
2. Ending China having most favored nation
3. Demanding China keep the promise they made to Obama and not militarize the S. China Sea or tariffs would go up.
She should have talked to Bernie Sanders and got ideas from him on helping the working class. I disagree with most of what Bernie is for, but I love his passion for the working class.
Plenty of things that - in hindsight - she could have done differently. But I don't think there was really much hope. It just wasn't in the cards:
- Inflation happened during Biden's term. It doesn't matter whose fault it is. The party in control gets punished. The conservatives in power lost in the UK, largely from people upset about about inflation. Harris was part of the Biden admin.
- I don't think policies and promises would have made any difference. Basically every economist believed that Harris's plans would be better for inflation and the deficit than Trump's plans of tariffs, lower taxes, mass deportation, and a greater influence on monetary policy. People don't care, policy stuff is boring. It's hard to message that. Harris was in the Biden admin,
they had their chance.
- People's memory/nostalgia for the pre-Covid days was greater than their memory or distaste for the daily chaos of the Trump admin. Again, it doesn't matter if Trump was or was not primarily responsible - he was in office - and pre-Covid was largely good.
- She apparently was not popular/likable. I don't have my own opinion of this, I didn't watch the debate, I haven't watched any of her speeches, rallies, interviews, any of it. The most I saw of her was accidentally seeing commercials on TV. But her 2020 run was not successful and she only had a couple of months to tack to the center and gain ground, it didn't happen.
- Dysfunction at the border was a real thing. And a lot of it was caused by choices Biden made, as evidenced by improvements when he eventually reversed course. And again, was Harris calling the shots? No, Biden was in charge, the buck stops there, but again Harris was in the administration.
I think she would have lost much worse to a "normal" Republican like Haley. I think the only chance the Democrats would have had is if Biden dropped out much earlier and the party would have been able to select someone outside of the admin who would have had a longer time to make their pitch and be less tied down to a unpopular admin. That combined with a historically awful opponent in Trump.
