It isn’t often that a single edition of a magazine leaves me discombobulated; magazines are waiting room fodder, evanescent. (Trust me: I spent my life working for them.) An article can be memorable; an entire issue rarely lingers as a coherent entity. But there was a spooky synergy to the September issue of The Atlantic, three stories in particular: Ross Andersen on Artificial Intelligence, David Brooks on How America Got Mean and Graeme Wood on a fascist bodybuilding social media weirdo who calls himself Bronze Age Pervert. Their cumulative effect was to create a nasty, howling emptiness in my soul—which put me in a perfect place to watch the third Republican presidential debate, especially Vivek Ramaswamy who seemed a distillate of the three Atlantic pieces: Synthetic. Mean. Perverse. “You’re scum,” Nikki Haley summarized, with admirable precision.
I mean, Ramaswamy’s was a performance for the ages—the dark ages. He may be the avatar of imminent dystopia, the most artificial of intelligences: ChatWTF. He is the detritus of Trump updated with a faster, more capacious operating system. “Smooth-as-a-suppository oleaginousness,” wrote Roger Kimball of The New Criterion. True, but worse. Every time Ramaswamy opened his mouth, a reflux tide of maggots tumbled out. He bristled from the jump, inviting the Republican Party leader Ronna McDaniel to the stage…to resign her position on grounds of incompetence, given Tuesday’s election results and the results of too-many Tuesdays since Donald Trump came along. There was flagrant cynicism to this: Trump’s the problem, not McDaniel—but Ramaswamy can’t say that because he is Trump’s cats-paw in these debates.
And crazy. No doubt, Bronze Age Pervert listened with envy as Vivek called on Democrats to:
“end this farce that Joe Biden is going to be your nominee. We know he’s not even the president of the United States. He’s a puppet for the managerial class. So have the guts to step up and be honest about who you’re actually going to put up. So we can have an honest debate. Biden should step aside. End his candidacy now. So we can see if it’s [Gavin] Newsom or Michelle Obama or whoever else.”
This is fabulous stuff. It squishes and slithers with neon conspiracy-slouch. Compare it to animatronic Ron DeSantis—a last-century specimen—attempting to explain why Republicans keep getting clobbered in abortion referendums:
“You’ve got to do a better job on these referenda,” DeSantis said, while adding that “a lot of the people who are voting for the referenda are Republicans who would vote for a Republican candidate. So you’ve got to understand how to do that.”
I’ve got an idea: how about not signing six-week abortion bans?
Actually, this was a good performance by DeSantis…relatively. He told anecdotes about actual people, which he used to good political effect. His plans to send special forces into Mexico are over-the-top, but his emphasis on the scourge of fentanyl flowing across the border is the shining path (Sendero Luminoso, for those who remember the Peruvian guerrillas) to victory for Republicans in 2024—something Joe Biden and his people don’t seem to understand. If Trump slips on a banana peel or a court appeal, DeSantis would not be an implausible candidate in Iowa.
But Nikki Haley continues to dominate these things. There’s a freshness to her, a toughness. Her language is unexpected, unchained. When Ramaswamy accused her daughter of using Tik-Tok, she blasted him: “Leave my daughter out of your voice,” which sounded far more spontaneous than “out of your mouth” or the more traditional, “Don’t you dare drag my daughter into this.” This followed upon her brilliant—and also spontaneous-sounding, “Every time I hear you, I feel a little bit dumber” in the last debate. Clearly, Ramaswarmy inspires her; she should keep him—well, the memory of him—in her hip pocket as she moves forward.
Haley was also clear and forceful on foreign policy, which usually doesn’t count for much in presidential elections. But clear-thinking does: “A strong America doesn’t start wars,” she said. “A strong America prevents wars.” This is an old concept, though it’s never been stated better. And her humanity on abortion, an issue that flummoxes Republicans, is palpable—politically astute without sounding phony. (Debate moderators take note: How many questions, like how many weeks should abortion be legal or Hugh Hewitt’s how many ships should the Navy have, are a mug’s game. The noose is easily slipped. Time is wasted. A better question would have been: “We had 600 ships during the Reagan Administration, we have about 250 now: What kind of ships, if any, do we need?”) Chris Christie—ah, poor Chris Christie, even more talented than Haley—said we need more submarines, without being asked. But a better answer would have been: “We didn’t have any drones when Reagan was President, or Patriot missiles. Force posture has to change with technology. On land, we don’t need as much infantry now, but we could probably use more Special Forces. We probably don’t need as many ships as we did 40 years ago.” (Oh, if only we had a candidate with military experience; DeSantis has it, but makes the least of it—a defense intellectual he is not.)
Back to Haley: She can be too slick. Joe Biden didn’t “give” Iran $6 billion. A “strong” U.S. does start wars—incredibly stupid ones like Vietnam and Iraq. But she’s probably the best alternative to Trump and I suspect she would clobber Biden. Her path—and there still is a path—is a respectable finish in Iowa, then victories in New Hampshire and South Carolina. This is not likely. It’s not impossible, either. The commentariat seems convinced this cake is baked. The debate was irrelevant. Trump’s the nominee. Too soon for that: let’s see how Haley’s dough rises, literally and figuratively.
My Book Pages
Just finished reading Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver. It is flat-out brilliant, a perfect American hero for the 21st century, just as Huckleberry Finn was for the 19th. It is excruciating at times, but also hilarious. I don’t know how she managed to capture the voice of an Appalachian teenage boy so perfectly—though she is from there—but there is never a false step. Remarkable work.
And also…The Bear on Hulu is my favorite streaming series of the past year. It’s about haute cuisine in Chicago—a subject that eludes me—but it may be the most American thing I’ve seen in a while. Brilliant writing, acting, everything.
It’s quite amazing for all the candidates, who are far behind Trump, refuse to directly address him. Except for Christie, they’re quiet as a scared little mouse! The V candidate is nuts!
Great piece Joe. A lot of smart thinking and witty writing there. Hayley did have a good night for all the reasons you cited. And Christie, for all his baggage, did come off as the most authentic and natural politician.