With Harris, We Choose Hope.

Passing the torch to the next generation means not being limited by our fears.

We were on defense. Suddenly, we’re seeing the world that can be. With Biden, we could kick the race, class and gender cans down the road. Now, there is a palpable sense of relief from facing these challenges head on, and even outright elation in realizing, “We got this!” Passing the torch to the next generation means not limiting ourselves based on internalized fears. What if we applied that lesson to the climate and the economy? Standing up to corporate America might gain us more in voters than it loses us in donors. I’d like to find out.

Olympic Games, Paris, 2024

Learned Helplessness

For a long time, it seemed like no matter what we did, we just couldn’t open up a lead on Trump. He would say something horrible or even get convicted of felonies, and yet nothing would change. We thought the debate would be a slam dunk, but then it all went bad. The mainstream media decided to kick us while we were down. White House staffers even said that they were “resigned to” a second Trump presidency.

When nothing you try has worked, you start to believe that nothing will ever work. Psychologists call this “learned helplessness,” and it is synonymous with depression.

Many of us stuck by Joe Biden, and for good reason. He has been an extraordinary President. We know and love him. He beat Trump once, and we believed he could do it again. But when things go too badly for too long, you develop an aversion to risk. You can’t imagine things getting better, so you just try to stop them from getting even worse.

In Biden, there was an element of safety: he is a white man with a working-class vibe, not likely to “offend the sensibilities” of people with prejudices. Having Biden step down could have led to a protracted power struggle, ending in whole swaths of Democratic voters walking away mad. It just felt like a risk we couldn’t afford to take.

There was only one way this could work. It had to be President Biden’s decision. He needed to throw his support behind someone, and that someone had to be Kamala Harris. Somehow, President Biden knew that it would work. He saw something in her when he chose her to be his Vice President, and he knew she was ready to take this on.

We Got This

I don’t think we knew just how well it would actually go. The unanimous support. The unprecedented wave of donations. The massive phone calls. The viral memes. The voter registrations. The response has been overwhelming.

We are looking around and seeing a world that can be, instead of being paralyzed by fear of a world that doesn’t have to be. Suddenly, worrying about nominating a woman of color just seems so “last-week.”

On the one side, we have the potential loss of voters who would not have voted for us anyway. On the other side, we have the fearsome power of the 300,000 strong A.K.A., the Divine 9, and Gen Z. On one side: the Washington Post and New York Times (hemorrhaging subscribers), Truth Social and Xitter. On the other side: Heather Cox Richardson and Beyoncé, YouTube, Threads and TikTok, Swifties and Childless Cat Ladies. I know which side I would rather be on!

Not only have we got this, there is a very real possibility that we are going to crush this.

Is it a done deal? Of course not. But that is what HOPE will do for you. No matter how daunting the challenge, facing it head on feels infinitely better than living without hope and making decisions based on fear.

Passing the Torch

Previously, people talked about replacing President Biden with a younger candidate without explaining what that younger candidate actually brought to the table. It felt like ageism, and in some ways it was. Now, I believe they were trying to express something that doesn’t necessarily have to do with age, but frequently does.

When you do this work for decades, you experience a lot of defeats. You learn, if only subconsciously, that you are helpless when it comes to changing big things, especially those having to do with power.

Young people like AOC seem immune to the idea that anything is outside their reach. Perhaps, what they bring to the table is this: they have not yet learned what they can’t do. The thing is, they may be right. Just because we have not been able to do something for thirty years, does not necessarily mean that we can’t do it now. If we stop trying, we’ll never find out. Far too many people in Washington have stopped trying and don’t even know it.

The best argument for passing the torch to the next generation may be to stop limiting ourselves based on our fears.

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Going All In

The Climate Crisis and Economic Fairness

It’s not always a question of age. Some people never lose their ability to see what could be. President Biden and Bernie Sanders are no spring chickens, but they both still envision and keep pushing for change. Biden has worked in Washington his whole life, but despite this, his administration has taken on corporate power in a way that we have not seen since the Roosevelts: Franklin, Eleanor and Teddy.

Too many inside the beltway see what they are doing and still think, “We can’t do that,” despite the fact that they ARE doing that.

Voters feel that climate instability and economic unfairness have reached crisis levels. Why can’t we talk about them with the level of urgency that they deserve? When we speak in public and fail to acknowledge the reality that voters experience in their everyday lives, they feel like we are gaslighting them, and rightly so.

Why aren’t we sounding the alarm on the climate crisis? Why do we still talk about it in terms of economics, when converting to renewables is morally necessary at any cost? Why aren’t we talking about fact that corporate decision makers are out of control, and the accelerating accumulation of wealth is both making capitalism unsustainable and driving authoritarianism across the globe?

Why? Because a few wealthy campaign donors don’t want us to.

The Biden-Harris administration’s anti-trust efforts have been on fire under fearless FTC Chair Lina Khan, taking on Google, Microsoft, grocery store owners, gas companies, and more, and fighting anti-competitive behavior and price gouging.

Now, billionaire Democratic donors Barry Diller and Reid Hoffman are saying, in public, that Kamala Harris should dump Lina Khan, because she’s “bad for business.” On the other side, J.D. Vance has publicly praised her in an attempt to sound like an economic populist, even as he lives in the pocket of his patron, Peter Thiel, who co-founded LinkedIn with that very same Reid Hoffman.

Do big donors really have all that power? Or are we just in the habit of thinking that they do?

Most big donors care about the same things that we all do. Some change their tune when their own business interests are on the line. Small donors can now collectively raise money in quantities that rival the checkbooks of billionaires. What does this mean? Is it possible that we could stand up to powerful interests that we once thought untouchable?

Are we ready?

The torch is being passed from Joe Biden to Kamala Harris, but it feels like a lot more is happening.

Are the younger generations moving in on the Baby Boomers? Are the grassroots out-organizing Party operations? Do independent media voices have a bigger reach than the mainstream media? Are the small donors finally freeing candidates from their dependence of big donors?

Everything seems to be in transition. Where we are in that transition, I can’t say for sure, but even being able to ask those questions is exhilarating.

A week ago, I could not have imagined the wave of energy caused by the candidacy of Kamala Harris. Now I want to take that sense of possibility and see what other self-imposed limits we can liberate ourselves from.

We are already doing the work on the climate and the economy. The people who don’t want us to do it, already know about it. The only people who don’t know are the voters. They are angry, frustrated and depressed. We’re talking like everything is fine. They think we’re delusional.

We are already paying a heavy political price for not facing these issues head on.

If I had to choose between Lina Khan and Reid Hoffmann, I’d take Lina Khan. We’ll get far more votes from going all-in on economic populism, than we could buy with all of Reid Hoffman’s money.

We could put front and center in our campaigns, the mission of restoring balance to our climate and fairness to our economy. We could champion the amazing work the Biden-Harris administration is already doing and talk about the future we could build, with the help of the voters. Think of the relief and hope we could unleash by finally facing these challenges head on, especially among our younger generations.

If the last week has taught us anything, it’s that the cost of not taking risks may be higher than we realize, and - our brand new reality - that the upside of “going for it” could be beyond the limits of our current imagination.

THANK YOU, as always, for reading, subscribing, and all that you do to make our world a better place!

In solidarity,

Antonia

Contact me about communications consulting and custom content at antonia@antoniascatton.com or (202) 922-6647‬.

NOTES:

Billionaire Orders Kamala Harris to Fire Lina Khan
By Matt Stoller, BIG by Matt Stoller on Substack, Jul 25, 2024

“A few days ago, billionaire LinkedIn founder Reid Hoffman gave $10 million to the Kamala Harris effort, and promised a lot more… This morning, Hoffman went on CNN and issued demands. Harris must end Biden’s tariff and antitrust regimes, he said, and fire Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan.”

“The only upside here is that Hoffman is being very public, aggressive, and explicit about his demands. And he’s going to corner Harris until she kisses the ring, or refuses to do so. From his perspective, he’s not donating $10 million, he’s making a purchase. Or so he thinks. Now it’s up to Harris to make the choice. Does she have Silicon Valley donors, or Silicon Valley owners?”

Two billionaire Harris donors hope she will fire FTC Chair Lina Khan
By Jody Godoy, Reuters, July 26, 2024

“Billionaire Democratic donors Barry Diller and Reid Hoffman said in interviews this week they hope Kamala Harris will replace Federal Trade Commission Chair Lina Khan if she becomes U.S. president, openly rejecting a pillar of President Joe Biden's antitrust policy.

Khan has been at the forefront of the Biden administration's push to use U.S. antitrust law to boost competition and address high prices and low wages. Khan, who oversaw the FTC's ban on noncompete agreements, has drawn the ire of corporate groups, but won fans including Donald Trump's running mate, JD Vance, for her skepticism towards big business.”