Goodness Gracious Great Walz of Fire!
The dad America never had & the return of weird.
As I watched Kamala and Governor Walz appear together for the first time as running mates in Philadelphia, my first thought was WAIT THAT ISN’T MARK KELLY. Instead it was that guy from Minnesota that I’d never heard of before. America’s folksy dad with a twinkle in his eye. When the two walked on stage, they seemed like lifelong friends. Kamala was laughing so hard I thought maybe he was tickling her.
Which would be weird, a term that Tim Walz has made cool again by using it to describe Trump and J.D. Vance. As he said in an interview, “These are weird people on the other side.” And, as he repeated at the rally, “These guys are creepy and yes, just weird as hell.”
When I was growing up, I used “weird” all the time, “weird-o” if I wanted to take it to the next level. My parents didn’t like us using any kind of salty language but apparently weird was acceptable. However, my sister had a poster on her bedroom door of a dog sitting on a chair saying, “Cripes! This plastic seat is cold!” My mother made her take it down because “Cripes” sounded too much like “Christ.”
Let’s be honest. Trump’s not “weird.” He’s a “psychopath.” He was even more unhinged than usual in his Thursday press conference, and was eventually taken off stage in a straitjacket.
But first, he talked about the the size of his crowds, saying his January 6th rally was larger than the one for MLK Jr.’s historical “I Have a Dream” speech on the national mall. You know when you hear someone say something so outlandish that you have to ask them to repeat it because you feel like you must be dreaming? (Except you know you’re dreaming if it’s the first day of high school and you forgot to wear pants.)
“Nobody’s spoken to crowds bigger than me,” Trump said. “If you look at Martin Luther King, when he did his speech, his great speech, and you look at ours — same real estate, same everything, same number of people, if not — we had more.”
The AP reported that MLK’s crowd was 25 times larger but, in all fairness, Trump’s rally was much more exciting, considering his call to hang his own vice president on the Capitol grounds. Chills.
Trump also told a story about a harrowing emergency landing in a helicopter ride with former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown. Fine. It was actually former California Governor Jerry Brown but when you’re staring death in the face, you’re forgiven if you get a few names wrong.
According to Trump, “We thought maybe this was the end.” But it turns out the whole thing’s a lie. There was no emergency landing and no one was ever in danger. What a weirdo. And creepy. A creepy weirdo.
But if I’m being completely truthful, I used to get scared any time there was the slightest bit of turbulence on the plane. I would stand up and scream to my fellow passengers, I CAN’T BELIEVE YOURS ARE THE LAST FACES I’M GOING TO SEE.
Sidebar: I purchased one of those sassy Kamala campaign tees in a size small and they sent me a shirt that looks like an XXL. I won’t be able to wear this except as a dress with a belt. Still comma cool.
I will assume that gorgeous t-shirt hangs at the front of your closet, next to the size XXXXXL HRC t-shirt some campaigner stole from the “Leftovers Box” in Iowa and smuggled into Texas for you during the Aughts.